[ATLian]

>But to you everything in the bible is just black and white. I
>have been here too long to see some of your arguments.

Come on, even I know that not everything in the bible is black and white, a lot of the stuff is symbolic.

Believers use the freedom of interpretation to their advantage to the fullest. When it suits them, a statement can be black & white, and other times it can be symbolic.

First, the believers insist that their interpretation of the symbolic things in the bible is the one and only correct one, and some go ahead and claim that non-believers can’t even interpret stuff correctly since they don’t have the power of the holy spirit in them to enable them to interpret correctly. That’s an arrogant condescending and totally flawed approach to reasoning.

Secondly, when stuff is black and white but it makes god look bad, believers try to sugar-coat the situation and bring in some non-existence symbolism. On the other hand, when god does despicable things, I’ll call it as it is – EVIL! e.g. when god accepts a human sacrifice or kills a million innocent kids, that is evil and wrong. For a believer, it’s too painful to realize and accept that his god is doing something which a rational man can see is evil and immoral, so he will re-mix and sugar-coat the situation so that god doesn’t come out as bad. That’s why when god kills Job’s innocent kids, the believer overlooks that atrocity, and instead points out that Job had great faith and god is great because he cured him of his sores and gave him 28 more kids. WTF?



>Now who should prove to the other the Christ was married. It
>is clear that in the scriptures it is not present.

So what. There’s no mention of Jesus ever taking a crap in the bible, doesn’t mean he didn’t do it. My point is this – there are many things which men at that point in time used to do as normal men e.g. get circumcised, get baptized, get a career, get married, etc. The bible points out that Jesus was a normal jamaa till he turned 30, so it makes sense to assume he was all those. If he wasn’t, then the bible would have categorically pointed it out.

If it's hard evidence you want - it’s a fact that the guys who compiled the bible chose the final 66 books from more than 100 books available. There are some gospels out there which didn't make the final cut coz the compilers of the bible thought they'd mess up with the image of Christianity they were trying to potray. e.g. the gospel of Thomas which says that Christ had a twin brother, and also the gospel of Phillip which says:

"There were three who always walked with the Lord: Mary, his mother, and her sister, and Magdalene, the one who was called his companion. His sister and his mother and his companion were each a Mary.

... the companion of the [Savior is] Mary Magdalene. [But Christ loved] her more than [all] the disciples, and used to kiss her [often] on her [mouth]. The rest of [the disciples were offended] . . . They said to him, "Why do you love her more than all of us?" The Savior answered and said to them, "Why do I not love you as (I love) her?"

I think we can all agree that Jesus is a moral upright guy who wouldn't be kissing anyone other than his wife on the mouth. And that the word "companion" means more than just a friend...



>Even at th
>Cross Christ gives John the responsibility of taking care of
>his widowed Mother Mary.

I didn’t know Mary was a widow when Jesus died, what happened to Joseph?