Old Biblical Stories…Redux

I spent a lot of time on this reply, it needs to be on the blog front page.

Hi Marianne, Thank you for writing.

You write:”
I am a scientist that is paying attention. I have spent 30 years in biochemistry, which includes cell biology, toxicology, pharmacology, inflammation, biophysics of DNA and RNA, and medical research in general.

Great, I’ve always wanted to talk to someone in the research. If you are comfortable with it, could you tell me where you received your degree, what degree you have, and what particular field you work in today?

You write:
“Most scientists do not have any proof for what you say. It is all just “tradition.” They just assume evolution did this, and evolution did that. There is no proof. What the lay person perceives as proof is just scientific speculation, based on this traditional thinking.”

So are you saying here that you do not agree with or accept evolution?
How old do you think the earth and our universe is?

You write:
“you make several unsubstantiated comments. Like Noah did not exist. Well there are records of him, just like there are records of Julius Caesar. There was a garden of eden, and the description of what happened to it is consistent with the syrian african rift – most of it fell into this pit. The bible knew about this rift before modern science did. And the descriptions of the Garden match up with local areas, if you understand tectonic plate shifts.”

Here is what I actually wrote in my reply to your earlier post:
“Looking around and paying attention and studying the world we find the evidence that there never was a world-wide flood, which means we are not descended from Noah’s 3 sons. We find that real humans have been walking the earth for at least 200,000 years (means that there was no Adam and Eve as the Bible relates), which also means there was no fall from grace in the Garden of Eden, which means there is no Original Sin…which also means there is no need for a redeemer (Jesus) for our (non-existent) original sin .”

I did not say Noah never existed (although I do doubt that he did) I said there is NO evidence of his supposed flood, and you will find the evidence for this fact is all over the internet. You say there are records of him…could you perhaps guide me to them?

Regarding the Garden of Eden, there are many stories and guesses as to where it was. The Discovery and Nat Geo channels have had a few specials  about that, and it has variously been placed in Turkey, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ethiopia, and Kenya. The Great Rift Valley which goes through Ethiopia, Kenya, and Tanzania, and goes right by the Afar depression…you know where Lucy and her brethrens bones are found, also the border area between Namibia and South Africa, and probably other places I haven’t heard about.  Yes, I am familiar with plate tectonics

The Largest DNA study on record at this time is the IBM, Nat Geo Genome Project which has over 350,000 DNA samples right now, and they are showing all the existing human bloodlines come from Africa, primarily the Ethiopian, Kenya area and the border area between Namibia and South Africa.

And why would there be a Garden of Eden if Adam and Eve did not exist?

You write:
“I do not accept the Jewish archeologist denying the Exodus or Joshua. I say the opposite. They are uncovering new evidence every day. They have sites where the Red Sea was crossed, and the pharoah’s chariots are still down there, under water. THey also have sites where the Israelites offered sacrifices in the desert, with hebrew symbols. The israelites were instructed to leave markers along their journey, and these markers have been found. “

You do not accept the Archaeological evidence? Do you have other scientific evidence that refutes this? Is this part of your field today? Also it’s not just one archaeologist.

There has never been a discovery of Pharaohs chariots in the Red Sea, or the Reed Sea for that matter, and believe me they have been looked for.  If you insist there is…could you please point me to the evidence, as I have scoured the internet for almost three years now for evidence of this (and other Biblical things) and have had no luck at all.

To the best of my knowledge many, many archaeologists have scoured the Sinai for a hundred years looking for any evidence at all that over a million Hebrews wandered there for 40 years and have found absolutely nothing.  There is even no evidence at Kadesh-Barnea where a million Hebrews supposedly spent the majority of their time during this 40 years.  You know that the evidence of Joshua defeating the town of Jericho and Ai are lacking also, don’t you?  I haven’t heard anything at all about markers.

You write:
“Most modern church and theology seminaries are getting away from the truth, not going toward it. Much is crap. They need the holy spirit to know truth, not a man getting paid a salary. He is just a hireling.”

I guessing here that you are an evangelical fundamentalist and believe in the literal Bible as being inerrant in all matters. Would I be right?  I think a lot of what the modern church and seminaries are doing is trying to keep up with the emerging science that somehow impinges on religion.  This is what’s going on with the Old Testament and Genesis specifically. The circumstantial evidence against Adam and Eve, Noah’s flood, Tower of Babel, Exodus, Joshua, and the subsequent fallout from these stories being false…nothing but myth, is changing our world of religious thought. Denying facts do not make them go away.

You write:
“As far as time on the earth, no data is any better than the tool that measures it. There is no realistic tool that can measure over 500o years. The rest is speculation, and going off the standard curve, which is bad science.”

Have you heard of Potassium Argon dating?  There are also about 20 or 30 radioactive element methods of dating besides the common C-14

Also there are the following:
Absolute dating
Amino acid dating
Astronomical chronology
Biochronology
Datestone
Dendrochronology
Electron spin resonance
Fluorine absorption dating
Ice-Core dating
Iodine-xenon dating
Law of superposition
Obsidian hydration dating
Oxidizable carbon ratio dating
Principle of faunal succession
Relative dating
Thermoluminescence dating

I’m sure I’ve missed one or two…but then you know all this as a scientist.

Dendrochronology can go back 11,000 years now. Not helpful in the Sinai, but useful in other parts of Israel…to sometimes fact check the old stories.

You might want to check out an older post of mine here: https://thewordofme.wordpress.com/2009/06/06/carbon-dating-and-the-bible

In it I reference a Christian writer and scientist who actually works in the age-dating field. I have there a link to a PDF file about age-dating that the man wrote especially for Christians. Also I will post his contact data here: Dr. Roger C. Wiens RCWiens@MSN.Com Dr. Wiens has a PhD in Physics, with a minor in Geology. His PhD thesis was on isotope ratios in meteorites, including surface exposure dating.

He was employed at Caltech’s Division of Geological & Planetary Sciences at the time of writing the first edition. He is presently employed in the Space & Atmospheric Sciences Group at the Los Alamos National Laboratory.

He has published over twenty scientific research papers and has also published articles in Christian magazines. Dr. Wiens became a Christian at a young age, and has been a member of Mennonite Brethren, General Conference Baptist, and Conservative Congregational, and Vineyard denominations.
Whole PDF article can be found at: http://www.asa3.org/ASA/resources/Wiens.html

Age Dating in the many ways and methods used by science nowadays works…there is NO real dispute about this…except from YEC’s

You write:
“If you want to know Jesus, he will make himself known to you, in a way that is unique to you.”

Is there really a need for Jesus…if there was no Adam and Eve and consequently no “Original Sin”?

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Obama and Secrecy and Human Rights

Obama’s support for the new Graham-Lieberman secrecy law

Sounds like a dry subject, but t really isn’t.
Follow this link if you believe in human rights and want to get really mad
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2009/06/01/photos/index.html

I voted for this guy and believed in his platform…what a fool I was.

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Pre-History and the Religious Fundamentalist

A study published in the August 13^th. 2009 edition of the journal Science has revealed that early modern humans living around the Southern tip of Africa some 72,000 years ago were using fire to shape their stone tools and weapons

““We show that early modern humans at 72,000 years ago, and perhaps as early as 164,000 years ago in coastal South Africa, were using carefully controlled hearths in a complex process known as heat treatment,” said study lead author Kyle Brown.

Until this point it was the widely held belief that humans began using heat to forge tools 25,000 years ago in Europe, the researchers said.

The study based its conclusions on pieces of silcrete, a type of stone that were found in various states of glossiness, indicating they had been treated with heat.

“Prior to our work, heat treatment was widely regarded as first occurring in Europe at about 25,000 years ago, We push this back at least 45,000 years, and, perhaps, 139,000 years, and place it on the southern tip of Africa at Pinnacle Point,” said study co-author Curtis Marean.

The study was conducted by researchers from universities in Cape Town, Africa, Liverpool, England, Wollogong, Australia, and Bordeaux, France.

Full story found here: http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2009/08/13/stone-tools.html

or a longer version of story can be found at the link below.

http://www.physorg.com/news169391684.html
A story from October of 2007 at Science Daily describes earlier findings of this primeval human habitation site and relates that “After decades of debate, paleoanthropologists now agree the genetic and fossil evidence suggests that the modern human species — Homo sapiens — evolved in Africa between 100,000 and 200,000 years ago.”

Full story can be found here:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2007/10/071017145252.htm

So the evidence just keeps adding up and the religious right/fundamentalists just stick to their old Bible stories as if nothing is happening.

Think about the ramifications, as regards Biblical history, of just these two discoveries alone…minus the thousands and thousands of other bits of evidence that we already have that totally refutes religion. Some people just never get it.

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God Watches Over Us

Such a loving God watching over us.

“The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked; his wrath towards you burns like a fire; he looks upon you as worthy of nothing else but to be cast into the fire; he is of purer eyes than to bear to have you in his sight; you are ten thousand times so abominable in his eyes as the most hateful venomous serpent is in ours.” Jonathan Edwards, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” preached in his home church… Northampton, Massachusetts in 1741

And out of his mouth proceedeth a sharp sword, that with it he should smite the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron: and he treadeth the winepress of the fierceness of the wrath of God, the Almighty. Revelation 19:15

“Therefore will I also deal in fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity; and though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, yet I will not hear them.” Ezekiel. 8:18

“I will tread them in mine anger, and will trample them in my fury, and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my garments, and I will stain all my raiment.” Isa. 63:3

“And the people shall be as the burnings of lime, as thorns cut up shall they be burnt in the fire. Hear ye that are far off, what I have done; and ye that are near, acknowledge my might. The sinners in Zion are afraid; fearfulness hath surprised the hypocrites,” Isa. 33:12-14.

“And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord. And they shall go forth and look upon the carcasses of the men that have transgressed against me; for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh.” Isa. 66:23, 24

And here I thought we had a loving God looking after us.  🙂

More Lies From Christianity

How much you want to bet that if religion ever ruled the world again that something like the below could happen again?

“On the 7th of December, 1484, Pope Innocent VIII sent forth the bull Summis Desiderantes. Of all documents ever issued from Rome, imperial or papal, this has doubtless, first and last, cost the greatest shedding of innocent blood. Yet no document was ever more clearly dictated by conscience. Inspired by the scriptural command, “Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live,” Pope Innocent exhorted the clergy of Germany to leave no means untried to detect sorcerers . . . Witch-finding inquisitors were authorized by the Pope to scour Europe, especially Germany, and a manual was prepared for their use [by the Dominicans Heinrich Krämer and Jacob Sprenger]—”The Witch Hammer”, Malleus Maleficarum. . . . With the application of torture to thousands of women, in accordance with the precepts laid down in the Malleus, it was not difficult to extract masses of proof . . . The poor creatures writhing on the rack, held in horror by those who had been nearest and dearest to them, anxious only for death to relieve their sufferings, confessed to anything and everything that would satisfy the inquisitors and judges. . . . Under the doctrine of “excepted cases,” there was no limit to torture for persons accused of heresy or witchcraft.”  Andrew Dickson White, “A history of the warfare of science with theology in Christendom” pp 351-352

Aren’t the pronouncements of the Pope infallible and direct from God. Since the church claims a direct line to God they should never be wrong in any matters of interpretation and dogma…should they?  Have they?

And echoes of the these thoughts below of early church fathers still reverberate in today’s churches, as many denominations still practice unjust quasi-slavery over women.

“In pain shall you bring forth children, woman, and you shall turn to your husband and he shall rule over you. And do you not know that you are Eve? God’s sentence hangs still over all your sex and His punishment weighs down upon you. You are the devil’s gateway; you are she who first violated the forbidden tree and broke the law of God. It was you who coaxed your way around him whom the devil had not the force to attack. With what ease you shattered that image of God: Man! Because of the death you merited, even the Son of God had to die. . . . Woman, you are the gate to hell.”  Tertullian 160-220 AD, ‘De Cultu Feminarum,’ section I.I, part 2

I was thinking about the early Christian church (Catholic) and comparing it to today’s church thought and practices, and you know there have been tremendous changes in it. Interpretation of the Bible has undergone a revolution that still continues as we become smarter and less intimidated by religious authorities and realize that it’s not “God breathed.”

Religion has the onus of having to be right from the very start…after all God is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent. Nothing He does or says is wrong…right?

You know what; many of the things in Christian religion were and are wrong. I’m not talking itsy-bitsy matters here such as a word disagreement or two, I’m talking major things the church has screwed up; such as the witch thing, and the holding half of the human population in total disregard, and endorsing slavery for humans.  Look back in the Old Testament and see how God says to kill for small matters that humans do all the time and are meaningless in the grand scheme of things.

I mean do we really want to kill someone for disrespecting their parents or for making fun of a bald man.  Do we want to go around killing homosexuals for something they most likely have no control over…and let’s not forget that if you believe in God…God made that homosexual.

We now know that most of Genesis is lies and most probably Exodus as well.  The “scholars” at Answers in Genesis are right in one thing…if Genesis is wrong (and it is), then the whole foundation of the Christian faith goes down the drain.

I believe that all the evidence points to religion in general, and Christianity in particular, being nothing but a scam against the human race, and it’s guilty of genocide against us.

God and Christianity and Us Poor Humans

I’ve recently been in a discussion with a person about Satan and why he would even bother anymore since his fate is already sealed. We and Satan already know he loses the battle with God, and…all the people who follow Christianity know it.  The story has been outlined for us by the Church; we know Armageddon will be coming, the Four Horsemen, the Anti-Christ, and whatever else John writes in Revelation.

This God of Christianity is going to allow this melodrama to proceed to the point of human annihilation on this planet, and somehow God calls this victory.  ALL the various Christian denominations believe they alone will survive and live forever…either in Heaven or in a  Earthly Paradise, looked over by God–in person.  All this Armageddon and stuff is caused by a Devil (or is it the original plan of God when He started all this crappy melodrama?), who knows he will lose the fight; does this make even the slightest bit of sense?

I like the following part of an essay that I have already posted earlier on my blog…it speaks to the problem with Devils and any other spirits called up by religion.

“For many centuries the church filled the world with devils — with malicious spirits that caused storm and tempest, disease, accident and death — that filled the night with visions of despair; with prophecies that drove the dreamers mad. These devils assumed a thousand forms — countless disguises in their efforts to capture souls and destroy the church. They deceived sometimes the wisest and the best, made priests forget their vows. They melted virtue’s snow in passion’s fire, and in cunning ways entrapped and smirched the innocent and good. These devils gave witches and wizards their supernatural powers, and told them the secrets of the future.

Millions of men and women were destroyed because they had sold themselves to the Devil.

No man has genius enough to describe the agonies that have been inflicted on innocent men and women because of this absurd belief. How it darkened the mind, hardened the heart, and poisoned life! It made the Universe a madhouse presided over by an insane God.

Think! Why would a merciful God allow his children to be the victims of devils? Why would a decent God allow his worshipers to believe in devils, and by reason of that belief to persecute torture and burn their fellow-men?”  Robert Ingersall

Does this man above speak the truth?  Did the churches do these terrible crimes?  Yes they did…its known written history.  And then later on in the American colonies the Puritans repeated the deadly serious criminal act of burning and hanging “witches” and railing against demons.  I think this is a serious mistake that a real “God driven” religion would not make.

Or would you think that there was real demons and evil spirits and Satan himself doing these things?  If not, how would you reconcile the churches doing these things in the name of God?  Do many Christians you know believe in Satan and think he sends his minions to do bad stuff in the world…like he was supposed to have done in the Dark Ages and in the Puritan states of America’s past?

Think about this; The Catholic Church (who was the victor in the God Wars way back then) was the keeper of the scriptures and writings of all of early Christianity. They molded the church (and Scripture), in the way they wanted. They alone keep the religious fires burning in the beginning years.  They promulgated the evil words that started the above scenarios. They started the whole mess.

The Protestant Reformation or Revolution started by Luther started out with the best intentions, but they made at least one mistake…they used the same book, and that book is terribly, terribly wrong about so many things

“This fact is forgotten by Protestants. They read blood-curdling stories of the Inquisition and of atrocities committed by Catholics, but what does the average Protestant know of Protestant atrocities in the centuries succeeding the Reformation? Nothing, unless he makes a special study of the subject . . . Yet they are perfectly well known to every scholar . . . If I do not enumerate here the persecutions carried on by Catholics in the past, it is because it is not necessary in this book to do so. This volume is addressed especially to Protestants, and Catholic persecutions are to them sufficiently well known . . .

…What makes, however, Protestant persecutions especially revolting is the fact that they were absolutely inconsistent with the primary doctrine of Protestantism — the right of private judgment in matters of religious belief! Nothing can be more illogical than at one moment to assert that one may interpret the Bible to suit himself, and at the next to torture and kill him for having done so!”  The Double Standard of Protestant “Inquisition Polemics” by John Stoddard

So why do you think religion is any different today?  We no longer believe in witches and demons…at least most of humanity does not, but there are still many inconsistencies in how Christians practice their faith and most of them pick and choose their theology to suit their life and how they want to live it.

I think that a religion based on a real God who is able to interact with us would be unquestionably believed by all people, there would be unanimity in all matters of belief and understanding in His message. There would have been no need or reason for all the unbelievable terror and evil carried out in His name, no evil men sentencing people to death in His name, no churches growing fat off the dissemination of the “Holy Word”.  No people using His church and His religion to sodomize helpless children or prey on the weak and vulnerable, to steal others wealth and in general keep people under the yoke and in their control.  And there would be NO need for devils, demons and such.

The common apologetic for these problems mentioned is that it is evil men who have done this; God and The Church are blameless in this matter. Really!!–not much of a God to allow so much crime in His house.

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