After decades of biblical study - I can't bring myself to believe anything?

Question

The creation story actually contridict itself in the first 2 chapters. The book of Gen is filled with an angry god that takes credit for everything . The following books concerning the law show god to be obsessed with menstrul flows and forskins along with brutal whipping and death sentences. God says he is changleless but "repents" twice . Repent means to turn around to change - so much for changeless. God apparently enters a deal in Judges 11 where the cannonites get slaughtered and in return the guy burns his daughter alive. The whole book centers on one family Israel and makes it plain at times no one else matters a damm. Hell doesn't exist as we know it until the Greeks introduce it to the Jews and then jesus intriduces it to us - The gospels contridict each other and jesus says it's okay to won people - He called a black woman a dog and Paul who wrote 70% of the bible is somtimes a Jew and somtimes a Christian . God changes personality all the time.

Answer 1

God is LOVE. It is beyond conditional words here....
Religions are humanity trying to explain the unexplainable.

Breathing causes spiritual amnesia.

Your body is WHAT you are IN, not WHO you are.

God is HOW you are able to BE you.

God is HOW you are able to recognize your reflection, when actually you cannot see it.

God is HOW you recognize yourself in photos, even when you forget everyone else that you CAN see for yourself.

God is everything AND nothing at all.

Welcome to this temporary conditional reality, where you forget yourself, so you can pretend whatever you choose all over again.

Answer 2

God doesn't change anything. You are a victim of taking everything you read as "gospel." The bible is a collection of myths, written by men through the ages. IT is a storybook filled with metaphors, aimed at a very simple-minded audience who were ignorant of nature and their surroundings..you and I both know that. The Old Testament is nothing but a story book with morality passages...similar to Aesop's fables...just enough truth to make it convincing, but to believe in these writings as absolute is nothing short of silly. The New Testament was written by those who had plenty to gain by their writings...much of it is self-serving, after all...the writers were wined and dined no matter where they went. These writings are passed off as the "word of God," and I do not know about you, but...I have no problem with people "talking to God," but when he starts talking back to them, I become more than suspect. And, truthfully, none of the Bible is Christian...that religion didn't arise until many, many years after the Bible parts were written. What is very disconcerting is the selection of the books that would constitute the Bible....many scrolls were left out, as they did not fit the general scenario that benefited the Church. Everything, in life, that is touched by humans, has an agenda of some type. Translaters have an agenda, the writers had an agenda, and the decipherers had/have an agenda. When someone tells me an absolute derived from mystical nonsense found in the Bible, I brush the ideas aside, politely smile, but I NEVER agree. I just let it slide. Personally, I get a big kick out of the mathmatic presentations I have seen, the calculations of what will happen when..and after the time passes, there are always excuses pouring forth as to why the calculations were wrong...HOW Convenient.

Answer 3

If you came to these beliefs after "decades of Bible study," I have a few questions for you:

1) what Bible were you reading?

2) why can't you spell a simple word like "Caananites" if you've been reading it for at least 20 years?

3) why do you not understand that the "guy who burns his daughter alive" was not following God's Law?

4) why would you think Jesus called a black woman a dog? He did no such thing. However, a Samaritan (i.e. Caucasian) woman equated herself to a dog when asking Jesus cure her demon-possessed daughter.

5) where do you see that God doesn't care about non-Jews? Perhaps that's hidden in the many parts of His Word where He states Salvation is also meant for the gentiles ...

6) were do you see the word "repent" used in conjunction with God? Citation, please ...

7) after decades of study, you'd know that Gehenna (and other words with similar meaning) is mentioned throughout the Old Testament.

8) your last statement explains why you don't know the answers to these questions: if you think Paul wrote 70% of the Bible, you don't have a complete copy! You've only got about 10%!

Answer 4

I will tackle the first 2 chapters of creation. The reason you think it contradicts itself is simple. The 6th day creation is Adam in the Hebrew which means mankind in general, all of the races of man were created on that day to have dominion over the 'wild'. These are what we call paleolithic man, they were hunter-gatherers. On the 8th day, He created 'eth-ha-Adam' or THAT MAN ADAM in the Hebrew, a different type of man, a farmer. Read it closely. This Adam was put in the 'field' as a husbandman, or farmer, and then brought the animals of the field, not of the wild, to name. This is what we call Neolithic man, and if you read further you will see that the children of Adam and the children of Eve brought art, music, culture, etc. to the world that was already filled with 6th day man, the hunter gatherers. This is where Cain found a wife, from the 6th day tribes. Read a history book and re-read Genesis and you'll see what I mean. And use a Strong's concordance to understand the Hebrew meanings, it will be clear as a bell ~ no contradiction whatsoever.

As for the other things, all I can tell you is that Yahweh has all of the same emotions that you and I do, He shows all of these emotions throughout the bible. He even changes His mind, just like we do - we are made in His image, remember? He married Israel at one point and then divorced her, because she was unfaithful, just like we would. Yahweh is a God of war at times, and vengeful and there is a reason for it.

He has a purpose for us and when you realize that His children, the Hebrew people, eth-ha-Adam's lineage, were put here with a job to do, you can see why he showed all of the facets of his emotion when they continually disobeyed Him. Yahshua (Jesus) showed the same level of emotion, even though churches water him down to a very docile person, he really wasn't all of the time. He had 'righteous indignation' and showed a great range of emotion from anger to sorrow to love, etc.

Answer 5

You don't look in books for spirituality. If you could even begin to understand faith, you'd know it's the belief in things of which there is no physical, tangible evidence. It is the foundation of religion, and by its very nature can't be proven in text. I know that part's in there somewhere, if between the lines. But you can't read there, can you?

Truths can be drawn out of stories and experiences, though, but only if you have some insight to complement your self-proclaimed intelligence (which I don't believe you have, despite your "decades of biblical study").

You seem very sad and naive. Any efforts at explanation would be wasted on you-- you're not even asking a question.

Answer 6

Of course God takes credit for everything. He's the creator of the universe. Don't put God in a people sized and shaped box. God does not change, but does respond to the pleas of people who love him. He desires interaction with His creation. The people whom he has slaughtered are worshipers of demons who sacrifice their own children to their god. God chose the Hebrews in part because no one else cared about Him. They were the only ones who wanted to interact with God, and He still cared enough about the rest of us to give us Jesus Christ - who brought salvation and a knowledge of God to all. Paul didn't write 70% of the bible, but he did write a significant portion of the New Testament. He was born a Jew and remained a Jew his whole life, but his direction changed when he also came to know Jesus as his savior. He didn't stop being a Jew, he just became more complete in his faith. There are Jews like that today.
I don't know the part about Jesus calling a woman a dog, but it probably didn't have anything to do with her skin color, but her behavior.
Reading the bible is not something you can do lightly, or without seeking knowledge from people who can give you a historical context. It isn't like reading a novel, where the people in it are all human, it is the story of the human condition, and God's interaction with us. If you are mad at God for being a superior being, too bad. It's what He IS. We can not put Him in a box, wrap Him around our thinking, or compare Him to ourselves or other people we know. He is God, He does not have to obey the laws of physics, because he is both present in us, and at every other point in the universe at the same time and moment. He is not constricted by time or space. His perspective and plan are both complete, both temporally and encompassing all people, and the entire universe.
God has planned the entire universe around your presence on this earth in the time and place where you are. He has created, in a billion ways the circumstances around you and created you in particular to be the curious seeker that you are so that we could have this conversation, right here, right now. He has intricately woven together both you and I, all of our parents and other relatives, our soceities so that we could meet at this point and discover what it is He wants us to know. And each and every moment of our lives is exactly like that. How are you going to give that meaning?
Stop expecting God to serve you.
Stop expecting God to be a vending machine.
Discover your purpose within His plan and live! Don't just be dead in a live skin.
Amen
By the way, God loves it when we work so hard to find Him. He loves to deal with our questions. You don't just ignore the problem of your presence and its meaning, but truly have striven to seek Him, what a blessing to Him and to you!

Answer 7

theres a heaven and theres a hell believe it or not God knows your thoughts fronm far off. The bivle says curse myGod and you will surelly die. In the beginning God created the heavens and the earths in the beginning the earth was void. Yoou need to look a little deeper into the bible

Answer 8

What you need to understand is that the old testament is just that old. When Jesus came to earth, he broke will all of the old rules and now we have to follow the new commandments. I know that you have all of these questions and they are all fair and understandable. But, the only person that can answer all of those questions is God. Pray to him to give you the answers and the understanding that you need.

God Bless

Answer 9

This is because you studying for knowledge and not for the love you have to God. Your studies are worthless if you don't know Jesus. The word of god is foolishness to those who do not now Jesus. If you truly knew him you wouldn't be so confused. I would say talk to Jesus and ask him to clear up your confusion.

Answer 10

That's why Christianity has so many factions. Different factions of Christianity choose to believe different parts of the Bible. None of them believe the whole Bible for the obvious reasons you just listed.