Are you religious?

[Thorondorito]

When I do good, I feel good; when I do bad, I feel bad. That's my religion

Amen.

 

[Wij]

im not religious but i celebrate christmas kinda odd if you think about it

Not really. What's wrong with presents and piss-ups ?

 

[Wij]

Amen.

Except it's stretching the word religion a little far if that's all you mean. Admirable sentiments but ethical ones, not religious ones.

 

[Chronictank]

I read everything you say, but i have not seen you listing any of those "scientifical facts". If you have then i just cant find them, so can you please just do us all a favor and say them again? :touch:

I really would actually like to hear them.

here you go with some edits

Here are some quotes and i will map them to our modern day findings;

Then He turned to the heaven when it was smoke... (Quran, 41:11)

Edit: on request from later post

"the heavens and the earth were joined together as one unit, before We clove them asunder"
"It is He Who created the night and the day, and the sun and the moon; all (the celestial bodies) swim along, each in its rounded course" (21:30 -21:33).

This was in the chapter explaining the origins of the universe,
scientists discovered that stars are formed from clouds of dust from the "big bang"
Additional:
"turned to the sky, and it had been (as) smoke. He said to it and to the earth: 'Come together, willingly or unwillingly.' They said: 'We come (together) in willing obedience'" (41:11).
This can be read as the forming of the planets because of the context of the chapter it is in, but i personally thought it was a little ambiguous to use as a example. Note that the come together in the 3rd person is very likely only for illustrative purposes rather than the physical act of squashing planets together, in the qu'ran this is done alot
It goes further than this tho

Have not those who disbelieved known that the heavens and the earth were one connected entity, then We separated them?... (Quran, 21:30)

This we didnt find out until the modern century that the universe most likely originated from the same source,
the earth and the heavens above are fromed form the same 'smoke' meaning they are a connected entity, they then spread out (seperated).
Additional edit:

"It is He Who created the night and the day, and the sun and the moon; all (the celestial bodies) swim along, each in its rounded course" (21:30 -21:33).

It goes further to say that all the celecstial bodies (planets etc) have a eliptical oribit, something not known until the 16th century a la Johannes Kepler who came up with Keplers laws which govern the orbit of a planet

I'll re-affirm the point with a quote from Dr Alfred Kroner, a german geoscientist from Johannes Gutenberg University when they did the discussion on science and religion

Thinking where Muhammad came from . . . I think it is almost impossible that he could have known about things like the common origin of the universe, because scientists have only found out within the last few years, with very complicated and advanced technological methods, that this is the case.”2 Somebody who did not know something about nuclear physics fourteen hundred years ago could not, I think, be in a position to find out from his own mind, for instance, that the earth and the heavens had the same origin

And to be honest, i agree with the guy it is pretty impossible to see how a guy in the 1400's could possibly come to such a conclusion wth no scientific background

 

[Ingafgrinn Macabre]

im not religious but i celebrate christmas kinda odd if you think about it

Not really... christmas originally was midwinterday. This holiday was adopted several 100 years ago by christian religion.

 

[Huntingtons]

here you go with some edits

first of, if you belive the qouran to be true then allah exsists and then we cannot argue that mouhammed wrote it (because, then he didnt). The qouran is allah's word and therefore making mouhammed obsolete (in this discussion) and your "arguments" holds no grounds. if its to be interpreted this way.

and i've yet to see the proof you so solidly claim you have. where is the proof - what you show there is interpretations, using words as CAN and VERY LIKELY. You dont see scientists using words as very likely in a journal about the physics of (whatever). Its very likely that this element reacts with this element and therefore creates that element. no siiiir.

/edit

and what you qoute and post as assumptions are not objective views on it. what you're reading is a text and the way you're processing it is trying to find messages in the text, like you would do in an english class - but english doesn't prove the exsistence of anything but letters and sounds.

 

[Chronictank]

The next point i wasnt going to mention as it was argued in the islamic community over its meaning, so if you google it you will find many quotes to and for on the subject. This is because in the past scholars believed the universe was finite, so said this quote couldnt possibly be accurate, others read it as the universe is expanding.

"The heavens, We have built them with power. And verily, We are expanding it" (51:47).

Only rescently it was prooved that the universe is actually expanding

Here are a few points the bible and qu'ran differ tho;

"Allah created the heavens and the earth, and all that is between them, in six days" (7:54).

The bible took this as literally 6 days, but in the qu'ran the word day is "youm", this refers to a long period of time. The reference to the word day is also quashed in other versesl; in 70:4 it is compared to 50,000 years, in 22:47 1000 years. The actual meanin gof the word youm is roughly translated to "a long period or time, an era or eon"
Instead of the modern sense of the word day it refers to 6 distict periods of the universe forming.
this is in line with the modern belief of the origins of the universe happening in 6 distict phases

 

[Chronictank]

first of, if you belive the qouran to be true then allah exsists and then we cannot argue that mouhammed wrote it (because, then he didnt). The qouran is allah's word and therefore making mouhammed obsolete (in this discussion) and your "arguments" holds no grounds. if its to be interpreted this way.

I dont actually see your point, muhammad may have dictated it but how does that make it any less the word of "god"?

and i've yet to see the proof you so solidly claim you have. where is the proof - what you show there is interpretations, using words as CAN and VERY LIKELY. You dont see scientists using words as very likely in a journal about the physics of (whatever). Its very likely that this element reacts with this element and therefore creates that element. no siiiir.

/edit

and what you qoute and post as assumptions are not objective views on it. what you're reading is a text and the way you're processing it is trying to find messages in the text, like you would do in an english class - but english doesn't prove the exsistence of anything but letters and sounds.

maybe so, but if you had a answer book simply telling you all the scienitific theories we know today would it make them any less valid
for example if i was to say to you v = d/t
speed as a vector(velocity) = distance/time
Are you saying that the forumla above as is, isnt true?

anyway off to uni to become learned (in theory ><)

 

[Wij]

I dont actually see your point, muhammad may have dictated it but how does that make it any less the word of "god"?


maybe so, but if you had a answer book simply telling you all the scienitific theories we know today would it make them any less valid
for example if i was to say to you v = d/t
speed as a vector(velocity) = distance/time
Are you saying that the forumla above as is, isnt true?

anyway off to uni to become learned (in theory ><)

None of this is proof though. Just because you find some passages in the Qu'ran that sound a bit like (but not really) what science has discovered the universe is like does not prove anything. Science has found other explanations not requiring a God. Otherwise what's to stop anyone alse doing the same thing with their holy book or even work of fiction ? If someone found something in Don Quixote that looked a bit like (but not really) how something in the universe was formed we wouldn't conclude the whole book is true.

 

[Raven]

some of the bible is a pretty good reference to things that did actually happen, most of it is a fairy tale though.

 

[Thorondorito]

I prefer the Silmarillion

 

[Naetha]

I think with all religion you have to apply common sense. (I am a great believer in common sense).

It's partly why I'm a Quaker - I like the fact that you take the more sensible and ethical parts of Christian (and generally Abrahamic) religion and apply them to modern life. I like the way of thinking that there is that of God in everyone, it is just shown in different ways. It's the sort of religion that I can believe in alongside my logical philosophy.

As long as I don't think too hard about my religion (or philosophy for that matter) and take things with a pinch of salt, I think its a good way of living.

 

[Huntingtons]

I dont actually see your point, muhammad may have dictated it but how does that make it any less the word of "god"?


maybe so, but if you had a answer book simply telling you all the scienitific theories we know today would it make them any less valid
for example if i was to say to you v = d/t
speed as a vector(velocity) = distance/time
Are you saying that the forumla above as is, isnt true?

anyway off to uni to become learned (in theory ><)

im trying to point out that you're saying mouhammed wrote the qouran (which would seem logical if you dont belive in allah). but in the qouran allah is the author of it, therefore by saying mouhammed is devine coz he wrote the book is wrong because according to the muslims he didnt write it, allah did - with that assumption in mind mouhammed is not relative to the discussion including the qouran (it seems to me you're trying to prove that the qouran has divine interference or that mouhammed is a deity).

2nd:

what im saying is that by analyzing (thats what you're trying to do with the qouran) a book it doesnt become a true story. the qouran has nothing to back up the comments thats stated, science has somewhat solid arguments for their assumptions. thats the difference in my eyes

sorry if its hard to understand, its quite hard to explain this special matter in english for me

 

[Ati]

Logic. Survival. Would you put your 1/100000000000th chance of "going to heaven" before your chance to stay my hand if I was over you with a sword threatening you to denounce your religion? (not that I'd do that *cough*)

So, you loose your "logic" because you believe in something?
You loose your "survival" because you believe in something?

I find this quite annoying really, do not think that is a good example of testing ones faith when people say they will die for it.

Lol, what is stopping me from staying your hand anyway?
Depending on my religion, what is the problem with me killing you? According to british law I'd be justified in doing so.

Just because I try and prevent death dosnt mean that i automaticaly denounce a religion? The instinct for survival would be put inplace by god anyway if i wanted to believe so.

A poor example. Try not to bring extremeist ideas into this thread, i see where you were going with this and it isnt a good place. Bad things are happening. Lets not use them as examples okay?

I can think of many worse to use, but even more better

 

[Jeremiah]

The bible took this as literally 6 days, but in the qu'ran the word day is "youm", this refers to a long period of time. The reference to the word day is also quashed in other versesl; in 70:4 it is compared to 50,000 years, in 22:47 1000 years. The actual meanin gof the word youm is roughly translated to "a long period or time, an era or eon"

Dude you have got it mixed up. "Youm" is the Hebrew word for period of time. The Bible was in Hebrew, the Qu'ran in Arabic, its the Bible that actually says 6 "periods of time". The reason the English speaking Bible says 6 days is that we dont have a good mapping onto Hebrew terms, and so people have taken this literally (which isnt right, imo). Keep with the posting tho, you are making a good case!

Huntingtons: Theres nothing wrong with saying Allah would be the author of the Qu'ran, but Mohammed was the scribe. People might just use misleading terms, but just because Mohammed did the physical writing does mean this makes him the author And so its not a contradiction to say that Allah is the Author and Mohammed the writer (Scribe) since it could be claimed that it was dictated to Mohammed

 

[Huntingtons]

Huntingtons: Theres nothing wrong with saying Allah would be the author of the Qu'ran, but Mohammed was the scribe. People might just use misleading terms, but just because Mohammed did the physical writing does mean this makes him the author And so its not a contradiction to say that Allah is the Author and Mohammed the writer (Scribe) since it could be claimed that it was dictated to Mohammed

then he still did not forsee or know any secrets about the univers, allah did. Chronics argument is that the Qu'ran has rites that are divine in knowledge before their time (he's indirect saying its mohammed who knew these things, if he was claiming it was allah then there would be no discussion on this subject). my claim is that in the Qu'ran it says that this is allahs word and it cannot be doubted for he is the all mighty. Using the Qu'ran to argument for the exsistence of god, then you're assuming its allah and then the words chronic are qouting are not spectacular because ofc Allah knew what he had created. catching my drift?

 

[Jeremiah]

then he still did not forsee or know any secrets about the univers, allah did. Chronics argument is that the Qu'ran has rites that are divine in knowledge before their time (he's indirect saying its mohammed who knew these things, if he was claiming it was allah then there would be no discussion on this subject). my claim is that in the Qu'ran it says that this is allahs word and it cannot be doubted for he is the all mighty. Using the Qu'ran to argument for the exsistence of god, then you're assuming its allah and then the words chronic are qouting are not spectacular because ofc Allah knew what he had created. catching my drift?

I'm not quite sure what your point is (in a non flaming way)? I'm guessing Chronics point was that there are historically texts describing the creation of everything, parts of which may seem to be being proven by modern day science. Now if this is true then maybe some respect has to be given to the other things said by those texts (Such as the presence of a diety)

Now it seems that you are saying that if we take the Qu'ran to be written by Mohammed, it is immediatley discredited because it claims to be the word of God. And on the other hand, if it is the word of God, then we shouldnt pay any attention to it anyway since he would undoubtebly know anything anyway. Is that what you mean?

 

[Raven]

im not religious but i celebrate christmas kinda odd if you think about it

not really seeing as its not a proper Christian celebration, its actually pagan, they just nicked it.

 

[Chronictank]

Dude you have got it mixed up. "Youm" is the Hebrew word for period of time. The Bible was in Hebrew, the Qu'ran in Arabic, its the Bible that actually says 6 "periods of time". The reason the English speaking Bible says 6 days is that we dont have a good mapping onto Hebrew terms, and so people have taken this literally (which isnt right, imo). Keep with the posting tho, you are making a good case!

i stand corrected, sorry i have only read the english version
thanks for the clarification

Huntingtons: Theres nothing wrong with saying Allah would be the author of the Qu'ran, but Mohammed was the scribe. People might just use misleading terms, but just because Mohammed did the physical writing does mean this makes him the author And so its not a contradiction to say that Allah is the Author and Mohammed the writer (Scribe) since it could be claimed that it was dictated to Mohammed

This is exactly what im trying to get at

 

[Chronictank]

I'm not quite sure what your point is (in a non flaming way)? I'm guessing Chronics point was that there are historically texts describing the creation of everything, parts of which may seem to be being proven by modern day science. Now if this is true then maybe some respect has to be given to the other things said by those texts (Such as the presence of a diety)

now why couldnt i put it that way from the start :<


I thought about it and i think my example isnt particularly useful;
Ok when i was in school my physics teacher would give us a formula e.g. v = d/t
speed as a vector(velocity) = distance/time

He then would explain the theory behind the aparatus and how to use it,
after he had done that he would say ok now proove the theory right or wrong.
That way the person doing the investigation not only understood the concept of the whole thing, he/she could understand the implications of it.
But just because he didnt give us the method doesnt make v = d/t any less valid, do you get what i mean?

 

[Huntingtons]

Now it seems that you are saying that if we take the Qu'ran to be written by Mohammed, it is immediatley discredited because it claims to be the word of God. And on the other hand, if it is the word of God, then we shouldnt pay any attention to it anyway since he would undoubtebly know anything anyway. Is that what you mean?

close. but if its the word of allah and we're discussing the presence of a deity as you put it and we belive the Qu'ran then its the word of god and there's no reason to discuss it as it must be true then (states the Qu'ran). im quite sure the Qu'ran is supposibly written by allah and handed to mohammed.
yeah, thats what im saying

 

[Alliandre]

close. but if its the word of allah and we're discussing the presence of a deity as you put it and we belive the Qu'ran then its the word of god and there's no reason to discuss it as it must be true then (states the Qu'ran). im quite sure the Qu'ran is supposibly written by allah and handed to mohammed.
yeah, thats what im saying

The thing is, if the Qu'ran's written by someone who isn't omnipotent and omniscient, then they do not know everything, and so are not worth worshiping in my opinion. Worthy of alot of respect? Most definately. When worshiping comes out of the picture, it's not really religion in my eyes. But I'll definately be taking a closer look at the Qu'ran in the future, and that free e-book posted about earlier.

 

[Calaen]

They thing with books and such is everyone takes their on view on it. Yes you will get a group of like minded people thinking the same thing about certain characters, but each individual when they read creates an image in their own mind that I doubt could be recreated by someone else.

So when you get millions of people reading the bible for instance, there is so much information that is is easy for people to read it and say well thats a big massive contradiction. And they are not wrong are they?

 

[Jeremiah]

They thing with books and such is everyone takes their on view on it. Yes you will get a group of like minded people thinking the same thing about certain characters, but each individual when they read creates an image in their own mind that I doubt could be recreated by someone else.

So when you get millions of people reading the bible for instance, there is so much information that is is easy for people to read it and say well thats a big massive contradiction. And they are not wrong are they?

I think you are right - problems happen when people form their own ideas about the things they have read which dont agree with the "norm" and they are promptly persecuted

 

[Calaen]

Yes but the world we live in today has got to allow us to make our own minds up on things or else we would be run by some big evil leader who commands everything we do. I will take countries fighting against each other rather than live like that.

 

[tris-]

if miracles and the like were trully real things why did the rate at which they happen suddenly drop?

maybe it was for reasons. im sure some reasons we have now are more 'important' than some back then. these days AIDs and famine is massive in africa, but no miracles?

so you might say god created us to think for and resolve things our self. if thats the case why were miracles and the like required back then?

ive never seen a good explanation and some stats to show the rate of decrease in miracles and the like.

 

[Ingafgrinn Macabre]

If god is omnipotent, and the words in god's book are his words, written down by someone else, why does he contradict himself that much?

 

[liloe]

Wow, that's a lot of posts I missed before answering =) First of all some little things to previous posters.

I guess some people still do not know the difference between religion and religious extremists and this is what often gives the religion itself a bad touch. Just because some christian leaders decided to start a holy war to reclaim Jerusalem in the dark ages it means that christianity asks for holy wars and it doesn't mean that all agreed with it. Same goes for many cruelties done under the cloak of religion. Religion itself doesn't defend itself, there are only people taking sides for it and if these people act bad, their religious belief will be blamed for it, which is simply not right.

It also seems that generally religion is seen as an antiquated thing and that believers are rightout boring people. Well I can definately tell you that it's wrong cause I clicked the last option and I'm more or less coming home from a Metal gig. I'm quite sure that some religious extremists would want me to burn in hell for it, but for me there's no way I'm giving up a thing that is fun and doesn't hurt me cause where does the bible state I shouldn't listen to Heavy-Metal? =)

Well, so I already said it, I clicked the little option at the end of the list and yes, religion affects my daily life. I don't go around praying every hour, but I believe that god is a guiding figure, just in the sense that guide means. You can do whatever you want at all times as long as it's in your physical/psychical possibilities, but following the guide is a safe way, even if not always the easy one.

Now for me religion is more than the simple question where life comes from or how the earth was created. Religion largely designs the afterlife and what happens when you die. You know, I don't like to get that personal on a forum, so if you want to flame me for what I write now, fuck off, normal answers are always welcome =)

When I speak for myself about religion, I speak about christianity cause well, that's what I believe in. Also there has often been brought in the aspect of science, but if you look closer at the bible, it's a book of many faces. It has genealogy, history, science, spirituality, humanism and future in it.

Science in what way? Well if you read many of the things the israelitans had to do during their 40y wandering through the desert, you can see that most of these things were crucial for their daily life in terms of hygiene. Strict separating of sick people, separation of different food containers cause they couldn't be cleaned properly. The israelitans had to wash themselves on many occasions and while the jews maintained this for many centuries, people in europe became sick cause of bad hygiene. So in that case, the bible was like a survival handbook.

History, well, there are many chapters devoted to the history of Israel and if you want, you can easily analyze that with other sources and see that the Bible is correct in all this. Some of these chapters are also quite interesting to read, if you like history =)

Also many proverbs are taken from the bible, so it can't be that wrong, can it? King Salomon wrote a lot of very interesting things concerning daily life and how to act towards other people, things that are still very actual and also apply to modern society.

Wait...did I read future? Yes you did. I don't know how many of you know about the book Daniel in the bible, but it's a very interesting case of future prediction. Now before people start that the Bible is not a thing that exists that long, correct BUT... The bible was assembled by a convent afaik, but Daniel scrolls were found, dating from long before christ (the date was set with very scientific methods, for those interested =)) ), so it was not written afterwards.
I could go into deep details here, but basically there are multiple predictions in this book, one for example giving the year of christs birth and death. Following other sources, you can easily see when Daniel was the right hand of the king, cause the Medo-Persians wrote down things already and thus their texts can be compared with the Bible. Now given the predictions in Daniel and knowing when he lived, you can calculate to the original year "0". There's also a prediction of when the israelitans will be let free of their slavery in babylon.
Daniel also predicts about the death of Jesus that "no harm will be done to his bones". When he was crucified, this came true but was very untypic for the time cause usually the legs of the crucified people were broken so they died faster of suffocation.

Well, so much to the point that you can show with science, but there is more to religion that this. Religion is also when others say "coincidence" and you say "guidance" which is hard to explain, but that's the same with praying. A pure scientist would say you talk to the air, a believer sais he talks to god.

Well, there are things in my religous life I can explain with science, others are things that I'd explain with experiences =))

So, that's my PoV on things, feel free to agree or disagree in a normal way of communicating and I will even reply =)

P.S. omg shocker, Liloe goes to church Now you know it ^^ But for the record, the other young people who go there aswell are all normal people =) From crazy snowboarders to the heavy-metal faction like me =)

 

[Jeremiah]

if miracles and the like were trully real things why did the rate at which they happen suddenly drop?

maybe it was for reasons. im sure some reasons we have now are more 'important' than some back then. these days AIDs and famine is massive in africa, but no miracles?

so you might say god created us to think for and resolve things our self. if thats the case why were miracles and the like required back then?

ive never seen a good explanation and some stats to show the rate of decrease in miracles and the like.

One of the main reasons about the decline in miracles is that as soon as one happens, everyone sets about trying to disprove it was a miracle - that it was staged or was just a media frenzy or something. Another is lack of belief around as well. I'm not saying that the reason people dont get their miracles is because they dont have enough faith, but that if they do get their miracle, the amount of unbelief around them convinces them it wasnt one.

Personally I've heard of miracles, the minister at my church served as a missionary in parts of South America and has told us countless episodes where, right in front of him, people have had limbs grow back, disease has immmediatley dissapeared - all kinds of stuff. But yeah, none of this I have witnessed first hand. But the Bible never promised that people would believe because of miracles, but by reading it and having faith

 

[Wij]

people have had limbs grow back

You don't actually believe that do you ?