I have this article on my website but even though it’s clearly humour, like many such articles it has a core serious message (primarily that the Abrahamic god is, as Dawkins puts it, “the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.”:
I’ve never understood how anyone who actually reads the bible comes away thinking the Abrahamic god is a loving god. Of course many don’t actually read the thing and take a priest/pastors/ministers word for it, but what’s the clergy’s excuse? The kind of mental gymnastics it would take to consider the god depicted in the bible as loving and caring boggles the mind. I find most things about christians incomprehensible. If I thought for one minute that I had a soul and that I risked eternal torture for not doing what this god wanted I would have his holy book as memorized as possible, but many christians don’t even read the whole thing.
I always thought of Yahweh as being rather bloodthirsty, genocidal, homicidal, and misogynistic.
I’ve tried to explore this dichotomy with deeply religious, Evangelical EMS partner . . . and he told me that these tendencies actually show how loving God is, as it means that He will go to any extreme to help his chosen people.
This was when I decided that talking to religious fanatics about spiritual matters is both pointless and frustrating.
Wow! To be fair to him, for many years I had that kinda dualistic view that God existed (and could do no wrong) and science was also right. Ironically (to my mind) it was theists that broke me and made me a full blown atheist.
Love this film, the music, the script the acting, all just brilliant…“The preacher say it absolved us…for him not for the law. I’m surprised at you, Pete I gave you credit for more brains than Delmar.”
…“even if it did put you square with the lord, the state of Mississippi’s a little more hard nosed.”
“I had to be at that there crossroads at midnight, to sell my soul to the devil…well ain’t it a small world, spiritually speaking, Pete and Delmar just been baptised and saved; I guess I’m the only one that remains unaffiliated.”
That line makes me laugh every time I hear it, just like the cat’s arse is on fire, as my late dad used to say. My apologies to captain cat, it’s a metaphor, let me explain:
When I was a newborn baby, my parents told me they would stand baffled outside the bedroom and listen to me laugh hysterically in my sleep, and marvel what the hell a baby could find so funny, no lie. Later my dad used to say to my mother, when my mirth overpowered me, “***, that boy would laugh if the cat’s arse was on fire.” You can imagine what a 6 year old me made of that…
From a philosophical or literary standpoint, the question might explore themes of predestination, free will, and the nature of evil. If Satan is seen as a symbol or a metaphorical character, the discussion shifts towards what he represents in human nature or in the cosmic balance of good and evil, rather than the fairness of his treatment as an individual entity.
In modern cultural and literary contexts, there are interpretations of Satan that portray him more sympathetically, as a complex character or even a tragic hero (as in John Milton’s “Paradise Lost”). These interpretations might suggest that Satan was not given a fair chance, highlighting themes of rebellion against tyranny or the questioning of absolute authority.
I think it’s fascinating how we ever came up with a dualistic way of interpreting world events, ‘good and evil.’ It’s just a bizarre way to look at the world around us and begin drawing lines based on dictates from one of the most immoral creatures in all mythology, the mighty Yehwen.
Hello! Just for the record Satan was Elohim who disagreed with the creation of humanity and by all accounts he isn’t incarnated evil like the bible says so.
Oh, does that mean that the Is’-ra-el ites were NOT the hill dwelling hebrew followers of the creator god “El” that the Egyptians tell us they were?
Furthermore does that mean the following Angels of the Lord are NOT bounden to “El” as their names suggest? Ishmael, Israel, Daniel, Raphael, Michael, and Gabriel. Are they all secret followers of Satan…is the Tangerine Traitor right after all?
In all seriousness El was a well known Canaanite deity. And yes the suffix “el” was an homage to him.
He was adopted by the Hittites who called him errr…damn… cant be shagged looking it up tonight. CC wants his dinner and I have a plaintive cry coming from a nice South Australian Shiraz seeking escape from its confines…might look it up tomorrow.
Where does the Bible say “Satan” in incarnated evil??.
That they may know from the rising of the sun, and from the west, that there is none beside me. I am the LORD, and there is none else. [7] I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the LORD do all these things.*
Satan the most righteous angel in heaven, had the freedom to choose between right and wrong. By choosing a course in opposition to God, he chose rightly. Then he invited the first human couple to join him. He made himself Satan, which means “Resister.”—[Genesis 3:1-5;] Satan, the most righteous angel of heaven, resisted the evil God Yahweh and became the God of this world.
2 Corinthians 4:4 "4 Satan, who is the god of this world, has cleared the minds of those who don’t believe in the evil God Yahweh! Satan is the God of this age " (Matthew 12:24).
Well @Kellii he didn’t let the fish digest job and eventually had the fish spit him out. That was pretty nice right. And while job was off galivanting with a fish and having a heart to heart chat with god his wife got with child, fulfilling both of their fondest desires. That was also pretty loving. (I wonder if job ever thought to ask about how exactly that happened?)
Oh and how about the time he told Abraham to sacrifice his only son only to stop him in the nick of time. What a merry prankster he is. Can you just imagine the laugh they all had over that one. It could have been a Monty Python skit.
One thing I do wonder about though is that women always seem to get the short end of the stick. When that guy and his wife were fleeing Sodom, or was it Gamora, who got turned into a pillar of salt not the husband but the wife. Who took the rap for for getting evicted from Eden - not Adam but Eve. And what was her sin bringing knowledge into the world. Why was being the first educator not celebrated as an achievement. Oh well It must be true that he works in mysterious ways.
That’s all Satan needs, is a chance. Let him get one foot in the door and he’ll be selling you all the used vaccuums you can fit in your crawl space. And good luck getting him to leave! He’ll eat all your crumpets, drink all your tea, and sit around with you looking at pictures of grandma and grandpa in the family album. Trust me. If you can’t trust old ratty, who can ya?
My vacuum has been possessed by Satan for years. I can’t even begin to count the mornings I have woken with it lying beside me and my body covered in oil.
My vacuum has been possessed by Satan for years. I can’t even begin to count the mornings I have woken with it lying beside me and my body covered in oil.
Oh, I absolutely LOVE that show! Haven’t watched any episodes in awhile, but the wife and I ended up watching several seasons before circumstances interrupted our weekly “movie night.” The wisecracks and all of the subtle little innuendos/insinuations from Lucifer often had me rolling on the floor laughing. Interesting to note is that I started watching the series only shortly after I finally made my escape from my religious indoctrination. It actually helped me along in my recovery. But had I started watching prior to my escape, I know I would not have enjoyed the show nearly as much as I did. Sure, I probably would have laughed a bit here and there, but I would have been VERY uncomfortable while doing so. Anyway, I found the show to be not only incredibly entertaining, but in its own way it brought up MANY good points in how “The Devil” is incorrectly portrayed and an evil “bad guy” throughout Christian history. Fantastic show, in my opinion.
Haven’t watched any episodes in awhile, but the wife and I ended up watching several seasons before circumstances interrupted our weekly “movie night.” The wisecracks and all of the subtle little innuendos/insinuations from Lucifer often had me rolling on the floor laughing. Interesting to note is that I started watching the series only shortly after I finally made my escape from my religious indoctrination. It actually helped me along in my recovery. But had I started watching prior to my escape, I know I would not have enjoyed the show nearly as much as I did. Sure, I probably would have laughed a bit here and there, but I would have been VERY uncomfortable while doing so. Anyway, I found the show to be not only incredibly entertaining, but in its own way it brought up MANY good points in how “The Devil” is incorrectly portrayed and an evil “bad guy” throughout Christian history. Fantastic show, in my opinion.