The Iron Chariots

[DLH]

My point is that in response to Tom's question you brought things in from a different book of the Bible to support your cause, while previously castigating us for doing the same.

I didn't castigate I informed of another possibility. I keep forgetting atheist don't like that. And it isn't a case from book to book it is a case from any of the books directly to us who read it thousands of years later.

 

[Wiploc]

First, the omni's. Mostly religious nonsense.

That's all I'm saying.

If I say to you that a creature is omnivorous, what does that mean? That it will eat metal, rocks, glass, and thermonuclear weaponry? No. In a similar sense omnipotence and omniscient don't mean absolutely what they are often thought.

That's my point: The beliefs of Christians are often obviously wrong.

Omnipotence: God can do everything? God can't lie.

Then Christians who believe he is omnipotent are wrong. Except for you, of course, who believe in a sort of punk-omnipotence. I've seen versions of the Christian god who couldn't do any magic at all, who couldn't supersize fries even if they worked at McDonald's.

No, God can do anything that he wills within his purpose, will and characteristics.

And his purpose, will, and characteristics are mysterious, I bet.

Omniscience: God can get to know anything he wishes to know, but he doesn't know all things before hand.

Then your version of Jehovah has no issue with the Problem of evil. Too bad he didn't think to investigate that serpent/apple stuff, though.

He didn't know Adam and Eve had sinned until he had asked them,

I suppose that's one way to interpret it. I'm more familiar with the version where Jehovah knows, but is acting like he doesn't know in order to manipulate the kids into confessing.

But your version is good too. No interpretation is privileged over any other; there is no reading that can be called "true" at the expense of other readings.

he didn't know if the people of Sodom and Gomorrah were as bad as everyone was saying until he sent the angels to investigate. Omnipresence isn't to any degree supported by scripture.

I'm talking about Christianity. Your focus is more on the bible, on what Christians should believe if they read the bible and believed it, and if it were true and accurate and subject to being interpreted consistently. We need to try to keep the two ideas separate.

God isn't everywhere all the time. He has a fixed position in Heaven and is often mentioned elsewhere, like Solomon's temple immediately upon completion or a mountain with Moses, or in hell in a figurative sense.

I'm sure you have a justification for that belief, just as I'm sure the people who believe god is omnipresent have a justification for theirs.

Secondly . . .

• Tt wasn't that God couldn't defeat the iron chariots, as he did later when the Israelites regained their faith.

My point is that god can't be both omnipotent (regular omnipotent, not punk-omnipotent) and also unable to defeat iron chariots. The two beliefs held together are an obvious contradiction.


And a whole lotta Christians hold the two beliefs together.

The Bible doesn't teach hell or a literal torture of souls

But Christianity does. You're talking bible; I'm talking Christianity.

It is impossible for man to see God and live, but it is possible to see spirit creatures who have come to earth in human form to represent him.

I looked on his face and lived? We talked face to face. He showed me his backside? Those are inconsistent with the claim that no man may look upon god and live. Spirit creatures are beside the point.

 

[Keith&Co.]

If I say to you that a creature is omnivorous, what does that mean? That it will eat metal, rocks, glass, and thermonuclear weaponry? No. In a similar sense omnipotence and omniscient don't mean absolutely what they are often thought.

That's my point: The beliefs of Christians are often obviously wrong.

Odd that DLH of all people can't understand the context where 'omnivorous' is used and what the word means, when that's pretty much the crux of his pretense to superior biblical understanding. Words, their meaning and the context.
Is there anyone who'd think omnivores ate a D5 missile?

 

[DLH]

That's my point: The beliefs of Christians are often obviously wrong.

Odd that DLH of all people can't understand the context where 'omnivorous' is used and what the word means, when that's pretty much the crux of his pretense to superior biblical understanding. Words, their meaning and the context.
Is there anyone who'd think omnivores ate a D5 missile?

Now you should pay attention if you are going to share in the discussion with the others, Keith.

He's zealous for the omniscience but to a fault.

 

[DLH]

Deuteronomy 20:1-4 and Joshua 17:18-18:1

Ummm ... no.

At the beginning of Judges 1, the first line is "After the death of Joshua", so the fight referenced in Judges was a different and later war than the one referenced in Joshua, which he is a part of. They were both against the Caananities, but there's nothing in Joshua which has to do with the fight in Judges which is under discussion.

Deutoronomy mentions the word "chariot", but other than that I don't see how that applies to account of the battles which are happening in Judges.

I've been trying to think of a way I could explain this without having to write out the Canaan / Israeli military history, which you would reject, for whatever reason, and I realize all I have to do is ask you a couple simple questions and let you figure it out for yourself.

Q. What was the purpose of the conflict between the two and what were they afraid of which the skeptic's say God wasn't strong enough to go against?

A. Mountainous region / iron chariots.

Q. Why wasn't this accomplished at first and was it accomplished later?

A. Lack of faith, and yes.

That's all there is to it. Joshua is irrelevant to the point. It's the same thing. Objective: mountainous region. Deterrent: Lack of faith due to fear of iron chariots.

 

[Bronzeage]

One of the most common misconceptions held by atheists is the case of the iron chariots. God, it is believed, wasn't strong enough to protect the people of Israel from the people of Canaan due to the former having chariots with iron scythes protruding from their wheels. The refutation:

1. Jehovah said that the people of Israel were not to be afraid, even though their opponents had horses and chariots. Early in their period Israel didn't possess these things specifically for that reason. Jehovah wanted them to be sure that it wasn't numbers, horses, or chariots that could be misconstrued as their strength. Their strength, it must be realized, was Jehovah their God.

2. Once the Israelites corrected their behavior and regained their faith Jehovah dealt with the iron chariots accordingly and the Israelites were victorious.

Why didn't Israelites shoot the chariot horses? It would seem an iron chariot with no horse is pretty much useless.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Ummm ... no.

At the beginning of Judges 1, the first line is "After the death of Joshua", so the fight referenced in Judges was a different and later war than the one referenced in Joshua, which he is a part of. They were both against the Caananities, but there's nothing in Joshua which has to do with the fight in Judges which is under discussion.

Deutoronomy mentions the word "chariot", but other than that I don't see how that applies to account of the battles which are happening in Judges.

I've been trying to think of a way I could explain this without having to write out the Canaan / Israeli military history, which you would reject, for whatever reason, and I realize all I have to do is ask you a couple simple questions and let you figure it out for yourself.

Q. What was the purpose of the conflict between the two and what were they afraid of which the skeptic's say God wasn't strong enough to go against?

A. Mountainous region / iron chariots.

Q. Why wasn't this accomplished at first and was it accomplished later?

A. Lack of faith, and yes.

That's all there is to it. Joshua is irrelevant to the point. It's the same thing. Objective: mountainous region. Deterrent: Lack of faith due to fear of iron chariots.

You're not even trying. You're talking about two different wars a generation apart. It's like describing a battle in WWII by referencing trench warfare strategies which took place during a battle in WWI and saying it's they're same because they were both fighting the Germans, even though there wasn't anything like the same kind of trench warfare in the latter one. There is not a single reference to any kind of lack of faith on the part of the Israelis going on during the war that Judah led. All that storyline was done with a generation previously.

You can't just grab random, unrelated passages which are talking about completely different events and say that they apply to these other events discussed elsewhere simply because they share a single commonly-used word. Well, you can, but you can't do it without your argument being farcical.

 

[Earl IV]

I'm not taking any chances.

My iron chariot (by Harley Davidson) has provided adequate protection from rapture up to this point, I see no reason to change.

 

[DLH]

That's my point: The beliefs of Christians are often obviously wrong.

People. People are often obviously wrong. That changes things a bit.

Then Christians who believe he is omnipotent are wrong. Except for you, of course, who believe in a sort of punk-omnipotence. I've seen versions of the Christian god who couldn't do any magic at all, who couldn't supersize fries even if they worked at McDonald's.

That's funny. The omnipotent thing isn't entirely wrong, thus my comparison to omnivorous. To over exaggerate the meaning of the words to the extreme is a religious sort of carelessness. That's why I don't like using religious terminology to explain anything, because there is that tendency to do that. Omnivorous doesn't mean to literally eat everything and omnipotent doesn't mean literally can do anything. Then the skeptic always says: "Well, if a God can't do everything what good is he?" or some stupid shit like that . . . what are you going to do, huh?

And his purpose, will, and characteristics are mysterious, I bet.

No, there's this collection of books explaining in detail, and we were made in his image. That doesn't mean we look just like him.

Then your version of Jehovah has no issue with the Problem of evil. Too bad he didn't think to investigate that serpent/apple stuff, though.

That's a rather cryptic remark. The problem of evil? Isaiah 45:7 KJV "I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things." The Hebrew word for evil is ra, and as used in Isaiah 45:7 it basically means justice through calamity, for example, Adam's expulsion from the garden, or the flood. Of course it can also mean something bad, ugly, gloomy, ungenerous. Modern day comparison: parent tells child that to play in the busy street is bad (ra), child thinks the rule of not playing in the street is ungenerous (ra) so does it anyway. Either of two possible negative outcomes are bad (ra) for the child; the child gets hurt or the father punishes the child for playing in the street. That's evil.

I suppose that's one way to interpret it. I'm more familiar with the version where Jehovah knows, but is acting like he doesn't know in order to manipulate the kids into confessing.

Hmmm. What about the angels in Sodom or Cain shortly after the demise of Abel?

But your version is good too. No interpretation is privileged over any other; there is no reading that can be called "true" at the expense of other readings.

I don't buy that. We are all capable of error. I've made my share of mistakes, but that isn't to say that no reading can be called "true" at the expense of others.

I'm talking about Christianity. Your focus is more on the bible, on what Christians should believe if they read the bible and believed it, and if it were true and accurate and subject to being interpreted consistently. We need to try to keep the two ideas separate.

Agreed.

My point is that god can't be both omnipotent (regular omnipotent, not punk-omnipotent) and also unable to defeat iron chariots. The two beliefs held together are an obvious contradiction.

God couldn't defeat the iron chariots because he had made an agreement with Israel and they weren't living up to their side of that agreement. He could have easily evaporated the iron chariots in any number of ways himself. Really. Logically, from reading the Bible there is no reason not to conclude this.

I looked on his face and lived? We talked face to face. He showed me his backside? Those are inconsistent with the claim that no man may look upon god and live. Spirit creatures are beside the point.

What?! Often when spirit creatures, or angels (the Hebrew and Greek words for angel means messenger. When the messenger is originally spirit he is called angel when originally human he is called messenger) appear to men throughout the Bible they are often called "angel," "man," "God," and even "Jehovah" simultaneously throughout the account. They are "angels" originally, "men" in appearance, and "God" or "Jehovah" as a representative of God or Jehovah. So, on one hand men have seen "God" and on the other hand they can't see God and yet live. Even Moses only saw a representation of God.

 

[DLH]

I'm not taking any chances.

My iron chariot (by Harley Davidson) has provided adequate protection from rapture up to this point, I see no reason to change.

Well, cool, but joking aside, the rapture is nonsense. Unsupported by the Bible.

 

[DLH]

One of the most common misconceptions held by atheists is the case of the iron chariots. God, it is believed, wasn't strong enough to protect the people of Israel from the people of Canaan due to the former having chariots with iron scythes protruding from their wheels. The refutation:

1. Jehovah said that the people of Israel were not to be afraid, even though their opponents had horses and chariots. Early in their period Israel didn't possess these things specifically for that reason. Jehovah wanted them to be sure that it wasn't numbers, horses, or chariots that could be misconstrued as their strength. Their strength, it must be realized, was Jehovah their God.

2. Once the Israelites corrected their behavior and regained their faith Jehovah dealt with the iron chariots accordingly and the Israelites were victorious.

Why didn't Israelites shoot the chariot horses? It would seem an iron chariot with no horse is pretty much useless.

Well that would depend upon the time in question. At one point there was a ban on all metal. They couldn't use spears or arrow tips or swords, much less the Uzi which they hadn't invented yet.

 

[Earl IV]

I'm not taking any chances.

My iron chariot (by Harley Davidson) has provided adequate protection from rapture up to this point, I see no reason to change.

Well, cool, but joking aside, the rapture is nonsense. Unsupported by the Bible.

As is your so-called evidence debunking god's weakness against Harley Davidson motorcycles.

(If you truly wanted to set joking aside, this thread wouldn't exist)

 

[DLH]

I've been trying to think of a way I could explain this without having to write out the Canaan / Israeli military history, which you would reject, for whatever reason, and I realize all I have to do is ask you a couple simple questions and let you figure it out for yourself.

Q. What was the purpose of the conflict between the two and what were they afraid of which the skeptic's say God wasn't strong enough to go against?

A. Mountainous region / iron chariots.

Q. Why wasn't this accomplished at first and was it accomplished later?

A. Lack of faith, and yes.

That's all there is to it. Joshua is irrelevant to the point. It's the same thing. Objective: mountainous region. Deterrent: Lack of faith due to fear of iron chariots.

You're not even trying. You're talking about two different wars a generation apart. It's like describing a battle in WWII by referencing trench warfare strategies which took place during a battle in WWI and saying it's they're same because they were both fighting the Germans, even though there wasn't anything like the same kind of trench warfare in the latter one. There is not a single reference to any kind of lack of faith on the part of the Israelis going on during the war that Judah led. All that storyline was done with a generation previously.

You can't just grab random, unrelated passages which are talking about completely different events and say that they apply to these other events discussed elsewhere simply because they share a single commonly-used word. Well, you can, but you can't do it without your argument being farcical.

You're going to make me write out the entire history, aren't you? When it is totally unnecessary.

It's the same struggle for the Israelites to get the low plains of the mountainous region of the Canaanites for the tribe of Judah. Then they did. It doesn't matter if it was two hundred years later and many battles were fought in between.

 

[DLH]

Well, cool, but joking aside, the rapture is nonsense. Unsupported by the Bible.

As is your so-called evidence debunking god's weakness against Harley Davidson motorcycles.

(If you truly wanted to set joking aside, this thread wouldn't exist)

No, if I wanted to set joking aside, I wouldn't do this . . .

 

[Tom Sawyer]

You're going to make me write out the entire history, aren't you? When it is totally unnecessary.

It's the same struggle for the Israelites to get the low plains of the mountainous region of the Canaanites for the tribe of Judah. Then they did. It doesn't matter if it was two hundred years later and many battles were fought in between.

The entire history isn't relevant to the point being discussed, so there's no more need for writing that out than there would be a need to write out the history of crop yields in Nigeria during the 14th-18th century.

There was a specific event during that history where the Israelis lost their faith and Joshua dealt with it by going on about how their faith in God is stronger than any of the enemies' armies. A generation later, another war against the Caananites happened and there is no reference to any crisis of faith going on in the Israeli army. They were kicking ass all over the place and only lost one battle and there is nothing about that battle in which their lack of faith happened to play a part. The descriptions of both of those distant events happen to have the word "chariot" in them because that was one of the strongest weapons that the Caananites had and the Caananities had an advantage in terrains where they could be properly deployed.

There is nothing about the Joshua passage on faith which references the events of the Judges' passage. You're just doing a text search and asserting a relationship between two unrelated storylines because they happen to share a common word.

 

[Bronzeage]

Why didn't Israelites shoot the chariot horses? It would seem an iron chariot with no horse is pretty much useless.

Well that would depend upon the time in question. At one point there was a ban on all metal. They couldn't use spears or arrow tips or swords, much less the Uzi which they hadn't invented yet.

The time in question would be right before the scythe wheeled chariots turned and cut the Israelite line down like alfalfa.

Are you saying the Israelite Army went into battle against iron chariots armed with clubs and rocks?

 

[braces_for_impact]

I love bible enthusiasts. They love getting bogged down in petty details ignoring the obvious all throughout the book. You're busy discussing iron chariots when you should be asking yourself why the god you worship, this god of the bible, is so incredibly small, so blase', so without even the slightest hint of creativity or imagination.

This god you worship supposedly created the entire universe and everything in it. Our galaxy alone is 100,000 light yearsin diameter. Yet, EVERYTHING that concerns your god can be compressed into an area of the middle east a couple of thousand square miles in area. This speaks volumes about your god, and who actually created it.

 

[Bronzeage]

I love bible enthusiasts. They love getting bogged down in petty details ignoring the obvious all throughout the book. You're busy discussing iron chariots when you should be asking yourself why the god you worship, this god of the bible, is so incredibly small, so blase', so without even the slightest hint of creativity or imagination.

This god you worship supposedly created the entire universe and everything in it. Our galaxy alone is 100,000 light yearsin diameter. Yet, EVERYTHING that concerns your god can be compressed into an area of the middle east a couple of thousand square miles in area. This speaks volumes about your god, and who actually created it.

No, that's just the part that concerns us. If there is a God who created the entire universe and everything in it, all 100,000 light years of it, there's no reason to think we could understand it or him(customary masculine pronoun, not intended to imply God has male genitalia).

One can't submit that God didn't do something the way they would have done it, and claim it is evidence of no God.

 

[Wiploc]

People. People are often obviously wrong. That changes things a bit.

You said, "One of the most common misconceptions held by atheists is the case of the iron chariots." Emphasis added.

But your version is good too. No interpretation is privileged over any other; there is no reading that can be called "true" at the expense of other readings.

I don't buy that. We are all capable of error. I've made my share of mistakes, but that isn't to say that no reading can be called "true" at the expense of others.

The bible is shot thru with contradictions. If you want to make harmonizing interpretations, that's a matter of personal preference, not truth. The bible says that god is both possible to see and impossible to see. Those can't both be true. Any attempt to harmonize them is discount one part of the bible at the expense of another.

If you want to say that the god who can be seen is not the real god, that's your privilege, but it isn't true. If somebody else says, "No, it's the god you can't see that's not real," her interpretation is just as good--just as true--as yours.

God couldn't defeat the iron chariots

Then he isn't omnipotent. That's all I'm saying. People (Christians!) who think he's omnipotent, and who also think he can't defeat iron chariots are wrong.

If you disagree with my use of "omnipotent," we can rephrase: Those Christians who believe that god can do anything (possibly except for violating logic) but can't defeat iron chariots are wrong.

I looked on his face and lived? We talked face to face. He showed me his backside? Those are inconsistent with the claim that no man may look upon god and live. Spirit creatures are beside the point.

What?! Often when spirit creatures, or angels (the Hebrew and Greek words for angel means messenger. When the messenger is originally spirit he is called angel when originally human he is called messenger) appear to men throughout the Bible they are often called "angel," "man," "God," and even "Jehovah" simultaneously throughout the account. They are "angels" originally, "men" in appearance, and "God" or "Jehovah" as a representative of God or Jehovah. So, on one hand men have seen "God" and on the other hand they can't see God and yet live. Even Moses only saw a representation of God.

People saw Jesus too, right? So Jesus isn't god? He's a "messenger," a spirit creature representing god? That's a new twist. But you have to twist and twist the words of the bible in order to "harmonize" them.

 

[Earl IV]

As is your so-called evidence debunking god's weakness against Harley Davidson motorcycles.

(If you truly wanted to set joking aside, this thread wouldn't exist)

No, if I wanted to set joking aside, I wouldn't do this . . .

Jelly [emoji23]


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