heaven and hell?

[luke07930]

Hello friends. I'am an atheist and a Buddhist. I have been debating on some Islamic websites and found them suprisingly welcoming, and even more suprisingly open to the critisism and my logical aproach to disbeliief. Although many of my arguments are just ignored when I point out that scripture is not proof. But on the whole I have found my experience on the Islamic boards very constructive.

I'm here to open a debate about the claims of the monotheistic religions, I want to talk about Christianities claims and Islam. Anything you would like to know about Buddhism feel free to ask.

So let me start by saying Hello to everyone and hoping you all find peace and happiness.

My first question is why would god burn peacefull, kind, loving non believers and forgive a cruel, selfish believer as long as he repents and asks for forgiveness on his deathbed??

Surely this undermines Christianities claim to be the moral basis in our society.

If a cruel, tyranical Christian can get away with it and be forgiven.

What are heaven and hell for if they are not the celestial carrot and stick to stop us from being evil. Or is heaven and hell just a way of ensuring belief in god???????????

[anti-hillbilly]

Welcome Luke,

Do Buddists believe in reincarnation?

[luke07930]

Welcome Luke,

Do Buddists believe in reincarnation?

Some do, but the Buddha never talked about reincarnation. The Buddha taught about impermanance, impermanance of pleasure, impermance of pain, impermanance of life, impermanance of everything.

impermanance is a law of nature.

If everything is impermanant as the Buddha taught how can there be reincarnation?? Many buddhists do believe in reincarnation but they are always ready to change their beliefs if they can be proved wrong.

The Buddha taught not to believe anything on faith, authority or through scripture.

If the Budda gave a teaching he always said 'dont believe what I say! only believe when you have tried it and found it to be true for youreself'.

So reincarnation is a belief a faith that comes from the Hindu religion that was carried through to buddhism in later years and not strictly a teaching of the Buddha. I myself have no belief in reincarnation. I hope this clears up any confusion

[apothanein kerdos]

My first question is why would god burn peacefull, kind, loving non believers and forgive a cruel, selfish believer as long as he repents and asks for forgiveness on his deathbed??

This assumes that every non-believer is loving. The fact that they have rejected Christ, God's gift to man, shows that no matter what good they do they have still comitted the ultimate immoral action. By rejecting Christ they have said, "I can be good on my own and without God." Though they may bring about some good works, the fact remains they have comitted the greatest evil imaginable and therefore are not moral, loving, peaceful, or kind. They are at war with God by rejecting His sacrifice, they are cruel by rejecting the One Who died for them, and they are unloving because they refuse the gift of absolute love.

A Christian, one who truly accepts Christ, will not be a tyrant. If someone claims Christ but acts like a tyrant, he most likely is not a Christian. The reason is that Christ changes who we are, not in our physical sense but in our intellectual and spiritual sense. Furthermore, if one accepts Christ on his death bed then yes, he has become a Christian. This is fair and moral because:

1) He has just acknowledged that everything he did was absolutely wrong in life

2) He has just acknowledged that he was in desperate need of someone to save him from himself

3) He has just acknowledged that he has been wrong for how he lived and instead wants Christ to help him in his last hours

As for a question to you, how can you be both? If you are an atheist I would ask for you to provide reasoning for how you can follow Buddha's teachings when there is no purpose to life.

[apothanein kerdos]

The Buddha taught not to believe anything on faith, authority or through scripture.

If the Budda gave a teaching he always said 'dont believe what I say! only believe when you have tried it and found it to be true for youreself'.

This is another similarity between Buddhism and Christianity(Buddhism predated Christianity) when Paul said in " thess:20: Despise not prophesyings. 21: Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.22:

It is known that Buddhist monks were active all the way to Antioch and beyond.It is no doubt that Paul was exposed to these teachings during his life time.

This is a HORRIBLE interpretation. For one, Paul tells us in 2 Timothy 4 that we are to obey all of scripture because it is divinly inspired. Secondly, Peter tells his followers that Paul's writings are the equivalent to scripture. Third, Paul was giving commands to be followed and instructed his commands to be read elswhere. Fourth, Paul used the Old Testament as validation for his theology, not personal experience. Five, Paul invalidated personal experience as a measure of truth and instead relied on logical thinking in light of the Old Testament.

Once again, another failed attempt to link the two.

[redeemed098]

Hello friends. I'am an atheist and a Buddhist. I have been debating on some Islamic websites and found them suprisingly welcoming, and even more suprisingly open to the critisism and my logical aproach to disbeliief. Although many of my arguments are just ignored when I point out that scripture is not proof. But on the whole I have found my experience on the Islamic boards very constructive.

I'm here to open a debate about the claims of the monotheistic religions, I want to talk about Christianities claims and Islam. Anything you would like to know about Buddhism feel free to ask.

So let me start by saying Hello to everyone and hoping you all find peace and happiness.

My first question is why would god burn peacefull, kind, loving non believers and forgive a cruel, selfish believer as long as he repents and asks for forgiveness on his deathbed??

Surely this undermines Christianities claim to be the moral basis in our society.

If a cruel, tyranical Christian can get away with it and be forgiven.

What are heaven and hell for if they are not the celestial carrot and stick to stop us from being evil. Or is heaven and hell just a way of ensuring belief in god???????????

Hi Luke and welcome.

You have a good name Luke..Luke means "to walk in the light."

Luke, what makes you think these people are kind, peaceful and loving..? and what makes you think a "cruel, selfish" believer is truly repentant at all...?

Why do you equate UNbelievers with being Kind, loving and peaceful and yet see believers as cruel and selfish...? Surely there are UNbelievers who are cruel and selfish, as there are also believers who are kind, loving and peaceful..

If it were up to YOU Luke to decide what constitutes "goodness" and "Kindness", then I guess the standard would be set on the foundation of what YOU think or in your opinion it IS to be "good" or "Kind." So what does it mean to be good or kind then...? Is it who helps the most people in time of need..? Is it the one who pours the most money into charity...??? Is it the soldier who takes a bullet to save his buddy...? Is it the mom who gets up every morning with three kids and gets them all ready for school and looks after the house all day while hubby is at work...? Is it Mother Theresa...? Is it the pope...? How do we define "good..??"

Surely you can see that in order for us to be good, then there MUST be a standard that defines what it IS to be good.

Have you heard the story Jesus told about the "good Samaritan." Jesus teaches that what this man did was a Good and right, but he is also quite clear in his teachings that there is NONE who is good. So what then of the "good Samaritan..?" He did a charitable thing but was he saved by his act of goodness or did he still need to repent of his sins in order to be saved..? You see, while the Samaritan did what was admirable, clearly this is NOT what God means by "good."

Good in mans eyes, YES..!! But in Gods sight, clearly there is another standard of "goodness". Otherwise he wouldn't call ALL people everywhere to repent. It is easy to look good in the sight of men Luke, but how does one look when God himself is the standard...?

You see Luke, while you feel free to determine for yourself who IS and ISNT good, you make yourself the standard. In effect the statement you make is this.

"The world would be a much better place to live if people were more like ME."

While this may be a nice thought to have, and you may even think it to be true, there is something I want you to know about Christians...Followers of Christ do NOT think the world would be a better place if people were more like THEM. They believe the world would be a better place if people were more like CHRIST.

Christians recognize the power of sin and damaging effects it can have on peoples lives. They also recognize that they themselves have fallen well short of the standard of God. Christians know that they are not "good" Luke...They may do good things and on many occasions do bad things too, but Luke, being good is about a whole lot more than "Not being Bad." Its not always about the things that you Did do, it can often be about the things that didnt do which you should have. We dont measure goodness Luke...God has already given us the standard..He IS the standard. If you want to see the plumbline that God has put in place to measure goodness, then look to the 10 Commandments. Judge yourself according to THEM...Test yourself..See how good you look in the sight of God.

Let me ask you a question Luke...From the heart think about the answer..No need to respond Luke, just think about it....

If God were right now this very instant to remove from the world all poverty, illness and disease, famine, drought, pestillence and war....How long do you think it would stay that way..??

If you are going to ask questions about God Luke, then they must begin on a right premise...There is nothing wrong with God. It is we who are slaves to sin and our own self indulgences. We need to look at ourselves, not others...We need to realise that no one elses sins are ever going to justify or excuse our own.

We need to look to Christ, not Christianity.

Your question about heaven and hell is a good one, but to put a really simple answer in place for you I would say this...

God has shown us that there are two absolute kingdoms at work here....and he has done it for a very good reason...To reveal to ALL that there is NO neutral ground or fence to sit on...There is a Kingdom of Light and there is a Kingdom of Darkness. In this lifetime you will choose to serve one or the other. Luke, one more thing....In this lifetime you will also choose which one of these are to be your eternal dwelling place.

You do not have to believe this is true of course, but NOT believing wont alter anything...Nothing has the power to alter truth. Not even UNbelief. You see, when you choose to NOT believe, your choice is a conscious choice. When you choose not to go ONE way, you are actually choosing to go the other.

Think about these things.

Regards,

Ben.

[luke07930]

My first question is why would god burn peacefull, kind, loving non believers and forgive a cruel, selfish believer as long as he repents and asks for forgiveness on his deathbed??

This assumes that every non-believer is loving. The fact that they have rejected Christ, God's gift to man, shows that no matter what good they do they have still comitted the ultimate immoral action. By rejecting Christ they have said, "I can be good on my own and without God." Though they may bring about some good works, the fact remains they have comitted the greatest evil imaginable and therefore are not moral, loving, peaceful, or kind. They are at war with God by rejecting His sacrifice, they are cruel by rejecting the One Who died for them, and they are unloving because they refuse the gift of absolute love.

A Christian, one who truly accepts Christ, will not be a tyrant. If someone claims Christ but acts like a tyrant, he most likely is not a Christian. The reason is that Christ changes who we are, not in our physical sense but in our intellectual and spiritual sense. Furthermore, if one accepts Christ on his death bed then yes, he has become a Christian. This is fair and moral because:

1) He has just acknowledged that everything he did was absolutely wrong in life

2) He has just acknowledged that he was in desperate need of someone to save him from himself

3) He has just acknowledged that he has been wrong for how he lived and instead wants Christ to help him in his last hours

As for a question to you, how can you be both? If you are an atheist I would ask for you to provide reasoning for how you can follow Buddha's teachings when there is no purpose to life.

So you are saying that kindness, love, peace and goodness is only possible in Christian people????. It is an exclusive quality of people who believe in the story of Jesus and everyone else is just pretending to be kind but are really bad in their hearts. This is quite plainly an extremist view (edited by moderator). I'm glad not all Christians think like you. And I dont think that anyone with such an (edited by moderator) skewed view of the world and other people can really enter into a logical debate, because quite obviously you are so stuck in youre own world view that nothing and nobody else matters to you apart from youre fellow believers and what you believe in.

So let me get this right, My mother is a bad person even though she does aid work (infact she is just pretending to be a kind loving person, she doesnt really mean it), the Dalai Lama is a bad person even though he preaches peace and kindness to all sentient beings, Torquemada is good because he was a believer.

(Edited by moderator)

As for me being a buddhist you obviously have no idea about buddhism if you think that god has anything to do with it. Buddhists dont believe in god and we have a deep love and compassion for others. There is so much meaning to life we dont need the supernatural to give life meaning.

(edited by moderator)

So you are saying that kindness, love, peace and goodness is only possible in Christian people????.

(edited by moderator)

Note: If you can't address issues without personal attack, your posts will be removed - The mod team

[luke07930]

Hello friends. I'am an atheist and a Buddhist. I have been debating on some Islamic websites and found them suprisingly welcoming, and even more suprisingly open to the critisism and my logical aproach to disbeliief. Although many of my arguments are just ignored when I point out that scripture is not proof. But on the whole I have found my experience on the Islamic boards very constructive.

I'm here to open a debate about the claims of the monotheistic religions, I want to talk about Christianities claims and Islam. Anything you would like to know about Buddhism feel free to ask.

So let me start by saying Hello to everyone and hoping you all find peace and happiness.

My first question is why would god burn peacefull, kind, loving non believers and forgive a cruel, selfish believer as long as he repents and asks for forgiveness on his deathbed??

Surely this undermines Christianities claim to be the moral basis in our society.

If a cruel, tyranical Christian can get away with it and be forgiven.

What are heaven and hell for if they are not the celestial carrot and stick to stop us from being evil. Or is heaven and hell just a way of ensuring belief in god???????????

Hi Luke and welcome.

You have a good name Luke..Luke means "to walk in the light."

Luke, what makes you think these people are kind, peaceful and loving..? and what makes you think a "cruel, selfish" believer is truly repentant at all...?

Why do you equate UNbelievers with being Kind, loving and peaceful and yet see believers as cruel and selfish...? Surely there are UNbelievers who are cruel and selfish, as there are also believers who are kind, loving and peaceful..

If it were up to YOU Luke to decide what constitutes "goodness" and "Kindness", then I guess the standard would be set on the foundation of what YOU think or in your opinion it IS to be "good" or "Kind." So what does it mean to be good or kind then...? Is it who helps the most people in time of need..? Is it the one who pours the most money into charity...??? Is it the soldier who takes a bullet to save his buddy...? Is it the mom who gets up every morning with three kids and gets them all ready for school and looks after the house all day while hubby is at work...? Is it Mother Theresa...? Is it the pope...? How do we define "good..??"

Surely you can see that in order for us to be good, then there MUST be a standard that defines what it IS to be good.

Have you heard the story Jesus told about the "good Samaritan." Jesus teaches that what this man did was a Good and right, but he is also quite clear in his teachings that there is NONE who is good. So what then of the "good Samaritan..?" He did a charitable thing but was he saved by his act of goodness or did he still need to repent of his sins in order to be saved..? You see, while the Samaritan did what was admirable, clearly this is NOT what God means by "good."

Good in mans eyes, YES..!! But in Gods sight, clearly there is another standard of "goodness". Otherwise he wouldn't call ALL people everywhere to repent. It is easy to look good in the sight of men Luke, but how does one look when God himself is the standard...?

You see Luke, while you feel free to determine for yourself who IS and ISNT good, you make yourself the standard. In effect the statement you make is this.

"The world would be a much better place to live if people were more like ME."

While this may be a nice thought to have, and you may even think it to be true, there is something I want you to know about Christians...Followers of Christ do NOT think the world would be a better place if people were more like THEM. They believe the world would be a better place if people were more like CHRIST.

Christians recognize the power of sin and damaging effects it can have on peoples lives. They also recognize that they themselves have fallen well short of the standard of God. Christians know that they are not "good" Luke...They may do good things and on many occasions do bad things too, but Luke, being good is about a whole lot more than "Not being Bad." Its not always about the things that you Did do, it can often be about the things that didnt do which you should have. We dont measure goodness Luke...God has already given us the standard..He IS the standard. If you want to see the plumbline that God has put in place to measure goodness, then look to the 10 Commandments. Judge yourself according to THEM...Test yourself..See how good you look in the sight of God.

Let me ask you a question Luke...From the heart think about the answer..No need to respond Luke, just think about it....

If God were right now this very instant to remove from the world all poverty, illness and disease, famine, drought, pestillence and war....How long do you think it would stay that way..??

If you are going to ask questions about God Luke, then they must begin on a right premise...There is nothing wrong with God. It is we who are slaves to sin and our own self indulgences. We need to look at ourselves, not others...We need to realise that no one elses sins are ever going to justify or excuse our own.

We need to look to Christ, not Christianity.

Your question about heaven and hell is a good one, but to put a really simple answer in place for you I would say this...

God has shown us that there are two absolute kingdoms at work here....and he has done it for a very good reason...To reveal to ALL that there is NO neutral ground or fence to sit on...There is a Kingdom of Light and there is a Kingdom of Darkness. In this lifetime you will choose to serve one or the other. Luke, one more thing....In this lifetime you will also choose which one of these are to be your eternal dwelling place.

You do not have to believe this is true of course, but NOT believing wont alter anything...Nothing has the power to alter truth. Not even UNbelief. You see, when you choose to NOT believe, your choice is a conscious choice. When you choose not to go ONE way, you are actually choosing to go the other.

Think about these things.

Regards,

Ben.

Hello Ben, and thankyou for youre warm welcome. And please I know my name, dont wear it out bro!

First let me clarify something that you guys seem to be missunderstanding. I dont know why you guys are missinterpreting what I said. But I didnt say that non believers were all loving and believers were all bad, my experience is that most people are compassionate.

Without love and compassion, (which by the way are not exclusive qualities of the Christians) the human race couldnt survive, so most people Christians, Muslims and Atheists alike are kind and compassionate.

As for what defines good it is all about intentions. Act with greed, ignorace or murderous intent I think we can all agree that this is bad. Act with love, compassion and kindness in youre heart, I think we all agree that is good.

It is not about doing amazing works for charity, gangsters give money to charity that says nothing about you heart. When I buy my paper I have a genuine affection and empathy for the newsagent, I smile and take the time to talk to the newsagent. You see if you live youre life with a feeling of connection and compassion with the world around you and the people you come into contact with, this is without a doubt an ethical and good way to lead youre life. You should live like this because you actually love the people you meet not because god told you to be good it should come from youre heart.

As long as you try to lead youre life like this with love in youre heart refrain from violence, lying, stealing or using sex as a weapon or tool you will have lived a wholesome life.

As for the rest of what you say about me thinking that the world we be a better place if everyone thought like me. When did I say that??

That is not what I think! and the world would without a doubt be a duller place if everyone was the same. Anyway the whole idea is absurd, reality is far to complex for everyone to be the same it is an imposibility a total fantasy.

But saying that, isnt that the aim of Christianity?

To convert every man woman and chid into the faith? This is not my wish and please dont atribute things I didnt say to me.

Also I didnt say that I was some kind of judge or baromator for who was good and who was bad, only you youreself can know what youre intentions are soo please stop putting statements in my mouth that I didnt say.

As for the ten commandments. Wasnt it Moses that god gave them to? Is that the same Moses that was incensed by the Isrealites mercifull restraint towards the conquerd medianite people. And gave orders to kill all male prisoners and older women.

''BUT ALL THE WOMEN CHILDREN WHO DO NOT KNOW MAN BY LYING WITH HIM, KEEP ALIVE FOR YOURESELVES''

You see all this talk of god and how everyone should be Christian or fry in the lake of fire is not only contradictory and illogical, the only authority Christians have to back their claims up is scripture, the passage of time and their imovable, blind faith.

Even if on the off chance there is a creator god, what are chances that the rules and customs in the bible would really be its will, this creator who created billions of galaxies with billions of stars and billions of planets would of had himself incarnated as a man to be tortured and executed for a symbolic sin by a Adam who seeing as we have discovered dinosuar bones almost surely didnt exist.

Why would such a powerfull creator use such an inefficiant way of getting his message accross?

Surely such an important message as OBEY,BELIEVE OR BURN. Should have been comunicated to every man woman and child on the planet. Not just the people who where lucky enought to be born in the geographical area as Jesus.

Why would he have left such an important message open to logical critisism. Why would he hide dinosuar bones??? Is he a prankster, is he trying to trip us up???

If he wont reveal himself to us and he wants us to believe in him through faith, why then give us enquiring minds????? Why give us teachings about the cosmos that are totally wrong?? The sun does not revolve around the earth, why tell us that??????

As for youre question about how long the earth would remain without hunger, poverty and war if a supreme being removed poverty, hunger and war..?? Well that is simple. If he didnt change the way plants grew, humans tribal nature and the size of the population, not very long. But what has that got to do with anything???

So until Christianity or Islam can bring tangible proof of god and then prove that the rules in youre particulr book is actually the will of god then we should question god and all of the claims that Christians and Muslims make.

As for the idea that something with such complexity as life and the universe can be divided into such a simple predictability as good and evil is crazy. Life is far more amazing and complex than that.

Peace

[billie]

The Bible saya there is not one good--no, not one.

It also says there's only one good one---God.

And it says all our own righteousness is as filthy rags before God.

Maybe you're a great person, Luke. Maybe it isn't apparent to you your need for a savior. I will pray for you. God showed me how I could never be good enough on my own. He also showed me I didn't have to be, that He would take care of that for me, if I let Him. He loves you, and He wants you to know Him. Do you want that, too, Luke?

[apothanein kerdos]

So you are saying that kindness, love, peace and goodness is only possible in Christian people????. It is an exclusive quality of people who believe in the story of Jesus and everyone else is just pretending to be kind but are really bad in their hearts. This is quite plainly an extremist view and very ignorant. I'm glad not all Christians think like you. And I dont think that anyone with such an absurd and skewed view of the world and other people can really enter into a logical debate, because quite obviously you are so stuck in youre own world view that nothing and nobody else matters to you apart from youre fellow believers and what you believe in.

So let me get this right, My mother is a bad person even though she does aid work (infact she is just pretending to be a kind loving person, she doesnt really mean it), the Dalai Lama is a bad person even though he preaches peace and kindness to all sentient beings, Torquemada is good because he was a believer.

This sounds more like the logic of a tyrant!! obey me or suffer, I will forgive youre cruelties but I will punish youre disobedience. I think Saddam Hussain, Hitler and Pol Pot have alot in common with youre view of the Christian god.

Ah, when you cannot respond to someone, build a straw man, misrepresent what they say, and then marginalize them so you don't have to deal with what has been said.

This is an Ad Hominem attack and one that lacks any rational. If you'll read, I said that though non-Christians can show good, it means nothing in light that they have comitted the biggest immoral act known in the universe of rejecting Christ.

In fact, I said:

The fact that they have rejected Christ, God's gift to man, shows that no matter what good they do they have still comitted the ultimate immoral action. By rejecting Christ they have said, "I can be good on my own and without God." Though they may bring about some good works, the fact remains they have comitted the greatest evil imaginable and therefore are not moral, loving, peaceful, or kind. They are at war with God by rejecting His sacrifice, they are cruel by rejecting the One Who died for them, and they are unloving because they refuse the gift of absolute love.

Though they may perform good, the truth is they are not good because they have comitted the greatest immoral action one can comitt.

As for me being a buddhist you obviously have no idea about buddhism if you think that god has anything to do with it. Buddhists dont believe in god and we have a deep love and compassion for others. There is so much meaning to life we dont need the supernatural to give life meaning.

No, but you do need to have some criteria for your belief. As an athiest, how can you place any emphasis upon the goodness of man when, if you are intellectually honest with yourself, "goodness" is merely a construct of the mind?