Questions about the bible !

[alexXcJRO]

I had believe 10 years that the Bible is true . Now i am not so sure . Here are some of the problems that i found:


The story of Creation - in the Bible it says God created the universe and life in just 6 days in this order first
the Earth, then the Sun,Moon,the stars and finally life but science tells us a different thing
first was the Big Bang, then the stars ,then the earth and moon,then life, all of this took billions
of years.The question is how can both science and bible be correct?

The story of Adam and Eve -Adam and Eve were like small children : innocent , naive and with no knowledge of right and
wrong.God punished them for breaking his only rule by banishing them from a life of bliss,abundance,
immortality and no pain in Eden to a life of struggle, pain and mortality. They were bound to make
mistakes and not listen to their father because they haven’t experienced yet the consequences of
doing that. Also we must not forget that God didn’t explain what death is. If they had known that
for their transgression the punishment would be so severe they probably wouldn't have eaten the
forbidden fruit. So the question is how an all loving, just God in his infinite wisdom and mercy
could punish his beloved children so drastically at their first mistake?Isn't God's justice perfect?


The story of Noah- Men have became more corrupt and violent except Noah and his family who were righteous. God gets angry
and decides to destroy the world through a flood.Tells Noah to build an ark and bring 2 of every land
animal in the ark in 7 days .We know that the circumference of the Earth is about 40,000 km and for
example the distance from the Middle East and Australia is ~ 11,000 km .So the question is how he
managed to covered hundreds of thousands of km and gather all the animals from every corner of the
earth in just few days?
- God spared Noah and his family for being righteous,yet he killed at least one small child in the flood.
Jesus said small children in the eyes of God are innocent,righteous and not corrupted .So wouldn't an
all loving God in his infinite wisdom and mercy would have spared also all the children may they have
been in the thousands,hundreds or just one? Isn't God's justice perfect?
- God created the rainbow after the flood implying that there never was a rainbow before the flood. This
contradicts the scientific definition of what rainbows are because if you have light,refraction of
light and rain you have rainbows.This leads to the only conclusion that there are only three possible
scenarios that create an environment where rainbow would not form:
1.There is no sunlight. But terrestrial life is dependent on sunlight, in this scenario all life
would have died.
2.There was no rain but the Bible tells us of rain before the supposed creation of the rainbow.
3.Light did not refract but if light did not refract, sight would be impossible. It is light
refracting in the lens of the eye that allows sight by focusing the light onto the retina.
The question is how can both science and bible be correct?

The concept of Hell- Hell is a place where men go if they disobey Gods rules and not repent before their death, a place
of eternal torment and torture.How could an all loving God in his infinite wisdom,mercy could
torture billions of people forever for a finite numbers of sins committed in their finite life.
Wouldn't God's perfect justice demand a punishment proportional to the number and gravity of sins?
- Throughout the human history of hundreds of thousands of years man had believed in thousands of
different Gods,from gods of wind, trees and animals, to polytheistic gods of the vikings: Odin,
Loki,Thor or of the romans and greeks: Jupiter,Mars,Venus/Zeus,Ares,Aphrodite or of the egyptians:
Ra,Osiris,Horus or of the hindi:Shiva,Vishnu,Brahma to monotheistic gods like Allah,Ahura Mazda,
Buddha,Zalmoxis. Some of these gods are still worshiped today and they will be in the future.This
leads to a rather unsettling conclusion that all the people that never heard of the bible but
failed to figure it out that the right god is Yahweh or just failed to figure it out that there
is a god at all or be born in a different religion and consequently believed,worshiped and prayed
to their god or gods, are doomed to an eternity of torture in hell.This apply also to both to those
who heard of Yahweh but chose to remain faithful to their religion or belief and also to atheists
and agnostic who can’t believe because of insufficient evidence. Wouldn't an all powerful, all
loving God in his infinite wisdom would have thought of a better kind of revelation of himself then
that of the bible , like for example reveal himself and his wishes clearly, personally to every
human like he did with Noah or Moses or Paul, and by doing which give everyone a equal chance at
salvation and redemption? Why choose to remain hidden,idle while seeing all the billions of people
going on with their lives believing in,worshiping,praying and sacrificing them and others to false
god or gods and in the same time punish them for not obeying his rules when they haven’t even heard
them?

[abelcainsbrother]

I had believe 10 years that the Bible is true . Now i am not so sure . Here are some of the problems that i found:


The story of Creation - in the Bible it says God created the universe and life in just 6 days in this order first
the Earth, then the Sun,Moon,the stars and finally life but science tells us a different thing
first was the Big Bang, then the stars ,then the earth and moon,then life, all of this took billions
of years.The question is how can both science and bible be correct?

The story of Adam and Eve -Adam and Eve were like small children : innocent , naive and with no knowledge of right and
wrong.God punished them for breaking his only rule by banishing them from a life of bliss,abundance,
immortality and no pain in Eden to a life of struggle, pain and mortality. They were bound to make
mistakes and not listen to their father because they haven’t experienced yet the consequences of
doing that. Also we must not forget that God didn’t explain what death is. If they had known that
for their transgression the punishment would be so severe they probably wouldn't have eaten the
forbidden fruit. So the question is how an all loving, just God in his infinite wisdom and mercy
could punish his beloved children so drastically at their first mistake?Isn't God's justice perfect?


The story of Noah- Men have became more corrupt and violent except Noah and his family who were righteous. God gets angry
and decides to destroy the world through a flood.Tells Noah to build an ark and bring 2 of every land
animal in the ark in 7 days .We know that the circumference of the Earth is about 40,000 km and for
example the distance from the Middle East and Australia is ~ 11,000 km .So the question is how he
managed to covered hundreds of thousands of km and gather all the animals from every corner of the
earth in just few days?
- God spared Noah and his family for being righteous,yet he killed at least one small child in the flood.
Jesus said small children in the eyes of God are innocent,righteous and not corrupted .So wouldn't an
all loving God in his infinite wisdom and mercy would have spared also all the children may they have
been in the thousands,hundreds or just one? Isn't God's justice perfect?
- God created the rainbow after the flood implying that there never was a rainbow before the flood. This
contradicts the scientific definition of what rainbows are because if you have light,refraction of
light and rain you have rainbows.This leads to the only conclusion that there are only three possible
scenarios that create an environment where rainbow would not form:
1.There is no sunlight. But terrestrial life is dependent on sunlight, in this scenario all life
would have died.
2.There was no rain but the Bible tells us of rain before the supposed creation of the rainbow.
3.Light did not refract but if light did not refract, sight would be impossible. It is light
refracting in the lens of the eye that allows sight by focusing the light onto the retina.
The question is how can both science and bible be correct?

The concept of Hell- Hell is a place where men go if they disobey Gods rules and not repent before their death, a place
of eternal torment and torture.How could an all loving God in his infinite wisdom,mercy could
torture billions of people forever for a finite numbers of sins committed in their finite life.
Wouldn't God's perfect justice demand a punishment proportional to the number and gravity of sins?
- Throughout the human history of hundreds of thousands of years man had believed in thousands of
different Gods,from gods of wind, trees and animals, to polytheistic gods of the vikings: Odin,
Loki,Thor or of the romans and greeks: Jupiter,Mars,Venus/Zeus,Ares,Aphrodite or of the egyptians:
Ra,Osiris,Horus or of the hindi:Shiva,Vishnu,Brahma to monotheistic gods like Allah,Ahura Mazda,
Buddha,Zalmoxis. Some of these gods are still worshiped today and they will be in the future.This
leads to a rather unsettling conclusion that all the people that never heard of the bible but
failed to figure it out that the right god is Yahweh or just failed to figure it out that there
is a god at all or be born in a different religion and consequently believed,worshiped and prayed
to their god or gods, are doomed to an eternity of torture in hell.This apply also to both to those
who heard of Yahweh but chose to remain faithful to their religion or belief and also to atheists
and agnostic who can’t believe because of insufficient evidence. Wouldn't an all powerful, all
loving God in his infinite wisdom would have thought of a better kind of revelation of himself then
that of the bible , like for example reveal himself and his wishes clearly, personally to every
human like he did with Noah or Moses or Paul, and by doing which give everyone a equal chance at
salvation and redemption? Why choose to remain hidden,idle while seeing all the billions of people
going on with their lives believing in,worshiping,praying and sacrificing them and others to false
god or gods and in the same time punish them for not obeying his rules when they haven’t even heard
them?

Wow! You covered many things but based on your many questions it makes me think that you've been listening to atheists either challenging you about these things or by listening to certain atheists teach the bible and mock it and you felt you could not defend it,etc. I don't know if I can address every question you brought up. It would take time to address each question but I would say that it is impossible to fully understand God and his word without having been born again first, a person must have the Holy Spirit's help to understand the things of God.

The kingdom of God will not make sense to those who have not been born again and do not rely on the Holy Spirit to help understand the things of God.In some cases you may have been believing the wrong biblical interpretation and so it does not seem like it lines up with science. Have you ever questioned the biblical interpretation you've been going by? Because there are other interpretations that line up much better with science that you should consider. God wrote the book of life but he also wrote the book of nature also and they will line up much better when we have the correct interpretation.

[alexXcJRO]

It doesn't matter which bible(i compared these issues in my post against many bibles) i read because important facts are
present in every bible like :
-God create light before stars but you can't have light without stars. So why is the bible saying another thing?(I think everyone agrees that light comes from our sun every day.)(Genesis 1:1-19)
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

-God created the rainbow after the flood but if you have rain,sunlight and refraction of light you can have rainbows,so how their was no rainbows before?(Genesis 9:8-16)
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

-God told Noah to gather from all land animals and put them in the ark because in 7 days the flood will begin.So again how come Noah managed to cover hundreds of thousands of km to collect all the animals in just few days(or even few years)from every corner of the Earth?(Genesis 7:2-4)
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?s ... ersion=NIV

[Kurieuo]

Welcome Alex, There are more than one interpretation.

One interpretation I'd encourage you to read over is the Day-Age interpretation on the main site: http://godandscience.org/apologetics/day-age.html

There are also other articles that would perhaps interest you here: http://godandscience.org/apologetics/creation.html

To give you some hints with your first point, in Genesis we we have God created absolutely everything "the heavens and the earth". On Day 1 God light appears on the Earth, clearly at the end of day 1 there can't be a literal evening in morning without the Sun.

[alexXcJRO]

Lets assume the model Day-Age Genesis Interpretation is correct .
(with the note that "God was "hovering or brooding" over the seas of the newly formed earth means God creating the first life forms in the sea seems a bit fetched)
The model tells and i quote :" that at the earth's creation, it was covered with a dense layer of clouds and gases which would have made it dark at its surface, next, God removed much of the cloud cover, when He stated, "Let there be light" .
Genesis 1:6-10 describe the initiation of a stable water cycle (9) and formation of continents .
Next the translucent cloud layer was removed so that the sun, moon and stars shown through when he stated "Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years"."
So from the model we conclude that after the creation we had direct sunlight and rain(water cycle).

Now let's go to the story of Noah:
God created the rainbow after the flood implying that there never was a rainbow before the flood. This
contradicts the scientific definition of what rainbows are because if you have light,refraction of
light and rain you have rainbows.This leads to the only conclusion that there are only three possible
scenarios that create an environment where rainbow would not form:
1.There is no sunlight. But terrestrial life is dependent on sunlight, in this scenario all life would have died.
2.There was no rain but the Bible tells us of rain before the supposed creation of the rainbow.
3.Light did not refract but if light did not refract, sight would be impossible. It is light refracting in the lens of the eye that allows sight by focusing the light onto the retina.
The question is how can both science and bible be correct?

Let's not forget about the other issues:
The impossible quest of Noah:
-God told Noah to gather from all land animals and put them in the ark because in 7 days the flood will begin.(Genesis 7:2-4)
Here clearly God says that seven days from that moment he made the statement :go and take the land animals, the flood will come. Noah had to go ~11,000 km to Australia to get kangaroos or ~10,000 km to North America to get grizzly bears or ~5,000 km to China to get a panda bear and so on.
So again how come Noah managed to cover hundreds of thousands of km to collect all the animals in just few days(or even few years)from every corner of the Earth?

Concept of hell :
-Bible tells us that if man does not confesses his sins and ask for forgiveness during his life on Earth there will be consequences after death meaning spending an eternity in hell a place of eternal torture and torment together with devil and his fallen angels.
(Romans 6:23),(John 14:6),(1 John 1:9),(Revelation 20:10),(Revelation 14:10-11),(Matthew 25:41),(Matthew 25:46),
(Jude 13),(2 Thessalonians 1:9),(Matthew 13:50),(Mark 9:43).

So again how can all loving God in his infinite wisdom, mercy punish his beloved children so infinitely severe for sins committed in a finite life?

[PaulSacramento]

RE: Genesis
All your issues are answered if you understand the literary genre of Genesis, to who it was written to and why.
It is NOT a science book.


Putting aside that what you wrote here is incorrect and that none of the passages you quoted say what you state:

Concept of hell :
-Bible tells us that if man does not confesses his sins and ask for forgiveness during his life on Earth there will be consequences after death meaning spending an eternity in hell a place of eternal torture and torment together with devil and his fallen angels.
(Romans 6:23),(John 14:6),(1 John 1:9),(Revelation 20:10),(Revelation 14:10-11),(Matthew 25:41),(Matthew 25:46),
(Jude 13),(2 Thessalonians 1:9),(Matthew 13:50),(Mark 9:43).

How can God be all loving and yet punish?
I ask you, how can he NOT ??

[Kurieuo]

PaulS takes a different tact with Genesis, and it's one where he is nonetheless careful not to throw out the baby. To place those additional questions aside for the moment, not least because I'm on my phone... have you ever thought about bigger questions like how if we're merely atoms and chemical reactions, how this or that atom or reaction could be wrong or bad or even good in a moral sense?

Two books of recommend to you are William Craig's Reasonable Faith and CS Lewis' Mere Christianity. That is, if you don't mind reading.

Re: God's justice, read up on what Dr Mengele did. Tell me what you believe God should do with such? I'd also argue that God's righteousness isn't about punishment for wrong necessarily, though that forms some of it, but that grace and love is also there such that if we do love God then a way is open to us to be cloaked in God's righteous rather than God exacting from us what is fairly due.

[PaulSacramento]

God's justice is all encompassing, as is His love.
God IS Justice, just as he IS love.
His justice is that even the worse person in the world CAN have a chance at redemption and forgiveness IF they want it.
I don't know about you, but that is WAY MORE than I would do for many people out there.

[alexXcJRO]

-->PaulSacramento : "All your issues are answered if you understand the literary genre of Genesis, to who it was written to and why.It is NOT a science book."

So what you are saying that bible is just a fairy tail, collection of fantastic stories with no base in science , not rooted in the reality of our world that has no respect for the laws of our universe.
1.Let’s assume that the stories of the bible(creation, noah's flood,etc) is somehow true contrary to science beliefs. So God could have created the universe in any fashion he would have wanted, being all powerful. But then man discovers and demonstrates through scientific process (which has proven reliable in the past and present because it has given us all the amazing inventions and things we use in our every day life like phones, televisions, cars, planes, satellites, medicine, internet, etc)how the universe works using the gifts God bestowed upon him like intelligence, curiosity, logic, imagination and a desire to question everything and then looks in the bible and sees a total different thing. God could have made the universe the way science tells us so we don’t question the story of creation the way it is told in the bible .

2.I posted on William Craig's Reasonable Faith forum ,but my post didn't even got approved:(

-->Kurieuo: " God's justice, read up on what Dr Mengele did. Tell me what you believe God should do with such? I'd also argue that God's righteousness isn't about punishment for wrong necessarily, though that forms some of it, but that grace and love is also there such that if we do love God then a way is open to us to be cloaked in God's righteous rather than God exacting from us what is fairly due."

So both of you are saying that if psychopaths like Hitler,Mendel had repent and asked for forgiveness they would have gone to heaven.and the jews because they didn't believed in Jesus went to hell.
In my opinion an all loving God in his infinite wisdom,mercy and with a perfect justice would not do such a thing.

[PaulSacramento]

So what you are saying that bible is just a fairy tail, collection of fantastic stories with no base in science , not rooted in the reality of our world that has no respect for the laws of our universe.

I'll stop you right there since I have seen this silly tactic over and over.

If YOU do NOT want to believe in the bible then don't.
What you MUSt do, however, is stop saying the bible is something that it is not simply because YOU WANT it to be so.
That is enough.

I used to have more patience for so-called skeptics that pretended to be honest seekers of truth, that is until I saw the pattern that I am seeing with you.

If you truly wanted to understand the bible you would be seeking knowledge with an open mind and yours is, quite clearly, made up and closed.

[Nicki]

My take on the rainbows (and some other things in the Bible) is - God is in control of everything. He made a universe, which was something quite unusual at the time (presumably there had never been one before) and maybe he didn't allow rainbows until after the flood. The Bible says that God made the animals come to Noah and go into the ark - maybe they got a good head start.

[alexXcJRO]

-->PaulSacramento:" I'll stop you right there since I have seen this silly tactic over and over."
If YOU do NOT want to believe in the bible then don't.What you MUSt do, however, is stop saying the bible is
something that it is not simply because YOU WANT it to be so.That is enough.I used to have more patience for so-called skeptics that pretended to be honest seekers of truth, that is until I saw the pattern that I am seeing with you.
If you truly wanted to understand the bible you would be seeking knowledge with an open mind and yours is, quite clearly, made up and closed."

You don't have to get aggressive .Like is your belief that the other religions are fantasies. In this state i am at this moment regarding christianity.

Let me give an example :
Gandhi dedicated his life to the wider purpose of discovering truth, or Satya.
Gandhi summarised his beliefs by saying "Truth(Satya) is God".

Gandhi about Jesus : "It was more than I could believe that Jesus was the only incarnate son of God,and that only he who believed in Him would have everlasting life. If God couldhave sons, all of us were His sons. If Jesus was like God, or God Himself, thenall men were like God and could be God Himself. My reason was not ready tobelieve literally that Jesus by his death and by his blood redeemed the sins ofthe world. Metaphorically there might be some truth in it. Again, according toChristianity only human beings had souls, and not other living beings, for whomdeath meant complete extinction; while I held a contrary belief. I could acceptJesus as a martyr, an embodiment of sacrifice, and a divine teacher, but not asthe most perfect man ever born"
http://www.mkgandhi.org/ebks/whatjesusmeanstome.pdf

So if Gandhi( A man who teached about peace, non violence, tolerance ,love. A man who who tried and to some extent made the world a better place.) failed to believe and understand the story of the bible,of Jesus, a man who meditated,fasted extensively and dedicated all his life in search of the truth and God, what chance do we have ?
So this leads to the fact that because Gandhi failed, he gets as reward a eternal punishment of torment and torture.
Was not Gandhi a honest seeker of truth ? How come he didn't figure out the truth?
Let's also imagine a convicted felon on death row who has raped and killed many children, in the prison reads the bible gets remorseful and asks God for forgiveness .Believes in and that he is saved trough Jesus so he is saved after death and goes to heaven.

How is this showing that God is all loving infinite in his wisdom,mercy and with a perfect justice ?


-- Nicki : "My take on the rainbows (and some other things in the Bible) is - God is in control of everything. He made a universe, which was something quite unusual at the time (presumably there had never been one before) and maybe he didn't allow rainbows until after the flood. The Bible says that God made the animals come to Noah and go into the ark - maybe they got a good head start."

Let's forget about how the story of creation and noah's flood went . Let's assume they went how the bible told.
What about these other issues i found ?

Concept of free will and the story of Noah.
Man can choose not to serve the God of the bible , so this implies he does have free will.
“15 But if serving the LORD seems undesirable to you, then choose for yourselves this day whom you will serve, whether the gods your ancestors served beyond the Euphrates, or the gods of the Amorites, in whose land you are living. But as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.” (Joshua 24:15)”

Because man has free will that means he can do as he wishes during his life: he can choose to be a force of good or a force of evil in this world, to love God, hate him or just ignore him, to avoid sin or embracing it.

”12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways. 13 So God said to Noah, “I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them. I am surely going to destroy both them and the earth. “(Genesis 6:12-13)

God then comes and kills all humans except for Noah and his family for their being too corrupt, violent, and evil. This goes in contradictions of the concept of free will, because if men really had free then God shouldn’t have destroyed them for their choices before death.

So how come that he did?

At least one infant or young child was killed in the flood.
Infants and young children are incapable of fully understanding either their spiritual condition or God's requirements for salvation. Can God judge them even though they don't understand the basis of that judgment?

The Bible does indicate that children are innocent, for example, when
describing how some of the Israelites in the Valley of Benhinnom had become corrupt so as
to sacrifice their own (innocent) children:
"Because they have forsaken Me and have made this an alien place and have burned sacrifices in it to other gods, that neither they nor their forefathers nor the kings of Judah had ever known, and because they have filled this place with the blood of the innocent and have built the high places of Baal to burn their sons in the fire as burnt offerings to Baal, a thing which I never commanded or spoke of, nor did it ever enter My mind;" (Jeremiah 19:4-5)
There you have an analogy between corrupt men and infants who are innocent.

"Moreover, your little ones who you said would become a prey, and your sons, who this day have no knowledge of good or evil, shall enter there, and I will give it to them and they shall possess it. (Deuteronomy 1:39)"

The Bible clearly indicates that children are regarded as being innocent because of their lack
of ability to discern between good and evil, they are no capable of making moral choices.
So they are morally correct in the eyes of God.
Let’s see what righteous means = morally right or justifiable, good, virtuous, upstanding, worthy.
As we can see children are not corrupted but innocent, righteous and blameless in eyes of God.

"9 This is the account of Noah and his family. Noah was a righteous man, blameless among the people of his time, and he walked faithfully with God.10 Noah had three sons: Shem, Ham and
Japheth.11 Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight and was full of violence. 12 God saw how corrupt the earth had become, for all the people on earth had corrupted their ways." (Genesis 6:9)
There you have an analogy between corrupt men and Noah who is righteous and blameless.

So again i ask how come God didn't saved all the babies or young children but he did Noah ?

[PaulSacramento]

Like I said, stop right there and don't bother because all you are showing is your lack of understanding in the bible and what it says AND showing that you are NOT here to learn at all.
Why ask questions when, according to your posts, you already know all the answers.

[RickD]

Alex,

If you are open, then listen. You seem like you are just waiting for a response so you can argue.

And why did you list yourself as a Christian in your profile?

[Kurieuo]

Yes, at least be honest. You don't respect us, neither we you.