So in the mind of the athiest?

Question

God never created man in his own image but Man created God from their imaginations,right? wow. To create a God that disapproves of the very things that mankind loves to do and consider normals. What an imagination.As far as I know, When you create something its supposed to be for you not against you. The imagination of mankind, its a mystery sometimes

sorry,spelled atheist wrong.lol

Answer 1

No god exists to do the creating. The god concept was created as an explanation... it was exploited as a means to power. Both influences survive today.

Answer 2

People created God to control those below them into behaving in a way that would cause the least amount of problems for them and to keep the people working hard. Just as your parents might have lied to you when you were small to make you do something like clean your room, brush your teeth, etc. If you made it so that everything would make everyone happy the whole system would brake down very quickly, it only makes sense to create rules, even if they make people unhappy sometimes. Why is taking drugs illegal for example, when some people enjoy it? Can you answer me this? Why is it that God created rules that go against natural human behaviour? And why did he create rules that seem to go in favour with what a work boss or leader here would want even the ones that don't believe in God? What about all the other religious you would claim are wrong, like Buddhism? They have rules too that go against natural human behaviour. It's an obvious fact that nothing can go your way all the time and rules must be set for society to work properly.

Answer 3

It's a survival thing. No big mystery! We like to have things, but stealing them is, in the end, a negative process. We know that, so we don't do it (though plenty do!) The things we designate as 'crimes' were put in place to aid our survival. That these rules were then attributed to the gods is a separate issue altogether. It is simplistic to think of it in terms of gods being created to prevent us from doing what we want to do and having what we want to have! Gimme a break! And yes, you are right! The imagination of mankind is a mystery! It still sustains religion and gods, in spite of the fact that 90% of the things that were once only in the realm of the gods, is now commonplace and mundanely human, And in spite of the fact that we now have answers to most of the questions that we believed were the work of gods.

Answer 4

The development of the creationist theory didn't happen overnight. There have been god and goddess figures in most of the surviving cultures: not necessarily one god though. The concept of a monotheistic Deity was created by males, and was designed to provide males, the socially ascribed status resulting in their attitude of superiority. The concept of sin, guilt, and penance, is also a construct of males.The level of ascribed status was then assigned value. The males who exhibited the most intelligence, leadership, and survival skills, were usually at the top of the status heap, and had the position of "chief", or top honcho. To me, the very denial and suppression of the value of the necessity of females, still today, is quite revealing. There will always be insecure males, who rely on their gender as evidence of their superiority. They are, however, being phased out.

Answer 5

Men created God to try to explain things which he couldn't understand. ("My crops died because I angered the gods." "I have welts on my body because the gods are punishing me") They attributed everything bad to the anger of the gods, and everything good to pleasing the gods. It started to take the form of tales they would tell of being rewarded or punished. Considering that a lot of our "morals" are logical (don't kill, don't steal, etc.), they would attribute perceived "punishments" to those acts. It began as an oral tradition. Over time, more and more things got added to the list of things that the gods would punish us for. The people who thought up these stories were highly superstitious and fearful people who lived in a time when they were surrounded by death. They had virtually no medicines, no way to treat diseases, they didn't understand how the world works..why the river floods, where tornadoes come from, what lightening is, etc. You were considered to be old if you reached the age of 40. About 75% of children born died in infancy. They didn't HAVE a lot working FOR them, and their superstitions reflect that.

Answer 6

Oh we're quite used to that spelling by now.

The initial purpose of most religions is to make people behave. Not the little people, who don't have much choice about their lives, but the bigshots, the ones with money and influence who can game the system to get richer and more influential at the expense of the poor and powerless.

Unfortunately, they can also game religious systems, diverting the moral emphasis from social justice issues to personal character flaws. Who cares about groups of starving beggars when you might go to hell for having a dirty thought!

Insofar as God may exist, God would have to make a difference in the world. We know how it naturally runs. The big crush the small. So if God took sides, it would be with the underdog. Otherwise, what difference would he make?

And so he does. The prophets of the Bible rail against the well-connected who cheat customers, burden the beleaguered with impossible religious obligations, flaunt their wealth and make a public show of their purchased "virtue". Jesus said stuff about that too. An old definition of a "prophet" is someone who comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable. But the comfortable like to pretend that the slightest inconvenience is a persecution, and that their every casual donation should be appreciated by the unworthy desperate and a redemption from their participation in the institutionalized structures that keep the rich rich and the poor poor.

Does God's concern make a difference? Sometimes. There are some good people who use their faith in God to correct societal defects and relieve suffering in the world, but there are also believers who act just like the Pharisees did in Jesus' day. And there are also atheists of both kinds. It seems to be a matter of what kind of inspiration you prefer in your fuel tank.

Answer 7

I always thought perhaps it was an atheist who imagined up God. Someone wise before their time that realized the bad things humans do and that they needed to be stopped.

People tend to behave better if someone is watching over them all the time. Like when you're at work, and your boss is around you work harder. Or in school, if there's a substitute, you slack off. (By "you" I mean anyone reading this. If not yourself, someone you know.)

And perhaps in knowing this, invented the idea of an all-knowing, all-seeing God to make people THINK someone was watching their behavior...so that they would stop doing things that they might do otherwise (ie: when not being watched).

I thought about this because of a moral survey I had to take when I got my newest job. One of the questions was: "if you knew you wouldn't get caught, would you steal?" And it made me think about human nature in general.

I know it's kind of an out-there theory, but I don't have the answers and I'm still wondering about religion/origins of man and gods/and the truth of life.

Answer 8

Presumably you believe that while your god is true, all the other thousands of gods people have believed in through the ages are all made up, right?

And yet they, too, often have difficult rules to obey, and disapprove of normal human behaviour? And require sacrifices - some real, some nominal like giving up food for a period.

Strange, huh? Why would these people have made up these gods with such irritating characteristics? And yet they did.

And so's yours.

CD

Answer 9

When people create their own gods, they create them as not having anything to do with their own lives. At least not in determining right from wrong. Imagine that. hmmmm. the possibilities that flow, from having a god that lets you do what you want when you want to. it's an amazing fact if you think about it. we were created to worship, so what do we do? Instead of worshipping THE God that created us(it would be to easy) we create gods to say we worship(variety of forms) we don't want to worship something that tells me i can't do something that is detrimental to me. For heavens sake, they once crucified a man for this very thing, telling us to do thigns that are eternally good for us, and not to do things that are detrimental to us...

Answer 10

LOL...so you're saying God is against us, not for us? Touche.

I'll agree with you on one point - "the imagination of mankind, it is a mystery."

But what you're trying to ask is why man would invent a "God" who seems to disapprove of everything he enjoys. Well, for one thing, from the POV of religious institutions, it makes for an excellent means of controlling and manipulating people. Criminalize sexuality, for example, and you've pretty much "nailed" everybody, since everybody has a sex drive. It's the age-old advertising trick: invent a disease and then present your product as the cure.

Answer 11

God was created by men to help them deal psychologically with the fear of the unknown, including death. All of those things that it disapproves of were also created by men as a means of controlling the ignorant masses.

How ironic that someone who believes in an imaginary being is mocking the "imagination of mankind". Or shall I say hypocritical...