Comment on About the historical relationship of Islam to the United States by sacredcow

Parent Post: About the historical relationship of Islam to the United States · In Reply To

sacredcow · 5/10/2026, 12:21:51 PM · permalink

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resolutionaryman · 5/10/2026, 2:13:52 PM · permalink

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braven · 5/10/2026, 4:52:22 PM · permalink

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sonatime · 5/11/2026, 12:55:17 AM · permalink

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braven · 5/11/2026, 5:08:57 AM · permalink

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sonatime · 5/11/2026, 7:40:24 AM · permalink

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braven · 5/12/2026, 12:08:09 AM · permalink

Don't believe everything you think:)

🤣🤣🤣

This is brilliant....the humor....and the gaslighting that follows.....epic.

The level of cognitive dissonance that rears up in that short passage should win you an Award for Script Writing Extrordinaire!  
  
Not entirely sure I can do it justice...not altogether too sure if young Shakespeare would do this justice.

Jung might have a chance with it.....Nietzsche would give it a good sounding...*.like ringing a bell.*

Here goes.

*God already spelled out the whole story, including how it ends, in the Bible.*
God did that did he?  
Including how it ends?

That seems awfully conclusive....predictive.....and with what seems like a complete lack of .....wait for it....Free Will.

*Still not enough?*
Few would doubt you are only getting started here. :)

*How else was He supposed to get your attention?*

A phone call would be good...and convenient.

A strongly worded letter might work.

He could appear before me with a huge Blunt and we could start World Peace together.

That would be good.😇

*Without free will we would all be robots, and I doubt you would enjoy arguing theology with one. Free will makes the conversations interesting*

While Free Will 'seems' to make things interesting.....truth is also interesting.  
Truth has a good ring to it.  Rings true...*.like ringing a bell.*
Free will is a bit too Christian metaphysics....and little more....to me.  
  
However....as previously mentioned....please shed light on my never ending blind spots....all good.  
  
Maranatha brother Sonatime😇

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sonatime · 5/12/2026, 7:24:19 AM · permalink

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braven · 5/12/2026, 5:40:07 PM · permalink

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sonatime · 5/12/2026, 7:46:54 PM · permalink

I'm not mixing messages, but I can see how it might have come across that way. I think resolutionarman saw the comment and either thought it was directed at him or felt he could shed some light on it.  
  
I was making light of the apparent contradiction in expressing strong disdain for living around "evil Christianity" while having no plans to leave, especially for a Muslim country.  
  
My main point was that demons have no saving grace. Their decision to disobey God was made with full knowledge and understanding of the consequences. Humans, on the other hand, still have a chance to repent and restore their relationship with God.  
  
When you say, “God will kill everyone and maybe sort things out?” that feels like cherry-picking. We all understand that death comes for everyone. The Bible is very clear on the why:  
  
“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.” (Romans 3:23)  
“For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Romans 6:23)  
  
It always makes me curious what filter or lens you’re using when you read the Biblical passages and or arrive at such upside down conclusions. If you would just explain how you arrived at your perspective, I will wander no more:)  
  
Maranatha brother Braven:)

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saarnok · 5/21/2026, 3:52:54 AM · permalink

Okay. I've got to ask so I can understand the logic being presented here.  
  
You're saying that demons understood God to be all powerful, that they would lose any contest, that they were God's creation, living inside God's creation, never to escape God's creation no matter what... And freely chose to go against God?  
  
Cause, that's not making a lot of sense.  
  
It doesn't help that we're dealing with a modern conception of "demon" that didn't really exist in ancient times and is actually less than 500 years old for the most part.  
  
From pre-biblical Greece we have the "daimon", the ancestral spirits helping to guide the current populace. Later on, Hebrew writers recognized the gods of other peoples which were eventually polemicized into their own version of daimons, eventually becoming a formalized and completely distinct "demon" by around 1600, with such works as [Pseudomonarchia Daemonum](https://www.esotericarchives.com/solomon/weyer.htm).  
  
In ancient terms there isn't even any real category difference between angels, demons or any other non-physical entity.  
  
Maybe I'll do a post on the subject on my personal pocha.

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sonatime · 5/22/2026, 12:56:14 AM · permalink

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saarnok · 5/22/2026, 4:20:05 AM · permalink

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sonatime · 5/22/2026, 6:04:38 AM · permalink

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saarnok · 5/23/2026, 2:14:25 AM · permalink

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sonatime · 5/23/2026, 2:56:20 AM · permalink

I’ve been grokking it out for a long time. I was born into the Catholic denomination but didn’t really know the Bible until I started reading it on my own. The first thing I did was pretty much forget about the Catholic Church. Nothing feels more empty to me than big organized religion.  
  
You seem to be saying that greater knowledge of God should make beings more likely to choose good and submit to Him. But Satan had knowledge and closeness to God, yet he still fell because of pride - “I will be like the Most High.” And in Revelation, it appears a third of the angels made the same choice.  
  
So would you say the Watchers’ decision, the angels who “forsook their place” and lusted after the daughters of men, was also a flawed design by God? The text clearly shows they understood what they were doing and deliberately chose immorality.  
  
1 Enoch 6:1-5:  
  
"And it came to pass when the children of men had multiplied that in those days were born unto them beautiful and comely daughters. And the angels, the children of the heaven, saw and lusted after them, and said to one another: 'Come, let us choose us wives from among the children of men and beget us children.'  
And Semjaza, who was their leader, said unto them: 'I fear ye will not indeed agree to do this deed, and I alone shall have to pay the penalty of a great sin.'  
And they all answered him and said: 'Let us all swear an oath, and all bind ourselves by mutual imprecations not to abandon this plan but to do this thing.'  
Then they all swore together and bound themselves by mutual imprecations..."

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saarnok · 5/23/2026, 3:43:33 AM · permalink

I appreciate that you're including Enoch in what I guess is your personal canon. And, I'm not particularly versed in Enoch which is mostly not considered as being canonical in Christian circles, but, I don't think it makes any real impact on my point.  
  
Yes. The story is that the bene elohyim chose to defy a god that in your modern conception is infinitely powerful and infinitely knowledgeable. That's not the god they were defying. It simply can't be.  
  
Their god could be thwarted, deceived, circumvented, outwitted.  
  
This is still apparent in the story of Sodom and Gomorrah when Abraham bargains with God to spare the cities if there should be any innocents in them. God is going to physically go there to see if the rumors of their iniquity is true or not.  
  
You're writing your conception of God over the top of what the original authors believed, retrofitting their writings for your purposes.  
  
And, you're going to need a link to your source for Enoch, possibly even provide some reason for why you think your source should be considered valid for this purpose. My own source for Enoch is Project Gutenberg [https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/77935/pg77935-images.html](https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/77935/pg77935-images.html) and my reason for why I "trust" it is because they're in the business of having the "real" translation. At least allegedly.

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sonatime · 5/23/2026, 8:01:44 AM · permalink

To your other point. I understand it, but I think you’re creating a false dilemma.  
  
The Bible often uses anthropomorphic language, describing God as “going down,” dialoguing, or engaging personally. This doesn’t mean the original authors saw God as limited or ignorant. It shows a sovereign, infinite God choosing to make Himself personal and relatable to finite humans.  
  
We see this throughout Scripture: with Abraham at Sodom, with Moses, David, Solomon, and Israel as a whole. These interactions weren’t signs of weakness, they were deliberate acts of condescension, designed to build relationship and faith in people made in His image.  
  
As Psalm 8:4 asks:  
“What is mankind that you are mindful of them, human beings that you care for them?”  
  
The same God who inspired the Scriptures was intentionally revealing Himself according to His wisdom, keeping a record for the benefit of all who would later read it.  
  
Abraham’s conversation with God in Genesis 18 reflects this relational heart, not divine limitation.  
  
You accuse me of retrofitting modern theology, but interpreting these passages as proof of a primitive, limited “tribal god” is also an overlay, and one that ignores the clear theme of a holy, transcendent God who willingly draws near to His creation.

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saarnok · 5/24/2026, 7:49:55 PM · permalink

I'm sorry, I'm going to have to push back pretty hard here. God shares a meal with Abraham. God wrestles with Jacob.  
  
"The faithful" try to have it both ways depending on which interpretation is advantageous at the moment.  
  
Either "God" walks in The Garden in the evening: (NIV) "Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the LORD God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and they hid from the LORD God among the trees of the garden." Or he does not. "The Bible" says he does.  
  
Genesis 18: One of the strangers is identified as God. Read it.  
  
Genesis 24: Jacob wrestles with God.  
  
Exodus 24: (NIV) "Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and the seventy elders of Israel went up and saw the God of Israel. Under his feet was something like a pavement made of lapis lazuli, as bright blue as the sky. But God did not raise his hand against these leaders of the Israelites; they saw God, and they ate and drank."  
  
"God" was a physical being witnessed by multiple people.  
  
I get that your Sunday school teacher or apologetics "expert" is telling you these claims you're parroting. But, you're just wrong.  
  
This god is not infinite (you should celebrate). It's a powerful individual.

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sonatime · 5/25/2026, 1:35:25 AM · permalink

I’m not dismissing your passages but I think God intentionally reveals Himself in personal, and sometimes in the physical ways, this is purposeful for the people involved at the time and for every reader afterward. God condescends to our level so finite humans can relate to Him, while still respecting our free will. He draws near without overwhelming.  
  
Look at Moses in Exodus 33. He boldly asks, “Please show me your glory.” God doesn’t say no, but He protects Moses: “You cannot see my face, for no one may see me and live.” Moses only sees God’s back.  
  
The same pattern shows up with Joshua. In Joshua 5:13-15, Joshua meets the “Commander of the Lord’s army” with a drawn sword. Joshua falls down and worships him. The Commander accepts the worship and says, “Take off your sandals - the place where you are standing is holy.” Few verses later in Joshua 6:2, it is clearly the Lord (Yahweh) speaking to Joshua about Jericho. This isn’t inconsistency or a limited “physical being.” It’s the infinite God choosing to make Himself knowable and relational.  
  
It is not “having it both ways.” It’s one holy, transcendent God who willingly steps into our reality for relationship, on His terms, for our benefit/good.

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saarnok · 5/25/2026, 1:52:52 AM · permalink

I think that's being innately dishonest.  
  
And I think it's worth taking a moment to specify that by innately, I mean unavoidably. You don't really have a choice in the matter after you've abandoned attempting to objectively examine the text in favor what you must maintain as "The Truth". The truth doesn't need your honesty. It needs your loyalty.  
  
And, I'm not really faulting you here. It's innate. It's just the way it is.  
  
If you read the bible openly from Genesis on, honestly, you'll begin to see the reformation of a previously polytheistic culture into one which at least nominally considers itself to be monotheistic.  
  
While I'm by no means qualified to tease out all the many pagan traditions and gods, it's pretty obvious in a general sense.  
  
Even the bit you mention from Joshua reveals it. The commander is elohim. One of potentially thousands upon thousands of such figures, all of which might be proper to worship at one point in the history, but not later on.  
  
This polytheistic nature of what we today call The Jews survived long enough to leave archaeological evidence at the Elephantine temple, which for perhaps insufficient reason I consider to be the actual "First Temple" which will later be attributed to Solomon.  
  
Early "Jews" throughout their populace and history believed in possibly thousands of elohim which would eventually be condensed into "God" conceptually. And, it's not really hard to see that in the text once you start looking for it.

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