The Garden of Eden

[F1fan]

You are now free to buy stocks and become an owner and a suppressor of the workers in the mind of Marx. Marx followers seem to create chaos/revolution, much like was done by the trained Marxist, the leaders of BLM,

So you oppose black citizens protesting police brutality? Do you think black citizens shouldn't have civil rights? Do you see the civil rights marches and violence of the 60's as chaos/revolution, and bad thing? If so, bad for who?

and then just try and take the means of production, which were accumulated by those making wise investments, rather than sleeping in mom's basement, and then black mailing corporations, before buying multimillion dollar homes.

Communism was way too idealistic to ever work. The same way Capitalism can't work in an idealistic way. That's where civil rights started, the abuses of capitalists.

Did you notice the antifa rift raft were sons and daughters of the elites,

No I haven't. It's an irrelevant fringe group.

who went to your elite colleges, and apparently only learned to create chaos in their effort to destroy what is to be able to create their own Marxist Utopia and do cardboard gardening in the streets.

If this is all you have as an example it's exceptionally weak. Where is your gripe against banks and the corruption of big business? There's your actual elite. They manipulate right wing citizens so they can get republicans elected, and cut their taxes so they can accumulate more wealth. Not a single word from you are these sins, greed, lies, etc.

 

[DavidSMoore]

Your Progressive Argentina example came within a hairs breath of collapse, before a social conservative in the Libertarian party pulled it from collapse, and fired your Progressive non-working elements in the government to make the country economically stable. As for "democracies", there are around 2000 different types of democracies, ranging from full democracies with 23 countries, to authoritative democracies with 57 countries, with scores ranging from rich Norway with an 87% rating, which lives off its energy wealth, such as oil and gas, to Yemen with a 22% rating. Norway is stable because it is rich and made good investments. Democracy Ranking - Wikipedia Obama with his pen and cell phone, turned the U.S. into a straight dictatorship, with Biden over taking Obama his number of executive decisions. Why don't you go to China with a 38 democracy rating, and participate in their democracy, which gives you a one-party choice, which is the aim of the Democratic party of the US in trying to raise the number of appointed Supreme Court Justices, the elimination of the electoral system, and the making D.C. a state, and exclude the opposition candidate through any means possible. As for rich democracies which turn dictatorial, Venezuela is at the top of the list, because of bad decisions, based on the Marxist theory. How Venezuela went from a rich democracy to a dictatorship on the brink of collapse Don't go there now, because they ate all of the Zoo animals. I would suggest you going to Cuba, which is considered a system which reflects the Marxist-Leninist principle of democratic centralism, except that energy prices just went up 500 % and a minimum subsidized food level no longer exist for all of the population, and they are asking the U.N. for milk to feed their children. Maybe you could make a plea for someone to purchase you a one-way ticket.

Here's another quote from Tyranny of the Minority:

In 1995, less than 25 percent of Americans expressed dissatisfaction with their democracy. That figure has increased dramatically in recent years, reaching 55 percent in 2020. Although public dissatisfaction with democracy has grown all of the world, it has risen more sharply in the United States than in other Western democracies. According to the Pew Research Center, only 41 percent of Americans said they were satisfied with democracy in 2021, compared with more than 60 percent in Australia, Canada, Germany, and the Netherlands and more than 70 percent in New Zealand and Sweden.
(Tyranny of the Minority, pg. 242-243)

Why are so many Americans dissatisfied with democracy? Our nation cannot be considered poor in any sense. Our Constitution is the oldest in the world. By any normal metric Americans should be the most satisfied with their democracy of any nation.
The simplest explanation is that the U.S. Constitution is stuck in the past. The Senate is where legislation goes to die. The House massively over-represents low population states. And the Electoral College is heavily skewed toward low population regions. Twice this century the loser of the popular vote has won in the Electoral College. Our Constitution needs reform.

 

[2ndpillar]

Why are so many Americans dissatisfied with democracy? Our nation cannot be considered poor in any sense. Our Constitution is the oldest in the world. By any normal metric Americans should be the most satisfied with their democracy of any nation.
The simplest explanation is that the U.S. Constitution is stuck in the past. The Senate is where legislation goes to die. The House massively over-represents low population states. And the Electoral College is heavily skewed toward low population regions. Twice this century the loser of the popular vote has won in the Electoral College. Our Constitution needs reform.

The constitution was formed to protect the minority, by giving each state 2 Senators, not to protect the majority cities, who seem to shoot themselves in the feet, and expect the minorities to pay for their mistakes. Instead of giving elite college graduates a debt relief for their massive student loans, I would suggest that the government offer the students a Peace Corp free ride to their favorite Marxist country, and try and fix world problems, with a hold on their debt balance while they save the world. When they return truly educated, they could then become productive, and then pay off their loans. At that point the American people might feel better about how their "democracy" spends their money.

 

[2ndpillar]

Which is a basic social rule. You don't think these rules didn't exist before the Hebrews wrote them down, do you?

Social order and religious rules evolved at the same time.

Your response was with respect to Yeshua's message, not "social order". As for "social order", there are basically two types, those who take/steal (wicked), such as the communist, and those who don't (righteous). Those who create chaos and steal, are represented by the Marxist, and the righteous, are those who do not covet their neighbor's goods. You can use your humanistic values to create your Marxist heaven (Utopia), but it will always devolve into hell, as is the case of China, Cuba, San Francisco, Venezuela, Portland, Cleveland, Chicago, and Russia right now. The best I can hope for is that you buy a fully EV vehicle, the weather turns cold, and the price of electricity skyrockets more, and you learn that the Progressive left is generally full of themselves. The good thing that Cuba has over California, is that the black outs are scheduled, rather than random. As for the Hebrews, before Abraham, you had Ur, and the men of renown, the giants, the offspring of the heavenly watchers. The offspring of the "heavenly watchers" produced the demons, which seem to rule your world (Revelation 16:13).

 

[DavidSMoore]

Obama with his pen and cell phone, turned the U.S. into a straight dictatorship, with Biden over taking Obama his number of executive decisions.

Here's a link to the Federal Registry of Executive Orders, by president:

Federal Register :: Request Access

I'll let the followers of this thread judge for themselves whether President Obama broke the mold.

 

[DavidSMoore]

The constitution was formed to protect the minority, by giving each state 2 Senators, not to protect the majority cities, who seem to shoot themselves in the feet, and expect the minorities to pay for their mistakes.

There was an intense debate about the structure of the Senate in the Federal Convention. Low population states had become accustomed to the power they had under the Articles of Confederation and they insisted upon equal representation in the Senate. Mr. Gerry (of Massachusetts) was present when the Articles of Confederation were written, and he voted in favor of their provision for one vote per state. Here's what he said about his decision:

Mr GERRY urged that we never were independent States, were not such now, & never could be even on the principles of the Confederation. The States & the advocates for them were intoxicated with the idea of their sovereignty. He was a member of Congress at the time the federal articles were formed. The injustice of allowing each State an equal vote was long insisted on. He voted for it, but it was agst his Judgment, and under the pressure of public danger, and the obstinancy of the lesser States. The present confederation he considered as dissolving. … He lamented that instead of coming here like a band of brothers, belonging to the same family, we seemed to have brought with us the spirit of political negociators.
(Solberg pg. 191)

After a couple of weeks of discussion it was decided to turn the decision about the Senate over to a committee. James Wilson and James Madison, the two most vocal supporters of a Senate that would represent people rather than states, were specifically excluded from that committee. In other words, the decision to cave in to the demands of the lower population states had already been made. It wasn't a decision that was intended to "protect the minority." It was an expediency that was adopted to placate the small states.

 

[2ndpillar]

I'll let the followers of this thread judge for themselves whether President Obama broke the mold.

Obama knew his DACA executive order was unconstitutional, and he did it anyway, which is breaking his oath of office. Similar to Caesar crossing the Rubicon. Obama’s Unconstitutional Immigration Order The man was a Progressive Marxist, whose idea was that he was god on earth, and his minions would follow him to hell, if they got them a check in the mail, or free medical care with them keeping their own physician. Well, the "many" keep falling for that kind of rhetoric, and like a frog, will not notice the temperature of the water until it is too late. As for the most "executive actions", that would fall on the Progressive Marxist, Franklin Roosevelt, the godfather of Obama and Biden.

 

[Anne1]

The Catholic Church no longer claims that the traditional belief in the immobility of the earth is true. So there's a clear example of the fact that tradition is no guarantee of truth, regardless of how many eons ago it was proclaimed to be so.

Sorry, but this is incorrect. The Catholic church wasn't around to claim anything at all about the earth in the year 500 BC.

 

[Anne1]

Not all of Genesis is allegorical. Do you consider the stories of Abram/Abraham and Isaac, Jacob and Esau, etc. allegories?

I beg your pardon if I didn't explain this correctly. Adam and Eve existed - that is the truth. But the garden and the snake were told in an allegorical manner, conveying real but complex truths in a way that could be understood by anyone.

Of course Abraham and Isaac existed. Good heavens this is one of the major prophecies in the Old Testament.

Does anyone know how the various Jewish denominations regard Genesis? I have a stepfather who is Jewish but, alas, heartbreakingly, he is an atheist who knows nothing about the Bible except to say it's all garbage..

 

[DavidSMoore]

Sorry, but this is incorrect. The Catholic church wasn't around to claim anything at all about the earth in the year 500 BC.

But the Catholic Church certainly existed in 1633 when Galileo was put on trial for asserting that the earth moves.

 

[DavidSMoore]

Obama knew his DACA executive order was unconstitutional, and he did it anyway, which is breaking his oath of office. Similar to Caesar crossing the Rubicon. Obama’s Unconstitutional Immigration Order The man was a Progressive Marxist, whose idea was that he was god on earth, and his minions would follow him to hell, if they got them a check in the mail, or free medical care with them keeping their own physician.

It's been several decades since I read the Communist Manifesto but I don't recall Marx saying anything about DACA or anything like DACA. So I'm not sure I understand how you got from DACA to Marxist. And if you think it represents Obama's darkly evil plot to overthrow the entire federal government, the Trump administration terminated DACA in 2017, thereby bringing Obama's scheme to a crashing halt. But then the Supreme Court found that the termination of the Trump administrations termination of DACA violated the Administrative Procedures Act and was therefore unconstitutional.

According to Pew Research 74% of Americans favor a law that would provide permanent legal status to immigrants who came to the U.S. illegally as children, while 24% are opposed. DACA perfectly illustrates my argument that the American people can't get what they want from their government. The American people want the DACA dreamers to have a pathway to citizenship. It's only a tiny minority that don't want that-- and yet they have been consistently able to kill any attempt by the majority to get what it wants.

 

[IndigoChild5559]

As far as you know, it's "a mythical place that never existed" (which is redundant). Of course, you can't prove that.

How do you know there was an "Ice Age"?

No, it can't be proven to be false. Just like you can't prove there is no Valhalla. Just like you can't prove Muhammad didn't see an angel. Just like you can't prove that the Navajo emerged from the underworld. Just like you can't prove that you have to pay Charon to ferry you over the river Styx.

 

[1213]

It's a fruit tree. People eat the fruit of fruit trees. They don't eat the bark or the leaves. I'm baffled by how you are reading this. You seem to be trying to make this story far more complicated than it is.

Sorry, if it feels complicated. I just want to say, God didn't say the fruit gives knowledge.

 

[1213]

The Serpent did not lie --- the Serpent told them the Truth .. that if they ate the fruit 1) they would not die 2) eyes will be opened knowing good and evil. Both things were true. it is the trickster God that lies. .. The Serpent God tells the Truth.

They died, lost their life with God. But, death is relatively slow process, for you it takes about 100 years.

Also, that day they knew like God about good and evil, because they understood what the serpent did to them. The fruit itself didn't give the knowledge, it was just the result of what they did.

 

[bobhikes]

Why did God evict Adam and Eve from the garden of Eden? Christian dogma holds that God kicked them out because they violated his directive not to eat the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But that’s not the whole story. Here’s what the Bible actually says:

God didn’t want them to have both knowledge of good and evil and eternal life, so he threw them out to prevent them from eating the fruit of the tree of life. So the moral of this story is that Adam and Eve blew the one chance that humanity had for eternal life by getting themselves kicked out of the garden of Eden and thereby no longer being able to eat the fruit of the tree of life.

And that is the perspective from which the entire Old Testament was written-- except for the book of Daniel. That is the only book of the Old Testament that specifically describes the resurrection of the dead, the last judgment, eternal life, and paradise-- all four of those things.

Don’t take my word for it. Here’s what the world of biblical scholarship said about the matter more than 25 years ago:


There’s plenty of evidence from the biblical text itself that on the whole the Old Testament authors didn’t believe in the New Testament notion of the resurrection. Here’s an excerpt from the Psalms:

If God doesn’t remember those who are dead, then he can’t forgive their sins. If the dead are cut off from God’s hand, then he can’t resurrect them.

Chapter 2 of the book of Isaiah describes the author’s vision of the end of time:


What is most significant about the author’s words is what they do not say. There’s no mention of the resurrection of the dead, of the last judgment, of eternal life, or of paradise. But here’s what he says will happen:


That’s a description of farmers living in peace with the farmers of other nations. That’s not a description of angelic beings playing laudatory music in the vault of heaven.

In Zechariah Chapter 14 the author describes his vision of the end of time. Prior to that time the enemies of Jerusalem will surround the city:


But God will appear and will battle against the gathered nations:


God will bring about the destruction of Jerusalem’s enemies. And what then?


What is the Festival of Booths? It’s a Jewish religious observance. So in Zechariah’s vision everyone who survives the existential battle for Jerusalem will ultimately be converted to Judaism. And they will be required to go into the city of Jerusalem every year to observe the Festival of Booths. As far as I am aware there are no Christian sects that observe the Festival of Booths.

And as in Isaiah there is no mention anywhere in Zechariah of the resurrection of the dead, of a last judgment, of eternal life, or of paradise. The visions of these two very well known Old Testament authors have literally nothing in common with the New Testament vision of the end of time.

The book of Job has the longest discourse on man’s place in the universe of any book in the Bible. Job’s life was destroyed. He lost his oxen and asses to the Sabeans. His sheep and servants were consumed by fire. His camels were carried off by the Chaldeans. His sons and daughters were all killed when a great wind destroyed the house in which they were dining. And finally Satan afflicted Job with suppurating sores that covered his entire body.
Job debates the cause of his plight with several other men and claims that he was wrongly punished. But at no time throughout the discussion is there any mention of rewards or punishments in the afterlife. At the very end (Job 42:1-6) Job confesses to God that he was mistaken about God’s purposes. God accepts his apology and returns to Job everything that he had lost-- in this life, not in any version of an afterlife.

The Christian dogma of Original Sin holds that the terrible crime committed by Adam and Eve-- that of eating the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil-- has propagated throughout the entire human genome. As a result every human who has ever lived has been tainted with that indelible stain and is therefore utterly steeped in evil.
But as we’ve seen above, the story of the garden of Eden is less about the knowledge of good and evil than it is about eternal life. From what God actually said in Genesis 3:22, God would have been perfectly content to allow the humans to have knowledge of good and evil so long as they didn’t also have eternal life.

The doctrine of Original Sin is predicated on a complete misreading of the otherwise charming story of the garden of Eden. And it is one that has utterly warped the Christian understanding of human nature.

Early Christianity was manipulated by the Roman's. Romans were the first supporters of the Christain religion as such a lot of the Roman mythology is in it. The catholic church is in my opinion the last stand for the Romans to take over the world. If you look at its setup and compare it to the Roman government, there are far too many similarities. As I said even the religion itself has comparison to Roman Mythology. Even the Roman way to govern other nations works. They didn't go in and rule with an iron fist, they put local friendlies in charge and supported them with the military.

 

[Sargonski]

They died, lost their life with God. But, death is relatively slow process, for you it takes about 100 years.

Also, that day they knew like God about good and evil, because they understood what the serpent did to them. The fruit itself didn't give the knowledge, it was just the result of what they did.

The passage intimate that they will die on the spot .. and the knowlede was not from what they did .. but from the fruit of Sophia who is another God in the story along with the Snake. .. while your "God meant they would die sometime way in the future" is an unlikely but possible translation .. your Apple story is not a possible translation made up intentional mistranslation/deception

Behold the scripture you are bastardizing..

5 “You will not certainly die,” the serpent said to the woman. 5 “For God knows that when you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it.

The woman is said to be gaining wisdom upon the eating of the fruit .. Full Stop .. Why are you making up this deception .. or did you cherry pick a passage out of Context and from there try to re-construct a new reality -- omitting verse 6

 

[jimb]

Early Christianity was manipulated by the Roman's. Romans were the first supporters of the Christain religion as such a lot of the Roman mythology is in it. The catholic church is in my opinion the last stand for the Romans to take over the world. If you look at its setup and compare it to the Roman government, there are far too many similarities. As I said even the religion itself has comparison to Roman Mythology. Even the Roman way to govern other nations works. They didn't go in and rule with an iron fist, they put local friendlies in charge and supported them with the military.

What??? You can't be serious.

What specific "Roman mythology" is in Christianity?

"The catholic church is in my opinion the last stand for the Romans to take over the world" is nonsense. If that was the case they are doing a lousy job of it. It's estimated that Catholics are 17.87% of the world's population.

How many slaves are part of the Catholic religion? How many countries does the Catholic church control militarily?

Saying that the ancient Romans "didn't go in and rule with an iron fist" demonstrates your clear lack of knowledge world history.

"Violence played a significant role in Roman identity, and images of war and violence were pervasive throughout the Roman world. The myths and history of Rome are filled with brutal acts of rape, fratricide and war." Cambridge World History of Violence

 

[bobhikes]

What??? You can't be serious.

What specific "Roman mythology" is in Christianity?

"The catholic church is in my opinion the last stand for the Romans to take over the world" is nonsense. If that was the case they are doing a lousy job of it. It's estimated that Catholics are 17.87% of the world's population.

How many slaves are part of the Catholic religion? How many countries does the Catholic church control militarily?

Saying that the ancient Romans "didn't go in and rule with an iron fist" demonstrates your clear lack of knowledge world history.

"Violence played a significant role in Roman identity, and images of war and violence were pervasive throughout the Roman world. The myths and history of Rome are filled with brutal acts of rape, fratricide and war." Cambridge World History of Violence

You've heard of the Crusade's, the story of penance The medieval witch hunts. This is just a few of the greatest off the top of my head. The early church tried and most often got the governments to do what they want by declaring there enemy's evil. Rape,, Violence, war fratricide are all vibrant parts of the Roman Catholic Churches history. You do see Roman is even in the Name. They never dropped it. If they felt the Roman's were really that bad why carry the name.

How many Roman's are made to look bad in the Bible.

Give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's
Pilate is also given a pass by Jesus himself
Maybe the Roman Soldiers during the crucifixion.

 

[jimb]

You've heard of the Crusade's, the story of penance The medieval witch hunts. This is just a few of the greatest off the top of my head. The early church tried and most often got the governments to do what they want by declaring there enemy's evil. Rape,, Violence, war fratricide are all vibrant parts of the Roman Catholic Churches history. You do see Roman is even in the Name. They never dropped it. If they felt the Roman's were really that bad why carry the name.

How many Roman's are made to look bad in the Bible.

Give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's
Pilate is also given a pass by Jesus himself
Maybe the Roman Soldiers during the crucifixion.

The church got governments to do what they wanted? Seriously??? You have no knowledge of history!!!

Rome is a city. Using that name means nothing more than geographic location.

The Roman government is clearly shown to be bad in the New Testament. Among other things, THEY KILLED JESUS CHRIST.

You have misspelled "Caesar"

 

[bobhikes]

The church got governments to do what they wanted? Seriously??? You have no knowledge of history!!!

Rome is a city. Using that name means nothing more than geographic location.

The Roman government is clearly shown to be bad in the New Testament. Among other things, THEY KILLED JESUS CHRIST.

You have misspelled "Caesar"

Lets have some examples from the New Testament or even the Bible that calls out Rome. You laugh but you offer no proof. The New Testment makes it Clear that Christ death is on the Jewish leadership. Pilot washes his hands of the crime and even tries to release Christ.