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Its obvious you are just trying to agitate them. But to entertain you the last two wouldn't be "resurrected" so to speak (even though this is something some de

Its obvious you are just trying to agitate them. But to entertain you the last two wouldn't be "resurrected" so to speak (even though this is something some denominations believe it is not universal). To accept Christ you need to, in every denomination, say some form of a prayer of salvation. This excludes the last two regardless of the purity of one of them. The first man could be saved if he turned his life towards Christ and quit his evil. Second man is a shoe-in. I'd recommend reading the bible. I've done it once for bible school many, many years ago and once more for my own edification. Even if you don't believe in Christ, in order to construct a salient argument in the framework of the religion you should at least know what you're arguing.

sudhirc 4y ago
Which bible version do you recommend? I am not trying to agitate him. Rather I am trying to have a logical conversation. I do not understand what makes someone in 21st century believe in a God that is willing to let upright people burn in hell just because they do not pledge alliance to him. This idea of eternal saving vs. eternal damnation by all powerful almighty is so contrary to the ideas I have grown up with.
saiya-jin 4y ago
Not really, if you reject the whole premise of religions as desperate band-aid to that dark and terrible unknown that is death that scares all of us profoundly, and accept that they are frankly ridiculous fairytales that make no more sense in this world than Santa claus for example. They tell a lot how humans internally cope with such big unknown since our evolution as sentient beings, but not much about what is true and what isn't. There is really no deep need to understand bronze age morals, logic, misogyny etc. that translate very, very poorly to modern times and societies and this divide will get only bigger as time goes on. Or they do translate if you keep ignoring large parts of bible 'because they were not literal', while gladly accepting other which suit you more. One of endless examples - women marrying as non-virgins should be stoned to death instead. Or they should not be taught anything. Of course then comes the usual argument about old-vs-new testament, but that's just ridiculous mental gymnastics about the very simple and unavoidable fact that bible itself is very illogical and self-conflicting. As a true christian one should accept it all and not cherry-pick, I mean its 1 book. It doesn't matter that christianity with all its sub-sects is just a sect of early judaism, its still part of it and so is Old testament. So much for the word of god what should be pure truth across whole age of universe, it can't hold even 2000 years very well. And we talk about already heavily re-re-re-edited version that was done in proper fanatical times by fanatical zealots and approved by highest christianity power structures, so obviously made things quite a bit more smooth - I bet easily 1000 bucks that reading original texts would be pretty shocking to every single christian. Some stories have nice moral conclusions, but so do Ezop's tales and gazillion other ancient texts, so that's not an argument. I can't talk to my some of my relatives who are religious about this, because we very soon, in any topic, arrive at illogical situations that they can't explain even though they have deep understanding of the bible, can't reason and just turn to childish reaction in vein of 'its like that because its like that and stop it'. I have a pet theory that people raised in religion create this inner soothing bandaid that explains all terrible and dreadful and this becomes unremovable part of their personality, it becomes all time go-to place when anything goes south in their lives. It becomes their permanent source of strength and permanent weakness. From what I saw over my life, the weakness part is much much more prevalent unfortunately. It drives them into desperate situations where instead of helping themselves and/or others they get passive and pious. They start praying like crazy, even though they know no god ever worked like that. They can't even properly entertain the idea that there may not be any god, immortal soul, afterlife etc. and what we have now is all there is and ever will be. For me its liberating thought, I do believe in mankind and its future among stars and that's more then enough, no need to wish for eternal life. And if there is some form of creator, he truly doesn't care about us anymore, at least in this universe. But those indoctrinated from early age into word/by/word religious texts just can't do it, even with gun to their head, hence what I call 'permanent weakness'. Doing this to your own kids should be criminal in 21st century since they have 0 defense to indoctrination from their closest ones, let them grow up and decide for themselves. I would have much much more respect for ie christianity or other religions if they sticked just to those 10 commandments, which basically say 'be a good moral person'. But people being stupid arrogant delusional as they always are, created whole made up universe and its origin stories, didn't even check properly (or ignored) what others wrote before them so conflicts abound, created ridiculous power structures that have absolutely no reason to exist and did frankly absolutely horrible things for whole medieval times in Europe and also long time after that, all to present times. Also religions should be uniting people, but oh boy they do divide them like nothing else. Catholics vs protestants, X vs Y, not much love there, its never 'us christians' (same as ie sunni vs shiites, for outsider just kids squabbling over something unimportant). Mental exercise - can you entertain this idea for a moment that what you believe ain't true in any way? Can you properly accept it and continue living with it even through difficult times that life always brings, never reverting somewhere deep inside back? /rant over
- sudhirc 4y ago
  > Not really, if you reject the whole premise of religions as desperate band-aid to that dark and terrible unknown that is death that scares all of us profoundly Not all cultures are scared of death. For example for Hindus death is like changing clothes. I come from the land where someone dying after living a full life is actually celebrated with dance and music. I seriously didn't get the hue and cry over the death of 90+ years old queen. Were people expecting her to live forever in that frail failing body? > I would have much much more respect for ie christianity or other religions if they sticked just to those 10 commandments, which basically say 'be a good moral person'. That's pretty much the essense of eastern dharma Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism,Sikhism etc. There are no commandments. karma returns back what you accrue. Gods can't do zilch to fix bad karma.

sudhirc 4y ago

Which bible version do you recommend? I am not trying to agitate him. Rather I am trying to have a logical conversation. I do not understand what makes someone in 21st century believe in a God that is willing to let upright people burn in hell just because they do not pledge alliance to him. This idea of eternal saving vs. eternal damnation by all powerful almighty is so contrary to the ideas I have grown up with.

saiya-jin 4y ago

Not really, if you reject the whole premise of religions as desperate band-aid to that dark and terrible unknown that is death that scares all of us profoundly, and accept that they are frankly ridiculous fairytales that make no more sense in this world than Santa claus for example. They tell a lot how humans internally cope with such big unknown since our evolution as sentient beings, but not much about what is true and what isn't. There is really no deep need to understand bronze age morals, logic, misogyny etc. that translate very, very poorly to modern times and societies and this divide will get only bigger as time goes on. Or they do translate if you keep ignoring large parts of bible 'because they were not literal', while gladly accepting other which suit you more. One of endless examples - women marrying as non-virgins should be stoned to death instead. Or they should not be taught anything. Of course then comes the usual argument about old-vs-new testament, but that's just ridiculous mental gymnastics about the very simple and unavoidable fact that bible itself is very illogical and self-conflicting. As a true christian one should accept it all and not cherry-pick, I mean its 1 book. It doesn't matter that christianity with all its sub-sects is just a sect of early judaism, its still part of it and so is Old testament. So much for the word of god what should be pure truth across whole age of universe, it can't hold even 2000 years very well. And we talk about already heavily re-re-re-edited version that was done in proper fanatical times by fanatical zealots and approved by highest christianity power structures, so obviously made things quite a bit more smooth - I bet easily 1000 bucks that reading original texts would be pretty shocking to every single christian. Some stories have nice moral conclusions, but so do Ezop's tales and gazillion other ancient texts, so that's not an argument. I can't talk to my some of my relatives who are religious about this, because we very soon, in any topic, arrive at illogical situations that they can't explain even though they have deep understanding of the bible, can't reason and just turn to childish reaction in vein of 'its like that because its like that and stop it'. I have a pet theory that people raised in religion create this inner soothing bandaid that explains all terrible and dreadful and this becomes unremovable part of their personality, it becomes all time go-to place when anything goes south in their lives. It becomes their permanent source of strength and permanent weakness. From what I saw over my life, the weakness part is much much more prevalent unfortunately. It drives them into desperate situations where instead of helping themselves and/or others they get passive and pious. They start praying like crazy, even though they know no god ever worked like that. They can't even properly entertain the idea that there may not be any god, immortal soul, afterlife etc. and what we have now is all there is and ever will be. For me its liberating thought, I do believe in mankind and its future among stars and that's more then enough, no need to wish for eternal life. And if there is some form of creator, he truly doesn't care about us anymore, at least in this universe. But those indoctrinated from early age into word/by/word religious texts just can't do it, even with gun to their head, hence what I call 'permanent weakness'. Doing this to your own kids should be criminal in 21st century since they have 0 defense to indoctrination from their closest ones, let them grow up and decide for themselves. I would have much much more respect for ie christianity or other religions if they sticked just to those 10 commandments, which basically say 'be a good moral person'. But people being stupid arrogant delusional as they always are, created whole made up universe and its origin stories, didn't even check properly (or ignored) what others wrote before them so conflicts abound, created ridiculous power structures that have absolutely no reason to exist and did frankly absolutely horrible things for whole medieval times in Europe and also long time after that, all to present times. Also religions should be uniting people, but oh boy they do divide them like nothing else. Catholics vs protestants, X vs Y, not much love there, its never 'us christians' (same as ie sunni vs shiites, for outsider just kids squabbling over something unimportant). Mental exercise - can you entertain this idea for a moment that what you believe ain't true in any way? Can you properly accept it and continue living with it even through difficult times that life always brings, never reverting somewhere deep inside back? /rant over

sudhirc 4y ago
> Not really, if you reject the whole premise of religions as desperate band-aid to that dark and terrible unknown that is death that scares all of us profoundly Not all cultures are scared of death. For example for Hindus death is like changing clothes. I come from the land where someone dying after living a full life is actually celebrated with dance and music. I seriously didn't get the hue and cry over the death of 90+ years old queen. Were people expecting her to live forever in that frail failing body? > I would have much much more respect for ie christianity or other religions if they sticked just to those 10 commandments, which basically say 'be a good moral person'. That's pretty much the essense of eastern dharma Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism,Sikhism etc. There are no commandments. karma returns back what you accrue. Gods can't do zilch to fix bad karma.