No Bible = No God ???

by Sirona 30 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  Sirona

  Something has gotten on my nerves a bit recently. There are numerous discussions regarding the validity of the bible which usually result in the following:

  * An ExJW who has doubts about the bible concludes there is no god

  * An atheist points out the bible inconsistencies and as a result says its ridiculous to believe in a god.

  * A Christian who sees value in the bible asserts that the bible god is GOD (and none other)

  What bugs me is that everyone seems to ignore the fact that there are so many religions in the world who don't acknowledge the bible at all and the validity of the bible has NO bearing whatsoever on the question of whether a Deity or Deities exist.

  Too many "god doesn't exist" threads centre on the Christian view of God.

  Not all religions think God is some old man in the sky who judges....some think god is a woman LOL (being flippant here but you know what I'm getting at).

  World" Religions:

  There are many, long established, major world religions, each with over three million followers. We have shown the five largest North American religions in bold:

  	Baha'i Faith
  	Buddhism
  	Christianity; Christian groups, denominations and families (Amish to The Way)
  	Confucianism
  	Hinduism
  	Islam
  	Jainism
  	Judaism
  	Shinto
  	Sikhism
  	Taoism
  	Vodun (Voodoo)

  

  

  1 Neopagan Religious Faiths

  Neopagan faiths

  are modern-day reconstructions of ancient Pagan religions from various countries and eras. They experience a high but diminishing level of discrimination and persecution in North America. They were once rarely practiced in public for reasons of safety. This is rapidly changing for the better.

  	Asatru (Norse Paganism) *
  	Druidism
  	Goddess Worship
  	Wicca
  	Witchcraft

  Notes:

  	Many followers of Asatru regard themselves as "Heathens" rather than "Neopagans."
  	Many followers of these religions refer to themselves as "Pagans." We use the term "Neopagan" because it is less ambiguous. "Pagan" has a variety of unrelated meanings.

  

  Other organized Religions

  These are smaller religions, with a well defined belief in deity, humanity and the rest of the universe. Of the many hundreds of faith groups in the world, we have chosen these because of their historical significance, or because of the massive amount of misinformation that has been spread about them in North America:

  	Caodaism
  	Damanhur Community
  	Druze
  	Eckankar
  	Elian Gonzalez religious movement
  	Gnosticism
  	Gypsies
  	Hare Krishna - ISKCON
  	Ifa, the religion of the Yoruba people of West Africa
  	Lukumi
  	Macumba
  	Mowahhidoon
  	Native American Spirituality
  	Rom, Roma, Romani, Rroma, (a.k.a. Gypsies)
  	Santeria Elian Gonzalez religious movement
  	Satanism; The Church of Satan
  	Scientology
  	Unitarian-Universalism
  	The Creativity Movement (formerly called World Church of the Creator)
  	The Yazidi branch of Yazdânism
  	Zoroastrianism

  So before people say "God is obviously a sadistic b**tard" based on the Bible god, think again!

  Sirona
• 

  Nathan Natas

  I'm an atheist.

  As such, I believe in NO gods.

  Go ahead, name one: nope, I don't believe in him, her or it.

  I feel your definition of "atheist" is a bit narrow. If a so-called "atheist" chose only to disbelieve in ONE of the thousands of "divine beings," he wouldn't be much of an atheist, imo.
• 

  Sirona

  Nathan

  I didn't say that atheists only reject one of the numerous gods. I'm perfectly willing to accept that they reject all gods.

  What I'm saying is that some people have the view that if one rejects the Christian God (based on rejection of the bible) then one immediately rejects all other gods and all other ideas and concepts of god because they never bother to consider that the bible god isn't the only one!

  So many people say "the bible is rubbish therefore I'm an atheist" - at least thats what I've noticed on this board.

  Sirona
• 

  journey-on

  Sirona

  You hit the nail on the head. But, I think it's because that's pretty much the only frame of reference most have.

  They don't really see beyond that closed way of looking at things because to them "god" is an entity and they

  are angry at "Him" right now because they blame "Him" for not making it right. Their consciousness hasn't

  expanded to be able to encompass a more comprehensive concept.

  In their anger at religion and its failures, they become dogmatically convinced that God is the bastard, or rather,

  their concept of God is the bastard. To be able to scream "I AM ATHEIST" feels good to them right now. It's a

  form of rebellion against Christianity and religion in general, and once they do it, they become comfortable with saying it and embracing it.

  It exhilarates them to spit in "His" face.
• 

  jwfacts

  I was thinking about this very thing this morning. The reason is that the Watchtower inculcates that very all-or-nothing view.

  I wrote some essays as a teenager that weighed up the validity of being a Witness or an Athiest. Strangely, it never occured to me to weigh up the validity of whether other religions could be right and the Watchtower wrong.

  My family always make comments that no one else worships God. What they mean is that no one else worships the name they use to describe God. It is common for a Witness to say, "why have you left Jehovah" when what they really mean is "why have you left the Organization". Maybe
• 

  AlmostAtheist

  I see what you're saying Sirona. If you follow any of the "I'm leaning toward atheism" threads, it's not at all unusual to hear an atheist telling the poster, "Remember, BibleGod isn't the only god out there. You don't have to reject god to reject BibleGod."

  So there are those that see things the way you do. I admit I've seen comments like the ones you're posting about. They make me cringe, too.

  Dave
• 

  Gopher

  Sirona,

  You're right, there are many versions of god/gods to choose from. Being from the Western World, the odds were that I would first be exposed to the Christian view of God and its holy book. That's where my doubt started.

  I extrapolated from there, and concluded that any explanation that mankind would have of a god would be unsatisfactory. But I did look at the effects of other major religions to see if there were any I found appealing. While there are kind and good people in each faith, I didn't want to join. Maybe I'd been worn out due to the intensity of my JW experience.

  I don't know that it's my duty to go examine each and every belief about god to see if one of them might be true. However, I certainly respect people's right to believe whatever they want, as long as they aren't harmful or too intrusive about it.
• 

  Awakened07

  I agree with the first post that this forum is very 'Bible God' -based, but that's to be expected I guess, this being a predominantly western forum. I have wanted to point it out several times, so it's a good thing you did.

  But the fact that there are a myriad of Gods to choose from doesn't really strengthen the God hypothesis either, in my opinion. Perhaps quite the contrary. But I'll let that rest for now.

  What I'd like to say is that there are probably many types of atheists out there; some are atheists simply because they've grown up being atheists with atheist parents, some were theists but have only one or two reasons for becoming an atheist, like for instance being 'angry at God' for not stepping in and doing something (although that would really be anti-theist not atheist).

  On this forum however, it is my opinion that most atheists here are well informed individuals who have taken a well thought out decision to be atheists. Not because they're angry with the concept or with God, or because they've thrown the baby out with the bathwater, but because they don't see any reasons for believing (no matter how mindnumbingly impossible that may seem to a believer). I take exception to the idea that atheists 'really actually know that God exists, they're just angry with him and like to shake their fists at him'. I don't think such a description fits, although of course atheists on this forum may point out all the bad things in the Bible or other religious texts, or point to all the horrible things that have happened and do happen, or attack the Bible in some way, and may therefore seem angry. That doesn't mean they're angry at a God they don't believe in(!), but that they feel the need to try and make people wake up and smell at least some of the coffee. Which, by the way, it thankfully seems many of the theists here have done.
• 

  Carmel

  As a Baha'i and a former JW I can appreciate where the progression from believing in the OT god to rejecting it along with the printing company disquised as a religion that promulgated it. I too noticed the tendency to swing from one extreme to another. I certainly began to question it all as I searched for a better paradigm than I could find in christianty, I could never come to the conclusion that some form of intelligence wasn't behind the universe from the macro to the micro. I was an honest agnostic.

  I have met many former card-carrying atheists in the Baha'i Faith and have asked many of them how they went from being convinced that there was no god to becoming a "believer". Every one of them, and there have been several, rejected the OT god but were as I attracted to the practicality of the faith we now share and its "definition" of an "unknowable essense" that is uncreated.

  So for most athiests I have this in common that I too don't believe in the god they don't believe in!

  Carmel
• 

  jaguarbass

  Sirona, good post.

  But I am an agnostic. I do find my confusion or not knowing to be mainly bible based.

  If there is a God he seems to not be talking at the moment. At least with words.

  Some would say his major talking is his creation.

  Others think things just created themselves.