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| נשלח ב-28/12/2006 22:55 |
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It is a common mistake which is firmly rooted in many minds, that the Bible's presentation of Creation is scientific as would be any book of geology and physical cosmology. The organisational nature of the story of creation in the bible is so obvious and so compatible with its educational purpose, that there is no reason to assume a revelation of future scientific discoveries. Man has been taught that the burden of scientific revelation bears upon him. Interestingly, the jewish calendar does not start day one from the first day of creation, which couldn't be a proper day with no astrological system yet, but from day six, when the creation of the first chronicled man, Adam, is described.
Understanding the educational purpose of the Bible, suggests that also historical facts in the Bible, may not have happened, but were told for education's sake. The probability that the book of Job is a mere legend is widely accepted in judaism based upon a talmudic opinion.
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| נשלח ב-28/12/2006 22:56 |
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I9I Atheists ignore the fact that religion is extremely beneficial to society
Those who emphasize the good effects of religion never seem to realize that such effects fail to demonstrate the truth of any religious doctrine. This is why we have terms such as "wishful thinking" and "self-deception." There is a profound distinction between a consoling delusion and the truth.
In any case, the good effects of religion can surely be disputed. In most cases, it seems that religion gives people bad reasons to behave well, when good reasons are actually available. Ask yourself, which is more moral, helping the poor out of concern for their suffering, or doing so because you think the creator of the universe wants you to do it, will reward you for doing it or will punish you for not doing it?
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| נשלח ב-28/12/2006 23:25 |
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This the crux of the problem with religion, that it does not provide anymore a gradual process for maturing out of it. In the past before the oral interpretation of the bible was written down and that its texts were holified to a similar level to the written divine revelation, it provided an evolutionary dynamism. this has been blocked and religion has stagnated.
Furthermore, religions have failed to understand the necessity for dynamism to a point that they have developped a cruel intolerance towards those who matured out of its nitty gritty details. That intolerance undermines the purpose of religion and may cause the desmise of the stiffening religions as they become unbearable.
תוקן על ידי שכליאל ב- 28/12/2006 23:54:24
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| נשלח ב-28/12/2006 23:27 |
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I10I Atheism provides no basis for morality
If a person doesn't already understand that cruelty is wrong, he won't discover this by reading the Bible or the Koran — as these books are bursting with celebrations of cruelty, both human and divine. We do not get our morality from religion. We decide what is good in our good books by recourse to moral intuitions that are (at some level) hard-wired in us and that have been refined by thousands of years of thinking about the causes and possibilities of human happiness.
We have made considerable moral progress over the years, and we didn't make this progress by reading the Bible or the Koran more closely. Both books condone the practice of slavery — and yet every civilized human being now recognizes that slavery is an abomination. Whatever is good in ure — like the golden rule — can be valued for its ethical wisdom without our believing that it was handed down to us by the creator of the universe.
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| נשלח ב-28/12/2006 23:49 |
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The knowledge and the basic practices of morality are already acquired in kindergarden. However, that knowledge and training is not sufficient for overcoming the trials of life that man encounters as he grows. He needs to grow in an atmosphere of moral discipline which as mentioned earlier, is provided solely by religious obligation with its godly supervision of the most inner recluses of human dwellings and of the depths of his heart.
The Bible does not portray utopian human beings and does not demand to jump at once to utopia. Human nature allows man to mature gradually. When slavery was accepted everywhere it would have no educational sense to demand its banishment. It would either cause the rejection of the bible or it would mold man to do something that would remain unacceptable to his heart and would be performed as hypocritical acting. The bible takes man as he is and leads him gradually to become man as he should be. It is therefore that the bible requires an oral interpretation which keeps the bible's principles throughout the changes in human mental and moral evolution.
The stagnation that has occured with the oral interpretation is the problem of religions as mentioned earlier.
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