Datasets:

beyond

/

20NG

like 0

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article qkj c horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes in article lsr ihinnsa exodus eng sun com emarsh hernes sun eng sun com eric marsh writes in article qjahh mrs horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes science the real world has its basis in values not the other way round as you would wish it if there is no such thing as objective value then science can not objectively be said to be more useful than a kick in the head simple theories with accurate predictions could not objectively be said to be more useful than a set of tarot cards you like those conclusions i don t i think that you are changing the meaning of values here perhaps it is time to backtrack and take a look at the word value n a fair equivalent or return for something such as goods or service monetary or material worth worth as measured in usefulness or importance merit a principle standard or quality considered inherently worthwhile or desirable precise meaning as of a word an assigned or calculated numerical quantity mus the relative duratation of a tone or rest the relative darkness or lightness of a color the distinctive quality of a speech or speech sound in context of a moral system definition four seems to fit best in terms of scientific usage definitions six or eight might apply note that these definitions do not mean the same thing no i m using definition or perhaps in both cases if there is no objective worth usefulness or importance then science has no objective worth usefulness or importance if nothing is inherently worthwhile or desirable then simple theories with accurate predictions are not inherently worthwhile or desirable do you see any flaws in this the problem is your use of the word objective along with values both definitions three and four are inherently subjective that is they are particular to a given individual or personal you see what one person may see as worthwhile another may see as worthless if on the other hand some things have objective worth usefulness or importance it would be interesting to know what they are again your form of measurement in this sentence that being of worth is subjective if you can provide an objective foundation for morality then that will be a good beginning i m not willing to attempt this until someone provides an objective basis for the notion that science is useful worthy or important in dealing with observed facts alternatively you could try to demonstrate to me that science is not necessarily useful worthy or important in any situation in other words i need to know how you use the term objective when i find that my usage of a word is different than the usage of that word given by another person i try to find a standard against which to judge that usage in most cases the dictionary is the standard i use here is a definiton of objective objective adj of or having to do with a material object as distinguished from a mental concept having actual existance a unenfluenced by emotion or personal prejudice b based on observable phenomenon by this definition science does not have an objective worth since the phrase objective worth is an oxymoron however you asked something a little differently this time you asked for an objective basis for a notion the fact that the use of science as an intellectual tool is responsible for changes in our world the changes are material and thus objective would provide an objective basis for an argument however the conclusion arrived at from that argument that science is good is subjective i think that the problem here is one of word usage take a little time and read the definitions of these words objective subjective worth value morality good evil i believe that if you think about the meaning of them for a while you will have to conclude that there is no such thing as an objective morality frank o dwyer i m not hatching that odwyer sse ie from hens by evelyn conlon eric

talk.religion.misc

re christian owned organization list in article a byu edu stephan sasb byu edu stephan fassmann writes in article apr mnemosyne cs du edu kcochran nyx cs du edu keith justified and ancient cochran writes in article sdcc ucsd edu shopper ucsd edu writes does anyone have or know where i can find a list of christian owned corporations and companies one that i know of is wordperfect i believe that wordperfect is actually owned by the mormons sorry wordperfect is own by a mormon not the lds church slight semantical difference the lds church does own a heck of a lot however they are the largest land holder in missouri where they think christ will appear at the second coming i believe they also own some large beverage company like pepsi that was why they had to take caffiene off of their forbidden substance list

talk.religion.misc

re apr god s promise in john in article bskendigc ku c dx netcom com bskendig netcom com brian kendig writes i ve asked your god several times with all my heart to come to me i really wish i could believe in him cos no matter how much confidence i build up on my own the universe is a big place and it would be so nice to know i have someone watching over me in it brian k i am pleased with your honesty and to be honest as well i believe you have not asked my god to come to you why do i say this because by the things you write on the net and the manner with which you write them you show me that you made up your own god and are attempting to pass him off as the real thing i got news for you yours doesn t at all sound like mine your god doesn t come to you because your god doesn t exist i ve gone into this with an open mind i ve layed my beliefs aside from time to time when i ve had doubt and i ve prayed to see what good that would do i don t see what more i can do to open myself to your god short of just deciding to believe for no good reason and if i decide to believe for no good reason why not believe in some other god zeus seems like a pretty cool candidate i am sorry brian but when i read your postings i do not see an open mind what i do see is misunderstanding lack of knowledge arrogance and mockery please tell me what more i can do while still remaining true to myself be true to yourself then have an open mind and so end the mockery gain knowledge of the real god put your presumptions aside read the bible and know that there is truly is a reason for everything and there exists a god that has so much love for you that the depth of it goes beyond our shallow worldly experience a person who commits himself to seeking god will find god jesus stands at your door and knocks but a person who half heartedly opens the bible or opens it with purpose to find something to mock will find learn and see nothing the only thing one will gain with that attitude is folly be careful to not jump the gun for at first glance there are many passages in the bible that will seem bizarre and absurd be assured that even though they seem alien at first be confident that they are not be assured that beyond your present comprehension there lies such deep reasons that once you see them you will indeed be satisfied i will personally guarantee that one as jesus put it you will never be thirsty again your cup will even flow over from king solomon b c to b c it is the glory of god to conceal a matter to search out a matter is the glory of kings jesus says in john no one can come to me unless the father who sent me draws him and in john for god so loved the world that he gave his one and only son that whosoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life you are included in whosoever and i also pray that the father is drawing you which it seems he is doing else you wouldn t be posting to talk religion misc remember brian you could be a st paul in the making paul not only mocked christians as you do but also had pleasure stoning them yet god showed him mercy saved him and paul became on of the most celebrated men in the history of god s church you see brian i myself better be careful and not judge you because you could indeed be the next paul for with the fervor that you attack christians one day you might find yourself one and like paul proclaim the good news of jesus with that very same fervor or more or you could be the next peter what jesus said to peter jesus would probably say to you satan would surely like to have you why so because peter was hard headed cynical and demonstrated great moments of stupidity but once peter committed himself to a task he did with full heart peter was the only apostle to have the faith to walk on water as jesus did you asked why not believe in zeus zeus didn t offer eternal life you got nothing to gain by believing in zeus brian ceccarelli brian gamma lpl arizona edu

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article apr scic intel com sbradley scic intel com seth j bradley writes in article c l i jj news cso uiuc edu cobb alexia lis uiuc edu mike cobb writes why isn t this falsifiable i e there is no god the world has existed forever and had no starting point how does one falsify god s existance this again is a belief not a scien tific premise the original thread referred specifically to scientific creationism this means whatever theory or theories you propose must be able to be judged by the scientific method this is in contrast to purely philosophical arguments if given a definite definition of god it is sometimes possible to falsify the existance of that god but when one refuses to give an immutable definition one can not whatever promises that have been made can than be broken john laws a man without the honor to keep his given word

talk.religion.misc

re did he really rise emery the one single historic event that has had the biggest impact on the world over the centuries is the resurrection of jesus this is hardly possible as the majority of people in the world were born lived their life and died without ever knowing anything about christ the majority of the rest of the world have decided that he is not who emery thinks he is emery why were the writers of the new testament documents so convinced that jesus really did rise from the dead we have four gospel accounts i am leaving out all proofs of emery s which rely on quoting the bible as proof circular reasoning etc there have been occasions already stated many times for later generations of xtians to change edit or otherwise alter the bible to fit their political gospel and if we accept the bible as true just because the bible says it is true then to be fair we have to do the same to the bhagavad gita and the koran both of which contradict the bible enough said emery yet we have no reason to believe these disciples to be immoral and dishonest we have no historic information that would lead us to the conclusion that these people were not god fearing people who sincerely and whole heartedly believed that the resurrection of their lord jesus was a real event and for what gain would they lie to make a stand at that time meant persecution imprisonment and perhaps even death again this is only the biblical account and there is no independent proof of any of this happening it just isn t there besides simply being sincere or willing to die for your faith does not make your faith correct there are muslims dying in bosnia right now does the fact that they are willing to die for islam mean that islam is the correct religion emery history bears out the persecution of christians roman historian cornelius tacitus govenor of asia in a d writing of nero s reign alluded to the torture of christians in rome all you have proven is that these people were tortured for their faith that does not prove that their faith is true or correct it just means that they were sincere in their beliefs being willing to die for what you believe doesn t make your belief the truth it s not that easy and minority religions have always suffered torture muslims suffer torture and harassment in india and bosnia today all religions are harassed in china today you haven t proven anything so far emery with all the suffering and persecution that it meant to be a believer it would be quite probable that at least one of those in the supposed conspiracy would come forward and confess that the whole thing was a big hoax not if they didn t believe that it was a hoax emery yet not one did it seems rather reasonable that the disciples did not make up the resurrection but sincerely believed that jesus had actually risen from the dead especially in light of the sufferings that came upon those who believed the followers of muhammad firmly believed in the miracles that the koran says muhammad performed they were attacked and slaughtered for their beliefs they didn t denounce muhammad or islam if you are correct then that means islam is the true faith you see how stupid your proofs are

talk.religion.misc

re judas crucifixion tyre etc frank decenso but how it s evident from the texts in ezek that god isn t concerned about buildings or structures god is concerned about people the people and leadership ezek never did return as a city others may have come later and built a city but the people and leadership that god prophesied about in ezek were never rebuilt as a city of people and leaders how incredibly fucking stupid of course the text is referring to the city itself buildings bricks mortar etc otherwise it makes no sense to refer to the future of tyre as being reduced to nothing but a place to spread fishing nets is there any twisting of text or semantic game that you won t do to preserve your faith from admission of error decenso

talk.religion.misc

re judas crucifixion tyre etc frank decenso i need to prioritize things in my life and this board is not all that important to me of course it is it forms a very big part of your self respect you come onto the board thinking you re some sort of apologeticist for your faith and you routinely get roasted over a grill for stupid theories and unfounded assumptions frank decenso this board will have to wait until if ever i can organize my life to fit it in i tried dropping out but sieferman coerced me to come back he won t this time i doubt that sieferman has anything to do with you dropping out it s probably closer to the truth to say that you don t have the cards to play in this game because you insist on playing from a losing hand and you re finally realizing it you will lurk on the board and keep quiet for a while looking for an area where you are certain that you are correct and then we ll see you pop back in again of course you then will say that you have merely returned because your life is now in order but we ll know better

talk.religion.misc

re is it good that jesus died in article bskendigc l jm netcom com bskendig netcom com brian kendig writes john most assuredly i say to you unless a grain of wheat falls onto the ground and dies it remains alone but if it dies it produces much grain he who loves his life will lose it and he who hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life if anyone serves me let him follow me and where i am there my servant will be also if anyone serves me him my father will honor why would i want an eternal life if i hate this one again you missed jesus s point if you read the surrounding passages you would understand what jesus means by life in the world but as is you bumbled around asserted your standard axiom that the bible is bunk and came up with the wrong idea also you do not know exactly what jesus means by eternal life brian k do you expect to jump in the middle of the quantum mechanics book and understand hermite polynomials having not read the surrounding material why do you such with the bible for an idea what jesus means by the world look up references to it in your concordance for a good description the whole book of ecclesiastes is game for eternal life check out john john you will find that eternal life is quite different than what you think eternal life starts now an infinitely high quality of life living in fellowship with god in short even if your deity does exist that doesn t automatically mean that i would worship it i am content to live my own life and fend for myself so when i die i can be proud of the fact that no matter where i end up it will be because of my actions and my choices if your god decides to toss me into a flaming pit for this then so be it i would much rather just cease to exist but if your god wants my respect and my obedience then it had better earn these and if it does then they will be very strong and true if my diety exists you would not just cease to exist jesus talks of hell in luke you ve got to understand my point of view i see christians spouting bible verse all the time as if it were some sort of magic spell that will level all opposition truth is it s not robert has never demonstrated that he actually understands what the verses imply he just rattles them off day by day some brazenly fly in the face of common sense and reality and i point these out where i can the truth is is that it is not some sort of magic spell the truth is is that you do not understand it and enjoy not understanding it christanity is a very nice belief set around a very nice book wrong again christianity is supposed to be relationship you do not even know what christianity is and you are arguing against it and in my opinion you re bumbling about blindly making up entities where there aren t any and depriving yourself of a true understanding and enjoyment of your life as long as you keep your beliefs to yourself i ll keep my beliefs to myself but as soon as you start waving them around expect me to toss in my opinions too just as i make up such places as jericho jerusalem babylon corinth ephesus susa and such kings as nebuchanezzar david solomon sennacherib herod pontius pilate but i guess then that you treat abraham lincoln as a myth like you do odin and zeus

talk.religion.misc

re gilligan s island den of iniquity beb pt com bruce buck writes in article apr nuscc nus sg matmcinn nuscc nus sg matthew macintyre at the national university of senegal writes gilligan sloth skipper anger thurston howell iii greed lovey howell gluttony ginger lust professor pride mary ann envy assorted monkeys secular humanism assorted headhunters godless heathen savagery russian agent who looks like gilligan godless communism japanese sailor godless barbarism walter pigeon godless bird turd the mosquitos bingo bango bongo irving godless rock n roll harold heckuba phil silvers hollywood hedonism john mcgiver butterfly flicking tonga the fake apeman deceit lust eva grubb deceit lust

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened tbrent bank ecn purdue edu timothy j brent writes probably not but then i don t pack heavy weaponry with intent to use it you don t really think he should have been allowed to keep that stuff do you if so tell me where you live so i can be sure to steer well clear i understand that they had the neccessary licenses and permits to own automatic weapons the public also has rights and they should be placed above those of the individual go ahead call me a commie but you d be singing a different tune if i exercised my right to rape your daughter he broke the law he was a threat to society they did there job simple i haven t seen any proof or even evidence that the bd s had broken the law if you have proof or evidence let s hear it the fbi said so is not evidence i ll support them all except no i guess there will always be people who wish to be peasants the politicians prefer unarmed peasants

talk.religion.misc

re biblical backing of koresh s tape cites enclosed xcpslf oryx com stephen l favor writes seems to me koresh is yet another messenger that got killed for the message he carried which says nothing about the character of the messenger i reckon we ll have to find out the rest the hard way koresh was killed because he wanted lots of illegal guns i haven t heard of any illegal guns being found he was accused of not paying taxes on legal guns

talk.religion.misc

re biblical backing of koresh s tape cites enclosed nelson p apollo hp com peter nelson writes nut or not he was clearly a liar he said he would surrender after local radio stations broadcast his message but he didn t then he said he would surrender after passover but he didn t the fbi said he would surrender we don t know what he said

talk.religion.misc

re merlin mithras and magick in article joshua apr bailey cpac washington edu joshua cpac washington edu joshua geller wrote i would really appreciate if when someone brought something like this up they didn t back out when someone asked for details josh excuse me i am not trying to back out josh maybe you should try to make an informed responce when your are trying to pack and your references are packed and someone responses like you did no grin pegasus

talk.religion.misc

re who s next mormons and jews in article apr ra royalroads ca mlee post royalroads ca malcolm lee writes in article c rlps fr world std com jhallen world std com joseph h allen writes in article qvk sinn vo clem handheld com jmd cube handheld com jim de arras writes it was interesting to watch the club today pat robertson said that the branch dividians had met the firey end for worshipping their false god he also said that this was a terrible tragedy and that the fbi really blew it i don t necessarily agree with pat robertson every one will be placed before the judgement seat eventually and judged on what we have done or failed to do on this earth god allows people to choose who and what they want to worship i m sorry but he does not ever read the first commandment worship of money is one of the greatest religions in this country you mean false religion

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article cjkc sy g ko netcom com cjk netcom com writes this was obviously a lot different than the ordinary fbi adventure i believe that the federal officers had a conflict of interests here throught out the whole affair it seamed to me that they were chiefly concerned with saving face rather than saving lifes its true that the bd were resisting arrest and that they should have surrendered when they first realized that these where federal officers but they didn t i m not sure what you mean by saving face unless you are confusing the fbi with the batf who are the ones who were in charge of the original search warrant but when they didn t the fbi should not have treated as a hostage situation it wasn t i think more discussions possible independant negotiators and family intervention should have been used independant negotiators what was there to negotiate any sort of plea bargin has to be brought to the court the negotiators can t negotiate charges or sentences fbi negotitators did make a deal for the dividians to come out koresh showed he was not negotiating in good faith and there is no reason to believe independent negotiators would have done any better richard

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened i told some friends of mine two weeks ago that koresh was dead the fbi and the batf could not let a man like that live he was a testimonial to their stupidity and lies now before everyone gets crazy with me let me say that koresh was crazy as a bed bug but out government was crazier and they lied to us they told us compound had been under survaillance for quite some time yet whoever was watching the place failed to see that koresh went jogging and into town on a regular basis everyone in the area claimed to have seen him and wondered why they didn t pick him up then there are two possible answers first they didn t see him what kind of survaillance is that second they didn t care they wanted a confrontation they wanted publicity and they got it after the first battle they told us that they did not know he knew they were coming they also said it would have been foolish to go in knowing that well we know now that they intercepted the informants call and went in anyway did they explore all of the possibilities for ending the seige according to them they did but according to the hartford courant the woman that raised koresh his grandmother was not allowed to go in and see him the fbi agent who she spoke with was bob ricks and according to the paper he said a lot of people think if you just talk to them logically they will come out his grandmother raised vernon howell koresh s real name she didn t raise david koresh someone who raises you and loves you does not speak to you strickly on a logical level there is also an emotional level on which they can reach you here s another one all during this operation the fbi has been claiming that they feared a mass suicide and that is one of the reasons that something must be done now they claim they never thought he would do it i knew they were going to do something when they started talking about how much money this was costing that was the start of the justification part part of the plan that s when i knew it would come soon but back to the plan it is considered cruel and unusal punishment to execute criminals in the minds of many people but look at what s acceptable they knew the parents adults had gas masks they did not know or were not sure if the children had them so the plan was to pour the gas into the compound the mothers seeing what the gas was doing to their children were supposed to run out and that would only leave the men to deal with i spent two years in the army and like everyother veteran i went through cbr chemical biological radiological warfare training part of that training is going into a room filled with the same stuff that the children were subjected to to make the stuff really interesting the gas also has a chemical agent that irritates the skin you think its on fire i have no doubts the children would become hysterical its not the kind of thing you never want to do again this was the plan the final solution we waited days for our hostages to come home from iran we gave these people days i stated on several occasions that there was absolutely nothing in this whole thing that the government could point to as a success well fbi agent ricks changed my mind again a newclip from the hartford courant and while expressing regret at the loss of life he suggested that the operation had been at least a modified success because not a single federal shot had been fired and not a single federal agent had been hurt it took dead children to get us that new definition of success one more thought the government claimed that they believed he had automatic weapons on the premises he had a license for the caliber machine gun they knew damn well he had one they also knew he had it legally still without the element of surprise they sent in agents to get him for all of this my president takes full responsibility what a guy i hope he gets it in article exuptr exu ericsson se exuptr exu ericsson se patrick taylor the sounding board writes in article prijat cs uofs edu bill triangle cs uofs edu bill gunshannon writes before you go absolving the batf fbi of all blame in this incident you should probably be aware of two important facts there is no such thing as non toxic tear gas tear gas is non breathable remaining in it s presence will cause nausea and vomiting followed eventually by siezures and death did the fbi know the physical health of all the people they exposed any potential heart problems among the b d s no doubt it is dangerous stuff when concentrated have you ever seen a tear gas canister tear gas is produced by burning a chemical in the can the fumes produced are tear gas the canister has a warning printed on the side of it contact with flamable material can result in fire now how many of these canisters did they throw inside a building they admited was a fire trap none they used non incindiary methods which means they produced the gas outside the building and pumped it in via the tanks visit the sounding board bbs a wildcat bbs obdis all opinions are specifically disclaimed no one is responsible patrick taylor ericsson network systems thx exuptr exu ericsson se don t let the se fool you

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article c stel k e boi hp com dianem boi hp com diane mathews writes dear brother bill one way or another so much for patience too bad you couldn t just wait was the prospect of god s message just too much to take so do you want the president to specifically order each and every activity of the fbi or what and how willing are you to blame reagan and bush directly for the incidents that took place in the war on drugs in their administration are you going to blame bush for the fact that weaver s wife infant son were killed it happened while he was president or consider the thousands in central america killed by those brave cia nsc sponsored freedom fighters thus far slick willie is a piker spl steve lamont sciviguy spl szechuan ucsd edu san diego microscopy and imaging resource uc san diego la jolla ca my other car is a car too bumper strip seen on i

talk.religion.misc

wanted moltmann s god in creation i m greatly in need of jurgen moltmann s book god in creation an ecological doctrine of creation if you have a copy you re willing to part with i d love to hear from you soon you may call me at or e mail me thanks susan soric independent agent susan soric upubs uchicago edu

talk.religion.misc

re abortion and private health coverage letters regarding dgs psuvm psu edu writes for an illustrative example in the opposite direction it may be possible to add services to an insurance contract and reduce the premium if you add preventative services and this reduces acute care use then the total premium may fall women who are known not to want abortion services for example might be judged to be more likely to require prenatal care coverage for childbirth which can be an order of magnitude more expensive than abortion this topic should really be restricted to talk abortion which exists to relieve t r m t p m of abortion flamage c j silverio cj sgi com ceej well sf ca us in melbourne fla meanwhile anti abortion marchers rallied to celebrate the death of dr david gunn praise god they shouted ny daily news fri march p

talk.religion.misc

re a kind and loving god malcolm lee mlee post royalroads ca wrote i will clarify my earlier quote god s laws were originally written for the israelites jesus changed that fact by now making the law applicable to all people not just the jews gentiles could be part of the kingdom of heaven through the saving grace of god i never said that the law was made obsolete by jesus just for reference here s the earlier quote malcolm lee mlee post royalroads ca wrote in reference to leviticus and deuteronomy these laws written for the israelites god s chosen people whom god had expressly set apart from the rest of the world the israelites were a direct witness to god s existence to disobey god after knowing that god is real would be an outright denial of god and therefore immediately punishable remember these laws were written for a different time and applied only to god s chosen people but jesus has changed all of that we are living in the age of grace sin is no longer immediately punishable by death there is repentance and there is salvation through our lord jesus christ and not just for a few chosen people salvation is available to everyone jew and gentile alike these are two conflicting statements to say one is a clarification of the other is a breach of logic i don t mind people shifting their position on an issue it irritates me when it is said under the premise that no change was made what about deuteronomy is it wrong now did jesus change that if anything he clarified the law such as in that quote you made in the following verses jesus takes several portions of the law and expounds upon the law giving clearer meaning to what god intended sure he does this however he doesn t address the notion of stoning non virgin brides because this needs no clarification are you going to deny that deuteronomy is not patently clear in its intent i think you will agree with me that there are in today s world a lot of modern day pharisees who know the bible from end to end but do not believe in it what good is head knowledge if there is nothing in the heart i ll agree that there is a lot of modern day pharisees that know the bible from end to end and don t believe in it depending on how they use this knowledge they can be scary they can argue any position they desire and back it up with selected parts of the bible such pharisees include david koresh and adolph hitler i will qualify this by saying i don t know if they actually believed what they were preaching but the ends certainly made the means look frightening however just as scary are those that don t know much of the bible but believe every word in fact this is probably scarier since there are far more of these people from what i ve seen in addition they are very easy to manipulate by the aforementioned pharisees since they don t know enough to debate with these people christianity is not just a set of rules it s a lifestyle that changes one s perspectives and personal conduct and it demands obedience to god s will no it demands obedience to a book if god came down and personally told me how i should behave then i would say that i would be doing god s will by doing it however if preachers pastors and evangelists tell me to obey the will of a book written by people who have been dead for close to two millenia even longer for the ot even if i follow everything in it with my heart i could scarcely be honest with myself by saying i m doing the will of god some people can live by it but many others cannot or will not that is their choice and i have to respect it because god respects it too well if god respects it so much how come there is talk in the bible about eternal damnation for non believers i see little respect eminating from the god of the bible i see a selfish and spiteful god god be with you not yours thanks malcolm lee rob lanphier lanphi snake cs uidaho edu lanph uidaho edu and for the curious here is my earlier post hmm for a book that only applied to the israelites deuteronomy jesus sure quoted it a lot mt in addition he alludes to it in several other places mt mk jn and just in case it isn t clear jesus thought the old testament isn t obsolete i ll repeat the verse in matthew which gets quoted on this group a lot do not think that i have come to abolish the law or the prophets i have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them i tell you the truth until heaven and earth disappear not the smallest letter not the least stroke of a pen will by any means disappear from the law until everything is accomplished anyone who breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven for i tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the pharisees and the teachers of the law you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven mt niv in pretty red letters so that you know it s jesus talking this causes a serious dilemma for christians who think the old testament doesn t apply to them i think that s why paul harvey likes quoting it so much

talk.religion.misc

re who s next mormons and jews in article c soda l murdoch acc virginia edu pmy vivaldi acc virginia edu pete yadlowsky writes ken arromdee writes did they not know that these men were federal officers do you know what a no knock search is yes but tell me how you think your question answers my question if the bds didn t know immediately that they were dealing with feds uniform apparel insignia they must have figured it out in pretty short order why did they keep fighting they seemed awfully ready for having been attacked without warning oh bloody sorry old chap why didn t you tell me you were a federale tough luck eh what s that you say you re not dead yet

talk.religion.misc

re rfd misc taoism in article cup portal com thyagi cup portal com thyagi morgoth nagasiva writes i would like to add my support for a misc taoism discussion group i applaud the enthusiam shown by the person posting cup portal com thyagi cup portal com i read in alt magick but i differ with him her in believing that at least some minimal parameters should be agreed upon thyagi wrote i recommend that the depth of generality indeed of ambiguity in this newsgroup misc taoism be maximized calling the tradition old or new is rather unnecessary and only leads to foolish squabbles there is no doubt that nature is a splendid teacher whether she appears in the words spoken by a tree or by a stream a microbe or a star let us not limit misc taoism to philosophy but if we don t limit it to something the discussion degenerates into a big amorphous glob other questions thyagi proposes are what is this actual process of reality why is taoism based upon an assumption why does this assumption concern knowledge and what can be known what is the value of not knowing what is a tao what does it mean to be tao d it seems to me that these questions more properly fall into the category of general metaphysics i would prefer any misc taoism to deal more closely with topics and works more closely associated with at least semi orthodox taoism with established classic works definitely included and works like mantak chia s argued about i think neo taoism should be excluded or get its own group what i mean by this is humpty dumpty taoism in which taoism means whatever a poster says it means this alt taoism could also be a refuge for debates about what taoism really means or speculations on sexual alchemy etc e g from thyagi again taoism does what the hell it wants i tell you taoism doesn t exist taoism is no more real that tao decide now real or not real exist or not exist when shall we be certain kent gloomily predicts quoting from thyagi s article however most traffic in the group will likely concern the philosophical secular taoism averred by alan watts and niels bohr and yogic taoism as it pertains to medical sexual and martial techniques i think that discussions of this nature are not completely out of place what s happening is that that the term taoism is becoming completely polluted and trivialized like the words magic alchemy zen etc by writers appropriating the word to mean whatever they want this is seen by the spate of new age books entitled the tao of this that and everything else with respect to some exceptions like the books by jou tsung hwa any other comments ideas i look forward to seeing them on balance i say let misc taoism rip and let the chips fall where they may if it just gets filled up with college freshmen asking about the tao of sex then it will have been a failure and people will post to these groups just as they do now tim p scott sending from megatek corporation ext scranton rd san diego ca usa fax internet tims megatek com or uunet megatek tims

talk.religion.misc

re davidians and compassion in article sandvik sandvik kent apple com sandvik newton apple com kent sandvik writes so we have this highly christian religious order that put fire on their house killing most of the people inside i m not that annoyed about the adults they knew supposedly what they were doing and it s their own actions what i mostly are angry about is the fact that the people inside including mothers let the children suffer and die during awful conditions if this is considered religious following to the end i m proud that i don t follow such fanatical and non compassionate religions you might want to die for whatever purpose but please spare the innocent young ones that has nothing to do with this all i have a hard time just now understanding that christianity knows about the word compassion christians do you think the actions today would produce a good picture of your religion kent sandvik newton apple com alink ksand private activities on the net surely you are not equating david koresh with christianity the two are not comparable

talk.religion.misc

re who s next mormons and jews in article isscck byuvm bitnet isscck byuvm bitnet casper c knies writes please allow me to explain myself in the governor of missouri casper c knies isscck byuvm bitnet brigham young university isscck vm byu edu ucs computer facilities capser before you deceive everone into thinking that the latter day saints have undergone undue persecution through the years for just believing in their religion perhaps you would like to tell us all what happened in the mountain meadow massacres and all the killings that were done under the blood atonement doctrine at the command of brigham young

talk.religion.misc

re info about new age in article qvnu a a geraldo cc utexas edu hawk ccwf cc utexas edu writes greetings could anybody here give me any information about new age religion about the history the teachings or may be suggestions what books i should read in order to get those info any help would be greatly appreciated contact watchman fellowship p o box holladay ut ask for their book the new age and space age heresies the new age in our schools

talk.religion.misc

re davidians and compassion sandvik newton apple com kent sandvik writes in article apr ra royalroads ca mlee post royalroads ca malcolm lee wrote do you judge all christians by the acts of those who would call themselves christian and yet are not the bd s contradicted scripture in their actions they were not christian simple as that perhaps you have read too much into what the media has portrayed ask any true believing christian and you will find that they will deny any association with the bd s even the th day adventists have denied any further ties with this cult which was what they were well if they were satanists or followers of an obscure religion then i would be sure that christians would in unison condemn and make this to a show case you might be sure but you would also be wrong and does not this show the dangers with religion in order word a mind virus that will make mothers capable of letting their small children burn to ashes while they scream i suspect the answer to this question is the same as the answer to do not the actions of the likes of stalin show the dangers of atheism

talk.religion.misc

re is it good that jesus died jesus this is the verdict light has come into the world but men loved darkness instead of light because their deeds are evil everyone who does evil hates the light and will not come into the light for fear that his deeds will be exposed kent sandvik says it seems we are dealing with a black and white interpretation brian are you subtly accusing me of evil things because i never saw the light however this is even more confusing because i even admit that i don t like the situation where i m not informed black and white a spade is a spade there is no hidden agenda behind this so stop trying to look for one it is an easy and as straight forward as it reads kent i am not accusing you of evil things jesus is accusing you and it is not only you that he is accusing he is accusing everyone me you and everyone in the world is guilty whether one sees the light or does not seen the light has nothing to do with whether we do evil things we do them regardless jesus uses the word men i am included jesus is not soloing you out jesus is making a general statement about out the sad state of man christians are not immuned from doing evil things a christian is just a person in whom the holy spirit indwells a christian can see the evil he is doing because his evil has been brought out into the light jesus is not saying that just because evil has been exposed that the christian will stop doing evil if you haven t seen jesus s light your evil deeds simply haven t been exposed to the his light you may shed some light on your own your human spirit shines at perhaps candela but the holy spirit shines at a megacandela the holy spirit can shine light into places inside us where we didn t even know existed so do you see jesus s point christians are not perfect nonchristians are not perfect nonchristians do not want to come into the light of jesus because they will see all the problems in their lives and they will not like the sight it is an ugly thing to see how far we have fallen from jesus s perspective do you think you want to know how really ignorant you are do you think brian kendig wants to know do you think i want to know ego verses the truth which do you choose i m watching the news about a man who saw the light and made sure that the children burned to death as part of his insight into the light i don t think the world is that simple and if you act in such ways when you are enlighted then i m a happy man and i pray i will never receive such light and i watched koresh too an imposter who thought he saw the light who made sure that the children burned to death sadly as part of his delusion it is even sadder that the people who died with him chose to die with them and that ignorance was their downfall to death and kent don t you bury yourself underneath a rock with an excuse like bringing up koresh as if koresh actually had truth in him david koresh was no light and no excuse for you to stay away from the real jesus christ david koresh who claimed to be jesus was a fraud it was obvious david koresh was born in america jesus was born in bethlehem koresh wasn t even a good imposter having missed an obvious point as that jesus warned of such imposters in the end times david koresh wasn t anything new to jesus jesus told us to be aware of imposters years ago so the next time an imposter makes a scene and claims to be jesus ask the obvious where were you born was your mother s name mary if the branch davidians asked that simple question they would have labeled koresh a liar right from the start the wouldn t have followed koresh they wouldn t have died but look what happened their ignorance cost them their lives their choice to be ignorant cost them a lot kent since you studied the bible under lutheranism do you not remember what tactic satan used to try to tempt jesus did not satan quote the bible out of context do you remember what tactic the serpent of genesis used to tempt eve did he not misquote god what satan used on eve and succeeded was the same ploy he tried on jesus but in jesus s case jesus rebuked satan back with the bible in context it didn t work with jesus does what satan did to eve in the garden and what satan tried to do with jesus in the desert remind you of what koresh did to his followers who did koresh emulate who was koresh s teacher koresh did to his followers what satan did to eve did not koresh kill his followersr did not satan cause adam and eve to die as well did not the cult followers believe koresh even though they knew the real christ was born in bethlehem did not eve choose to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil despite knowing that it would cause her death god held them all responsible deceiver and the rebeller none of them had an excuse as opposed to the branch davidians we have a second chance follow jesus and he will escort us to the path of eternal life don t follow jesus and you stand condemned already for like the branch davidian complex your house is already on fire satan adam and eve have already set it ablaze it is just a slow burn but it is burning nevertheless

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in a previous article spl pitstop ucsd edu steve lamont says or consider the thousands in central america killed by those brave cia nsc sponsored freedom fighters thus far slick willie is a piker only if you weight americans equal to salvadorans i don t

talk.religion.misc

re who s next mormons and jews in article blue cis pitt edu rjl pitt edu richard j loether writes yes of course as in matthew do not suppose that i have come to bring peace to the earth it is not peace i have come to bring but a sword remember the armor of god the sword that christians wield is the word of god the bible god be with you malcolm lee rjl rich loether snail mail university of pittsburgh the ideas email rjl pitt edu computing and info services mine voice epsilon drive all fax pittsburgh pa mine

talk.religion.misc

re davidians and compassion in article f dutxh quack kfu com pharvey quack kfu com paul harvey writes in article apr ra royalroads ca mlee post royalroads ca malcolm lee writes if one does not follow the teachings of christ he is not christian too easy that would exclude most self proclaimed christians do you follow the ten commandments as a matter of fact yes i do or at least i strive to i will not be so proud as to boast that my faith is i am still human and imperfect and therefore liable to sin thankfully there is opportunity for repentence and forgiveness god be with you malcolm lee

talk.religion.misc

re who s next mormons and jews isaac kuo saackuo spam berkeley edu writes in article isscck byuvm bitnet casper c knies isscck byuvm b gedaliah friedenberg friedenb maple egr msu edu writes as a latter day saint i found john s statement not at all ludicrous please allow me to explain myself in the governor of missouri governor boggs issued his so called mormon extermination order the only crime illegal activity the latter day saints had committed was their religious affiliation their anti slave stance missouri still allowed slave practices and their growing numbers influence in missouri i guess the mormons got what they deserved because they refused to bow to the will of corrupt and evil secular authorities this disobedience brought upon them persecution murder and finally forced expulsion from their lands and settlements it is significant to remember that these secular positions were held by average people and that at the time almost all americans were pretty homogeonously christian it was largely the mainstream christian s disgust at such practices as polygamy which resulted in their irrational hatred true but that is exactly the problem the mormon extermination order was issued not just by a christian it was allowed under the constitution of the united states which was instituted precisely to prevent incidents like this order from occurring in the first place as i indicated in an earlier posting your irrational hatred is clearly evidenced by individuals like robert weiss who could have been gov boggs lieutenant he would have fitted right in drewling et al and seems a modern day occurrence based on results slander persecution misrepresentation lies denying mormons representation in their own user group etc etc in intent and purpose what really has changed the situation is not entirely different today many irrational feelings and beliefs are justified through religion i don t think most of them are started because of religion but religion certainly helps justify and perpetuate prejudices and practices by providing a neat justification which discourages critical thought true as evidenced by numerous examples as i am sure you re aware in any regard mormon history alone indicates that secular authorities and i don t even discuss how uthan s were suckered into allowing part of their lands in becoming nerve gas and atomic bomb testing grounds is far from being trusted or righteous have things really changed for the better i may be a born cynic but i have no reason whatsoever that such has been the case in the early s i believe the late president kimball lds church leader strongly protested federal attempts to locate the mx peace keeper missile maze from being built in utah yet another inspired decision from secular authorities fortunately his opposition was influential enough for the feds to back off do you mean that the secular authorities are some continuous group of people with the common and uninterrupted goal of harrassing eradicating the mormons do you honestly believe that the main reason for using utah for nuclear testing etc was to get them thar mormons and what about the majority of uthan s who aren t mormons you seem to be searching for enemy correction the majority of utahn s are mormon i believe up to a in many cities and settlements throughout the western states conspiracies it is paranoid to believe that everything that affects you badly must have been done primarily for that purpose what i mean is that secular authorities are to be watched as we believe that satan has been given some power and dominion over the earth to divert truth judgment and justice in addition we believe that the adversary has power to influence the unjust and idolatrous greed for money would be a good example in order to bring about persecution war oppression and evil combinations as an intelligent being don t you suppose that the destroyer would yield his influence foremost on those with political power as far as utah is concerned what i pointed out were some horrible examples of environmental nightmares imposed upon by secular authorities which have brought death disease i e the downwinders and environmental contami nation i am hardly paranoid i am just not expecting too much from a secular government that may not share our values and faith and which indeed as gov boggs et al may be out to harm and destroy us as a matter of fact prophecies in my church indicate that in future years global persecution against mormons will so increase in intensity and scope that paraphrasing all those who wish to escape persecution and murder must flee to zion zion the pure in heart will be re established in those days and it ain t our current secular authorities who will rule over it david koresh did not pose a great threat to the federal authorities or the security of this nation and with john i too wonder who or what s next i personally feel that we should try to stop anyone who is a threat to the life of even one person sure he did not pose a threat to the security of this nation but he did pose a threat to the lives of his followers that much is definite hmmm definite by whom until such has been established beyond reason able doubt this alleged threat may have been less than the threat imposed upon him and his followers by the batf and fbi who killed who what constitutional right did the atf officers have to invade upon private land and to force themselves into the compound what really caused the murder of the little children could it be that the atf fbi presence has any bearing upon the events how would you interpret the mt masada events blame the jews what the heck did the romans do there anyway what business did the atf fbi has in waco texas the branch davidians never posed any threat to society this is like asking who really caused the deaths of the israeli olympic team in in that case the police botched the job as well but to lay a heavier burden on them than the terrorists would be a terrible mistake i think the same sort of reasoning applies in this case certainly if david koresh chose any peaceful option the atf and fbi would have complied the responsibility is more his than the authorities come now at issue is in how much the authorities escalated an otherwise peaceful stand off let s get it over with and force david koresh to come out by gassing them were they naive or what they played right into the hands of an apocalyptic thinking individual he had prepared his people for this eventuality for years and not one firetruck or plan was in place to deal with this scenario i feel that the authorities had some responsibility to protect their own citizens even if they were religious zealots and guilty of not paying a gun license has the batf become an extension of the local tax collectors david koresh no doubt will be described as the evil guy by the executioners while the actions of all those valiant and brave officers characterizing the atf fbi as executioners is inaccurate and unfair in order to be an executioner the least one must have done is have the intent to kill que intrusion into private property with semi s loaded with life ammunition isn t that implicit intent or at least prepared to kill i ask you would the batf warrant stand up in a civil court of justice i do not mind if criminals such as dangerous drug lords are brought to justice but escalating events to the point of allowing to if not compli city with the destruction of a people isaac kuo isaackuo math berkeley edu how lucky you english are to find the toilet so amusing o for us it is a mundane and functional item for you the basis of an entire culture manfred von richtofen casper c knies isscck byuvm bitnet brigham young university isscck vm byu edu ucs computer facilities

talk.religion.misc

re who s next mormons and jews dan sorenson viking iastate edu writes in mcclaryc snpq kb netcom com mcclary netcom com michael mcclary writes just thought i d clear up a few of the murky areas actually after surviving being driven out of nauvoo and later carthage the mormons did fortify utah they still arm themselves to defend the faith and stockpile food as well they have been involved in quite a lot of illegal activity including multiple and often underage wives for the leaders a practice still in vogue with some splinters of their sect the parallels between koresh and joseph smith are striking by they you mean the leaders of the lds church i grant you that when joseph smith was still alive plenty of accusations were filed most of which had little bearing with reality as evidenced by various verdicts i have studied lds history for years now and i have yet to see prove that the lds leadership was involved in quote illegal activities plural marriage yes but your charge of underage wives sounds like it could have originated from a tabloid and discredits the high moral standards which characterized these leaders and families unlike as it appears those of david koresh joseph smith started the sect after he and his brother hyram were murdered in a nauvoo il jail cell church membership split over who to follow initially smith was considered a prophet just like mohammed a rather interesting parallel considering muslims consider christ to be a prophet the same as jews i m led to understand make no mistake this was no messiah we re talking about in smith the and neither did he claim he was as the church reflects the moral aptitude of its leaders and especially those of joseph smith i have nothing but the highest respect for this inspired man whose only crime was that he refused to deny that he had seen a vision many have tried to explain the smith phenomenon away but the bold presence of an million member strong church stands as a witness that joseph smith s testimony had enough resilience and power to carry on the message thought at the time was that the gift of prophecy was to be handed down father to son after joseph smith died his son was only entering his teens brigham young and a few others claimed to have been bequeathed the gift and leadership prior to his death the council of twelve the church governing body wasn t of much help here and this basic conflict is still a wedge between the sects brigham young took his followers to salt lake the rest waited for smith jr to grow up enough to assume leadership the other claimants to the leadership were soon ignored like mike dukakis the rest were apostates and excommunicated members of the church while the great majority of the membership the twelve and the various auxiliary organizations chose to accept brigham young as the new prophet and leader of the church if you knew your lds scriptures and doctrine you would have known that brigham young was the first in line to fill the prophet joseph smith s vacancy he was the senior apostle in the quorum and various comments made by joseph indicated that it was brigham who would lead the latter day exodus to the west other rightful heirs were either dead hyrum smith or excommunicated oliver cowdery and while persecutions abounded and intensified joseph smith had already given orders to look for a new place an empty land beyond the boundaries of the united states at that time this rekhabite principle pseudographia was well understood and antipated by the great majority of lds faithful and was not questioned by them granted a couple of do it yourselfers stayed behind unwilling to sacrifice and to undertake the perilous journey to the unknown but this also was necessary to separate the tares from the wheat the church benefitted from this purification process they became even more unified and willing to carry out their mission to the world both sects practiced the year food stockpile doctrine and this being frontier and farming country most carried or at least owned weapons there is little evidence that they were a militaristic sect given that they tended to move on rather than face large scale opposition brigham young having suffered a great deal getting to salt lake seems to have been quite justified in making military training a good thing remember this was far beyond where even the us army went and these people had nobody to turn to save themselves just a little context to put this all in perspective btw since when is the church of jesus christ of latter day saints one of the largest denominations in the country a sect it didn t splinter from any other religion as did say the southern baptists or methodists so what did the mormons get it seems that j edgar hoover was very impressed with the way they kept secrets they re pledged to defend secrets with their lives and atone for sin with blood many actually do even to the point of suicide what a balloney suicide is sinful and against the law of god i am not comfortable with this alleged cosiness with mammon i assure you that many among us reject this attitude categorically period our only true allegiance is to our god and to the leaders which he has appointed to represent him in any regard to read this trash about suicide and atone for sins with blood is yet another insulting misrepresentation of what my church believes in and stands for the rlds the reorganized lds are friendly rivals of the lds and delight in telling stories about them which generates quick retorts from the lds members and everybody has a grand time at no time have i ever even heard this hinted at i m taking it with a salt block make it a really big salt mountain with a glacier on top so he hired virtually no one but mormons until the fbi was almost exclusively staffed by members of the church of later day saints though j edgar is finally gone the fbi personnel especially the field agents are still heavily mormon i have often wondered how this might affect the fbi s treatment of religious organizations a mormon would consider heretical preposterous even if this were true reliable data please i am convinced that those officers would perform to the highest codes of honor and conduct that s why they were selected for in the first place remember besides one of our articles of faith strongly states the principle of freedom of religion and that all people are free to worship how where or what they may if it s true there would be little affect lds and rlds philosophy is that all other religions have strayed from the true church as set down by jesus but that god will judge each on his own merits in addition the rlds also contend and the lds may as well that ignorance of the true way tm is an excuse you can only be condemned if you had been tought the way and rejected it in short lds and rlds suffer everybody from lutherans to buddhists secure in the knowledge that though they are wrong they will not be penalized for ignorance it is more likely that hoover liked them because of their rather strict upbringings which forbade alcohol tobacco hot drink like coffee or tea and the like these people are the salt of the earth and as such are more easily made to follow orders and have few vices to be used against them a good explanation i can accept that you are right that lds people are sometimes a little too cosy with mammon s orders the late president kimball for example was an exception with his strong opposition of the selection of the mx peace keeper missile maze in utah that s my somewhat educated guess anyway both sects have splinter groups that don t mirror the masses but these are small and rare and hardly worth noting their common ancestry none of this has any relevance to guns though when a man s religion is used to deny him the right of self protection with the weapons suitable for the job he ll find an ally in me dan sorenson dod z dan exnet iastate edu viking iastate edu isu only censors what i read not what i say don t blame them usenet post to exotic distant machines meet exciting unusual people and flame them casper c knies isscck byuvm bitnet brigham young university isscck vm byu edu ucs computer facilities

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article apr ccsua ctstateu edu parys ccsua ctstateu edu writes i told some friends of mine two weeks ago that koresh was dead the fbi and the batf could not let a man like that live he was a testimonial to their stupidity and lies deleted unfortunately i think you ve got it figured pretty well i also ask myself the question why did they plan for so many months why was this so important to them what was the government really up to why did they seal the warrant were they after koresh or were they after the first and second amendments among others we waited days for our hostages to come home from iran we gave these people days joe gaut in the super state it really does not f gautjw ccsvax sfasu edu matter at all what actually happened remember the alamo truth is what the government chooses to remember waco tell you justice is what it wants to happen jim garrison new orleans la

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article bskendigc rcbg azp netcom com bskendig netcom com brian kendig writes they used a tank to knock a hole in the wall and they released non toxic non flammable tear gas into the building how do you know were you there while obviously koresh was a nut case the typical inability of the government media to get its story straight is quite disturbing on tuesday night nbc news reported that the fbi did not know the place was burning down until they saw black smoke billowing from the building the next day fbi agents were insisting that they saw davidians setting the fire the fbi was also adamantly denying that it was possible their battery of the compound s wallks could have accidentally set the blaze while also saying they hadnt been able to do much investigating of the site because it was still too hot so how did they know they didnt accidentally set the fire sounds like the fbi just burned the place to the ground to destroy evidence to me legalize freedom

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article sandvik sandvik kent apple com sandvik newton apple com kent sandvik writes i m mostly angry why the davidians didn t spare the children the awful suffering see my other posting i m in a bad temper well dozens of children left the compound between the original batf assualt and the fbi assault weeks later so if koresh really wanted to kill children why did he let so many go legalize freedom

talk.religion.misc

re that kill by sword must be killed by sword in article sandvik sandvik kent apple com sandvik newton apple com kent sandvik writes so are you happy now when people including innocent kids died today no and im especially unhappy that these people died in an assault on private property with government armored vehicles i am also unhappy or actually very suspicious that the fbi was dismissing out of hand any chances that they might have accidentally set the blaze themselves i mean i guess we are just supposed to believe that ramming modified tanks into the walls of a building and injecting toxic gases into the building are just routine procedures no way anything could go wrong legalize freedom

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article visser convex convex com visser convex com lance visser writes please get an explaination of exactly what this non toxic tear gas was and what the delivery system was i refuse to believe any explaination provided by the fbi atf without lots of facts i do not believe that there is such a thing as non toxic tear gas you are correct see today s washington post the gas the fbi used is most certainly fatal in high concentrations of course non toxic tear gas is an oxymoron the whole point of tear gas is that it is toxic and its toxic effects cause people to seek fresh air legalize freedom

talk.religion.misc

re greek myth and the bible in pegasus fp dialin uoregon edu pegasus aaa uoregon edu laurie ewbrandt wrote irrelevant inserts from previous postings deleted a definiation from a text book used as part of an introductory course in social anthorpology the term myth designates traditionally based dramatic narratives on themes that emphasize the nature of humankind s relationship to nature and to the supernatural legends are ususally defined as tales concerning other times and places that do not give the same extensive emphasis to supernatural themes legends more often than myths are retold purely as entertainment from peter b hammand s an introduction to cutural and social anthropology second ed macmillion page this makes the bible a fibber magee s closet over stuffed with a little bit of every thing gleened by a wandering people pegasus now doesn t this sound a lot like the colorful or otherwise story from antiquity that somehow tries to or does explain natural pheno mena i think i hear what you re saying but i m not convinced that i know what you mean the possibility exists that what looks like myth on the surface may be after all much more than just a story ed mahood jr edmahood infoserv com

talk.religion.misc

re hitler pagan or christian was martin luther in article c e ak juts ccc amdahl com czl duts ccc amdahl com chris lee writes in article kevxu cunyvm bitnet kevxu cunyvm bitnet writes the irish have their version of the swastica called st brigid s cross there s also the three legged symbol of the isle of man the three legged symbol is a bit different there is a word for them but i can t recall it tri something trieskalon don t know these have more to do with the triple goddess in her three phases as reflected in females girl woman crone

talk.religion.misc

re apr god s promise in john brian lpl arizona edu brian ceccarelli writes in article bskendigc ku c dx netcom com bskendig netcom com brian kendig writes i ve asked your god several times with all my heart to come to me brian k i am pleased with your honesty and to be honest as well i believe you have not asked my god to come to you why do i say this because that would contradict your religious beliefs therefore you feel more comfortable simply accusing his sincerity so you will not have to critically examine your religious beliefs merlyn leroy

talk.religion.misc

apr god s promise in luke but he said yea rather blessed are they that hear the word of god and keep it luke

talk.religion.misc

re albert sabin in article quim innem ctron news ctron com king ctron com john e king writes rfox charlie usd edu writes bill i have taken the time to explain that biblical scholars consider the josephus reference to be an early christian insert by biblical scholar i mean an expert who in the course of his or her research is willing to let the chips fall where they may this excludes literalists who may otherwise be defined as biblical apologists they find what they want to find they are not trustworthy by scholarly standards and others i ve seen this claim about the josephus insert flying around the net too often to continue to ignore it perhaps it s true was there only one josephus manuscipt if there were say copies the forger would have to put his insert into all of them by the same token since josephus was a historian why are biblical scholars raising the flag historical scholars i would think would have a better handle on these ancient secular documents can you give researchers documents page numbers etc jack i became aware of the claim years ago so i decided to check it out on my own but then that was in bn times before net so here are some references see robin lane fox s the unauthorized version p where lane fox writes the one passage which appears to comment on jesus career is agreed to be a christian addition in my re albert sabin response c u sj sunfish usd edu to jim lippard april i noted that consensus is typically indicated subtly as in elaine pagel s the gnostic gospels p to wit a comment attributed to josephus reports emphasis mine scholars sometimes do not even mention the two josephus entries another subtlety reflecting consensus so far as i can deduce today s consensus is built on at least three things the long passage is way out of context origen did not know about the long passage and the short and long passages are contradictory i don t know the references wherein the arguments which led to consensus are orginally developed does anyone biblical scholars as i defined them include theologians and historians the former like the latter incorporate historical social technological and ideological contexts as well as theology so the distinction is blurred i didn t elaborate on that sorry in turn historians are compelled to incorporate theology can t say about the number of copies these were however bg times before gutenburg a hundred first editions seems exceedingly high counting on one hand seems more reasonable perhaps those mss without the long insert if any because anything is possible have been destroyed such a practice is certainly not foreign to religions anyway all we have are mss which have the two entries lippart in the message noted above talks about an arabic ms but here the ms date is critical rich fox anthro usouthdakota

talk.religion.misc

re abortion in uupcb ozonehole com anthony landreneau ozonehole com anthony landreneau writes to margoli watson ibm com larry margolis from anthony landreneau ozonehole com lm the rape has passed there is nothing that will ever take that away lm lm lm true but forcing her to remain pregnant continues the violation of lm lm her body for another months i see this as being unbelievably cruel lm lm life is not a violation lm but forcing someone to harbor that life in their body is a violation letting a mother force a child from her body in order to end that childs life is the ultimate violation i happen to take the violation of a person much more seriously than the violation of a mindless clump of cells smaller than my thumb your mileage may vary larry margolis margoli yktvmv bitnet margoli watson ibm com internet

talk.religion.misc

what we can learn from the waco wackos there are actually a few important things we can glean from this mess when they start getting desperate for an answer to the question what s it all about mr natural pinkboys will buy darn near anything which means there s still plenty of to be made in the false jesus business by enterprising subgenii just remember that once you ve separated the pinks from their green don t blow it all on automatic weapons from mexico put it in a swiss bank account smile a lot have your flunkies hand out flowers in airports the con will just shrug you off as long as you never never never start to believe your own bulldada if david koresh hand t started swallowing his own apocalypso now crap he d be working crossword puzzles in the bahamas today instead of contributing to the mulch layer in waco this is because when you start shooting at cops they re likely to shoot back and most of em are better shots than you are in short p t barnum was right and stupidity is self correcting thus endeth the lesson the doge of south st louis dobbs approved media conspirator tm one step beyond sundays to pm fm st louis community radio you ll pay to know what you really think j r bob dobbs

talk.religion.misc

re merlin mithras and magick in response to whitten fwva saic com david whitten i wrote there evidently was a feast of bread and wine associated with mithras i have often wondered if yeshua intentionally introduced this ritual to expand the appeal of his religion or if it was appropriated by later worshipers and you responded you could argue that if you wanted but i think a more reasonable argument would point out the fact that the remembrance feast was very similar to the pesach passover meal during seder a very jewish ritual of course the feast was the seder and the accounts of it are very clear on this point the difference is the connection between the bread and wine and the body and blood of god this is an old association of the tammuz osiris mithras line and not really related to judaism in any case i didn t really intend to argue the point i saw a possible association and pointed it out but i haven t the foggiest notion what really happened larry caldwell caldwell ohsu edu compuserve oregon health sciences university

talk.religion.misc

re burden of proof in article apr batman bmd trw com jbrown batman bmd trw com writes actually both are positive arguments positive may not be the best description here due to possible misunderstanding but it s the term you used positive arguments assertions can be both affirmative i e god exists and negative i e god does not exist both carry an equal burden of proof because they are both asserting that a certain idea is true the default condition in the absence of a preponderance of evidence either way is that the proposition or assertion is undecidable and the person who takes the undecidable position and says that he she simply disbelieves that the proposition is true is the only one who holds no burden of proof this is why the so called weak atheist position is virtually unassailable not because it stands on a firm foundation of logical argument but because it s proponents simply disbelieve in the existence of god s and therefore they hold no burden of proof when you don t assert anything you don t have to prove anything that s where weak atheism draws its strength but its strength is also its achilles heel without assertions axioms one has no foundation upon which to build as a philosophy it s virtually worthless imo of course so if i were to assert that there are no thousand year old invisible pink unicorns residing in my walls i need to support this with evidence i think the lack of evidence shall suffice who happen to like listening to satanic messages found in playing beethoven s th symphony backwards fbi officials said cult leader david koresh may have forced followers to remain as flames closed in koresh s armed guard may have injected as many as children with poison to quiet them and god saw everything he had made and behold in was very good genesis

talk.religion.misc

the fact of the theory in article c u p nx usenet ucs indiana edu adpeters sunflower bio indiana edu andy peters writes stuff deleted andy i think we do agree given your clarification of how we were each using the terms fact and theory i ll only add that i think perhaps i feel more strongly about separating them though your usage is quite valid note that the fact of evolution is still a theory in other words it could theoretically still be falsified and rejected but since it s so predictive and so consistently supported by evidence it seems pointless to explicitly try to falsify it anymore i ll add here that any falsification or rejection does not in any way reduce its current usefulness so long as it accurately predicts or describes things we can observe not to be a pain in the ass but is there any reason you don t just say the theory of evolution rather than the fact of evolution is still a theory i m asking because this whole thread got started because i was bothered by a post that referred to the fact of evolution basically leaving off the phrase is still a theory without a clarification like the one you just gave just saying the fact of evolution has a very different meaning to me description of atomic theory and alternative theories of gravity deleted both are very useful models that have no religious overtones or requirements of faith unless of course you want to demand that it is a factual physical entity described exactly the way the theory now formulated talks about it here is where you fail to make an important distinction you have shoehorned the facts of the existence of gravity and atoms and evolution into one category with the theories which have been proposed to explain the mechanisms the existence of these things is so predictive as to be considered fact the mechanisms on the other hand are still worth discussing i m not sure i agree here again it may be because i feel stronger about separating terms i was trying to say that the theories proposed to explain the mechanisms and the mechanisms themselves are the only realities here it is the existence of mechanisms not the things themselves that are so predictive as to be considered fact as you would say there aren t really little planetary particle systems called atoms out there or i should say and more to my original point it would be a leap of faith to say there are because we observe only the mechanisms there is no need to believe there are actually atoms out there as we have decided to think about them it s enough to discuss the mechanisms at any rate i m not sure i am being any clearer than before but i thought it was worth a shot the bottom line though is i think we agree on two fundamental ideas evolution is a theory supported by observational evidence my way the fact of evolution is a theory supported by observational evidence your way creation is just an opinion if a theist wants to call it a theory then he can i won t it has no supporting evidence and it neither predicts nor supports any observations that can be made with no mechanisms to talk about there really isn t much to say do you agree jim halat halat bear com bear stearns whatever doesn t kill you will only serve to annoy you nyc i speak only for myself

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article r qab o v horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes in article y rusnews w w mantis co uk mathew mathew mantis co uk writes frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes in article n rusnews w w mantis co uk mathew mathew mantis co uk writes this is complete nonsense relativism means saying that there is no absolut standard of morality it does not mean saying that all standards of morality are equally good presumably this means that some moral systems are better than others how so how do you manage this without an objective frame of reference either frank o dwyer or mathew said stiff deleted which goes faster a bullet or a snail how come you can answer that when einstein proved that there isn t an objective frame of reference stiff deleted speed is a quantifiable measure resulting from a set of methods that will result in the same value measured no matter the reference a bullet with zero velocity sitting on a table on a train moving mph will be moving at a speed of a mph to someone on the train b mph to someone stationary next to the train the reference frame makes the speed relative but what s interesting here is that every person on the train will see a stationary bullet every person off a bullet moving mph i know of no train where all the people on it every time it is filled will see a moral problem in exactly the same way jim halat halat bear com bear stearns whatever doesn t kill you will only serve to annoy you nyc i speak only for myself

talk.religion.misc

no news is bad news i m having trouble receiving news at the moment due to an overloaded news server i think that i can post out reasonably quickly though i m in a couple of threads at the moment which may be pending replies if anyone wants a reply from me over something i ve posted then i suggest sending an e mail copy of the point to me so that i can reply by news this is one way to shut me up cheers david on religion oh where is the sea the fishes cried as they swam its clearness through

talk.religion.misc

re food for thought on tyre there has been a lot of discussion about tyre in sum ezekiel prophesied that the place would be mashed and never rebuilt as there are a lot of people living there it would appear that ezekiel was not literally correct this doesn t bother me at all because i understand the language ezekiel used differently than do so called biblical literalists for example it sometimes happens that someone says my grandson is the cutest baby and then turns around and sees the granddaughter and says oh isn t she the cutest thing this person is not literally claiming to have lined up all the babies in the world according to cuteness and discovered his own grandchildren tied for first rather he is trying to express his emotions using words that are very object oriented because this example is one that is common to many people nobody misunderstands the intent of the statements the bible however is often at the mercy of people who assume that everything within must be exactly literally true for those people the existence of tyre is a problem for me it is not turning to the latest person trying to defend ezekiel we read this from john e king the prophesy clearly implies that people would still be living in the area no it implies nothing of the kind if you had nothing but the prophecy from ezekiel and you were told you interpret it literally you would never say oh he means that there will be houses and businesses and plants and stuff like that you would read i will make you a bare rock and you will never be rebuilt and you d conclude that tyre would be a bare rock the only way to get from fishing nets to houses and buildings and a medium large population is if you know that all that latter stuff is there in other words your answer means that ezekiel misled everybody who read the prophecy at the time it was written there is no way that given a literal reading they could read this passage and conclude medium size city you seem to feel that never be rebuilt means be rebuilt maybe so but it is hardly a clear implication mr king also writes so far i ve seen stated figurers ranging from to let s assume the latter one is correct by modern standards we are talking about a one horse town well no that s only a bit less than the population of annapolis where i m from you know the naval acadamy the state capital george washington resigned his commission in the statehouse annapolis may not be new york but it s at least a two horse town but supposing people is a small town it s still people more than ezekiel predicted and you ve said nothing about the other problem in chapter ezekiel predicts that nebuchadnezzar will will destroy tyre and loot all their valuables however nebuchadnezzar did not destroy tyre and in chapter ezekiel even quotes god as saying he and his army got no reward from the campaign he led against tyre let s ignore alexander for a moment and just pay attention to chapter ezekiel says n would destroy tyre and n did not destroy tyre ezekiel says that n would plunder their valuables but n did not plunder their valuables regardless of what you think about tyre now the fact is that n died before the place was destroyed ezekiel said n was going to do it and n did not this post is of course pointless inerrantists have an amazing ability to rewrite the bible as needed to fit whatever they want it to say for example i expect mr king to respond to the comments about ezekiel by pulling some clear implications out of hat when ezekiel said that n would demolish your towers that clearly implied that the walls would still be standing so people would know where the towers used to be and when ezekiel said that n would demolish your fine houses and throw your stones timber and rubble into the sea that clearly implied that n would never set foot on the island and when ezekiel wrote that n would build a ramp up to your walls that clearly implies that n would spend years stomping around on the mainland and never get close to the walls see a few clear implications that are totally contrary to the text and you can reconcile anything you want darren f provine kilroy gboro rowan edu do you know why i m the enabler because you demand it cliff claven

talk.religion.misc

re societal basis for morality in article merlyn digibd merlyn digibd digibd com merlyn leroy writes prayer in school is legal what is illegal is telling children what to pray or not to pray many people confuse you can t tell kids that they ought to pray now with kids aren t allowed to pray possibly because so few kids do so without being told or perhaps it s because they think that all governmental bodies should be in the business of suppressing all beliefs other than their own or else they re some sort of satanic humanist conspiracy it s the old if you re not for us you re against us bit emp

talk.religion.misc

re christians above the law was clarification of pe when are we going to hear a christian answer to this question in paraphrase on what or whose authority do christians proclaim that they are above the law and above the prophets major and minor and not accountable to the ten commandments of which jesus clearly spoke his opinion in matthew what is the source of this pseudo doctrine who is the pseudo teacher who is the great deceiver ok here s at least one christian s answer jesus was a jew not a christian in this context matthew makes sense matt do not think that i jesus came to abolish the law or the prophets i did not come to abolish but to fulfill jesus lived under the jewish law however he was the culmination of the promises of the prophets he came to fulfill the prophecies and fully obey god s purposes verse says for truly i say to you until heaven and earth pass away not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass away from the law until all is accomplished the key to this verse imho is the last phrase jesus as the fulfillment of the law accomplished what the law was supposed to accomplish verse whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments and so teaches others shall be called least in the kingdom of heaven but whoever keeps and teaches them he shall be called great in the kingdom of heaven taken in the context of jesus teaching jewish people about living lives under the law this makes sense in general it appears that jesus is responding to some criticism he must have received about doing away with the law that was not jesus intent at all he had come to earth to live the law as it should be lived and fulfill the promises made by god to his people all the way back to eve gen the serpent will bruise your heel but he will bruise his head jesus appeared to be doing away with the law because he did not honor the traditions of men as equal to the law of god he regularly locked horns with the religious leaders of the day because he would not conform to their rules only god s law in the matthew passage jesus is defending his dedication to the law and defending himself against his accusors almost the entire sermon on the mount matt is dedicated to helping the jewish people understand the true intent of the law sweeping away the clutter which had been introduced by the pharasees and their traditions in galatians paul describes the relationship of jesus to the law in this way but before faith came we were kept in custody under the law being shut up to the faith which was later to be revealed therefore the law has become our tutor to lead us to christ that we may be justified by faith but now that faith has come we are no longer under a tutor for you are all sons of god through faith in christ jesus i believe this says that after christ was revealed the law had served it s purpose i e our tutor to lead us to christ and now we are no longer under a tutor the law has been fulfilled as christ said he would do god the author of the old law and the christ man jesus are the same personality therefore the old law and the new testament the last will and testament of jesus are based on the same moral principles it makes sense that many of the principles in the old law are re expressed in christianity on the other hand now that the law has fulfilled it s purpose and christians relate to god through christ not the law it also makes sense that new practices and new symbolisms were established to represent the mysteries of this new relationship i e baptism representing christ s death burial and resurrection rom the lord s supper as a memorial to his sacrifice i cor and sunday as a day of worship commemorating his resurrection matt ff acts ok that s one christian s explanation i don t claim to have all these issues completely settled even in my own mind and i welcome other christians to offer other alternatives please excuse the long posting thanks for your interest if you have read this far john nunnally nunnally acs harding edu

talk.religion.misc

re alt sex stories under literary critical analy in sandvik sandvik kent apple com sandvik newton apple com writes in article qevbh h v agate berkeley edu dzkriz ocf berkeley edu dennis kriz wrote i m going to try to do something here that perhaps many would not have thought even possible i want to begin the process of initiating a literary critical study of the pornography posted on alt sex stories to identify the major themes and motifs present in the stories posted there opening up then the possibility of an objective moral evaluation of the material present there dennis i m astounded i didn t know you were interested to even study such filth as alt sex stories provide cheers kent sandvik newton apple com alink ksand private activities on the net finally brethern whatever is true whatever is honorable whatever is right whatever is pure whatever is lovely whatever is of good repute if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise let your mind dwell on these things phil more cheers john nunnally acs harding edu

talk.religion.misc

re that kill by sword must be killed by sword in article sandvik sandvik kent apple com sandvik newton apple com kent sandvik writes in article c tcz z rbdc wsnc org royc rbdc wsnc org roy crabtree wrote in article apr utarlg uta edu b zaw utarlg uta edu stephen writes in article sandvik sandvik kent apple com sandvik newton apple com kent sandvik writes so are you happy now when people including innocent kids died today it s amazing how everyone automatically blames one side or the other one thing for sure koresh will have no chance to defend himself against the statements lacking in fact or court sponsored verification made by agents who participated in the situation that killed him frankly speaking i don t care who started this whole show i just feel sad about the children that were trapped and had to die for a case that didn t have any reason whatsoever all mr koresh could have done would have been to release these children could he and the first three that died when guns ablazing in came the batf and fbi i imagine i would have some trouble giving up my children to someone who had just shot what two of them nb it takes two sets of guns in a situation like this yes i put the blame on koresh and similar fanatical religious leaders that think more about their cause than about keeping fanatical those whowill not tolerate another s way of life religious based on emotional internal or otherwise lacking in commonly defined scientific basis including legal ones such as this old saw innocent untilproven guilty not innocent until presumed guilty who is the fanatic note who is dead this usually bespeaks a fair bit for the idea that the other side also had lethal weapons used fatally they are dead the children at best koresh was an asshole and the government criminally negligent in its hadni ling of the case at worst koresh and his followers were innocent not brainwashed guilty of illegal arms possession as yet unproven and murderedd along with children they cannot speak for themselves members of the surviving alive and not burned to death batf fbi can and are inappropriately to the public eye outside the bounds of their legal authorities read the charter the constitution specifies that the courts convict while the enforcement arm investigates and that the evidence involved shuld not be disseminated in a way to harm or injure a party involved prior to that action its called slander or libel even where factually true butthen distoted or disseminated with intent to harm for the purpose of covering their butts because the bottom line is they said they wanted the kids to get out alive and thefbi the batf ms reno the prez and everybody else in this sick selfserving group of upright animals that used to be a freedom loving peaceful country called america look up the name it might surprise you has turned the point the finger of blame on the other guy and let those kids die note well they lived days they only died when attacked by outside force spock s world diane duane the spear in the heart of another is the spear in your own all of us are responsible iam you are the question is not whether but how guess what you get to make up your own mind on that children out from the war zone i m not ashamed of this statement who created the war zone you should be ashamed of bypassing that it s the same damned literally comment made by the folks in the former yugoslavia to justify ethnic cleansing gee they had the guns all they had to do was surrender to justify other means does not eliminate the fact that children died for a cause that they should not have been part of whose cause did they die for the one where they lived peacibly to all known purposes until proven in court folks or the cuase of righteous government safeguarding the freedom of the children who are now dead againi say i do not know who did what i was not there the fbi leaders show moral sickness trying to convict in the press ahead of schedule and you should look over your shoulder becuase if there is anything my ruminations that actually sets onto real fact of what happened and i do not know that i am defending people who ahving been burned to death cannot speak for themselves you may in years find that the concept in our court system has gone from due processss to due profit and the batf come to collect their fair share of the tax on the value of your house if you rented it for income which is going down now folks read bankruptcy its accurate in figures and it bypasses the greedy businessman and mankers who have taken profit from the corruption of our govbernment look to where the money went folks you got for medicare that paid a doctor for worth of medicine this is the customaryprofitmargin to businessmen for goernment entitlements who wll own the land of the cult now note well it was nonproift religious and nontaxable large tract of land hmmm use your brains folks it happened germany and it can happen here trillion admitted and counting kent royc sandvik newton apple com alink ksand private activities on the net

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article bskendigc rcbg azp netcom com bskendig netcom com brian kendig writes visser convex com lance visser writes they cut off the water there were no fire trucks present they refused to bring in fire equipment for fear that the firemen would be shot at and the fbi atf go blasting holes into the builing and firing gas munitions they used a tank to knock a hole in the wall and they released non toxic non flammable tear gas into the building take a second look at non toxic non flammable mace sold tothe public is supposedly nontoxic whatthey do not tell you is that if you get mace directly on the linings of the lungs such as a direct snort to the face above certain quantities it reacts similarly to a mustard gas inhalation i know my father and grandfather were exposed to poison gas in wwi and wwii dad went through the side effects of any weapon including those non toxic aerosols what the label actually means is usually it wont kill you it may give you permanent css asthsma but that s better than blowing a hole in your head all aerosols are flammable if you have enough oxygen and hit it with the right igniter some of the most non flammable substances known will boom or searflame if you hit it with the right combo let s take one a trash can fire makes black smoke already burned right can t go boom right wrong suck that smoke made up of paper that has carbonized or burned about of the fuel in it into an air conditioning return mix with about air and light a match feet of conduit is about the same when filled with that smoke mixture as oh say pounds tnt that is why the fire codes say no open ceiling tiles in buildings because stories of a building have blown out by nonflammable smoke so take a little nonflammable aerosol mix with gasoline or kerosene fumes no electricity remeber a bit of heating on the waco plains boil water to drink since the water was cut off liberally mix and allow to settle for hours fumes vent down into the bus underground and the davidians move the children upstairs to a saferoom they had one armor plated remember to breath because kids get sick and die from tear gas and along comes a tracer a spark what have you everyone burns to death try thinking before opening mouth it may not have happened the way the gmen say it did brian kendig je ne suis fait comme aucun bskendig netcom com de ceux que j ai vus j ose croire n etre fait comme aucun de ceux qui existent the meaning of life si je ne vaux pas mieux au moins je suis autre is that it ends rousseau

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article c tbyd zd dscomsa desy de hallam zeus desy de writes hang on you missed the point entirely they are protesting the lack of water because it deprived koresh of his constitutional right to prove his divinity by walking on it you can tell folks when the man has run out of reason attack the man s beliefs in legal terminology argument ad hominem attack the man not what he did that has yet to be proven illegal and the fbi atf go blasting holes into the builing and firing gas munitions they used a tank to knock a hole in the wall and they released non toxic non flammable tear gas into the building you can tell that the gas did not burn because dispite the fact that wrongo remember the fire movie a couple of years ago backdraft the scene in the factory with propane gas coming out of pipes and gasoline all over the floor with a degree flame front overhead note that it did not flash all at once fires ignite and burn unpredictably gases like tear gas mix and distribute unevenly and flash unevenly you are not a fire analyst you cannnot tell nb neither am i and i cannot tell nor is the fbi spokesman nor is reno maybe we all should shut up and get a forensics analysis first the building was full of it there was no flash of gas flame yes there was a flash in one room just pumped full of it phill hallam baker royc

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article qvv u kc morrow stanford edu salem pangea stanford edu bruce salem writes i think that the consensus will become that fbi atf muffed it not merely because they walked into an ambush on feb and koresh got his prophesy today against their stated intentions but because they played right into polarizing the situation and not diffusing it koresh had set up all the conditions of a classic cult confrontation and had stated publically what the outcome would become before or after his kids were shot the government upped the ante and parcipitated the conclusion today it does seem that the fires were set from within the compound by the members of the group and not caused by the cs gas or the way it was delivered let the subsequent investigation shed light on that suppose then why make the comment that the government had used pyrotechnics and started the fire the dividians still had the decision to stay or leave they never intended as did the jews against the nazis in ww ii do what i say or die to leave the building burns almost everyone dies it probably doesn t bother you much but it bothers many other people most of whom dont believe particularly in koresh or his message all humans i hope yes the finger pointing has begun four atf agents and branch davidians are now dead because of crazy tactics on the part of the atf and fbi yeah they blew it they were being too rational in a situation that was not your ordianry criminal game they haven t learned that much from jonestown or the move house or the sla shootout or perhaps they have kill first blame the dead ones destroy all the evidence royc

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article c s ck bt apollo hp com nelson p apollo hp com peter nelson writes who would be alive today if they had been released back when we were the word released is loaded until convicted in cxourt my children are my own when the feds use this type of loaded logic you cannot win we accuse you we shoot a couple of your kids we blame you for those shots we harrass you for days we tell you to come out or die we gas you you burn to death we blame you prior to trial for all of it debating this a few weeks ago peter

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article keng tunfaire keng den mmc com ken garrido writes lotsa stuff taken out bottom line due process was not served no peaceful attempt to serve a warrant occurred think on that royc

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in article c srew fcg noose ecn purdue edu tbrent bank ecn purdue edu timothy j brent writes give me a break what fireman should have to deal with a blaze like that and get shot at at the same time nearly all of them witness la firemen are among our real heroes most of the time i wonder when they were actually aasked to come or if they found out about the fire over the tv shot at by whom prove it these people were breaking the law i agree these weren t the best tactics when law replaces justice the system is dying or dead note that we had a small revolution years ago on this point they probably should have backed off pulled the perimeter way back and let them sit there with no media attention until they decided to come out the only other alternative i see would have been to send in a couple of special forces guys to capture or assassinate koresh but remember these fruit or perhaps just wait or maybeeven send in a few agents who are christian to sit down and pray outside the line try affinity rather than subversion loops were putting their lives on the lines voluntarily why should chuckle so would you if someone points a gun at you at that point you can die or live and if living means stayng in a building to keep badge carrying nuts off your kids i suspect you might as well both sides were wrong law abiding citizens have to put themselves in any more danger than necessary when dealing with a nut look at the man who jumped out of his bradley to grab a flaming women who was running back into the building yeah i would have to say they were trying to save those people i don t think i would risk my life that much to save someone that stupid that obviously didn t even want to be saved try again go see the movie sophie s choice grow up tim royc

talk.religion.misc

re abortion and private health coverage letters regarding in qk q fj agate berkeley edu dzkriz ocf berkeley edu dennis kriz writes if one is paying for a private health insurance plan and does not want abortion coverage there is no reason for that person to be complelled to pay for it just as one should not be compelled to pay for lipposuction coverage if one doesn t want that kind of coverage you appear to be stunningly ignorant of the underlying concept of health insurance dzkriz ocf berkeley edu rocker

talk.religion.misc

re merlin mithras and magick what an exciting thread finally mitra is sanskrit for friend as such he started out as an avatar of lord visnu mentioned first in the vedas later he seems to have risen to chief prominence worshipped by the persians associated with the sun but not the sun he is the lord of contract honor and obedience therefore naturally worshipped by soldiers he was ordered by the sun to slay the bull of heaven and he reluct antly agreed because of his obligation the blood of that bull spilled and grew all earth life then mitra and the sun sat down to eat worship of lord mitra ended in persia with the ascension of the zoroastrians hundreds of years later he was rediscovered and thrown into the official roman pantheon tm for some semi tricky reason i forget why but all references of him ended abruptly when he was stricken from same so apparently his worship was some sort of vehicle for advancement in the bureaucracy like membership in the communist party was in the soviet bloc the sociology of religion in ancient times is fascinating oh his b day was dec ahem i am not sure if the mystery cult really lasted after his was booted from the roman imperial god roster or what it contained mostly soldiers with levels of initiation they worshipped underground in caverns in pews the bull horns in those temples were for scaring away or impaling evil spirits i m not sure that they had mithraic significance or not i don t know that the ritual meal was of a cannibalistic nature as is the christian masses but eating deities goes way back to old kingdom egypt someone mentioned bullfighting did mithraists sacrifice bulls i forget more likely for a religious source might be the shower of bull s blood enjoyed by the worshippers of cybele on the day of blood cybele worship extended all throughout even up to france bigtime charles hope a si cunyvm a si cunyvm cuny edu government by reporters media ocracy

talk.religion.misc

waco conflagration precedents burning yourself alive seems a rough way to go given the waco bunch had other choices but it reminded me of the russian old believers who thinking the antichrist was coming in grew frantic when peter the great started westernizing russia and reforming the russian church a few years later they locked themselves in their churches and burned themselves alive by the thousands are there other cases of apocalypse obsessed christians resorting to self imolation is there a history of precedents andrew

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article r le mlj horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes in article r qp sk squick eitech com ekr squick eitech com eric rescorla writes in article r m r o horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes in article qvu jk kyle eitech com ekr kyle eitech com eric rescorla writes if almost all people agree that the sun exists in the usual uncritical sense and almost all people agree that a deal is bad it s a reasonable conclusion that the sun really does exist and that the deal really is bad i disagree completely until rather recently most people did not believe in evolution or the possibility of the atom bomb popular opinion is notoriously wrong about matters of fact true but nevertheless the basis of all matters of fact is overwhelming popular opinion and some overwhelming popular opinion is fact the sun shines if it were not so physics would be a personal matter assumed to be different for each of us there would be yourgravity and mygravity and no theoretical framework to encompass them and predict both this is simply complete nonsense the basis for matters of fact is if any class of opinion the majority of informed popular opinion for some value of informed i would really hate to base my knowledge of for instance qm on what the overwhelming popular opinion is the basis eric is people peering at the world and saying what they see i m talking about uninterpreted facts observations people do those agreement on some observations is a prerequisite for a theory that is more than personal yes that s true but you have to be clear exactly what is an uninterpreted observation it s pretty low level stuff the sun shines is already a lot higher level than that we can agree that i perceive brightness perhaps now i take an experience of good evil to be every bit as raw a fact as an experience of pain or vision that might seem like a good first pass guess but it turns out to be a pretty cruddy way to look at things because we all seem to have rather different opinions experiences about what is good and evil while we seem to be able to agree on what the meter says you re not comparing apples with apples if we all look at the same meter we ll agree if we re all in the same situation that s when we ll agree on fundamental values if at all people who say that nobody agrees on values to the same extent that they agree on trivial observations seem to be unaware of the extent of agreement on either huh what do you mean all in the same situation let s take me and dennis kriz as examples we re in pretty different situations but i think we can agree as to whether it s day or night i don t think we can agree as to whether or not abortion is morally acceptable yet we are certainly in the same difference of situations with respect to each other looks like weasel words to me frank i don t see that it s any evidence at all as i point out above i m really not interested very much in what the popular opinion is i m prepared to trust to some extent the popular opinion about direct matters of physical observation because by and large they accord with my own however if everyone else said the dial read and it looked like a to me i would hope that i would believe myself i e believing other people about these matters seems to have a reasonable probability of predicting what i would believe if i observed myself but the possibility exists that it is not since i know from observation that others disagree with me about what is good i believe i can discount popular opinion about good from the beginning as a predictor of my opinion i would say that the fact that it seems almost impossible to get people to agree on what is good in a really large number of situations is probably the best evidence that objective morality is bogus actually firstly if everyone else said the dial was and i saw i d check my lens prescription that s up to you i guess secondly your observation that people disagree shows nothing people may be looking at different things by virtue of being in different situations if i look at an elephant i ll see an elephant that doesn t imply that you will see an elephant if you look at an iguana this different situations stuff is pretty confusing frank how do we decide if we are in the same situation you mind explaining thirdly i question your assumption that when people disagree about how to achieve fundamental or secondary goals that they therefore do not have the same fundamental goals that seems to be the disagreement you refer to huh i don t think so i think that people disagree about fundamental goals ekr eric rescorla ekr eitech com would you buy used code from this man

talk.religion.misc

re biblical backing of koresh s tape cites enclosed in article apr woods ulowell edu cotera woods ulowell edu writes in article r j ie sbctri sbc com netd susie sbc com writes in article apr utarlg uta edu b zaw utarlg uta edu stephen writes for those who think david koresh didn t have a solid structure or sound biblical backing for his hour long tape broadcast i don t think anyone really cares about the solid structure of his sermon it s the deaths he s responsible for that concern most people i assume you have evidence that he was responsible for the deaths only my common sense the fire was caused by either koresh and his followers or by the fbi atf cia kgb and maybe the harper valley pta since you are throwing around the evidence arguement i ll throw it back can you prove any government agency did it please don t resort to they covered it up so that proves they did it or any wild theories about how the government agencies intentionally started the fire the key words are proof and evidence proves they did it all that thou shalt not kill stuff i d like to point out that the bible says do not commit murder the nkj translation mistranslates self defense was never considered murder the please explain how koresh was defending himself from those children who burned tim henrion southwestern bell technology resources thenrion sbctri sbc com

talk.religion.misc

re merlin mithras and magick caldwell facman ohsu edu larry caldwell writes kosinski us oracle com kevin osinski writes i recall reading in michael rutherford s novel sarum a scene in which the son of a roman nobleman living in britain takes part in a secret ceremony involving a bull he stands naked in a pit covered with some sort of scaffolding while assistants coax a bull to stand on the scaffolding they then fatally stab the bull which douses the worshipper in the pit with blood this is supposedly some sort of rite of passage for members of the bull cult i wonder if this is related to the mithras cult i don t know where rutherford got his information for this chapter the book is historical fiction and most of the general events which take place are largely based on historical accounts there is a rite like this described in joseph campbell s occidental mythology he also described levels of initiation i think i don t know where campbell got his info but i remember thinking he was being a little eclectic i also wonder what if any connection there is between the ancient bull cults and the current practice of bullfighting popular in some mediterranean cultures quite a bit if you haven t read campbell give him a try larry caldwell caldwell ohsu edu compuserve oregon health sciences university yes i cannot remeber which works i read about this in as it was many years ago this ritual was called the tarobaullum i believe the spelling may be off pope charles popec brewich hou tx us pope charles origin the brewers witch bbs houston tx

talk.religion.misc

re freemasonry and the southern baptist convention lowell locus com lowell morrison writes in article qv l oj usenet ins cwru edu ch cleveland freenet edu tony with the southern baptist convention convening this june to consider the charges that freemasonry is incompatible with christianity i thought the following quotes by mr james holly the anti masonic flag carrier would amuse you all the following passages are exact quotes from the southern baptist convention and freemasonry by james l holly m d president of mission and ministry to men inc n th st beaumont tx much drivel deleted jesus christ never commanded toleration as a motive for his disciples and toleration is the antithesis of the christian message page the central dynamic of the freemason drive for world unity through fraternity liberty and equality is toleration this is seen in the writings of the great writers of freemasonry page more drivel deleted i hope you all had a good laugh i know i did g tony a laugh tony this religeous bigot scares the shit out of me and that any one bothers to listen to him causes me to have grave doubts about the future of just about anything shades of the branch davidians jim jones and charlie manson uncle wolf member highland lodge f am grand lodge of california babtized a southern babtist and one who has beliefs beyond the teachings of either not to worry the masons have been demonized and harrassed by almost every major xian church there is for centuries now and still they stand they wil withstand the miserable southern boobtists i am sure they may even pick up a little support as people start to listen to the boobtists and realize that subtracting the obvious lies and claims of satanism that the masons sound pretty good by comparison one thing is known a sizable proportion of southern babtists are masons and the masons have already fired back in their own magazines against the boobtist witch hunt since the consrervatives have already been a divisive element with their war on boobtist moderates and liberals they may now start in on their mason boobtist brothers and hasten their own downfall as more and more southern boobtists realize their church can t stand being run by a handful of clowns looking for holy civil wars and purity tests and drop em out of the leadership positions they have taken over so as far as i am concerned the louder ruder and more outrageous an anti masonic crusade these old goats mount the better pop some pocorn and get a center row seat the circus is about to begin and oh look here come the clowns pope charles slack popec brewich hou tx us pope charles origin the brewers witch bbs houston tx

talk.religion.misc

re are atoms real was re after years blah blah blah petri and mathew your discusion on the reality of atoms is interesting but it would seem that you are verging on the question is anything real that is since observation is not reliable how can we say that anything is real i don t think this was the intention of the original question since you now define out the word real so that nothing can meet its criteria just a thought brian ps rainbows and shadows are real they are not objects they are phenomenon an interesting question would be if atoms are objects classical or phenomenon neo quantum or what

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened bskendig netcom com brian kendig writes b zaw utarlg uta edu stephen tice writes one way or another so much for patience too bad you couldn t just wait was the prospect of god s message just too much to take so you believe that david koresh really is jesus christ you know everybody scoffed at that guy they hung up on a cross too he claimed also to be the son of god and it took almost two thousand years to forget what he preached love thy neighbor as thyself anybody else wonder if those two guys setting the fires were agent provacateurs cutter gloster via mind org chris all jobs are easy to the person who doesn t have to do them holt s law

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in ursa bear com halat pooh bears jim halat writes in article qjd o nlv horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes firstly science has its basis in values not the other way round so you better explain what objective atoms are and how we get them from subjective values before we go any further atoms are not objective they aren t even real what scientists call an atom is nothing more than a mathematical model that describes certain physical observable properties of our surroundings all of which is subjective omigod it s an operationalist sorry jim but the idea that a theory explaining a myriad of distinctly different observations is merely a model is more than sensible people can accept your phobia about objective reality notwithstanding mark pundurs any resemblance between my opinions and those of wolfram research inc is purely coincidental

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in v rusnews w w mantis co uk mathew mantis co uk mathew writes there s no objective physics einstein and bohr have told us that speaking as one who knows relativity and quantum mechanics i say bullshit there s no objective reality lsd should be sufficient to prove that speaking as one who has taken lsd i say bullshit one wonders just what people who ask such questions understand by the term objective if anything i consider it to be a useful fiction an abstract ideal we can strive towards like an ideal gas or a light inextensible string it doesn t actually exist but we can talk about things as if they were like it and not be too far wrong how could striving toward an ideal be in any way useful if the ideal had no objective existence mark pundurs any resemblance between my opinions and those of wolfram research inc is purely coincidental

talk.religion.misc

re rawlins debunks creationism in article apr rambo atlanta dg com wpr atlanta dg com bill rawlins writes we are talking about origins not merely science science cannot explain origins for a person to exclude anything but science from the issue of origins is to say that there is no higher truth than science this is a false premise by the way i enjoy science it is truly a wonder observing god s creation macroevolution is a mixture of percent science and percent religion guaranteed within three percent error let us explore this interesting paragraph point by point sentence by sentence we are talking about origins not merely science origins of what are we speaking of the origins of life the human species the universe physical law biological diversity or what science cannot explain origins this is a false statement unless it is carefully qualified it depends on what origins we are talking about for a person to exclude anything but science from the issue of origins is to say that there is no higher truth than science again this is a false statement to begin with the notion of higher truth is distinctly dubious many people believe that there are ways to ascertain truth that are not in the repetoire of science they even believe that there are ways that are more reliable and certain many believe that there are truths that cannot be expressed using the language of science let it be so these truths are neither higher or lower they are simply true more to the point restricting one s discussion of origins to science does not reject other sources of knowledge it simply restricts the scope of discussion this is a false premise if this is intended as asserting that the previous sentence was false then is actually true however the context identifies it as another false or at least theologically unsound statement by the way i enjoy science on the evidence mr rawlins lacks sufficient understanding of science to enjoy science in any meaningful sense one might just as well say that one enjoys literature written in a language that one cannot read however one cannot mark this sentence as false to follow the analogy perhaps he likes the pretty shapes of the letters it is truly a wonder observing god s creation let us not quibble count this one as true macroevolution is a mixture of percent science and percent religion guaranteed within three percent error still another false statement however one can make it come out true with the following contextual modification macroevolution as misunderstood by rawline is a mixture of percent of what rawlins erroneously thinks of as science and percent of what rawlins erroneously thinks of as religion it is distinctly noticeable that mr rawlins fails miserably to touch on truth except when he reports personally on what he feels i do him the justice of assuming that he is not misinforming us as to his personal reactions one can account for this by the hypothesis that he has an idiosyncratic and personal concept of truth richard harter smds inc net address rh smds com phone us mail smds inc po box concord ma fax in the fields of hell where the grass grows high are the graves of dreams allowed to die

talk.religion.misc

re albert sabin in article apr rambo atlanta dg com wpr atlanta dg com bill rawlins writes deletion since you have referred to the messiah i assume you are referring to the new testament please detail your complaints or e mail if you don t want to post first century greek is well known and well understood have you considered josephus the jewish historian who also wrote of jesus in addition the four gospel accounts are very much in harmony since this drivel is also crossposted to alt atheism how about reading the alt atheism faq the josephus quote is concidered to be a fake even by christian historians and the four gospels contradict each other in important points weren t you going to offer a scientific theory of creationism benedikt

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article qie fkt horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes objective morality is morality built from objective values and organized religion is a religion built from organized values and ford tempo is a tempo built from ford values and rational response is response built from rational values and unconditional surrender is surrender built from unconditional values uncle bye jim halat

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article apr wam umd edu judi wam umd edu jay t stein objectively subjective writes qhn m a horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer culled from a discussion on christianity and objective morals question is there any effective difference between objective values exist and there is disagreement over what they are and values are subjective i don t see any is there any difference in saying absolute truth exists but some people think its a lie and truth is relative i think there is in both examples the first statement is a fundamental disagreement between at least two people the second statement is agreed upon by all to put it another way someone who says objective values exist does not agree that values are subjective jim halat

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article qjbn na horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes really you don t know what objective value is if i offered the people of the u s collectively for all of the land in america would that sound like a good deal that happens to be a subjective example that the people of the us would happen to agree on continue to move the price up at some point a few people would accept then more then more until probably all would accept at a high enough number endpoints of a subjective scale are not the given homes of objective viewpoints jim halat

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article qjd o nlv horus ap mchp sni de frank d s uucp frank o dwyer writes firstly science has its basis in values not the other way round so you better explain what objective atoms are and how we get them from subjective values before we go any further atoms are not objective they aren t even real what scientists call an atom is nothing more than a mathematical model that describes certain physical observable properties of our surroundings all of which is subjective what is objective though is the approach a scientist takes in discussing his model and his observations there is no objective science but there is an objective approach which is subjectively selected by the scientist objective in this case means a specified unchanging set of rules that he and his colleagues use to discuss their science this is in contrast to your objective morality there may be an objective approach to subjectively discuss your beliefs on morality but there exists no objective morality also science deals with how we can discuss our observations of the physical world around us in that the method of discussion is objective not the science not the discussion itself science makes no claims to know the whys or even the hows sometimes of what we can observe it simply gives us a way to discuss our surroundings in a meaningful consistent way i think it was neils bohr who said to paraphrase science is what we can say about the physical world jim halat

talk.religion.misc

re a message for you mr president how do you know what happened in c sqya f v noose ecn purdue edu tbrent bank ecn purdue edu timothy j brent writes probably not but then i don t pack heavy weaponry with intent to use it please cite your evidence that he was intending to use it you don t really think he should have been allowed to keep that stuff do you why not if so tell me where you live so i can be sure to steer well clear check the sig the public also has rights and they should be placed above those of the individual society does not have rights only individuals have rights go ahead call me a commie ok your a commie but you d be singing a different tune if i exercised my right to rape your daughter you think you have a right to rape anyone no wonder you don t care about the rightws of others he broke the law please indicate which law you feel koresh broke and when was he convicted of said crime he was a threat to society so you feel that owning guns makes him a threat to society when are y ou going to start going after knives and baseball bats as well or do you feel that someone who spouts unpopular ideas is by definition a threat to society they did there job simple it is simple if you think that there job is to assualt civilians support your first second fourth fifth sixth and eighth amendment rights lest they be taken away from you just as the fbi did to the davidians think about it i ll support them all except no in other words you don t support any of them mob rule isn t any prettier merely because the mob calls itself a government it ain t charity if you are using someone else s money wilson s theory of relativity if you go back far enough we re all related mark wilson atlantaga ncr com

talk.religion.misc

re apr god s promise in john starowl rahul net michael d adams writes if anyone in netland is in the process of devising a new religion do not use the lamb or the bull because they have already been reserved please choose another animal preferably one not on the endangered species list how about washed in the blood of barney the dinosaur judging from postings i ve read all over usenet and on non usenet bbs conferences barney is definitely an endangered species especially if he runs into me in a dark alley a lizard a lizard internet addresses alizard tweekco boo pacbell com preferred pacbell com boo tweekco alizard bang path for above alizard gentoo com backup pgp public key available on request

talk.religion.misc

re oto the ancient order of oriental templars thyagi cup portal com thyagi morgoth nagasiva writes this organization is known at the present time as the ancient order of oriental templars ordo templi orientis otherwise the hermetic brotherhood of light does this organization have an official e mail address these days an address for any of the sf bay area lodges e g thelema would do a lizard a lizard internet addresses alizard tweekco boo pacbell com preferred pacbell com boo tweekco alizard bang path for above alizard gentoo com backup pgp public key available on request

talk.religion.misc

new religion forming sign up let me begin by saying i think this is the world s first religion to use the net as its major recruitment medium therefore even if this religion does not take off its founding members will be very important historically as this method of soliciting membership will eventually become common the basis of this religion is to apply various aspects of current conventional morality to the characters in genesis and exodus but assume that the bible s accounts of the facts and historical events is correct for example story of adam and eve adam and eve are in garden of eden naked and ignorant have unlimited supply of food provided but no clothing jobs or knowledge god says not to eat fruit of tree of knowledge they do anyway then try to hide in bushes god finds them and forces them out of garden there are several different stories on what they were doing while naked in the bushes that might have angered god traditional philosophy the only reason you need knowledge or a job is to eat if someone else will provide you with food then you can be stupid and unemployed and it s ok this is why married women usually didn t work until recent decades authority figures such as god whoever was behind the vietnam war hitler and slaveowners are always right and should be blindly followed without question by ordinary people who can t make decisions for themselves interpretation of events based on traditional philosophy they were not supposed to eat the fruit they should have done whatever god told them to like small children they had their needs provided for and were obligated to do whatever their father said to being forced to leave the garden and work in order to obtain food was a punishment lessons from traditional interpretation ignorance is good knowledge is bad but tempting having food provided for you for nothing read welfare is ideal get ting a job and feeding yourself with what you earn is punishment public nudity is good covering up is bad authority figures are intrinsically right normal people are dumb and should do whatever they are told without question they should not think for themselves people in subordinate positions are especially obligated to refrain from learning for example it should be illegal for slaves to learn to read s philosophy people should seek education and employment outside the home unless named hillary clinton or murphy brown people should use common sense they should not kill other people binding of issac wars holocaust etc just because they are told to interpretation of events based on current philosophy they were supposed to eat the fruit god gave wanted them to seek knowledge rather than be handed it on a silver platter once they had gained knowledge and by seeking it showed their ability to make mature decisions for them selves they no longer needed to be treated like little children and were rewarded by being allowed into the real world lessons from new interpretation ignorance is bad knowledge is good but must be sought having food provided for you for nothing read welfare is at best a temporary measure getting a job and feeding yourself with what you earn is ideal public nudity is bad covering up is good authority figures are often wrong normal people are intelligent and should consider whether the instructions are really a good idea and alter or abolish bad governments they should think for themselves people in subordinate decisions are often discouraged from knowledge but should seek it anyway and all the harder for example poor children without good schools should work especially hard in order to make a better life for their children and themselves i have tentatively named this new philosophy the church of eveism because eve s decision to eat the apple is man sic kind s first good decision instead of its first bad one as traditionally believed she is therefore clearly a protagonist god at first appears evil for telling people not to seek knowledge but on deeper analysis is also a protagonist as god rewarded the decision to defy him and provided the tree in the first place the intention and desire were clearly to have the knowledge be obtained but to delay it until it was actively sought end serious discussion begin humor save this post to disk or file server someday it will be considered the most important writing since the commandments you want an original copy stay tuned for the rfd on soc religion eveism can i get a tax deduction for money i donate to this organization return to serious discussion when posting follow ups stephen weinstein weinss rpi edu

talk.religion.misc

o t o clarification sorry the san jose based rosicrucian order is called a m o r c i don t remember for the time being what the a m stand for but o r c is ordo rosae crucis in other words latin for order of the rose cross sigh seems l m loosing more and more of my long term memory otherwise their headquarters in san jose has a pretty decent metaphysical bookstore if any of you are interested in such books and my son loves to run around in their egyptian museum cheers kent sandvik newton apple com alink ksand private activities on the net

talk.religion.misc

re catholic lit crit of a s s in dlphknob camelot dlphknob camelot bradley edu writes in apr mtechca maintech com foster mtechca maintech com writes i am surprised and saddened i would expect this kind of behavior from the evangelical born again gospel thumping in your face we re the only true christian protestants but i have always thought that catholics behaved better than this please do not stoop to the level of the e b a g t i y f w t o t c protestants who think that the best way to witness is to be strident intrusive loud insulting and overbearingly self righteous pleading mode on please i m begging you quit confusing religious groups and stop making generalizations i m a protestant i m an evangelical i don t believe that my way is the only way i m not a creation scientist i don t think that homosexuals should be hung by their toenails if you want to discuss bible thumpers you would be better off singling out and making obtuse generalizations about fundamentalists if you compared the actions of presbyterians or methodists with those of southern baptists you would think that they were different religions sarcasm on be sure we pick on the correct groups here bible thumpers fundamentalists and southern baptists deserve our hasty generalizations and prejudicial statements just don t pick on the presbyterians and the methodists sarcasm off please prejudice is about thinking that all people of a group are the same so please don t write off all protestants or all evangelicals pleading mode off god i wish i could get ahold of all the thomas stories fbzr enval jvagre fhaqnlf jura gurer f n yvggyr oberqbz lbh fubhyq nyjnlf pneel n tha abg gb fubbg lbhefrys ohg gb xabj rknpgyl gung lbh er nyjnlf znxvat n pubvpr yvan jregzhyyre jemaleddin sasha david cole iv chief of knobbery research dlphknob camelot bradley edu

talk.religion.misc

re alt sex stories under literary critical analysis in article qevbh h v agate berkeley edu dzkriz ocf berkeley edu dennis kriz wrote i m going to try to do something here that perhaps many would not have thought even possible i want to begin the process of initiating a literary critical study of the pornography posted on alt sex stories to identify the major themes and motifs present in the stories posted there opening up then the possibility of an objective moral evaluation of the material present there dennis i m astounded i didn t know you were interested to even study such filth as alt sex stories provide cheers kent sandvik newton apple com alink ksand private activities on the net

talk.religion.misc

re abortion to margoli watson ibm com larry margolis from anthony landreneau ozonehole com lm the rape has passed there is nothing that will ever take that away lm true but forcing her to remain pregnant continues the violation of lm her body for another months i see this as being unbelievably cruel life is not a violation as for cruel killing a living being solely because it exsist that my friend is down right cold anthony slmr what s the difference between an orange the ozone hole bbs a private bulletin board service full service nodes usrobotics k bps gigs files skydive new orleans rime network mail hub usenet newsgroups please route all questions or inquiries to postmaster ozonehole com

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in article pww spac at rice edu pww spacsun rice edu peter walker writes in article apr rotag mi org kevin rotag mi org kevin darcy wrote the phenomenologist husserl for one considered intentionality to be the primary ontological stuff from which all other ontology was built perceptions consciousness thoughts etc frank is by no means alone in seeing intentionality or values as he puts it underlying all human experience even the so called objective experiences such as measurements of the natural world or the output of your des chip and others of us see it as intellectual masturbation i ll defer to your greater firsthand knowledge in such matters kevin

talk.religion.misc

re after years can we say that christian morality is in my mind to say that science has its basis in values is a bit of a reach science has its basis in observable fact i d say that what one chooses to observe and how the observation is interpreted and what significance it s given depends a great deal on the values of the observer science is a human activity and as such is subject to the same potential for distortion as any other human activity the myth that scientists are above moral influence or ethical concern that their knowledge can be abstacted whole and pure from nature untainted by the biases of the scientist is nonsense bill if one is to argue for objective values in a moral sense then one must first start by demonstrating that morality itself is objective considering the meaning of the word objective i doubt that this will ever happen so back to the original question and objective morality is this may be an unfortunate choice of words almost self contradictory objective in the sense used here means something immutable and absolute while morality describes the behavior of some group of people the first term is all inclusive the second is specific the concept supposedly described may have meaning however if there is a god as described by the christians for instance then he has existence apart from and independent of humankind his existence is outside of our frame of reference reality if this being declares a thing to be so it is necessarily so since he has defined himself as omnipotent and if his claims are to be believed he is at least omnipotent relative to us god is intrinsically self defined and all reality is whatever he says it is in an objective sense if god determines a standard of conduct that standard is objective if human beings are held accountable for their conformance to that standard while permitted to ignore it they substitute a relative morality or mode of conduct giving the term morality a nebulous meaningless sense that can be argued about by those pretending to misunderstand the standard is objective and the conduct required to meet that standard is therefore objectively determined just because it is convenient to pretend that the term morality is infinitely malleable doesn t mean that the objective standard itself doesn t exist morality has come to mean little more than a cultural norm or the preferred conduct of decent people making it seem subjective but it is derived from an absolute objective standard ironically this objective standard is in perfect accord with our true nature according to christianity at least yet is condemned as being contrary to human nre oppressive and severe this may be due as bill much to our amoral inclinations as to the standard itself but like it or not it s there x

talk.religion.misc

re flaming nazis okay i ll bite i should probably leave this alone but what the heck in article apr sun urz uni heidelberg de gsmith lauren iwr uni heidelberg de gene w smith writes in article tt r b w w brewich hou tx us popec brewich hou tx us pope charles writes rhoemer was the name of the guy responsible for much of the uniforms and props used by the early nazis in their rallies and such the name is roehm not rhoemer and hitler does claim that he came up with the swastika business but didn t he credit the actual flag design to a party member some dentist or other i believe he gives such credit in mein kampf he was killed in an early nazi purge he and many of his associates were flaming homosexuals well know also for their flamboyant orgies i have been trying to find if there is any actual evidence for this common assertion recently postings to such groups as soc history and soc culture german has not uncovered any net experts who could provide any well i m no expert but all of the histories of nazi germany assert this they make reference to several scandals that occurred long before the night of the long knives the impression that i got was that homosexuality in portions of the sa was common knowledge also a book by a homosexual author whose name escapes me at the moment called homosexuals in history asserts that roehm and heines were homosexuals as well as others in roehm s sa circle all the books say that roehm and his associate edmund heines were homosexual i have been able to find nothing beyond that and suspect this to be a sort of historical urban legend well you re the one who is in germany if you don t believe the history books look up the primary sources yourself those of us outside of germany do not have access to these you do it seems to me that there were plenty of documented instances several scandals the fact that on the knight of the long knives several sa members including heines were found sleeping together etc also i believe some people were complaining about the sa s homosexual activities seducing young boys etc the histories that i ve read make a very convincing case none of this sounds like urban legend to me irving a notoriously unreliable historian says that funk the nazi finance minister was homosexual he gives no sources i know next to nothing about irving and nothing about funk what precisely do you know that would contradict all of the other history books that i have read concerning the existence of homosexual nazis are you trying to say that all historians are taking part in an anti homosexual smear what about homosexual writers who agree with the official history don t you think they would have found out the truth by now if roehm and heines were not homosexuals i would think they would want to disassociate homosexuality from nazism no one should use any connection between the two to bash homosexuals in any case i challenge anyone to document this claim if you are going to challenge all historians on this point not just irving then the burden of proof is on you track down the references find out where the stories originate from again you are the one in germany close to archival material most people on the net are not i have found a great deal of evidence that there were many flaming heterosexuals among the nazis this seems to include all of the worst ones hitler himmler goebbels goering heydrich eichmann and many more eh what is your agenda here to prove that the nazis were heterosexuals so that you can bash heterosexuals does it bother you that some of the nazis might have been homosexuals does this make all homosexuals bad if this is true of course not and what about bisexuals are they half nazis i don t know why it would be so difficult to believe that some nazis were homosexuals the german officer corps before ww for instance was notorious for its homosexuality there were numerous scandals which rocked the german govt during the late th and early th century many of the kaiser s friends were prosecuted the kaiser was no homosexual but the germany army had a long tradition of tolerating homosexuality going far back into prussian history back to frederick the great at least who was himself a homosexual roehm was a product of this prussian officer tradition and the old german army like the english public school system being a well known center of homosexuality would have been quite willing to overlook roehm s homosexuality in addition some nazis complained of homosexuality in the hitler youth the hitler youth swallowed up all pre nazi youth groups and some of the various pre war vandervogel bund and volkish youth groups were known to promote homoerotic ideals and friendship and in many cases homosexuality itself so it seems to me not unlikely that there were plenty of homosexual nazis regardless of the official nazi dogmas concerning the evils of homosexuality why should this suprise anyone homosexuality has always existed in all societies it would be most unusual if the nazis were an exception no i don t have any sources for you as i think the only kind of proof you will accept would be citations from archival material and i do not have access to these nor do i intend to reread every book on the nazis and on modern homosexuality that i have ever read i don t have the time nothing is stopping you however from chasing down those sources until you prove otherwise though i will stick with the established histories david matthew deane deane binah cc brandeis edu be in me as the eternal moods of the bleak wind let the gods speak softly of us in days hereafter ezra pound

talk.religion.misc

apr god s promise in philippians those things which ye have both learned and received and heard and seen in me do and the god of peace shall be with you philippians

talk.religion.misc

re apr god s promise in john in article rn b w w tweekco uucp alizard tweekco uucp a lizard wrote judging from postings i ve read all over usenet and on non usenet bbs conferences barney is definitely an endangered species especially if he runs into me in a dark alley please please don t make barney to a modern martyr saviour mythical figure i detest this being and if humans will create a religion in his name then life will be unbearable cheers kent sandvik newton apple com alink ksand private activities on the net

talk.religion.misc

re disillusioned protestant finds christ in article c kxdd k j boi hp com jburrill boi hp com jim burrill wrote if jesus never taught the concept of the trinity how do you deal with the following mat then jesus came to them and said all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me mat therefore go and make disciples of all nations baptizing them in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy spirit mat and teaching them to obey everything i have commanded you and surely i am with you always to the very end of the age jim please that s a lame explanation of the trinity that jesus provides above baptizing people in the name of three things trinity if this is the case then i m wrong i assumed that trinity implies that god is three entities and yet the same cheers kent sandvik newton apple com alink ksand private activities on the net

talk.religion.misc

re biblical backing of koresh s tape cites enclosed netd susie sbc com writes in article apr utarlg uta edu b zaw utarlg uta edu stephen for those who think david koresh didn t have a solid structure or sound biblical backing for his hour long tape broadcast i don t think anyone really cares about the solid structure of his sermon it s the deaths he s responsible for that concern most people and i think we ought to hold christ accoountable for all of his followers who died at the hand of the romans also it was their own fault for believing god this society reminds me more of the roman empire every day i guess i ll just log off and go watch american gladiators cutter gloster via mind org chris all jobs are easy to the person who doesn t have to do them holt s law

talk.religion.misc

re albert sabin in article apr nntpd cxo dec com sharpe nmesis enet dec com system privileged account writes in article c ftjt sunfish usd edu rfox charlie usd edu rich fox univ of south dakota writes in article apr rambo atlanta dg com wpr atlanta dg com bill rawlins writes earlier dialogue deleted perhaps you should read it and stop advancing the bible as evidence relating to questions of science it did jesus exist by g a wells there is a great fallacy in your statement the question of origins is based on more than science alone nope no fallacy yep science is best in determining how religions handle why and who rich i am curious as to why you and others award custody of the baby to theists and religion i hope i didn t award custody rich i purposely used handle in order to avoid doing so i e that happens to be what religions do of course there are aberrations like scientific creationism i used best in part to indicate that science currently has a time of it with why and who so these domains are mostly ignored i also attempted to be brief which no doubt confused the matter as an aside for science i should have written how and when nobody seems to argue over what are they theists theologians any better equiped to investigate the who and why than magicians astrologers housewives not being sexists athiests or agnostics seems to me that the answer would vary from individual to individual i m not trying to be evasive on this but from a societal perspective religion works on the other hand sometimes it is abused and misused and many suffer which you know but the net result seems positive this from the anthropological perspective on human affairs you might call me a neo fruedian insofar as i think the masses can t get along without religion not that generally they are incapable they just don t and for myriad reasons but the main one seems to be the promise of immortality very seductive that immortality therefore it seems that theologians are better equipped than the others you mention for dispensing answers to who and why i suggest that this holds regardless of the truth in their answers to who and why simply because people believe in the end spiritual beliefs are just as real as scientific facts and explanation caution to some do not take this out of context do you suggest that the who and why will forever be closed to scientific investigation no in fact i don t think it is closed now at least for some individuals isn t there a group of theoretical physicists who argue that matter was created from nothing in a big bang singularity this approach might presuppose an absence of who and why except that it seems it could be argued that something had to be responsible for nothing maybe that something doesn t have to be supernatural maybe just mechanistic but that s a tough one for people today to grasp in any case theory without empirical data is not explanation but then your question does not require data in other words i agree that theorizing within scientific parameters is just as scientific as explaining so the answer is who and why are not closed to scientists but i sense that science in these realms is currently very inadequate data will be necessary for improvement and that seems a long way off if ever pretty convoluted here i hope i ve made sense it seems to me that or so years ago the question of the origin of life on earth was not considered open to scientific enquiry i agree generally but i prefer to put it this way the questions of how when who and why were not open to inquiry during the enlightenment reason was reponsible for questioning the theological answers to how and when and not for the most part who and why science was thus born out of the naturalists curiosity eventually carting away the how and when while largely leaving behind the who and why the ignorant the selfish the intolerant and the arrogant of course still claim authority in all four domains rich fox anthro usouthdakota did like your discussion around amhs and i did figure out what amh was from your original post much obliged funny how facts tend to muddle things isn t it well i am sure there are plenty of scientific creationist rebuttals out there somewhere even if they have to be created from nothing just for the record again amh anatomically modern humans best regards rich fox anthro usouthdakota