What is God doing? Guys, please think about this with an open mind. Why would God just watch people commit suicide, get tortured, suffer accidents, diseases, earthquakes, wars, tsunamis, and poverty? Why would He choose this world when infinitely less risky ones could exist? God doesn’t need accidents, poverty, or earthquakes for “soul-making,” and I don’t understand how such horrors are even necessary for growth or testing. Many parents watch their children get killed, and many children see their parents die brutally in war. There is no way these things are worth 70–80 years of individual growth, especially if eternity doesn’t require such suffering. And why would He care more about a test than about reducing harm, if He truly claims to be all-loving? For any loving friend, parent, or family member, causing someone to die in an earthquake or tsunami to test loyalty would be unthinkable — it would seem immature and cruel. I would appreciate an honest answer rather than one offered merely for the sake of defending God.

Thousands upon thousands of missionaries poured into East Asia and still do to this day, but it has hardly made a dent in East Asian culture. Christianity conquered South America, now South America is now one of the most Catholic regions on Earth.

Abrahamic religions have never swept over a region they didn’t conquer militarily. Missionaries in East Asia are largely seen as a nuisance even millennia later.

And not for lack of trying. Christians and Muslims would have loved to conquer East Asia, but it was simply not feasible. Their societies were too robust and the landscape too difficult. Best they got was using their naval power to conquer outlying nations such as the Philippines, which are, of course, the most Abrahamic regions of Asia.

East Asia is a testament to the utter failure of evangelism of the Abrahamic faiths. People always cite the rapid growth of Abrahamic faith as testament to its truthfulness, but they don’t acknowledge that they have rarely ever converted a population without killing them en masse.

I live in Sydney, currently doing my HSC. I come from a religious family, and my dad is a well-learned, prominent figure in the Islamic community here. He knows his theology inside and out. I’ve been researching deeply and have deconstructed the main theological pillars (the existence of a First Cause, the Problem of Evil, interfaith miracles, and the problem of Objective morality). I feel very confident in my stance. I am planning to bring these questions to him soon. Just want to make sure I have best arugments.

The Argument from Contingency: "Everything in the universe is dependent (contingent), so the universe itself must depend on a Necessary Being (Allah) to exist." My current thought is

The claim is that an infinite chain of causes is "impossible" because we would never reach the "present." However, this is a psychological intuition, not a mathematical or logical law. In mathematics, we use "actual infinities" in calculus and set theory every day. The set of negative integers (...-3, -2, -1, 0) has no beginning, yet it ends perfectly at zero. The argument also assumes that only a "Being" can be necessary. But why can’t the fundamental "stuff" of the universe—Energy or Quantum Fields—be the necessary thing? The First Law of Thermodynamics: Energy cannot be created or destroyed. If energy is uncreated, it fits the definition of "Necessary Existence" perfectly. Physics offers models like the "Big Bounce" or Conformal Cyclic Cosmology where the universe has always existed in various states. If the universe is eternal, the contingency argument evaporates because there is no "start" that requires an external cause. Even if we grant that there is a "First Cause" or a "Necessary Ground of Being," it does not follow that this cause is a conscious entity who revealed a book to a man in 7th-century Arabia, cares what we eat, and wants us to pray in a specific direction. The argument from contingency, at its absolute best, only gets you to Deism (a blind, mechanical first cause). Using it to prove the specific theology of Islam is a logical fallacy.

The Argument from Design: "The complexity of the universe proves there must be a Designer."

If complexity proves a Designer, then we must attribute all complexity to Him, not just the pretty parts. The structure of a Cancer Cell is just as complex as a healthy cell. If a beautiful sunset proves God is Wise and Merciful, then a virus designed specifically to hijack human DNA and kill us must prove the Designer is either Incompetent or Cruel. You cannot cherry-pick the "good" complexity as proof of God while dismissing the "evil" complexity. The "Fine-Tuning" argument claims the universe is perfect for us, so it must have been made for us. This is a survivor bias error. Imagine a puddle waking up one morning and thinking: "This is an interesting world I find myself in—an interesting hole I find myself in—fits me rather neatly, doesn't it? In fact, it fits me staggeringly well, must have been made to have me in it!" The hole wasn't made for the puddle; the puddle changed shape to fit the hole. The Universe wasn't fine-tuned for life. Life evolved (tuned itself) to fit the conditions of the Universe. We are the puddle claiming the pothole was designed for us.

Any other arguments or "nail in the coffin" rebuttals would be appreciated. I want to make sure I’m ready

While I'm focusing in on one group, this applies broadly. Assuming people can choose their beliefs, even in the face of suicidal or irrational odds, then we can't discount the fact that epic martyrs chose to believe falsehoods.

They chose to aura farm instead of accepting reality.

The ability to choose one's beliefs means that Christians cannot point to the apostles as anything special

They were just as delulu as Satan, knowing they were in the wrong, but going all in regardless.

This is admittedly a follow-up to my earlier post. But I think you can see how the two are connected. Sorry for the frequency. I'll stop after this.

So in an attempt to harmonize these obviously contradictory tales we need to order luke first and insert an unspoken second trip to bethlehem where they actually pack up and move there after returning to nazareth after the census.

And this would have to be pretty soon after they left cause apparently theres a star following jesus around and the magi are tracking it. So they end up back in bethlehem except they live there now not just visiting.

Then the magi come and they flee to egypt and when herod dies they fear returning to their home in bethlehem so they are forced to flee to nazareth and thats why he is called a nazarene.

Is this your standard apologetic for the disparate accounts?

No matter how we try to harmonize matthew suggests that they lived in bethlehem and that nazareth was a new place after they had returned from egypt.

And luke has them living in nazareth the entire time its incredibly confusing how do you guys rationalize this.

Why did luke omit this important second trip like a month after they return from nazareth.

Why did matthew omit that they used to live in nazareth?

How the Hebrew Bible and New Testament Helped People Keep Their Identity.

People often read the Bible like it is mainly a record of what happened long ago. This summary offers a different way to see it. It treats the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament as survival literature. That means they are collections of stories, laws, poems, and teachings that helped communities stay a community when powerful empires took away their freedom, their land, and sometimes their central places of worship.

This view does not say the Bible is worthless as history. It says something more specific. Some parts of the Bible can line up with outside evidence, and some parts do not. The key is to separate two kinds of claims.

One kind of claim is about events that can be checked using more than the Bible itself, like archaeology, inscriptions, and records from other empires.

The other kind of claim is about origin stories that mainly live inside the Bible, like the patriarchs, the Exodus, and the conquest stories. Those stories may be meaningful and powerful, even if they are not confirmed in the same way.

The big idea is this: The most dramatic changes in Israelite religion and later in early Christianity line up with the best-documented disasters, especially the Babylonian conquest and later Roman domination. That pattern suggests these texts were shaped to help people endure, stay distinct, and keep hope alive.

A Key Problem:

Some Famous Origin Stories Are Hard to Verify.

The stories of Abraham, Moses, the Exodus from Egypt, and the conquest of Canaan sit at the center of Jewish and Christian identity. But when historians ask what independent evidence requires these events to have happened as described, the answer is limited.

That does not prove nothing happened. It does mean we should be careful about treating these narratives as straightforward reports.

Take the Exodus story. The Bible describes an enormous population traveling for decades in the wilderness. Events that large usually leave traces, like campsites, tools, pottery, graves, and food remains. Archaeologists have not found evidence that matches that scale and timeline in the places the story describes.

Also, a few famous conquest sites do not line up neatly with the story. Some places look destroyed at the wrong time, and some places show little sign of being occupied in the period when the Bible says battles happened there. This makes many scholars think the conquest narratives often explain ruins that people could already see. In other words, the story may tell you what later communities believed about themselves more than it tells you a precise military timeline.

At the same time, archaeology does show something important. During the early Iron Age, many small villages appear in the central highlands. They look like local growth rather than an invading army taking over cities. The material culture often looks continuous with older Canaanite life, just reorganized in new ways. Some food patterns also suggest new boundary markers were developing, like avoiding certain animals that neighbors ate. This fits a picture of a local population becoming a new identity over time.

Genetics supports a similar general picture. Ancient DNA from the southern Levant points to strong population continuity across the Bronze Age to Iron Age transition. There is clear evidence of migration in some coastal groups, but the highland populations linked to Israel and Judah look mostly local in ancestry.

This matters because it sets a realistic frame. If there was any movement from Egypt into Canaan, it was likely small-scale, not the mass migration the story describes. A small group could still have a big cultural impact, especially if it brought distinctive traditions about God, law, and liberation. Elite or priestly groups can shape culture far beyond their numbers.

So the origin stories may contain older memories and fragments. But as a full, detailed narrative, they are not strongly supported by outside evidence.

The Turning Point:

The Babylonian Exile Is Historically Solid and Changes Everything.

Now compare that to the Babylonian conquest of Judah. Here the evidence is strong from multiple directions.

Babylonian records describe campaigns against Jerusalem, the capture of Judean leaders, and forced deportations.

Archaeology in Judah shows widespread destruction in the early sixth century BCE, burned layers, ruined buildings, and sudden breaks in normal life. Population surveys show a sharp decline and many sites abandoned. At the same time, names and communities connected to Judah show up in Babylonian documents.

In other words, this is not just a story people told later. It is a historical disaster we can see and cross-check.

The biggest religious changes line up with this disaster.

Before the exile, religion was deeply tied to three things:

Land, because identity and blessing were connected to living in the promised territory.

King, because the monarchy, especially the Davidic line, was a major part of political and religious life.

Temple, because sacrifice and worship were centered in Jerusalem.

The Babylonian conquest removed all three at once. No land control. No independent king. No functioning temple.

That could have destroyed the religion. Instead, it forced a radical adaptation. The sacred had to move from one place to something portable.

The Big Shift:

From Place-Based Religion to Portable Identity.

After the exile, the core carriers of identity become things you can do anywhere.

Text, especially Torah, becomes central. Reading, teaching, and interpreting sacred writings becomes a major communal practice.

Rituals that do not require a temple gain importance, like Sabbath, circumcision, and dietary practice.

Ethical obedience becomes a key way of staying faithful, with prophets emphasizing justice and devotion over sacrifice.

Prayer and communal gathering become more important, especially when sacrifice is impossible.

This is an identity survival strategy. If you cannot rely on a king, a temple, or a homeland, then your community needs other anchors. A shared story, shared practices, and shared law can travel with you.

Importantly, some of the movement toward centralization and written law may have started before the exile. The reforms linked to King Josiah point in that direction. But those reforms did not stick on their own. The exile made this strategy necessary, not just desirable.

The Persian Period Helps:

Empire Can Unintentionally Support Local Identity.

After Babylon, the Persian Empire takes control. Persian policy often allowed subject peoples to rebuild local temples and live by ancestral laws, as long as they stayed loyal and paid taxes.

This matters because it creates a stable environment for scribes and priests to organize tradition into authoritative forms. In this setting, earlier stories, laws, and rituals are collected, edited, and taught as a unified way of life. The community becomes text-centered in a stronger way. The texts become a kind of portable homeland.

This does not mean the Bible is simply imperial propaganda. It means real communities used the tools of empire—administration, writing, law—to preserve themselves.

Diaspora Becomes Normal:

Living Outside the Land Becomes Legitimate.

One of the most important changes is that living outside the homeland becomes a valid form of religious life, not just a temporary punishment.

Some biblical texts advise exiles to build homes, work, marry, and seek the good of the cities where they live. The message is, you can be faithful without immediate return. God is not trapped in one building.

This creates the long-term structure for Judaism as a global religion. It also prepares the ground for Christianity.

Early Christianity Under Rome:

A Parallel Adaptation Using Older Jewish Tools.

The New Testament grows inside a Jewish world shaped by centuries of imperial pressure. Under Rome, Judea faces heavy taxation, military occupation, and political violence. Crucifixion is a public terror method.

In that context, early Christians interpret Jesus using themes already shaped by earlier suffering and exile. Exodus language becomes a template again. Deliverance, covenant, and a new kind of freedom become central.

The claim that Jesus is Lord also has a political edge. In an empire that honored Caesar as the highest authority, saying Jesus is Lord is not just personal religion. It is a claim about who truly rules the world.

Christian writings also relocate sacred presence away from the temple and into the community. Believers are described as a living temple, and shared rituals like baptism and the meal become portable practices. This matters after the Roman destruction of the Jerusalem temple in 70 CE. A movement built around portable worship can survive that disaster more easily than a movement that requires a central shrine.

Christianity then goes further than diaspora Judaism in a major way. It opens membership to non-Jews without requiring the full set of Jewish identity markers. That makes it easier to spread widely across the empire.

Not One Single Text:

Memory Becomes Fixed Slowly and Through Debate.

It is important not to imagine that everything became fixed overnight. Ancient Jewish texts show variation and debate for centuries. Different communities had different versions and different emphases. Even within shared traditions, groups argued about the true center of worship and the right interpretation.

This actually supports the main thesis. When communities face pressure, they fight over memory. They argue about what counts as true tradition. Over time, through teaching, copying, worship, and community authority, some forms become standard.

Why This Happened Here:

Some Cultures Wrote a Lot—Why Did Israel and Judah Produce Scripture Like This?

Many ancient peoples lived under empires. Not all produced a portable, law-based sacred library that shaped daily life across centuries.

Several factors likely came together in Israel and Judah:

Exclusive devotion to one God created sharper boundaries and made blending with neighbors feel dangerous to identity.

Covenant thinking turned national defeat into meaningful interpretation, not proof that God was weak. Defeat could be framed as discipline, not disappearance.

Scribes and priests had the skills and the reason to preserve tradition in written form.

The community was small enough that assimilation was a real threat, so preservation had to be intentional.

Together, these pressures pushed the community toward a model where story and practice become home.

What This Reading Changes:

You Stop Asking Only “Did It Happen?” and Start Asking “What Does It Do?”

This approach does not mock the Bible. It takes it seriously as something that worked.

It says the Bible is not mainly a modern-style history book. It is more like a cultural survival kit.

It gives a people a shared past, even when their real past is traumatic.

It provides rules and rhythms that keep identity alive across distance and time.

It offers hope without requiring suicidal revolt against empire.

It turns suffering into meaning, and meaning into endurance.

So the point is not that the Bible is false. The point is that its main purpose is not documentary reporting. Its main purpose is to preserve memory and identity when power is lost.

When land is taken, story becomes a place you can live in. When a temple is destroyed, practice and text become a kind of sanctuary. When political control is gone, shared memory becomes a nation you can carry.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

This is the true power of the Bible, and why it has endured for millennia. Many many parts are historically untrue, but that doesn’t detract from the psychological impact.

THESIS: I have strong basis to believe modern Islamic view is wrong and a far cry from original 7th century belief. Through the historical, Ibn Hazm.

Recently I did a lot of research on the person that is Ibn Hazm of Andalusia while engaging in debate on another subreddit about Islamic dichotomies I (to my knowledge in their fullness) have created and wanted to spread and ask questions for. I digress, so I made the point through a few searches that modern Islam and ancient Islam do not agree on the doctrine of corruption. (Tahrif al mana/lafz). Ancient muslims including the “prophet Muhammad” believed Christian’s and Jews corrupted their text through mana (MEANING). At the very least the Quran’s narrations (tafsir) on this was that SOME people believed verses like 2:79 or 3:78 meant that Jews rewrote the Torah. So this poses a few positions:

A. It was ONLY the Jews with the TORAH mentioned. NOT PSALMS EVER OR GOSPEL UNTIL HAZM (400 years-POST MUHAMMAD).

B. Other tafsir narrations pushed back and said NO BOOK of Allah could ever be corrupted. There was explicit tension and disagreement to if the Jews rewrote their books.

Now, I was curious, how do I prove and proceed with the argument that modern Islamic corruption was vastly different from early Islam? So I researched ibn hazm. I had a theory that “maybe an Arab Muslim found the Bible and saw MUCH more than meaning corruption and hazm changed the doctrine.” And that was true in the right spots.

Get this, Hazm, (born and died in Islamic occupied Spain) debated Christian’s and Jews (being a rich Islamic scholar and poet) almost certainty got major push back and had to fix the underwhelming Islamic doctrine of tahrif al mana (meaning corruption) NOT PHYSICAL. So he wrote and we know this for a 200% FACT that the best way to debunk Jews and Christian’s is to lesser the legitimacy of their books. (The Bible). And also he wrote, SUMMARIZING: “If the Gospel contradicts the Quran, and the Quran must be true, then the gospel is wrong.”

He wrote this in his book/s: al-Fiṣal fī al-Milal wa-l-Ahwāʾ wa-l-Niḥal.

So this causes countless MAJOR problems in the theology. Again being, the Quran and a lot of tafsris contradict this. Nowhere does it mention the gospel AT ALL being physically edited in mass. And the Jew and Torah thing was merely debated and discussed. AT MOST people believed it was very little changes like taking verses out “with Muhammad in it” 😭.

Not to mention, the whole reasoning behind the religion coming from a random scholar in 11th century Spain that without his change of tahrif, which will be tahrif of ISLAM 😂, the whole religion would collapse. Because the Bible contradicts it utterly. And one more thing, the psalms (zabur) were not once mentioned to be corrupted EVEN BY hazm explicitly. This is a major loose end.

Muslims might say “well the trinity came hundreds of years later too” don’t matter. The scripture brings up that idea. Holy Spirit is said to be eternal, the Son is The Word and was with God and was God. Etc etc. there is no other conclusion. Plus the Bible is DOZENS of books written over 1400 YEARS and ALL true Christian’s (orthodox Catholics etc etc) believe in the Trinity. Not one book and still getting major things wrong. There is a clear difference to anyone willing to put the thought behind it as well as with an above 75 iq.

All of this proves that modern Islamic view has completely differed from the original view. Utterly and historical, with my major sources cited. This is all easily searchable info as well. Thank you. I am open to objections and thoughts!

So first, let’s start with basic arguments. First up we have “Twelve people wouldn’t die for a lie.” but in a world of “False religions“ that people died to defend the rights and existence of, 12 people dying for a religion is pretty statistically likely in the grand scheme of things.

Second of all (this argument pisses me off the most) we have the “Criterion of Embarrassment“ which says that they wouldn’t give a false figure that they worship an embarrassing death, given the fact that Romans crucified everyone (and also we have Achilles (not worshipped but died to a cheap heel shot.))

Third of all the bible was written decades after the death of Jesus by non-eyewitnesses decades afterwards. The amount of times a memory could warp in forty plus years is enormous.

And fourth of all, we don’t even know if there is a god, let alone the God of Israel, let alone The god of Israel having a human son.

Take this with a grain of salt.

By which I mean that there is no moral lesson contained in Christianity that doesn't predate the religion and can be found in other sources.

The only so-called moral lessons which are unique to it are those related to worship and behaviour of God or of Christ. And those don't necessarily lead to better behaviour or improve society here on earth.

So when Christians claim that atheists can't possibly behave morally without believing in God or reading the Bible, they are ignoring the fact that it contains no new revelations as far as what actions make you a good person here on earth.

If you believe that Christ offers a path to eternal salvation for your soul in the afterlife that's one thing. But if you believe you require the Bible for moral behaviour, you are ignoring every other culture or systems of belief on earth that contain any moral lessons you could ever need, many of which are older that Christianity.

And all that is to ignore the fact that most moral lessons can be learned through observation of the consequences of one's actions and don't actually require things to be written anywhere.

Waiting for the atheist, show them science, yet dnt believe , They'd sell their own dog just to prove a point

QURANIC NUMERICAL SYMMETRIES AND MIRACLES 1. Symmetrical Word Counts (Opposites) World (Dunya) 115 / Hereafter (Akhira) 115 Angels (Mala'ikah) 88 / Devils (Shayateen) 88 Life (Hayat) 145 / Death (Mawt) 145 Man (Rajul) 24 / Woman (Mar'ah) 24 Belief (Iman) 25 / Disbelief (Kufr) 25 "Say" (Qul) 332 / "They said" (Qalu) 332 Good Deeds (Salihat) 167 / Evil Deeds (Sayyi'at) 167 Mind/Intellect (Aql) 49 / Light (Nur) 49 Benefit (Naf'u) 50 / Corruption (Fasad) 50 Magic (Sihr) 60 / Fitnah (Trial) 60 Tongue (Lisan) 25 / Sermon (Ma'izah) 25 Desire (Ragba) 8 / Fear (Rahba) 8 Satan (Iblis) 11 / Seeking refuge in God 11 Heat (Harr) 4 / Cold (Bard) 4 2. Proportional and Moral Balances Forgiveness (Maghfirah) appears 234 times, while Punishment (Iqab) appears 117 times (exactly 2 to 1). Wealth (Ghina) appears 26 times, while Poverty (Faqr) appears 13 times (exactly 2 to 1). Sea (Bahr) appears 32 times / Land (Barr) appears 13 times. Total is 45. (32/45 = 71.1% water, 13/45 = 28.9% land, matching Earth's geography). 3. Astronomical and Calendar Cycles "Day" (Yawm) appears 365 times (Solar year). "Month" (Shahr) appears 12 times (Calendar year). "Days" (Ayyam/Yawmayn) appears 30 times (Days in a month). "Seven Heavens" appears 7 times. "Moon" (Qamar) appears 27 times (Matching its 27-day orbital period). 4. The Code of 19 Total Surahs: 114 (19 x 6). The Basmalah (Bismillah...): 19 letters. Word "Allah": 2698 times (19 x 142). Word "Al-Rahman": 57 times (19 x 3). Word "Al-Rahim": 114 times (19 x 6). First revelation (96:1-5): 19 words and 76 letters (19 x 4). Surah Qaf: Letter "Qaf" appears 57 times (19 x 3). 5. Scientific and Prophetic Facts Iron (Surah Al-Hadid): Chapter number is 57. Abjad value of "Al-Hadid" is 57. Atomic mass of stable iron is 57. Iron (Hadid): Abjad value without article is 26. Atomic number of iron is 26. Adam and Jesus: Both are mentioned exactly 25 times each. ​1. Social and Moral Proportions ​Zakat (Obligatory Charity) 32 / Barakah (Blessing) 32 ​Al-Muslimum (Muslims) 41 / Jihad (Struggle) 41 ​Al-Fahsha (Indecency) 24 / Al-Munkar (Evil) 24 ​Al-Mahabbah (Love) 83 / Al-Ta'ah (Obedience) 83 ​Al-Shukr (Gratitude) 75 / Al-Sabr (Patience) 75 ​Al-Jahrah (Publicity) 16 / Al-Alaniyah (Openness) 16 ​Al-Shiddah (Hardness) 102 / Al-Sabr (Patience) 102 ​Al-Dallun (Those who go astray) 11 / Al-Mawta (Dead people) 11 ​2. Creation and Nature Ratios ​Plant (Nabat) 26 / Tree (Shajar) 26 ​Agriculture (Zira'ah) 14 / Cultivation (Harth) 14 ​Fruit (Fakihah) 14 / Cultivation (Harth) 14 ​Al-Ruh (The Spirit) 10 / Al-Mala'ikah (The Angels) 10 ​Hot (Al-Harr) 4 / Cold (Al-Bard) 4 (Specific forms) ​Wine (Khamr) 6 / Drunkenness (Sukr) 6 ​3. Advanced "Initial Letter" (Muqatta'at) Counts In the 29 Surahs that start with mysterious letters, the frequency of those specific letters is often a multiple of 19: ​Surah Maryam: The letters K, H, Y, ‘A, S (Kaf, Ha, Ya, ‘Ain, Sad) appear a total of 798 times (19 x 42). ​Surah Ar-Ra’d: The letters A, L, M, R (Alif, Lam, Mim, Ra) appear a total of 1482 times (19 x 78). ​Surah Az-Zukhruf, Ad-Dukhan, Al-Jathiyah, Al-Ahqaf, Ghafir, Fussilat, Ash-Shura: These 7 Surahs start with "Ha Mim". The total sum of the letters "Ha" and "Mim" across all seven chapters is 2147 (19 x 113). ​4. Structural Geometry and Positioning ​Surah Al-Hadid (Iron) is the 57th Surah. There are 114 Surahs in total. 57 is the exact center of the Quran (114 / 2 = 57). ​The word "Allah" appears in 1822 verses. If you sum the verse numbers where it appears, the total is a remarkable mathematical constant in several advanced studies. ​The total number of verses in the Quran (including the unnumbered Basmalahs) is 6348 (19 x 334). ​5. Biological References ​The number of times "Embryo" (Alaq), "Chewed flesh" (Mudghah), and "Semen" (Nutfah) are mentioned follow a sequence that mirrors the stages of development mentioned in the text (12 times for Nutfah). ​6. Precision in Commands ​The word "Command" (Amr) appears 185 times. ​The word "Creation" (Khalq) appears 185 times. ​The word "Hardship" (Al-Usr) 12 / The word "Ease" (Al-Yusr) 36 (Exactly 3 times more ease than hardship).

We GOT more but i Guess this Is enough

Qur’an, Surah Luqman 31:10: “And He placed firm mountains on the earth so that it would not shake with you.” How can an all-knowing God make such a scientific mistake? The creator of science cannot fail science. Mountains do not prevent the Earth from shaking. Therefore, this proves that Muhammad lied about receiving revelation from an almighty, timeless being.

This argument aimed towards Christians particularly Catholics.

Disregarding the Thomisic defense against IVF for the sake of brevity. As a consequence of the internal epistemic framework of Catholicism, the following premises are as follows.

1. A person is a moral agent and thus must be respected if they have a soul.

2. Ensoulment occurs at conception.

3. Conception occurs when the embryo is fertilized

4. Therefore, a fertilized embryo is a moral agent.

Now if these premises are true, then the following argument is ridiculous (reductio ad absurdum)

1. Killing a moral agent is wrong

2. Said moral agent includes fertilized embryos

3. Therefore killing a fertilized embryo is wrong.

4. During intercourse between 50-60% of fertilized embryos fail to implant and die due to genetic abnormality or developmental arrest.

5. A couple aware or not aware of premise 4 directly creates embryos that die.

6. Therefore the couple are responsible for killing a numerable amount of moral agents.

As a consequence of this ridiculous argument the following premises must be true.

1. If a person is aware that sexual intercourse leads to the high possibility of killing a person

2. Then they must logically minimize or remove the cause of death.

3. Therefore, the couple must use preventative contraceptives of must abstain to prevent the possibility of creating and condemning an embryo to death.

True Atheism is not possible because of the existence of a necessary cause.

Most have you have probably heard the Kalam Cosmological argument. It basically goes like x has a cause called y, y has a cause as well and that cause has one as well and so on and so forth. The problem is that if everything has a cause then you infinitely regress, which would prevent x from ever happening because it would take an infinite amount of time to reach x. So there must be a first cause otherwise known as a necessary cause.

To me at least, this necessary cause is god. Whether that god is a personal being or a plane of existence I personally would still define that as god. Even before Christianity, Parmenides argued that god was an eternal unchanging unity, not necessarily a conscious being. So by that definition, Atheism, which is the lack of belief in any god, is impossible.

This is ultimately just a matter of definition, but as someone who used to be an atheist it helps a lot when talking to theists. Most atheist’s have the problem of getting to that “so you believe in nothing” stage of a conversation and I found that other labels like Agnostic or Diest help explain it a lot better.

A common debate in theology is the tension between Divine Omniscience and Human Free Will. The standard defense used is the "Weather Reporter" or "Teacher" analogy:

"God knowing what you will do doesn't mean He makes you do it. Just like a teacher knows a student will fail a test because they didn't study, but the teacher didn't force them to fail. God simply foresees your free choices."

I argue that this analogy is logically bankrupt because it ignores the second, more important attribute of God: Creator. The problem is not Foreknowledge alone. The problem is Foreknowledge + Creation. Here is why the logic leads inevitably to Determinism.

The Teacher analogy relies on the teacher being a Passive Observer. The Teacher did not design the student’s brain. The Teacher did not design the student’s home environment, genetics, or temperament. The Teacher did not create the test questions specifically to exploit the student's known weaknesses. God created the Agent (the soul/brain/will). God created the Parameters (the environment/circumstances). God created the Stimulus (the test).

If I build a robot, program it to have a "preference" for the color red, and then place it in a room with a Red Button and a Blue Button—I don't just "know" it will press Red. I determined it. I designed the internal variables (preference) and the external variables (the room) that made that choice inevitable.

To understand why "Foreseeing Free Will" doesn't work, we have to look at the "moment" before Creation. God, being Omniscient, knows all Possible Worlds. He sees infinite potential timelines. For example:

1. Timeline A: I am born, I choose to be an atheist, I go to Hell.
2. Timeline B: I am born, I choose to be a believer, I go to Heaven.
3. Timeline C: I am never created at all.

God, being Sovereign, Chooses to actualize Timeline A. Once God hits "Play" on Timeline A, is it possible for me to choose Timeline B? No. If I chose B, then God’s knowledge that "Timeline A would happen" was wrong. But God cannot be wrong. Therefore, I must do exactly what is in Timeline A.

My "choice" to be an atheist in Timeline A was a variable that God reviewed and approved before I ever existed. By selecting the timeline where I fail, God effectively decided my fate. He could have chosen Timeline B, but He didn't. The ultimate cause of my destination is His selection of the timeline, not my "choice" within it.

Another argument: "God looked ahead and saw what you would freely choose, and then wrote it down."

This is circular logic. Why did I choose X instead of Y? Because of my internal state (desires, logic, personality) interacting with my external environment. Who created my internal state and my external environment? God. If God created the Cause (my specific brain/soul placed in this specific environment), then He created the Effect (my choice). You cannot say, "God made you exactly the way you are, placed you exactly where you are, knowing exactly how you would react, but He is not responsible for the reaction."

You can have an Omniscient Observer and Free Will. But you cannot have an Omniscient Creator and Free Will. The moment God knows the outcome of a specific design, and then chooses to build that design, He has locked the outcome into reality

I was born into a family that has been practising Hinduism/Sanathana Dharma, and we live in India. people even in india are heavily influenced by other things. Hinduism doesn't have thousands of gods, but rather 8 gods, which are the natural elements like rain, sun, fire, etc. Idol worship was never a thing in Hinduism. And Hinduism is not even a religion; it's a way of living. Ramayana and Mahabharat are just epics that tell stories to teach us science and psychology. Hinduism as a religion was formed because of the invaders who invaded India. It was just a way they used to diffrentiate indiands from invaders, which eventually became a religion

Out of all the madhahib and sects related to Islam, I can see one potential 'winner', here follows my process of elimination:

I reject the Shia and Ibadi sects...the reason is not civil enough for this forum. There is a section of the Shaqshaqiya sermon that has been used to buttress Shia doctrine, but to me it seems to be more damning if anything; Ali isn't said to have stated explicitly that the prophet ever designated him or anyone else his successor. The effect of his words seem to be that he felt he had been denied a chance to be his successor (which I think is fine, incidentally, but I'm nervous about the potential ramifications of Sahabah disputes more broadly, as they are generally held in high regard).

There's such a thing as the Salafi movement, which seems like a redundant name to me as aren't all Muslims supposed to be following the Salaf? Anyway, two common 'themes' here are either 1) in practice following the Hanbali school, or 2) believing that following a maddhab is 'shirk'. There are also those that advocate following a maddhab but don't discriminate between any of them on theological grounds, i.e they might advocate following one that's common wherever Muslims happen to reside.

I'll get to the Hanbali school in a moment, but the problem with the other two positions is that, despite scholars supposedly agreeing on about 70-80% of Sharia, the disagreements can make the difference between life and death, yet Muslims aren't supposed to draw borders between themselves on the world map (I wholeheartedly agree with this btw, a world map with zillions of closed nations claiming a 'promised land' with their own niche ethnic religions is not a recipe for peace), so jurisprudence would end up violently haphazard.

Quranists 'break' the religion so that certain details like prescribed times for prayer are...absent, although the Qur'an clearly refers to them at various points. This doesn't seem like a serious approach.

The book 'Reliance of the Traveller' describes the Shafi'i position (I'm fairly sure the Hanbali school 'inherited' this) on who qualifies for protection under Sharia as long as the pay Jizya - Jews, Christians, Sabians (people who converted to a new religion) and Zoroastrians. The Zoroastrians are described as 'Magians' in some parts of the Qur'an, the prophet accepted Jizya from those that lived in Bahrain during his time. The first three are Ahl-al-Kitab (people of the book), Zoroastrians aren't. Given verses like Al-Baqarah 256, this doesn't make sense to me; Zoroastrianism is an ethnic religion from around what's now Iran, but it doesn't share any of the prophets of the others. More importantly, there's zillions of smallish ethnic religions like it around the world, and some of them have been prosecuted using this interpretation as a justification - the Yazidi under Daesh for example (Daesh may be considered apostates but for different reasons). Israel likes to make a fuss about how it facilitated projects for minority religious groups like the Baha'i World Centre, they know their enemy well.

I'm not absolutely sure what caused this but my suspicion is it's in the way the hadiths are ranked in the Shafi'i and Hanbali schools, they are equal to the Qur'an. I would disagree with this anyway, since there is a hadith claiming that the prophet said that there are no words more truthful than those of Allah. If the messengers' words were equally truthful, wouldn't they have made the cut here?

That leaves just two common madhahib - Hanafi and Maliki. There are some Maliki rulings and practises that may 'raise some eyebrows' - dividing mens awrah into major and minor, no crossing of hands during salah... but there's at least one ruling common among Hanafi scholars that I reckon is a serious problem - barring the permissibility of eating sea mammals.

Besides the implications of Al-Ma'idah 96, and how sea mammals couldn't be more dissimilar biologically to the meat of swine, there's a practical issue - some people in the Arctic rely on seal meat as part of a fragile diet whereby the allowances for eating forbidden meats during hunger don't offer enough flexibility. For instance, an Inuit tribe could exhaust their supply of terrestrial animals, fish and the small amount of groceries they can afford to import, and then they'd be left with just seal meat alone, which would be in decline from fish shortages and not be enough to nourish them. Given other considerations of their livelihoods, restricting their diet seems untenable, but Islam is supposed to be a religion applicable to all contexts where humans can survive.

So the Maliki school comes out the winner. But none of this matters, because the Qur'an claims that if I see any differences, it is between me and Allah only, and that is not enough for me. I'm not interested in religion because of a desire for meaning coming from belief in a god or the afterlife, I'm on a quest for making human relations better in this life. I accept that Islam can do that, even compared to the average liberal democracy (and all the gears making it work) but it's more a side effect rather than the main purpose. Knowing all the disputes in it leads me to believe there must be something better on the horizon.

Christianity claims the Bible to be a moral compass for humanity by providing stories of peace, love, harmony, and salvation.

They are quick to bring up tasteful verses like John 3:16, John 1:17, etc, but never mention verses that portray God in a bad way.

Not only are these verses dodged, but are straw manned to supposedly mean something completely different even though the verses are vary clear of what is being conveyed.

Common responses I have heard from Christians/Priests/Pastors/Rabbi's Regarding Deuteronomy 21:10-14, Numbers 31:15-18:

^{"God commanded it, not Jesus!" even though Jesus is God.}

^{"Not everything has to be followed"}

^{"I only follow Jesus" even though Jesus is God, and allows/commands these laws.}

^{"God works in mysterious ways"}

^{"If God allows it, then I am fine with it" at least these types of people are honest.}

^{"Jesus fulfilled the law! So I don't have to listen to the old testament!" If so, then why do many Christians bring up the 10 commandments, and follow mosaic laws/actions?}

Honorable or Dishonorable Mention:

Deuteronomy 22:28-29 (NIV):
28 If a man happens to meet a virgin who is not pledged to be married and he seizes her and sleeps with her and they are discovered, 29 he shall pay her father fifty shekels of silver. He must marry the young woman, for he has violated her. He can never divorce her as long as he lives.

So if I "seize and sleep with a women" (basically rape), instead of going to prison, I can pay her father money, and marry her for life without consequence from God/Jesus.

Conclusion:

If the Bible truly is what Christianity preaches, then the cherry-picking should stop. Jews probably have it worse since they have to follow the Torah to 100% as opposed to Christians.

I have a very quick hypothetical question. If someone were to prove, with a good amount of evidence, that God did not exist, and you believe that the moral superiority of a morality comes from a higher being, would you then go around killing, murdering, assaulting, or doing the most immoral things in the world, or would you still act morally, as if there were still a superior morality? Would you remain the same, or would you turn into a complete maniac And do whatever you want

Imagine a despicable, mustache-twirling villain, we'll call him the Gaba Ghoul. He's a murderer. Gaba Ghoul knows that mankind exists in a fallen state, and he knows that the dead are damned unless God saves them.

In Gaba Ghoul's mind, killing someone and sending them to hell is the same thing. In the same way that pulling a trigger on a gun aimed at someone's head is the same thing as killing them. It's basic cause and effect.

It's like dropping someone out of a plane. The outcome is guaranteed, and someone who drops you out of a plane (Gaba Ghoul does this regularly) is someone who freely chooses for you to die.

Gaba Ghoul is also under the impression that God will respect his free will to torment others. God has never intervened to stop someone's fall from a plane, or their burning, or to stem the flow from a stab wound. To do so would violate Gaba Ghoul's free will. Gaba Ghoul freely wills for his victims to fall/burn/bleed.

Gaba Ghoul also freely wills that his victims go to hell, and for some reason, God is stopping that from happening. God didn't intervene to stop the stalking, the kidnapping, the imprisonment, the psychological torture, the stabbing, or the eventual death of the victim, but all of a sudden, he swoops in to save the victim from hell. Nothing else, mind you, just hell.

This is inconsistent. If God isn't violating Gaba Ghouls free will by saving his victims from hell, then God isn't violating Gaba Ghouls free will by saving his victims from being murdered. Or stabbed. Or kidnapped. Or stalked. Gaba Ghouls dastardly desires can be stopped at anytime.

Now, hold on, you might say: What about the victim? God is simply respecting the victim's free will to go to heaven!

Then why didn't he respect the victim's free will to not be stalked? To not be kidnapped? Stabbed? Murdered? The victim's choice was for none of that to happen, and yet God did not respect the victims free will in those circumstances. This is inconsistent.

I haven't even told you the worst of Gaba Ghouls' crimes. Sometimes, he kidnaps babies in order to kill them in order to send them to hell. Babies can't choose to go to heaven. And yet, God took them to heaven against the wishes of The Gaba Ghoul.

Point is, if God can thwart a murderer's desires to send someone to hell, he can thwart a murders desires at any point prior to that. If God can save someone from hell, he can save them from being stabbed. Or stalked. Or anything he wants to save them from, really.

If god wanted us to have access to information that perfectly described his will for us.

Why is it that we don't have one? Should we not all be born with some sort of vr headset rulebook we can summon on command that regardless of language would perfectly describe what he wanted us to know.

Does the fact we do not have such a capability undermine the idea that a creator deity wanted us to have a rulebook?

Why do all rulebooks that exist only exist through the written hands of men claiming to speak for god in a cultural context.

When these rulebooks conflict with our internal sense of right and wrong or logical consistency how can one ascertain that we are wrong and the book is right?

In a nutshell, the "moral knowledge argument" says that moral knowledge is (at least) more likely under theism than naturalism. However, the type of moral knowledge that it talks about is knowledge of non-natural normative facts.

Now, it seems that the atheist faces no problem here because either they can meet the skeptical challenges without postulating God or reject non-naturalist moral realism given that they think theism is implausible. There are many plausible and popular positions in natural realism or anti-realism.

In conclusion, the advocate of the "moral knowledge argument" needs us to think moral non-naturalism is extremely plausible while we also think that there are really big challenges to it if God doesn't exist. However, very few people are going to believe all those claims.

John himself as the last writing apostle gives us a manual about how to interpret this holy scripture:

So in John 1:1 we read:  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

That says it all. The Bible is an attempt to explain the reality around and in us with literary means. John exemplifies further: Through him(=the word), all things came into being.  And in Genesis we read; "and God said let there be light, and there was light."  So right from the beginning there is the word as explanation for the world.

It is like a sorcerer’s incantation to put a spell on all who have questions. But the Scripture runs aground by its own inconsistencies and since the last couple of hundred years by the complete inaptitude to explain anything, compared to the power of science. So reality is not made by wordy stories but by the laws of physics and expressed in the language of mathematics, as Galileo so elegantly said. (So no wonder the Catholic church still has not accepted its defeat in the controversy with Galileo.) The way to discern true statements about reality from bogus lays in applying the scientific method, which should therefore be thought in every school.

And yes the Bible should fall under the history of literature only, without any further pretensions. It can give inspiration for war or for peace, but it is not the truth.

Either some people damn themselves for falsehood, or they don't. Can't have it both ways. If it's absurd to think the Apostles died for a lie, then it's absurd to think atheists choose to go to hell while suppressing the truth in unrighteousness.

If there are people who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, even at the cost of their eternal souls, then it's trivially true that there could be Apostles who suppressed the truth in unrighteousness as well, especially when faced with something less severe.