Occam. - 12 June 2012 10:32 AM

Quoting F-I:

Isn’t that what I said… twice? Y’all must be having trouble with my southern drawl…

  Sorry, we old fuds have failing memories and I didn’t go back and read the earlier posts.  Should have done that. 

No worries, Occ. Just messin’ with you, man. 

This is totally new to me. I mean, I know a lot of liberal Christians who deny most of the supernatural stuff in the bible, who don’t believe in a physical bodily resurrection of Jesus, etc. I even know some who think of god as more of a cosmic presence or force than a personal deity. But I have never met one who believed that god is totally imaginary. And I can’t think of any reason why such a person would continue to call themselves a theist—or even a deist.

What a strange bird this is! I have never personally met an individual who proclaimed themselves to be a christian who didn’t believe in the divinity of Jesus or the other major tenets in the floppy book. I’ve read about this of course and the most liberal adherents I’ve crossed paths with are the Episcopalians; the church my wife attends, but they don’t view god as a “cosmic presence”. I do know some desists but they still hold out hope for some form of god. I guess the could be called deist-like. I need to get out more.

Cap’t Jack

Write4U - 11 June 2012 10:42 AM

FreeInKy - 11 June 2012 10:36 AM

CuthbertJ - 11 June 2012 10:24 AM

Well, this is news only to the extent we consider things very narrowly.  EVERYBODY is somebody elses atheist right?  From the standpoint of Hinduism, all Jews and Christians are atheists for example. And so…

I don’t follow your logic, CuthbertJ. An atheist does not believe an any gods or spirits. Even religious people know and accept that. I never heard any Christian refer to Jews or Hindus as atheists. Even a Christian would not hurl that insult at another religious person. 

Strictly speaking an atheist does not believe in a god. But OTOH, if a theist does not believe in the other’s god, that other person might as well be an atheist.
During a discussion I once asked, “do you believe that the Islamic god is the same god as the christian god. After all, if there is only one god, it must be the same god.
The answer was “no, allah is a different god than the christian god.”  Go figure.

That person was not well versed in the teachings of Islam.  The “people of the book” (Jews and Christians) have the same god as Muslims.  A studious Muslim would still probably say however that people of any other religion or non-religion (other than Judaism, Christianity, or Islam) are infidels.  However, also, most Muslims, I think would have a serious problem with accepting other’s belief in the concept of the Holy Trinity and the deity of Christ and might thus have trouble giving non-infidel status to most Christians (to whom this is central to their beliefs).

TimB,
That person was not well versed in the teachings of Islam.  The “people of the book” (Jews and Christians) have the same god as Muslims.  A studious Muslim would still probably say however that people of any other religion or non-religion are infidels.

“Thou shalt not have no other god’s before me”

One thing worth noting here is the absence of any insistence on monotheism here. God does not declare that he is the only god in existence; on the contrary, the words presume the existence of other gods and insist that they should not be worshipped.

http://atheism.about.com/od/tencommandments/a/commandment01.htm

That was the point I was trying to get across. In principle it is the same god, “received” in a slightly different way.
Like a giant rubic’s cube, one person says “I have seen god and good is green, the second says “I have seen god and god is blue, etc. Thus instead of saying we have all seen the rubic’s cube, untold millions have died because of color selection. A nice excuse to act against people who have a god (bird) of a different feather.

TimB - 13 June 2012 12:50 PM

The “people of the book” (Jews and Christians) have the same god as Muslims.

But does God know that?  What if He thinks they are all wackos?

psik

psikeyhackr - 13 June 2012 06:31 PM

TimB - 13 June 2012 12:50 PM

The “people of the book” (Jews and Christians) have the same god as Muslims.

But does God know that?  What if He thinks they are all wackos?

psik

Well, I think that fervent belief in Jehovah/Allah is a kind of a delusion.  So if God thinks the members of the 3 great religions are wackos… hmmm… if A = B, and B = C, then .... Am i God?!!  : )  (faulty logic be damned… if I’m God, I can do that)