The Blog of an Atheist
March 4th, 2007 by Sean
Rantz Grotto, an athiest has just put together a blog about the Bible. He wants to know why we believe the Bible is true. He also wants to talk about matters of faith. Here is an excerpt from his original posting:
In a nutshell, I have been saying that because there are so many diffenent versions of the Bible it makes it hard to know what the true word of God is (assuming that the word of God is given in the Bible). Also, knowing that the Bible was transcribed by mortals, who is to say that somewhere in the transcription there was not a misspelling or wrong word inserted which chould inadvertanly change the meaning of one passage or another…
One point I usually make when I speak to people about why I am an Athiest is because I don’t see any proof otherwise. Religion is nothing more than trying to explain the unexplainable. …What I was really going to say is that if the Bible were a set of rules God set down for his children to follow then he is a poor parent. If, when my child is born in a few months, I set down a book full of vague rules for him to follow, don’t answer his questions regarding how to interrupt those rules, and then punish him if he gets it wrong, would you consider me to be a good parent? I would be following in the footsteps of the Christian God. How can you say I’m not? Is this really the model we should be following?
If you are interested check his blog out here
Thank you for the link. I would love to know what your readers have to say and invite them all to read what I have to say.
May you all find happiness in your own beliefs.
Please change the spelling: it’s ath*ei*st. Thank you, from your local spelling pedant.
Spelling is not really my strong point. Actually, I don’t really know what that point is…
Hi trying to catch up Rantz did you explain what your alternative beliefs were ? Maybe they will make better sense and we all could benefit from your insights I haven’t heard anything as yet in my 55 years that I would replace my Christian beliefs with I believe that there is truth you are a seeker of truth I think at least you have some notion of this I listen to different ideas and try to see if they are acceptable there is a whole mentalprocesss I may go through to discern this Do you actually know what you are rejecting?
Just a quick response to the excerpt. Although there are many versions of the Bible, they don’t contradict each other as much as some would have us think. The vast majority of variant readings affect spelling but not meaning. The Dead Sea scrolls proved that there hasn’t been as much change in the Scriptures as had been previously thought. The main differences among different Christian denominations are not based on variant readings, but on different interpretations of the readings. This is a whole different topic, too, and one that could be discussed.
Regarding your parent analogy… If I were to give a vague set of rules and then punish my children for not following them, I would indeed be a poor parent. But this is not the model of the God of the Bible. A more accurate analogy would be, I gave my children very clear instructions, but they disobeyed them. I then made an agreement with them that if they meet certain other conditions, including loving me and believing what I say, then I would forgive them for their misdeeds. That would be a model of good parenting, and is in fact what God has done.
The vagueness and confusion surrounding Christianity is not because of God, but because of the wrong ideas and prideful attitudes of others. God’s message is really quite simple and easy to understand, but it has been muddled by many of His supposed representatives. Yet it is still there in the Scriptures for anyone who wants to know the truth.