Thanks brother, I think we both veer off in different directions within the first couple steps so arrive at different understanding/feeling of theology, human nature, the world/universe, etc.
First where is your avatar from? It looks like a scene from an old dragon slayer movie but the quality is too good.
I would have thought your objections would have come from father down the list. The first few are not usually debated.
1. God is perfect. This one is far more simple than most would realize. If God is the ultimate moral truth then whatever he did would be true and the standard. There is little need to try and decide whether his actions line up with some external standard. It is also futile because there isn't one. Whatever he would do would become right by his doing it. Whatever he would demand would be absolute and objective (as far as we are concerned). This is the end result of divine command theory. I do not like it but am forced to accept it because it necessarily must be true if God exists. So God is perfect whether we agree with it or not (which is the only response we have available, agreement or rejection). Neither however would change the fact.
2. God cannot accept imperfection (a violation of his nature and requirements) concerning him or heaven remain God. The minute God compromises he is no longer God.
3. This one is even more simple. There literally is nothing that we have that can do anything to erase our mistakes or make us perfect.
I really thought you could have agreed with those.
b I read a few them. There is great difficulty in trying to pin an evil wrap on anything God would do. You would have to show God did not have justifiable moral reasons for his actions. Being that you and I are extremely finite creatures with a tiny fraction of the relevant information and God is an infinite being with every scrap of info possible it is an ant telling Newton how to do calculus. Now that is not to say that you can't reject God by considering his actions evil using your moral conscience as a standard. However you would not know if you were right until it was to late to change your mind. As an example give me one evil action God had committed (by your standards) that is illustrated in the Bible and how you KNOW it was actually evil.
This other thread I was in and out of last night better shows my take on Christianity and some of my own path.
It appears you have taken Biblical stories who's context and meaning have been pretty much uncontroversial for thousands of years and distorted them into something that reinforces an attitude you had before you read them. For example you took a story about Abraham's son and turned into either a God was toying with Abraham by seeing if he would do the right thing by not obeying him (which by the way is the exact opposite of how the story actually goes, a God who was impersonating demons, or a God who could not control what appeared in his revelation to man.
The actual story has 2 very important messages that completely ship wreck your interpretations.
1. God used this example to illustrate in no uncertain terms that they were not to do as other tribes in the area did and sacrifice their sons to him. The primary motivation for this event was to answer once and for all that no one is to be killed for him as was commonly done in their day. That is the diametric opposite end of the spectrum than evil. We are not and can not supply anything to fix the mess sin creates, as in the story of Abraham and Isaac and the cross God would supply the only thing perfect enough to eradicate our debt. That is the very heights of love, not evil.
2. Secondary point was to test Abraham's faith and to illustrate what he was to do in the future. I do not think God was ignorant of Abraham's devotion. I think Go used this to test Abraham for Abraham's sake. When I or anyone questions what we believe, we usually search our past for clues. For my faith I remember experiencing God directly a few times, having a few prayers answered, and the difference I could see in changed lives. Abraham at any moment where he was concerned about what he might loose could look back and remember his former willingness to give all and draw strength for it. As usual God does things in far more sophisticated ways than men do. He used this one event to also indicate what he would be doing in the future.
The OT is full of types and shadows of things fulfilled in full expression in the NT. The lambs blood on the door posts is an extremely detailed type of what would be the crucifixion, Abraham and Isaac another form of it, Melchizedek a form of eternal Christ like priesthood, etc.. People just are not that sophisticated.
Fundamental differences in the Divine being immanent or not and duality in general exist. The salvation of the cross requires a certain interpretation of Jewish writings that don't follow with me from the get go.
Are you suggesting that prophecies about a rejected, dying, and rising messiah are not in the OT? There are hundreds of them including details like the gall being refused by Christ, him not answering questions when interrogated, his being spat on, his clothes being gambled for, etc.... 350 plus.
Usually the claim goes like this. Isaiah 53 for example is said to either apply to Christ or the nation of Israel depending on who is reading, but this is silly. Actually it applies to both, but the question is how do we know it applies to Christ. The answer is simple, probability. The chances one human life would meet so many detailed criteria by accident is non-existent, the chances a nation over thousands of years would have some events that can be contorted to fit predictions by coincidence is almost 100%. So it is impossible to claim Christ accidentally met detailed criteria, but it is easy to say that criteria can mistakenly be applied to a nation. Not to mention that using my points as a premise exactly what occurred on Calvary should be expected as it would be a necessity. Since Jews killed Christ there exists every motivation possible to negate him as messiah. There exists almost no motivation apart from it being true to do the opposite.
BTW most NT scholars on all sides agree to 4 fundamental events (among many).
1. Christ appeared on the scene with an unprecedented sense of divine authority. In this context it makes no difference if he had it or not.
2. That he was killed by crucifixion.
3. That his tomb was found empty.
4. That sincere and credible testimony from even his enemies records experiencing him after death by many people.
Now between the Jews who killed him and never experienced him (some did but most did not) and the Christians who recorded experiencing every detail of the narrative (and who lived according to that faith even facing death along the way). Which group is in the best position to know? Is the claim Christ existed and rose from the dead or the claim he did not best explained by those 4 historical very likely events?
There would have to be extremely good reason, evidence, proofs for me to accept 'Transcendent God and dirty, evil humans' ideology that flies in the face of what natural, organic traditions feel/believe past and present as well as the Divine in my heart and mind.
Well the Biblical God is the most associated concept in human history with goodness, love, self sacrifice, and morality. Humans over 5000 years have had 300 of peace. I think the evidence is obvious.
Hebrew/Jewish cultural literature, or more so certain interpretations, ain't enough to do it.
How about a legal dissertation on the Gospels by two of if not the two greatest experts on testimony and evidence in human history (Simon Greenleaf and Lord Lyndhurst). How about the fact that maybe 1/4 of the human population claims to have experienced on the basis of Christ's rising from the dead or the fact that 2/3 of the human population agrees with a divine being and a faulty humanity. Would that tip the scale? If not what would?
