re: Amazon Prime new cartoon retells the creation story

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No.. go back and read it again.

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Please accept my apologies. I was wrong, and the weird thing is I’ve read the story many times, so I must’ve not been thinking straight.

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So, we see that Yahweh is not the deceiving spirit. The deceiving spirit is one of the host of heaven- presumably one from the left of Yahweh,

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I totally agree.

Verse 23 does state this though:

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Now therefore, behold, the LORD has put a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; and the LORD has proclaimed disaster against you.

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I read that as Yahweh took an active action in the lying, even though it might have come out of the mouth of the member of the heavenly host (can we call this what it is - a lower tier deity? A “god” with a lower case “g”).

With that said, if we’re splitting hairs, Yahweh looks like he didn’t lie. He put the lies in the mouth of his worker spirit and made him lie. Yahweh’s other lies are still his lies.

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Read the whole chapter. Objectively. Do some research on Ahab- he was the most wicked king in the history of Israel.

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In my opinion there’s not much objective facts to go by. According to the Bible yes he was wicked. I believe there probably was a real king Ahab but I’m not convinced he (or Jezebel) were evil. You might think Moses wrote the entire Torah. In reality, there were many authors and compilers and redactors over the centuries, but Deuteronomy, Joshua, Samuels, and Kings in their current form were more or less all redacted and compiled around the same time and with compatible themes. When these books were “finalized”, it was after the return of the Nobility and priestly class from Babylon to Jerusalem. Since the priests were now the rulers, and because they couldn’t have a king (because Isaiah 45:1 was the messiah - the anointed king - at that point in time), they had to explain why they accepted the Persian king without there being a Jewish king. Because those Jewish kings were wicked!

How were they wicked? Well the new priests adopted this concept from the Persians called Monotheism. The priests wanted the people to only worship on god - Yahweh- and only offer sacrifices to Yahweh at one spot - the Jerusalem temple - in order to collect 10% and enjoy eating bbq goats and lambs. They conveniently demonized those old dead kings like Ahab by saying they were wicked precisely because they worshipped all the other gods of the Canaanite pantheon. From the standpoint of the Jews before the Babylonian conquest - that was normal behavior because those Jews were Canaanite polytheists.

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Jeremiah who is perceiving the deception- not Yahweh admitting it. Could Jeremiah be wrong here? Ummm… yeahhhh.

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But Yahweh is the one inspiring the text, no? I know I don’t believe that but you do. If Yahweh inspired it, he is letting Jeremiah accuse him of lying to him without Yahweh correcting him.

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I believe it is a fool’s errand, to proclaim with such certainty that there is no God. That is, unless you possess infinite knowledge. Do you?

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I can see why you might think that, but it is because you are a fervent believer, and couldn’t imagine yourself being wrong. On the subject of certainty of no god - I can’t say that I am certain, and never claimed that. What I am very certain of is that the “Bible” was written by a bunch of ignorant people over centuries, and whatever the Bible says about God or the gods cannot be historical nor accurate nor reliable. The gods and “God” of the Bible are figments of the imaginations of primitive people who didn’t understand anything about the reality of nature.

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I figured it just got lost in the plethora of strife-ridden conversations you have. Lol!

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Please accept my apologies. I was wrong,

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No need to apologize- we all make mistakes. I appreciate your honesty.

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Now therefore, behold, the LORD has put a deceiving spirit in the mouth of all these your prophets; and the LORD has proclaimed disaster against you.

I read that as Yahweh took an active action in the lying,

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Sure, I can see how you would equate this to Yahweh lying- but I don’t see it as the same thing. It reminds me of the story of Joseph and his brothers- how what they meant for evil, God used for good. I would equate this with using the right tool for the job at hand.

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member of the heavenly host (can we call this what it is - a lower tier deity? A “god” with a lower case “g”).

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Absolutely. I watched Micheal Heiser’s Unseen Realm, and I gotta thank you for that. I got so caught up in not wanting you to be right about anything, that I almost missed out on a logical and biblical explanation of the verses we were discussing.

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Yahweh’s other lies are still his lies.

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Would you please elaborate?

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In my opinion there’s not much objective facts to go by. According to the Bible yes he was wicked. I believe there probably was a real king Ahab but I’m not convinced he (or Jezebel) were evil.

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And you are entitled to your own opinions, but they are just that. And so are mine. We could go scholar for scholar, but that would not change the fact that it is all a matter of opinion.

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You might think Moses wrote the entire Torah.

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I do. Though, I am not opposed to the idea that he may have compiled earlier accounts (whether oral tradition or written), in addition to his own material, under the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Spirit.

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In reality, there were many authors and compilers and redactors over the centuries

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It is arguable- at best. That is reality. There are sound arguments on both sides of this subject- leaving the ponderers of these arguments to make a faith-based decision about which is more sensible to them. This decision will inevitably be influenced by one’s presuppositional bias.

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Well the new priests adopted this concept from the Persians called Monotheism.

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This, again, is arguable. And, that’s not what Genesis 4:26 says:
Genesis 4:26 (NASB95): 26 To Seth, to him also a son was born; and he called his name Enosh. Then men began to call upon the name of the Lord.
Just a few generations after Adam. I don’t disagree that there was probably a majority of people who worshipped other gods- the Bible seems to agree. Starting with Cain, we can see that many (if not most/all) of his descendants (Lamech comes to mind) lived in willful disobedience to God, while presumably having irrefutable knowledge of His existence. The broad gate and the narrow path are illustrated throughout the Bible, so I would expect to find more evidence of the former. But, that doesn’t preclude monotheism (a term that developed in 1660 A.D.).

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But Yahweh is the one inspiring the text, no? I know I don’t believe that but you do. If Yahweh inspired it, he is letting Jeremiah accuse him of lying to him without Yahweh correcting him.

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Yes, I believe Yahweh inspired the text. I believe that the fact that there are appearances of contradiction and controversy; that can be reconciled… by a deeper study of scripture- driven by a desire for truth, points to a God that desires a relationship. Not to be mistaken for playing hard to get- you can absolutely just ignore these instances, and just believe that there’s logical explanation- or you can explore your doubts and find satisfactory solutions to these problems.

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I can see why you might think that, but it is because you are a fervent believer, and couldn’t imagine yourself being wrong

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I absolutely can imagine being wrong. I still occasionally have doubts. I think this only natural, and healthy- to an extent. But, I question my doubts, as well as my beliefs. I believe that the evidence in favor of, not just a God, but the Christian God, is overwhelming. In spite of this, I still occasionally have doubts. If I am wrong, and materialism and neo-Darwinian evolution is true, then, what does it matter? All that matters is the here and now- and it only matters here and now. We’re all cosmic meat puppets, driven solely by the forces of nature. When the lights go out- it’s over. There is no transcendent value to life. The very meaning of life is an illusion. (Which, ironically, is what the book of Ecclesiastes is about- life without God is vanity) I can accept this- if it is true. TBH, I would rather this be the case, than for anyone to go to Hell. I find far more comfort, concerning the afterlife, in ceasing to exist- rather than being in whatever version of Hell one can think of- for eternity. That being said, I just find the arguments for God (ID/fine tuning, Kalam, teleological, objective morality, etc) to be more consistent with reality. Especially when compared to alternative materialistic explanations- like how all life on earth came from a single cell, that, despite our best efforts, we cannot begin to explain how it came to be. Trust me- I get it. The whole thing is stranger than fiction. But, the more I look into it, the more sense it makes. If you imagine that all of humanity, from beginning to end, is like one child- being raised and taught by his Father; making mistakes and learning along the way- then I think that goes a long way in understanding the moral and intellectual development of mankind. This is just my own opinion- I offer no direct biblical or theological evidence to support it. It’s just a thought I’m working through.

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On the subject of certainty of no god - I can’t say that I am certain, and never claimed that

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Well, you certainly give the impression that you are.

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What I am very certain of is that the “Bible” was written by a bunch of ignorant people over centuries, and whatever the Bible says about God or the gods cannot be historical nor accurate nor reliable

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How can you be “very certain?” I would think that if they were so ignorant, then it would be easy to completely dismantle the Bible with incontrovertible evidence that the whole thing is a farce. And, I would think that this would have been done thousands of years ago, and almost no one would believe any of it today. Yet, here we are, 40+ authors and thousands of years later, and it is the world’s largest religion- and is responsible for the fields of science and education that have largely turned themselves against it- and yet still it endures. I think that is impossible for a myth to accomplish.

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I watched Micheal Heiser’s Unseen Realm

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Wasn’t it great? Normally I am not the one cheering for resolution of perceived biblical contradictions, but Michael did a great job conveying information, arguing with logic and evidence, and being entertaining. Michael wasn’t an atheist nor an evangelist, and I think he would really help Christians understand their religion better in a meaningful way. Jews too.

For instance, an uninformed person might think that Genesis 1, Deuteronomy 32, Psalms 82 and 89, exodus 12:12 and 20:3, and Jeremiah 43:12 just to name a few… might contradict Isaiah 45:5. But wait, in Isaiah 45:5, Yahweh says “I am Yahweh, there is no other”. It’s a “boast of incomparability” to quote Dr. Heiser. The (post exilic priestly class In Jersusalem) Jews acknowledged the existence of cherubim, seraphim, malakim (angels), demons, various spirits and the gods of other nations. Yahweh is clear to the Jews though that no other god can compare to him. There is no other god beside Yahweh. Not “besides” or “except”. Rather “on the side of” is the meaning. It means no other god is at Yahweh’s level of power and awesomeness. Most Christians don’t understand it.

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Would you please elaborate?

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It’s in my earlier posts. About Yahweh telling Adam he would die that very day he ate the forbidden fruit. Serpent told the truth. Kind of goes back to the subject of the OP. Apologists on here will say Adam did die that day, brought sin into the world, “died spiritually”. Then I argue that it’s a redundant phrase that the breath/spirit of life was needed to be alive. I quote Ecclesiastes and Psalms that say when your spirit dies or you lose your spirit, you return to the earth as dust. Even when Jesus died on the cross he gives up his spirit (literally stops breathing is all it means). I’m not trying to argue but you asked me to elaborate.

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I do. Though, I am not opposed to the idea that he may have compiled earlier accounts (whether oral tradition or written), in addition to his own material, under the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Spirit.

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When Moses is alleged to have existed, it was during the Bronze Age where the only writing systems were cuneiform and hieroglyphics. Papyrus and goat skin were in short supply. It’s why he received commandments on clay tablets. Writing the Torah on clay tablets in script that hadn’t been invented yet, writing about riding camels that hadn’t been domesticated yet, and writing the narration of one’s own death at the end of Deuteronomy would have been very difficult. Though if you can rationalize that God helped him, then you can rationalize anything.

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How can you be “very certain?” I would think that if they were so ignorant, then it would be easy to completely dismantle the Bible with incontrovertible evidence that the whole thing is a farce. And, I would think that this would have been done thousands of years ago

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Billions of people over 2000+ years have rejected the Bible. In the last 100 years, incontrovertible evidence that the whole thing is a farce has been found. We know about microscopic organisms now, what causes disease, the weather, plate tectonics and volcanoes, biological evolution and DNA, cells, physics. The Bible authors believed the earth was a flat disk held up by pillars sunk into the great deep, with a snow globe like glass firmament which held back the waters in outer space. They thought the sun and the moon were under the firmament, and travelled through tunnels under the earth to start the next day. They thought hail, snow, and lightning bolts were stored in Yahweh’s storehouses. It’s straight out of Persian, Greek, and Egyptian mythology that we learned about in high school.

ETA: to pile onto the list of hail and lightning bolts… a man commanded Yahweh to stop the Sun in the sky so they could have an extra long day to exterminate innocent Canaanite children. They thought the sun was just a light that ruled the day (Genesis 1). They had no idea that the earth was a sphere (pretty much anyway) and that it was rotating about its own axis and also revolving around the Sun. Imagine if the sun really stopped… we’d be vaporized instantly and if we weren’t, we’d all be killed in seconds from the gamma rays and x-rays coming from the sun because the earth would have no magnetic poles and no magnetosphere to absorb cosmic radiation.

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Pilate’s Court that first Good Friday, would you have shouted “Release Barabbas!” or “Crucify Jesus!”

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What is interesting here is that in some of our oldest manuscripts of Matthew 27:16, the criminal is named “Iesous Barabbas”. In Aramaic he would’ve been Yeshua bar Abba - and in English “Jesus son of the father”. In modern NIV, NET, NRSV, and other translations they use the old manuscripts and translate Matthew 27:16 as Jesus Barabbas. Barabbas is released, while the “real” Jesus is stripped (guards cast lots for his clothing) and mocked and then killed.

Where have I seen a situation where two “identical prisoners” are held, and one is released while one is sacrificed while lots are cast, and the sacrificed prisoner is sacrificed to atone for sin - to take away the sins of the (Jewish) world? Ah yes, the Day of Atonement, Leviticus chapter 16. Two unblemished goats are used - one set free, one is sacrificed to take away their sin.

So in the gospels, Jesus is stripped, called King of the Jews, given a crown of thorns, and is sacrificed, and a few days later, Jesus is resurrected from the dead. Now that reminds me of something. There’s this ancient Mesopotamian festival that the Babylonians celebrated called “Zagmuk”, wherein a prisoner is stripped down, mockingly anointed King and the embodiment of their gods named Marduk, is sacrificed at the end of the festival, then three days later Marduk is said to be resurrected as the new year had begun - at the vernal equinox (around March 19 for us on the Gregorian calendar).

So it appears that the death and resurrection of Jesus is a fairy tale retelling based on the more ancient Jewish festival of the Day of Atonement and the Babylonian festival Zagmuk. I can understand basing the gospel Jesus story of death and resurrection on an old Jewish custom, but the Babylonian link seems like a stretch… until you ask yourself in Babylonian mythology how did Marduk die? He died while killing a giant water dragon named Tiamat. After resurrection, he separated Tiamat’s body into halves, and used the lower half to make the earth, and the other half he spread out over the earth like a tent to make the firmament, and to hold back the chaotic waters above the firmament. In our bibles, it is Yahweh who killed Leviathan (the chaotic water dragon) and it is Yahweh who separated the waters from the waters (Jewish “Tehom”) and made the dry land and spread the Tehom as a tent to make the firmament in the sky. You see, Tiamat and Tehom are the same word, conjugated and pronounced slightly differently. One in Babylon and one in Hebrew. So in the Hebrew tales, Yahweh did everything Marduk did in Babylonian myths. And seeing as how Jesus was thought to be the earthly incarnation of Yahweh, this is starting to make sense.

According to Luke, Jesus Barabbas was a convicted criminal against Rome - he had taken part in an insurrection against Rome. If this was a real story and a real man, is it sensible to believe Pilate would have let a criminal against Rome go, while crucifying someone who didn’t commit a crime against Rome? Not me. Josephus - the ancient Jewish historian whose works are preserved by Christians - wouldn’t have thought so either. Rome and Pilate weren’t in the business of killing people the Jews didn’t like. Blasphemy was not a crime against Rome, against the ruling authority. Rome in a sense had religious tolerance as they ruled over many peoples and cultures with all sorts of beliefs. So I don’t believe Pilate would have let a real criminal go but kill a non criminal. He couldn’t have let the Jews dictate who he would crucify. According to Josephus, Pilate was a no nonsense guy who made it very clear to the Jews who was in charge and crushed several Jewish revolts. Pilate wouldn’t have been persuaded to do something like kill an innocent man by the Jews. I just don’t believe it.

I also don’t believe a crowd of Jews - the entire crowd in unison saying “His blood be on us and our children!” is realistic. Obviously this didn’t happen. A whole crowd of Jews wouldn’t have expressed the desire to have a man killed and then also accept the blood guilt of their sin to be passed on to their children.

Lastly since it isn’t about Barabbas anymore but it’s on my mind about Pilate: a roman crucifixion was a punishment that was torture but it was way more than that. It was about the display and the shame. The display was meant to show others their fate if they rebelled against Rome. The shame was that their dead bodies were to be left on the cross to decompose and to be eaten by buzzards and wild dogs and pigs. Since the entire point of Roman crucifixion was to be left up on the cross after death and not taken down, I think it is highly unlikely that Pilate would have permitted anyone to be taken down from the cross and buried.

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Release Barabbas!

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As a follow-up, for you or anyone else reading, I wanted to provide additional evidence of “Jesus Barabbas” being the correct reading.

This is from the NET Bible translation comments:

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Matthew 27:16 tc Although the external evidence for the inclusion of “Jesus” before “Barabbas” (in vv. 16 and 17) is rather sparse, being restricted virtually to mss of what was formally labeled the “Caesarean” text, the omission of the Lord’s name in apposition to “Barabbas” is such a strongly motivated reading that it can hardly be original. There is no good explanation for a scribe unintentionally adding (Iesoun) before (Barabban), especially since Barabbas is mentioned first in each verse (thus dittography is ruled out). Further, the addition of (ton legomenon Christon, “who is called Christ”) in v. 17 makes better sense if Barabbas is also called “Jesus” (otherwise, a mere “Jesus” would have been a sufficient appellation to distinguish the two). Metzger notes that codex S, a tenth-century majuscule, along with a score of minuscules, have a marginal comment on this verse as follows: “In many ancient copies which I have met with I found Barabbas himself likewise called ‘Jesus.’” The attribution of this scholium is variously given as Anastasius, Chrysostom, or even Origen (TCGNT 56).

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Church father Origen in the third century was not happy that the criminal set free was also named Jesus.
Origen on Matthew 27

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My posts to Squirrelmeister and Liberator were not, so far as I’m aware, attempts at conversion.

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Stop. Why would Squirrelmeister employ his intellect on behalf of Jesus without a conversion...

( X ) Dishonest.

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So, no answer from you.

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I'm willing to give an answer, I just need clarification. You could have provided it, though you see I'm willing to play ball and answer your hypotheticals so you back out so the same isn't expected of you.

( X ) Dishonest.

I'll do your work for you, though, since you're being dishonest and lazy.

If I were transported back to that time period, I wouldn't want Jesus crucified. I'm for free speech.

If I were raised in that time period? It's tough to say.

Unfortunately, your zeal for your religion leads me to believe no matter what you'd be killing women and children if your god commanded you to.

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No, when referring to the God of the Bible, the Christian God, the Jewish God, or the Muslim God, God is capitalized.

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You're incorrect.

"God is capitalized when it is used as a proper noun. God is kept lowercase when it is referred to as a common noun."

I understand you might not understand that genocide is bad, or that being dishonest is bad, but do you know the difference between a proper noun and a common noun?

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In summary, many scholars assign Markion as the very first written gospel, and the others are derived from Markion later in response to Markion being kicked out of the church around 165CE. So you see, a liberal dating of the canonical gospels is mid/late second century.

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What a load of BS. No scholars believe Marcion wrote a gospel. 1 John and 2 John were written as a warning against Proto-Gnosticism that was starting to pop up.

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I think it is highly unlikely that Pilate would have permitted anyone to be taken down from the cross and buried.

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Here’s one example.

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P.S.,
Here’s an analogy: If I were to state that it is highly unlikely for anyone to win the lottery, would you counter me by posting a link to someone who won the jackpot?

The finding of a skeleton in a tomb that has shown to have been crucified (while finding a couple more crucified skeletal remains in graves) is great stuff, and is a very rare find. To me, that supports the idea that it is unlikely for someone crucified to have been given a proper burial, considering scholars estimate just the Roman’s been 200BCE to 300CE to have crucified something like 100,000 to 150,000 people.

Bart Ehrman explains it better than me

The Romans had other forms of capital punishment. Crucifixion was the worst kind, and was reserved for slaves and for enemies of the state. The purpose of crucifixion was to give the recipient a slow, torturous death, but even more so to act as a visual disincentive to others not to challenge Roman authority, hence history shows that crucified persons were not given proper burials. Rather, the bodies were left up to rot and to be eaten by scavengers.

Josephus records Pontius Pilate as not a particularly nice fellow. There’s no record of him or any Roman letting a dead person down from the cross. Does that preclude a family from taking their loved one’s body down from the cross - without permission - after the Roman soldiers had left the site? No. Is it possible the dead guy could have fallen off the cross if the nails weren’t securely in the wood? Maybe.

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Do you ever wonder what else you may be wrong about?

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When did you quit beating your wife?

Out of everything I posted, this is what you respond with? Come on man, I think you can do better. The unlikeliness of Pilate letting dead Jesus down from the cross is just one small piece of a larger argument. Oh, and I had responded to more than one of your posts recently without a response.

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What a load of BS. No scholars believe Marcion wrote a gospel.

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Wrong. It’s not the majority position but some think Marcion wrote it.
Marcion authorship 1
Marcion authorship 2

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1 John and 2 John were written as a warning against Proto-Gnosticism that was starting to pop up.

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Yep, late second century or perhaps third century. A lot of people don’t realize these were written to oppose the Pauline epistles of a celestial Jesus and to support the real life flesh and blood earthly Jesus.