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I can't chime in on the bible talk because I really never read much of it myself. I probably should sometime to see if the things people say it says are really things that it says. Since all of the reasons I dislike christianity comes almost entirely from word of mouth.

However if all the different branches of christianity have anything to say about it, I'd say the bible has multiple interpretations, some of which contradict others.

For the record, Buddhism doesn't have a god Shira. This is a common misconception, but the buddha was simply an enlightened man like the Pope. The "god" of buddhism is the state of being called nirvana. I've probably put more effort studying the eastern religions (taoism, buddhism and a little tiny bit of hinduism) than western religions. So I felt like I'd chime in where I actually have something to say.


This discussion should it continue would be better placed in the debate forum. seriously it's there for exactly this kind of stuff. Not only would it allow other discussions to sprout in the ooc thread, but it would put the whole discussion in one place so that it may last longer/be easier to find.

That's exactly what I say when I tell people I don't believe in the Bible. Of course then they mostly get all huffy like I've offended their life or something. I then point out that I never said I didn't believe in GOD, I said I didn't believe in the BIBLE. Big difference.

And it's simply because, not only is translating an ancient dead language like Hebrew, Aramaic and Greek are incredibly hard; but several words we have in the English language aren't even in other languages; so when it comes to translation, people have to pick the original closest word to it. For example, The Coat of Many Colors, isn't actually a coat. Translators don't even know what it is, because the word in the Dead Sea Scrolls doesn't translate to any other existing word. The closest they guessed to was "coat" but for all we know it could have been a cloak, a tunic, a g-string, or a fairy.

Another reason I don't believe in the Bible, is because, when you were in elementary school, you're teacher sat you and everybody else down in a circle, and starting with the person closest to her on the left, she whispered a sentence in your ear. You had to keep whsipering the sentence as you heard it in the person's ear to your left, and by the time it got back to the teacher it was an incredibly different sentence from what she said. She would have said "I had tomatoe soup for dinner last night." But when it got back to her the sentence would be "I dog coughed up a turtle at the funeral" It was to teach you not to gossip, but the same thing applies to this situation. Several hundred years worth of text is written in the Bible, and at some point along the way, something had to have been changed when being told and written.

It's like people back in Green and Roman made up stories to explain certain events happening because they weren't as scientifically advanced and therefore didn't know that the Earth spun which made the sun "rise" and "Set" everyday; but instead they thought some great Sun God was the reason for it all. In any culture you go to, you'll find any diety that someone somewhere completely is convinced exists.

That's why I've resigned myself to believe there is *a* God out there; but its probably not the God depicted in the Bible, or Hinduism, or Buddhism, or mythology, or anything.