Are you a christian?

What in the gospels? Not much in the gospels except perhaps the seperation between the sheep and the goats and the casting into eternal fire all those who disobeyed God. Why not just annihilate them? It sort of contradicts the teaching in the sermon on the mount it seems. The sermon of the mount I first found to be the most profound teaching I had ever heard. But it was very much influenced by the Christianity of Dostoevsky. Now afterwards I have learned the Dostoevsky's christian vision wasn't that biblical. But I much much much prefers his vision of christianity to that of traditional dogmatic christianity and even to the christianity I find in the New Testament. Anyway. What more do I find based on hatred? The talking about the elect chosen by God before the foundation of the world... It sort of seems like the writers sometimes wants to revenge the jews. But if you want to speak about what I really find detestable in the New Testament, it is the Revelation of John. That is the most vengeful piece of writing I have ever read. And when I read it, I torn the pages of it to pieces. It destroyed my view of Christ that I had received from Dostoevsky. Other than that, I find not much hatred in the New Testament. I think it is the combination of the teachings there with much of The Old Testament that brings me problems also... And I have more problems with teachers of Christianity like John Chrysostom, Thomas Aquinas, John Calvin, Martin Luther, and Jonathan Edwards than with the New Testament itself.

What denomination do you belong to? How did you become a christian?

I know God is just. I just don't understand what is just with creating me sick and demanding me to be healthy under the threats of eternal torture. Not just punishment for a few years. Not even punishment for thousands of years. But forever!! For eternity! That is insane. I just can't wrap my head around how that is just when I had NO saying in all this in the first place. Would you mind to read the article by Arthur Schopenhauer and see what you think about it? Because in him I have found a soulmate as to what I find are the problems with Christian dogmas... So perhaps, if you can give me a respond to your opinion on those comments that he makes, perhaps that could clear some things up for me? I too believe christianity is true. But I don't have faith. I don't believe Jesus wants me to be near him. No matter how much scripture says so. Believe me. I have prayed myself insane before. I have screamed to God to please help me to believe. I have begged and pleaded for mercy and forgiveness. But all I feel afterwards is an intense fear. A fear of a wrathful, angry and vengeful judge who hates me because of my filth. But he created me. That makes me angry at him instead. So angry that I soon want to sin willfully and spit in his face. Yes. I am apparently a great blasphemer. But where is he? Why doesn't he care when I beg him to grant me faith?

I agree... I like Jesus except the introduction of eternal hellfire.

Are you a christian?

As I said, I believe Christianity might be true. But that is very bad news it seems to me.

Your vision of christianity is far preferable to the one I know of. To answer your questions: Honestly, my interpretation of Job is that God says "You are right". Right in what? That suffering has NO meaning. And the realization of this is the redemption. The "big other" is gone. That is what Job is about. Or as GK Chesterton, a famous catholic author said, when God asked Job who he think he is questioning God about his own suffering etc. what God really says is: "You sit there miserable because of your own suffering? Look around you. I screwed everything up!".

God wanted me to exist. Why? If I don't want to exist, what is God's reason for bringing me into existence if he foreknows that I don't want it. Suicide is condemned in christianity(perhaps not in orthodoxy) as the worst of all sins. That too I can not accept.

The sheperd of Hermas was even considered as canonical scripture by many of the church fathers, such as Irenaeus and Origen. It is contained within The Apostolic Fathers, so it has mighty importance.

You say there is no election and predestination? Well... That seems strange. Because in Scripture I find 25 places that speaks about election, and 5-6 places that talks about predestination. I also find a horrifying text from Paul in Romans 9 where he talks about how God creates some people in order to destroy them. And in Hebrews I find the same teaching as in the Sheperd of Hermas; those who fall away can never be forgiven, even if they want to.

You say the unforgivable sin is to believe that God is evil. Well, then it seems like I have committed it. You say that heaven and hell is the same place where God's love is responded to in different ways. How does that corresponds to scriptural words such as "punishment", "wrath", "vengeance", "retribution" etc? It seems rather to be wishful thinking? I find only a few verses in he bible that says God is love. Generally, the bible seems to say to me: "Love others and I will love you. Believe in Christ's sacrifice, and I will love you wretched sinner. Not because I love you really, but because I love my son. Now. Go love all your neighbours and enemies. If you don't I will cast you in that lake of fire along with your enemies." Even if you would experience God as Satan, why can't you be forgiven? Nothing is supposed to be impossible with God. No, in Scripture it is clear. God doesn't WANT to forgive them. "Shall never be forgiven" it says. Why. Because he is "Guilty of an eternal sin". Falling away in early christianity seems to have been equal to blasphemy against the holy spirit. This seems to me to be mind control and will to power. I fear christianity is true. But I must admit: Nothing in my life has made me so miserable and suicidal as the belief in the Christian God.

You said most christians would NOT agree that non-christians go to hell? hmm... That is not what I have seen. Neither among christians of today nor among the christians in history. If one is honest to what scripture and tradition has taught, the majority of the Jews were cast into a fire. That is a psychotic belief it seems to me. If I walk on the street thinking that the majority of the people there will go to hell (The gate is narrow as Christ says), then I get a panic attack. I was at a psychiatric hospital for a month because of this horrendous belief. It drove me to madness. I can't take it anymore. Show me the goodness of christianity. I can't find it anymore.

Regarding if I have the wisdom to say whether what God did was good or bad: He has given me the capacity to see what I see. And the conclusions I make of what he has revealed to me is that the world is a catastrophic mess.

BTW. Is Jehovah in the old testament the God of Jesus? Of course he is... Do you find the God who slaughtered the Amalekites, who wanted to stone homosexuals and women who had lost their virginity before their wedding to be Love? One really has to twist one's mind in order to say that it seems to me.

Yes well, I have struggled for over two years with christianity. I first fell for it. But the more I learned about its dogmatic beliefs, about God's character, about his omnipotence and omniscience, about predestination etc. I felt that it repelled me. It wasn't the religion I first seemed to have found anymore. And with the threats of hell hanging in the back of my head, I can't rest. Honestly, I am not an atheist. I don't know what I am. For some reason I believe christianity is true. But the christianity I have learned about from all my reading, if it is true, then life is a hellish nightmare to me. A nightmare that apparently will only get worse after death. Oh my have I found comfort in the writings of Nietzsche!

You don't. But I assure you, that IF I had a choice in the matter and a christian came and explained me the conditions, I would scream and say NO I DON'T WANT THIS.

What is the wish about heaven BTW? Isn't life and all its sufferings here enough? Can't one just accept them? Why would some sort of a judgement where the wicked suffer and the righteous prosper be something that justifies everything? TO me it makes everything worse. And eternal night of sleep without dreams seems like a perfect end of life to me. Where is God justified in he holocaust? If he is behind it, he is evil. Even if he foreknew it he is evil IMO. Where did the jews who were executed go? Heaven or hell? Hell according to most christians. Now, read the article by Schopenhauer if you want. It is a good one. And also, if you can give me some good arguments for christianity, then I am all ears. I listen. I wouldn't mind if it were true as long as God doesn't threaten me with eternal torture

Also, God created us ex nihilo. That is my biggest problem with christianity, because it means "you have no choice in the matter. I create you. Now obey me or be prepared for an eternal fire."

I refer to writings such as The sheperd of Hermas among others. They all take the position that if one falls away after becoming a christian, one is damned. One is not even forgiven if one asks for forgiveness. What kind of a revengeful and vindictive deity is that? A man may be 20 when he becomes a christian, and then falls into sins of lust at the age of 21, and then realizes his mistakes at the age of 22. Then apparently, God is so angry at him that he will never forgive him according to the early christians. This is repulsive. This young man then has nothing to do but to wait for an eternity in an agonizing fire. I find that unacceptable and evil. I understand that you are a christian? Please help me understand some things:

1.What is the relation between predestination and election on the one hand, and God's omnipotence and omniscience on the other? If God foreknew my fate, then why did he create me if my fate is eternal hell?

2. What is eternal hell?

3. Why did Christ speak about an eternal and unforgivable sin without really clarifying what it really is? It has brought tremendous suffering to many in the world.

4. If God foreknew the fall of man, why did he create man? And if he foreknew the damnation of many, why did he create them? To display his wrath? IF that is true, then having children is the most wicked action imaginable. One ought then to prevent life IMO.

In order for you to understand really what my implications are, then I suggest you read this "article" written by Arthur Schopenhauer. He expresses my views better than I can:

https://ebooks.adelaide.edu.au/s/schopenhauer/arthur/religion/chapter6.html

A christian would say that death is the result of a sickness in the soul; the seperation from God, the step out of being into constant becoming. But also that death has been overcome in Christ. Most people find that silly today and worship only the naturalistic point of view(which is though at least as silly IMO). Anyway, no matter what, the only real philosophical problem is the problem of death. God isn't useless because of rationality. It is just that man chooses not to think about deep questions anymore. Sure, our obsession with rationality "killed" God, but in reality it didn't. Either God is or isn't. Science has not in the least disproved his existence, because science only trusts the senses. And if the common man would have been more knowable about philosophers like Plato, Augustine and Kant, they would know that it is ridiculous to dismiss God just because one trusts in positivism. Life has no meaning? What does that mean? That conclusion is meaningless in it self. Its opposite too though. Anyway, one thing is for sure; death is the problem of everything. The "rational" person says that life is meaningless. Why? Because of death. The christian says that life is meaningful? Why, because they have a solution to the problem of death.

You can just as much prove with logic that God doesn't exist. Logic, just as reason, rests on assumptions that do not correspond to anything in the real world, that is on the assumption that there are equal things, that the same thing is identical at different points in time: but this science arose as a result of the opposite belief; that such things actually exist in the real world.

What I mean is like this basically. If I can imagine a perfectly straight line, a perfect circle etc, does that mean that they exist? Did Achilles catch up and run past the turtle? If no, then one can not prove God by natural reason, that is, by thinking one self to some sort of proof of his existence just because man's logical mind and reason says he exists. Because clearly, Achilles did in reality run past the turtle. If you say yes, then all I answer is that everything is possible. The existence of God is likely. I don't deny it. But I would say that our conscience is the thing that most points to his possible existence, not our reason and logic. So if you say; "I can prove God exists", I would answer "No."

Which god did you find through reason? You can as easily come up with a conclusion that God does not exist as that he does. Did you find the God of Abraham or the god of the philosophers? By the way, saying that God EXISTS is ridiculous. Everything that exists has a cause, in the sense that exist actually means out of becoming. Something that exists isn't, it becomes. Everything that is, doesn't exist. God IS, if one said that, I would perhaps say 'yes he probably is'. Did you reason your way to a being or a becoming? Nietzsche and Kant proved that reason isn't sufficient for proving any existence of God, god, or gods.

Now mind you, I don't deny the existence of God.

The god of natural reason is a non-god, as Karl Barth said.

All you can know, in reality, is that there isn't necessarily a sun, there is only an eye that sees a sun. I am a subject, an as a subject I am the knower but never the known. What is God to you? Subject or object?
Take the teleological argument for God's existence for example. Now I agree with Kant there; he said we can not know if it is our minds that structures an order or if there is an objective order. Just because we observe harmony and a structure, doesn't mean there necessarily IS a harmony and a structure.

It is a god of your imagination. Not the living God. Nietzsche killed the God of reason(yes, those who claimed to have faith were often just reasoning) a long time ago. Not to mention Immanuel Kant of course. Who destroyed the idea that you can reason your way to God.

A man can not reason his way to God. There is more likelyhood that what happened in the gospels in fact happened for real than People think. I would say it is even probable. Believing God to to be incarnated is still in a sense absurd though. For me, the unsolveable problem with christianity isnt God's existence, but rather the idea of eternal hell. Now this might sound weird, but I am almost certain that one of the following two men were right about human existence: Jesus Christ or Nietzsche. Darwin and the rest are boring.