is the Christian concept of the One from a philosophical point of view true?

[Dubious]

I would get no joy from that: why should I wish to humiliate people? That seems a thoroughly unkind and petty thing to do, doesn't it?

Your ethic is inspiring!

A man can't be forced to believe.

Ain't that the truth. There have to be more reasons to believe than not to believe if faith is to be activated. Unlike yourself, the reasons to believe are so few as to be in a perennial state of deficit, the bible providing absolutely none, negating, in fact, any possibility of belief. It requires a distinctly different source in seeding the potential for a new universal belief to sprout.

Conversely, my idea of god has never been in such absolute denial as the assertion that Jesus was the human manifestation of one. To me, that conclusion is incomprehensible in almost every detail as expounded in the gospels. A god could never debase itself by imploring people to believe in him in order to be saved. There are far too many perverse and illogical consequences to accept this as a command from god. One major objection is that such a command, when analyzed, announces a highly immoral entity who can never BE as claimed to BE. Such a 'god', bluntly stated, is not worthy of respect on any level.

...but then we don't know and can never know what Jesus actually said since he never had an amanuensis to record his thoughts for posterity. An Eckermann recording Goethe's thoughts and ramblings would have been imperative in the case of Jesus. If that were known, it's highly probable that Christianity would never have seen the light of day.

[Alexis Jacobi]

What you still miss, what you've never gotten, is that the ad hominems are nothing to me. I don't care a whit how you rail and rant, and even if any of it were true, it would have nothing to do at all with the justification or refutation of the statements I have made.

Then shut up about those non-dreaded ad hominems! If they are nothing to you cease to mention them.

However, the terms I use are fair and accurate.

[Immanuel Can]

A man can't be forced to believe.

Ain't that the truth. There have to be more reasons to believe than not to believe if faith is to be activated.

I don't disagree. One has to feel that what one is believing really is the truth. No question.

A god could never debase itself by imploring people to believe in him in order to be saved.

Here's another way of thinking about that. God, being the Supreme Being, must have every virtue in ultimate proportions. If He does not, then He is, by definition, not supreme in that respect at all. Something else is "better" than He is, at least in that respect.

So ask yourself: if we humans regard loving people and being sacrificial for their good as high-level virtues for human beings, then would we not expect the Supreme Being to be more -- not less -- loving and sacrificial in His nature than we are? So it can come as no surprise if the Supreme Being is, in fact, much more loving and sacrificial than you and I are. Were he not, that would be a diminishment of his goodness, a deficiency of a virtue of which we have more -- and one respect in which we would be better than God Himself.

However, if you've already been trained to think of God as a sort of Diestic being, one that's aloof, cold, uncaring and distant, and if you suppose those qualities to be virtues of some sort, then you might possibly imagine a God that was aloof, cold, indifferent to us and distant from us was better than one that loved us and sacrificed Himself to save us.

But such an argument would not make sense to very many people, I suspect.

[Immanuel Can]

What you still miss, what you've never gotten, is that the ad hominems are nothing to me. I don't care a whit how you rail and rant, and even if any of it were true, it would have nothing to do at all with the justification or refutation of the statements I have made.

Then shut up about those non-dreaded ad hominems!

Then stop resorting to them, and people will not know when you're losing a point and growing desperate and spiteful.

And they'll like you better. Or at the very least, they'll find you much more rational.

[attofishpi]

..and beyond AJ's points. Do you honestly believe that a person that has lived a virtuous life is going to be condemned JUST because he\she did not believe in Christ?

I honestly believe what Jesus Christ says about that: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

So don't believe me. I wouldn't want you to, anyway. I save nobody.

Believe Him.

Sure, and I do...in fact rather personally, as someone that knows what the day of reckoning entails.

However, I think you may have this interpreted askew.

This line you present: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

Understand the IMPORTANT words "not obey" the Son.

To believe, sure, depending on whether you truly believed in Christ, live by the standards he insisted you get eternal life.

To NOT believe in the life of Christ, but still live by his standards (eg. An atheist that believes in nothing but being eternally dead, does not get the eternal life, gets what they believed).

The WRATH of God remains upon those that did not live virtuous lives (Did NOT OBEY REGARDLESS OF BELIEF)

This ultimately means:
It does not take simply BELIEVING in Christ, it takes OBEYING his instructions to avoid the WRATH.
It does not require believing in Christ if one has lived by the same virtues to avoid the WRATH, although one may be eternally dead.

[Gary Childress]

..and beyond AJ's points. Do you honestly believe that a person that has lived a virtuous life is going to be condemned JUST because he\she did not believe in Christ?

I honestly believe what Jesus Christ says about that: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

So don't believe me. I wouldn't want you to, anyway. I save nobody.

Believe Him.

Sure, and I do...in fact rather personally, as someone that knows what the day of reckoning entails.

However, I think you may have this interpreted askew.

This line you present: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

Understand the IMPORTANT words "not obey" the Son.

To believe, sure, depending on whether you truly believed in Christ, live by the standards he insisted you get eternal life.

To NOT believe in the life of Christ, but still live by his standards (eg. An atheist that believes in nothing but being eternally dead, does not get the eternal life, gets what they believed).

The WRATH of God remains upon those that did not live virtuous lives (Did NOT OBEY REGARDLESS OF BELIEF)

This ultimately means:
It does not take simply BELIEVING in Christ, it takes OBEYING his instructions to avoid the WRATH.
It does not require believing in Christ if one has lived by the same virtues to avoid the WRATH, although one may be eternally dead.

Thank you, Atto. I do not believe that Christ was the same that created the universe and all that is. But I have heard and read some of Christ's words as recorded and I cannot argue with them. I cannot refute them. In fact, many of them make perfect sense to me and even command me to abide by them. But I do not believe that Christ and the creator of the universe and all that is are the same. I don't know what else to say. And I will NOT "accept" Christ just to reserve myself a place in "heaven". Christ and God and everyone in this world will see me for who I am and judge me based on that. And slowly what remains hidden by my shadow will be revealed. God is my judge. Chirst is my judge. You are my judge. EVERYONE here is my judge. I WILL NOT escape judgment either in this world or in the next.

[attofishpi]

Thank you, Atto. I do not believe that Christ was the same that created the universe and all that is.

I appreciate that Gazza, and neither do I. IF Christ created what we perceive from using the words "Let there be light"... then he was a bloody good programmer.

God is my judge. Chirst is my judge. You are my judge. EVERYONE here is my judge. I WILL NOT escape judgment either in this world or in the next.

Ya, well...the worst thing I came to real eyes on the 'Day of Reckoning' - more than 1 for me, is that you judge yourself against others, some of them you love.

"God's wrath"

Not a mindset to be part of..but I doubt you or other atheists have to partake.

[Lacewing]

God is my judge. Chirst is my judge. You are my judge. EVERYONE here is my judge. I WILL NOT escape judgment either in this world or in the next.

Ya, well...the worst thing I came to real eyes on the 'Day of Reckoning' - more than 1 for me, is that you judge yourself against others, some of them you love.

I agree. We judge ourselves... and it doesn't matter as much what anyone else thinks... even imagined deities. A bigger issue than our judgements is whether we can love ourselves (and others) anyway, despite what we may judge. Such love elevates everything to another level. This is also why the idea of judgmental gods makes no sense -- it's tied to density.

[Dubious]

..and beyond AJ's points. Do you honestly believe that a person that has lived a virtuous life is going to be condemned JUST because he\she did not believe in Christ?

I honestly believe what Jesus Christ says about that: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

So don't believe me. I wouldn't want you to, anyway. I save nobody.

Believe Him.

However, I think you may have this interpreted askew.

This line you present: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

Understand the IMPORTANT words "not obey" the Son.

The WRATH of God remains upon those that did not live virtuous lives (Did NOT OBEY REGARDLESS OF BELIEF)

This ultimately means:
It does not take simply BELIEVING in Christ, it takes OBEYING his instructions to avoid the WRATH.
It does not require believing in Christ if one has lived by the same virtues to avoid the WRATH, although one may be eternally dead.

They're two halves of a whole each equally contingent on the other. If you don't obey then you can't claim to have believed which makes believing without obeying an oxymoron. There is no separation. Believing and obeying are integrated in the announcement. Even if you obey it is indirectly since you don't believe, that is, you obey purely on a secular basis independent of the biblically mandated one and hence you are still damned.

It amounts to an injustice unworthy of any deity who functions not merely as a state god but also a moral one.

[attofishpi]

I honestly believe what Jesus Christ says about that: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

So don't believe me. I wouldn't want you to, anyway. I save nobody.

Believe Him.

However, I think you may have this interpreted askew.

This line you present: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

Understand the IMPORTANT words "not obey" the Son.

The WRATH of God remains upon those that did not live virtuous lives (Did NOT OBEY REGARDLESS OF BELIEF)

This ultimately means:
It does not take simply BELIEVING in Christ, it takes OBEYING his instructions to avoid the WRATH.
It does not require believing in Christ if one has lived by the same virtues to avoid the WRATH, although one may be eternally dead.

They're two halves of a whole each equally contingent on the other. If you don't obey then you can't claim to have believed which makes believing without obeying an oxymoron. There is no separation. Believing and obeying are integrated in the announcement. Even if you obey it is indirectly since you don't believe, that is, you obey purely on a secular basis independent of the biblically mandated one and hence you are still damned.

I understand the point you are making but I disagree and stand by my statements. All it says about "does not obey the Son", is that you will not see life AND the wrath of God remains. In this instance, the wrath of God may simply be that as a secular, non-believing person, you are not reincarnated for future life (something the atheist believed all along anyway).

As someone that had dealt with the 'wrath' of God too many times there are very different levels to it, in the East they call it karma, and it's true.

ANYONE that believes or not and lives contrary to the standards Christ insisted, against the golden rule etc, certainly the wrath will be more severe.

It amounts to an injustice unworthy of any deity who functions not merely as a state god but also a moral one.

Nah. You get what you give - and that seems to be something all cultures have somewhere in their society, even areas that Christianity has never reached.

[Dubious]

However, I think you may have this interpreted askew.

This line you present: "The one who believes in the Son has eternal life; but the one who does not obey the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him.” (John 3:36)

Understand the IMPORTANT words "not obey" the Son.

The WRATH of God remains upon those that did not live virtuous lives (Did NOT OBEY REGARDLESS OF BELIEF)

This ultimately means:
It does not take simply BELIEVING in Christ, it takes OBEYING his instructions to avoid the WRATH.
It does not require believing in Christ if one has lived by the same virtues to avoid the WRATH, although one may be eternally dead.

They're two halves of a whole each equally contingent on the other. If you don't obey then you can't claim to have believed which makes believing without obeying an oxymoron. There is no separation. Believing and obeying are integrated in the announcement. Even if you obey it is indirectly since you don't believe, that is, you obey purely on a secular basis independent of the biblically mandated one and hence you are still damned.

I understand the point you are making but I disagree and stand by my statements. All it says about "does not obey the Son", is that you will not see life AND the wrath of God remains. In this instance, the wrath of God may simply be that as a secular, non-believing person, you are not reincarnated for future life (something the atheist believed all along anyway).

As someone that had dealt with the 'wrath' of God too many times there are very different levels to it, in the East they call it karma, and it's true.

ANYONE that believes or not and lives contrary to the standards Christ insisted, against the golden rule etc, certainly the wrath will be more severe.

It amounts to an injustice unworthy of any deity who functions not merely as a state god but also a moral one.

Nah. You get what you give - and that seems to be something all cultures have somewhere in their society, even areas that Christianity has never reached.

That's okay! Others may see it your way as well. For me, whenever a single phrase is extracted from the complete quote the potential for distortion is enhanced.

Either way, it makes no difference. When you croak you will again default to ground level, that is, the one we all came from. Forget all the "wrath" BS which is a thoroughly animalistic trait, subject to adrenalin, controlling both humans and the higher primates.

[attofishpi]

Either way, it makes no difference. When you croak you will again default to ground level, that is, the one we all came from. Forget all the "wrath" BS which is a thoroughly animalistic trait, subject to adrenalin, controlling both humans and the higher primates.

Er lol, it ain't BS. Nobody ever believes ol' Bri. I've been told things about my previous life - I certainly was not born "again at ground level" and neither were U.

It truly is ironic, that me that stuck firmly with my belief in Christ would rather have been crucified than the "wrath" that God put me through (and the sage confirmed to me that indeed, I had suffered to that degree)...for my 'indiscretions'. It was all a setup and I'd rather be dead for the rest of eternity than have to live my life again.

Always look on the bright side of life...toot toot..!!

[attofishpi]

..and now for something completely different. (a bit goofy but interesting)

What Is Reality?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0ztlIAYTCU&t=1521s

[Dubious]

Either way, it makes no difference. When you croak you will again default to ground level, that is, the one we all came from. Forget all the "wrath" BS which is a thoroughly animalistic trait, subject to adrenalin, controlling both humans and the higher primates.

Er lol, it ain't BS. Nobody ever believes ol' Bri. I've been told things about my previous life - I certainly was not born "again at ground level" and neither were U.

It truly is ironic, that me that stuck firmly with my belief in Christ would rather have been crucified than the "wrath" that God put me through (and the sage confirmed to me that indeed, I had suffered to that degree)...for my 'indiscretions'. It was all a setup and I'd rather be dead for the rest of eternity than have to live my life again.

Always look on the bright side of life...toot toot..!!

Right now, the "bright side" is consuming the planet and likely to get brighter.

Do you know what crucifixions were actually like? They certainly weren't as depicted in Renaissance paintings or any paintings I know of. You were stripped naked, there was no "loin cloth". If you had to relieve yourself you did it hanging there. Also, in later depictions it always appeared as if you were at some distance from the ground. That too was extremely unlikely since wild dogs were ready to tear you apart whether still living or not. In short, crucifixions had to be much closer to the ground for that to happen. The whole process was to be as demeaning and painful as possible and not likely an outcome anyone would prefer over most other alternatives.

Earth to earth, dust to dust, that's one of the very few things the bible got right. The universe is without revenge; it doesn't matter what you did, how many you saved or killed. The sum of it is you will be what you were before you became. I can get to know any number of my past lives. All I have to do is go downtown, to the right quarter and pay a few bucks to find out! But let's say for the sake of argument, you're right. What guarantees it will be a human life? Even if it were, what part of the old YOU would still remain in the new version? Reincarnated or not, you as you NOW know yourself, will no-longer exist, equivalent to never having existed in the first place. Reincarnation was never a case of "living one's life over again". Eternal Recurrence was never its modus since that would yield perpetual sameness and what would be the point of that! Ground Level, in short, never grows the same tree twice.

Never fear! YOU will be dead for all eternity; if you do show up with all details intact in a new refurbished universe it will be merely as a disembodied statistic with not the least connection to the here and now, meaning, no leftover reincarnation trails connecting wholly disparate events.

Anyway! Forgive the length; I got carried away!

[attofishpi]

Either way, it makes no difference. When you croak you will again default to ground level, that is, the one we all came from. Forget all the "wrath" BS which is a thoroughly animalistic trait, subject to adrenalin, controlling both humans and the higher primates.

Er lol, it ain't BS. Nobody ever believes ol' Bri. I've been told things about my previous life - I certainly was not born "again at ground level" and neither were U.

It truly is ironic, that me that stuck firmly with my belief in Christ would rather have been crucified than the "wrath" that God put me through (and the sage confirmed to me that indeed, I had suffered to that degree)...for my 'indiscretions'. It was all a setup and I'd rather be dead for the rest of eternity than have to live my life again.

Always look on the bright side of life...toot toot..!!

Right now, the "bright side" is consuming the planet and likely to get brighter.

Do you know what crucifixions were actually like? They certainly weren't as depicted in Renaissance paintings or any paintings I know of. You were stripped naked, there was no "loin cloth". If you had to relieve yourself you did it hanging there. Also, in later depictions it always appeared as if you were at some distance from the ground. That too was extremely unlikely since wild dogs were ready to tear you apart whether still living or not. In short, crucifixions had to be much closer to the ground for that to happen. The whole process was to be as demeaning and painful as possible and not likely an outcome anyone would prefer over most other alternatives.

Do you know what a 3 month stint in HELL dealing with the evil side, the wrath of God is actually like?

Yep, I'd take crucifiction, get it over and done within a day or two.

Earth to earth, dust to dust, that's one of the very few things the bible got right. The universe is without revenge; it doesn't matter what you did, how many you saved or killed. The sum of it is you will be what you were before you became. I can get to know any number of my past lives. All I have to do is go downtown, to the right quarter and pay a few bucks to find out! But let's say for the sake of argument, you're right. What guarantees it will be a human life?

Exactly, and therein is part of the wrath of God, the karma - some have lost the right to reincarnate as human, there is reason for 666.

Even if it were, what part of the old YOU would still remain in the new version?

I should ask my sage! Memories are obviously gone, but I believe aspects such as your moral principles carry over (of course, just my belief..based on reasoning)

The night the sage introduced himself to me Nov 2005 he advised that we are born into the family that we deserve. (it's ALL karma)

Reincarnated or not, you as you NOW know yourself, will no-longer exist, equivalent to never having existed in the first place. Reincarnation was never a case of "living one's life over again". Eternal Recurrence was never its modus since that would yield perpetual sameness and what would be the point of that! Ground Level, in short, never grows the same tree twice.

Yes, I don't believe we live our lives again. I don't think Christ would take that option either.

Never fear! YOU will be dead for all eternity; if you do show up with all details intact in a new refurbished universe it will be merely as a disembodied statistic with not the least connection to the here and now, meaning, no leftover reincarnation trails connecting wholly disparate events.

Anyway! Forgive the length; I got carried away!

No worries, always a pleasure to chat with you, even though you have too much faith in a simple form of universe.