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Robbie Parry
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Posted: 14 October 2018 at 4:23am | IP Logged | 1 post reply

A distasteful story from the Bible is the "Book of Job". So much suffering for what does seem a lot like a wager/bet between God and Satan!
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John Byrne
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Posted: 14 October 2018 at 5:34am | IP Logged | 2 post reply

The God of the Bible is a very small god. He’s petty and jealous and cruel. Which tailors him perfectly for the times when the various chapters were written. Creation itself was also very small and cruel.

But as our knowledge expanded, God shrank more and more. Eventually people began to realize this tiny, primitive god just didn’t work any more, and with that realization came the beginning of the true human experience.

Unfortunately, it wasn’t everyone who came into the Age of Reason, and the World as we see it today is directly a result of that.

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Robbie Parry
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Posted: 14 October 2018 at 5:40am | IP Logged | 3 post reply

Yes, I agree.

The OT God was small in a power sense. I can't recall the exact chapter, but I seem to recall one where people had to put a mark on their doors so that God's angels could spare their homes during one of God's many onslaughts.

As a kid I thought, 'But wouldn't an all-knowing God know which houses to be spared? Why would residents have to mark them?'

The OT God is to the NT God what the Sphinx is to Galactus: the former is very powerful, but the latter is even more powerful. The OT God appeared to be running on "lower power levels" than the NT God (not to mention the different personality).
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John Byrne
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Posted: 14 October 2018 at 5:55am | IP Logged | 4 post reply

What’s your evidence for the NT God being more powerful, Robbie?
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Robbie Parry
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Posted: 14 October 2018 at 6:00am | IP Logged | 5 post reply

Perhaps "more powerful" was the wrong phrasing, but thinking of the fact that the NT God had more of a global/universal outlook. All that talk about a New Heaven/New Earth, resetting creation, destroying evil forever, casting the devil down, raising people from the dead, etc.

I realise, as an atheist, this is akin to me discussing comic power levels!

I suppose, rather than "more powerful", the NT God felt more universal whilst the OT God was a localised God.
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John Byrne
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Posted: 14 October 2018 at 6:17am | IP Logged | 6 post reply

I suppose, rather than "more powerful", the NT God felt more universal whilst the OT God was a localised God.

••

I think that's an overly generous interpretation! The NT God still focuses all his energy into a small section of the Middle East. Rome, the most powerful nation on Earth at the time, exists only to provide bad guys, and even that role is played down by later edits. No mention is made at all of India, or China, or the New World.

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Robbie Parry
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Posted: 14 October 2018 at 6:23am | IP Logged | 7 post reply

That's a fair point!
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