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RSS SilentRain

Reward Points:21
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2 points

Ah, okay, thank you very much! That was incredibly helpful. :) I wasn't sure if it meant "I vaguely know this person" or "I will follow this person to the ends of the earth" or anywhere in between...:P

I think I may have noticed that it also connects the points you get for posting debates...am I mistaken in that?

Again, I appreciate the warning. :) Thank you very much for caring enough to take the time and write this out for me. I look forward to debating with you again in the future!

1 point

Haha no problem! Glad you actually read through my many, many paragraphs...XD Sorry about the length! You had some very interesting points to bring up, and I appreciate your thoughts. :)

Wow, I didn't know that the Hindus believed Jesus to be anything more than an ordinary man! And the belief that everyone is the Son/Daughter of God is a very cool take on life. :)

Thanks so much for debating/talking with me! :) I really enjoyed it!

SilentRain(21) Clarified
1 point

"Don't blame God for your inclinations to be curious about things. You can control your curiosities."

My intent was not at all to blame him - or anyone - for anything. I am glad he made me the way he did. I would not be able to serve him as well if I didn't constantly think about things. :)

In my opinion, using my mind to wonder about the world he has put me in IS giving glory to God.

"Don't take this as a put down, I'm only trying to help..."

Thank you very much, I appreciate that as a fellow believer you'd care enough to correct me where you think I'm wrong. However, I've read up on this and talked with God and my pastor and I feel a peace in my heart knowing that God doesn't want me to be a mindless robot. I personally feel that he wants me to ask him questions, to wonder and muse about the things of his creation. If I am ignorant of anything, I know the Devil will use it against me. So I ask God questions, I study his word, I do research, and my mind can only grow sharper for it.

Just to clarify, do you believe that indulgence is a sin? (I am not referring to anything that might be breaking God's law. For example, what of indulging creativity, or indulging the questioning mind? Do you believe these to be sin?)

Haha we're not even talking about aliens any more...XD Well, at least, I'm not.

---

(This is totally off-topic and I apologize, but are you familiar with Myers-Briggs personality types? I doubt it, but I figured I'd ask anyway. I'm really curious what your type is...XD)

SilentRain(21) Clarified
1 point

Yes, these same arguments could most DEFINITELY be applied to other people, to anyone else who claims to be God or the Son of God. (I didn't try this 'cause I was mainly talking about Jesus, but hey! Side tangents are fun! :P) However in the case of Muhammad, he never actually claimed to be God. Both he and Buddha (and several others) said explicitly that they were 'just a man'. The lord, liar, lunatic discussion really only applies to anyone who claims to be divine. :) Great point though!

I believe that Muhammad was a good man with a lot of very intriguing things to say, but I disagree on some of his main points like the "Five Pillars of the Faith" (from what I understand of it, it is salvation through works. I believe that we are saved by grace.)

I have actually never heard of Scientology. :) I'll go look that up and get back to you.

As for Mormonism, yes, John Smith's visions could have been induced by a mental disorder such as schizophrenia. The problem is that there were no WITNESSES to this event, it was just the one man who claimed he had seen what he wrote down. However, in the Bible and regarding Jesus' ministry, there were hundreds of thousands of people who were eyewitnesses to his miracles.

But what if the Bible just contains errors? What if he never actually CLAIMED to be God? I could definitely see your reason for doubting it's validity, but Jesus seemed to pretty explicitly state that he was God in ALL FOUR gospels, which were written at different times and independently of each other. If just one gospel quoted Jesus claiming to be God once, twice, or three times, it could just be an error. But when four different eyewitnesses independently of one another quote Jesus claiming to be God as frequently as they do, I find it hard to doubt whether or not he claimed to be God.

I hope this made sense...at least a little! XD I know I leave HUGE replies, sorry! :P

1 point

Whutttt...XD I never noticed that! My gosh...I've been living a lieee!!!

(hehe I don't think anyone's trying to do anything whack, but it's still a really interesting idea!)

3 points

Thank you, I can understand your concern. :) He definitely is a bit hell-fire and brimstone...haha :P I'm sure he means well, though.

I'm kind of new to this site, and I don't really know all that is entailed with being allies. Could you enlighten me on what exactly it means?

If it means that I agree with him or support his ideas, then I should probably un-ally him now...XD

(Also, I'm sorry for such long responses!! I just tend to talk a lot...haha)

SilentRain(21) Clarified
3 points

Haha thanks, I appreciate that. :P

I can definitely understand the angle that you're coming from. People most certainly DO tend to exaggerate things, including religious texts. However I believe it's different with the Bible, and I'm happy to explain why. :)

The four apostles who wrote the gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John) lived with Jesus and got to know him first-hand. They wrote their gospels independently and at different times, yet all four of them tell the same story. When four eyewitnesses can agree without even knowing the other people's claims, you can be fairly sure that what they're saying isn't made up.

But what if over the years it was edited or 'beefed up' to make it sound better? Actually, the new believers were ASTONISHINGLY picky about the Bible's copying. They had to hand-write it since they didn't have printers back then, and would use only a special type of parchment for their scrolls. They wrote in a special kind of ink and made every letter exactly a hair's width apart. The way they copied it is super detailed as well. A man would read a letter and everyone copying it down would write that one letter. Then, he'd repeat it to make sure everyone got the same thing. If even ONE letter was off, the entire scroll was to be burned. (There is historic documentation of how this happened and these people were insanely detailed...I'd go crazy if I tried to do that!)

There's pretty much no way that there was a mistake or exaggeration in the Bible for many, many years to follow until the invention of the printing press. After Gutenberg printed the Bible, Pope Pious II wrote to Cardinal Carvajal in Rome that these new Bibles were "correct in their script, and without error". This guy KNEW his Bible stuff if he was pope, he'd notice any mistakes in it.

These Bibles weren't passed down through the generations by word of mouth - as so many stories are - but by print. If it traveled by word of mouth, then I could most definitely see the potential for flaws. However, due to the way it was printed, I just don't see how errors could occur.

Yes, you are correct. All his disciples could be crazy, or they could all be liars too. Or maybe Jesus just had everybody fooled.

Well based on the way they died, they really can't be liars. Many of them lived in smaller towns, so if they were crazy enough to believe that random people are God incarnate, people would probably know about it and wouldn't accept what they had to say. Also, Luke was a doctor. They wouldn't let a crazy person take care of their sick.

If Jesus were a liar/a lunatic and had everybody - including his disciples - convinced that he was God, his body would still be lying in the tomb. The disciples couldn't have stolen it and he couldn't have escaped since he was definitely dead.

Wow, that was a very good question! I've never really thought of it like that! Yes, I believe Jesus was divine because he was the Son of God, but at the same time he WAS (and is) God. Jesus and God are the same being, but at the same time they're different. It's super confusing, yes. XD I like to think of it as a body (wow that sounded awkward sorry). Let's say GOD in his entirety is a body. Jesus is an arm, God is the head, and the Holy Spirit is a leg. They're all the same being, but they're also different and have different functions.

So to answer your question as awkwardly as possible...(Sorry) yes, we're all sons and daughters of God and therefore technically siblings of Jesus, but A: we're adopted and B: Jesus is still God, so he still vastly out-ranks us on the who's-more-divine scale (if such a thing exists). I don't think one PERSON is more Godly than another from birth, but Jesus was also still God so he's in a separate category.

Wow, again, thanks for asking that question! It made me think, I appreciate it! :)

Also, I didn't know that about Hinduism. :) That's a really cool idea and an interesting take on life and the universe that I haven't heard of before!

Thanks again!

SilentRain(21) Clarified
1 point

Haha by definition, anything that doesn't live on earth is extraterrestrial. :) Extraterrestrial just means "not of earth". A rock from mars is extraterrestrial. It doesn't necessarily refer to intelligent life. :)

4 points

I personally firmly believe that Jesus was the Son of God. To help illustrate my point, I will be using C.S. Lewis' "Lord, Liar, Lunatic" discussion.

It's already been proven that Jesus did exist at some point in time, and during his life on Earth he very clearly claimed to be the Son of God (Jesus refers to God as his father, and when questioned about his divinity he very clearly says "I AM").

So, since Jesus claimed to be God, there are really only three options left of who he could be. He could either be who he said he was (Lord), he could have claimed to be someone he's not (Liar), or he could have thought he was someone but really wasn't (Lunatic).

LUNATIC: Was Jesus just plain crazy? 'Delusions of grandeur' is a common effect of Schizophrenia, after all. Maybe he was just a bit coo-coo? Well, if we look at the things he says, it really just doesn't sound like a madman or mentally-disturbed person talking. He speaks with eloquence and grace. There's no way a crazy person could talk like that. Also, considering how many followers he had, don't you think one of them would have noticed that he was acting a bit...off? They'd realize he's just a madman before too long and be back to fishing. Because of this, I don't think Jesus could be crazy.

LIAR: What if Jesus KNEW he wasn't the Son of God, and was just plain lying about it? Jesus was beaten, spat on, mocked, whipped within an inch of his life, and nailed through the hands to a plank of wood and hung in the air for hours to die of starvation, dehydration, or blood-loss. Jesus knew EXACTLY what was going to happen to him, and could have at any moment in time backed off and simply said, "sorry guys, I made it up". Yet he didn't. No sane person would willingly go through that torment for the sake of a lie, and we've already established that Jesus was sane.

And if, just for the heck of it, we assume that he WAS a bit mental, and that his disciples just kinda went along with it for whatever reason, after his death they'd have all scattered. Instead, this isn't at all what we see. They stuck to their faith to the death, and all eleven (Judas Iscariot is not counted here) of them died painful, bloody deaths because of their belief in Jesus. For example: Simon, Jude, Phillip and Andrew were crucified, James was thrown off the temple, stoned, and then had his brains literally beaten out with a club, Matthew and James the son of Zebedee were both stabbed with a sword, Bartholomew was either crucified or skinned alive and then beheaded, Thomas was stabbed with a spear, and John was thrown (alive) into boiling oil before being banished to the island of Patmos (he was the only apostle to die of natural causes).

All of them died or were tortured because they preached about Jesus. If they had any doubt in their minds whatsoever that Jesus was anyone but the Son of God, they would NEVER have gone through that.

So, last but not least, we come to Lord.

LORD: Could Jesus have been who he claimed he was? Well in order for him to be who he says he is, he'd need to do these two things. A: be the Son of God and B: die and come back to life. There are SO MANY old-testament verses that prophesy Jesus and say that he is the Son of God, three hundred and fifty three of them, to be exact, and Jesus fulfilled ALL OF THEM, including the ones about the location of his birth and that his parents would flee with him to Egypt when he was no older than two. How on EARTH could 'just one man' fulfill all of these? He couldn't. The odds are one in ten to the seventeenth power that any one person could fulfill JUST EIGHT of the prophesies surrounding his birth. http://www.christiananswers.net/q-aiia/jesus-odds.html

Secondly, he'd have to die and return to life. Well it's historical fact that he was crucified, but did he come BACK TO LIFE? Couldn't the disciples have just stolen his body or something? What if he was never actually dead? Quite frankly, no. It's not happening. Firstly, he was dead. He was definitely dead. May I remind you that he was whipped beyond the point of being recognizable, nailed to a cross, bled out for hours, and was then stabbed in the stomach with a spear? This'd definitely kill him. The soldiers responsible for executing Jesus KNEW what death looked like, they'd seen it hundreds of thousands of times. There's no way they'd let a man who had just fainted off the cross. Besides, even if this somehow happened, this same seriously injured man would need to wake up, fold his clothes neatly, then roll a two-ton stone away from the entrance and sneak past four to sixteen armed-to-the-teeth guards. Yeah...not happening.

So what if the disciples stole his body? What, you mean the eleven guys who had - only hours previously - run like scared bunnies at the first sign of trouble? We're told that Jesus' tomb was guarded, just in case something like this should happen. These soldiers were Roman soldiers, and sixteen of them were able to hold off over a hundred enemy troops. They could go all "this is Spartaaa" on the disciples and take 'em all out without even batting an eye. Now assuming for the sake of discussion that the guards all left to get coffee at the same time, that still leaves the problem of the two-ton stone rolled in front of the grave. There's no way eleven guys are going to move that thing (uphill, mind you) before the guards get back. And of course, this still leaves us with the problem of every disciple being killed in a horrible way. If they knew Jesus to be nothing more than a lie, there's NO WAY ON EARTH that they'd go through all that.

So, in conclusion, I hope you can see that Jesus was in fact the Son of God and that there really is no other alternative.

If I missed something or there is some flaw in my logic, I'd be happy to hear about it. :)

SilentRain(21) Clarified
1 point

I definitely agree with you on the majority of what you are saying. I definitely agree that we shouldn't doubt God and shouldn't meddle in things clearly against His word. I also agree that the majority of the time when people talk about aliens they're discussing another form of a 'supreme being' who could have created life and thus take the place of God. I also agree that the focus of scripture is on Christ, His death and resurrection and when studying scripture, that should be our main focus as well.

However, I have to disagree with you on one point: that we shouldn't even think about it. I believe that God created our minds with the ability to ponder our existence and think about things. I believe the Devil lies to us by saying "you're not allowed to question things" or "God doesn't want you to think". I personally feel that God calls us to ask Him about what He's made, to explore it, and to wonder and marvel at everything.

However, I also firmly believe that there is a line that we shouldn't cross when it comes to these things. For example, it's one thing to wonder about other religions and why they exist etc., but a completely different thing to meddle around in them and "be a Buddhist for a month" or something.

I am the kind of person who will think about things, muse through the logic of different sides of an argument, and pick the side that makes the most logical sense. I do this with all sorts of crazy, whacked-out ideas (I once wrote an eleven-page essay on whether or not humans could fly) all the time.

This is how God has made me. It would drive me near insanity if I felt I couldn't wonder about things anymore because God doesn't want me to think. I personally don't see how such a loving God would create people with minds that were designed to think and wonder and then tell us to stop it.

I can totally understand any concern that you may have about thinking about dangerous things and then being misled by them, but to say "don't ever think about it" is probably taking it too far. :)

So yes, there is definitely a line that we shouldn't cross (and I think accepting aliens is crossing the line) but the line doesn't start at wondering. If our 'wondering' goes too far, THEN it is wrong. But musing about God's creation and what could be doesn't seem wrong to me.

Also: For clarification's sake I don't agree with the Nephilim-are-aliens theory. Do I think they existed? Yes, definitely. It's pretty clear in the Bible that they existed. But I don't really go much farther on that belief than "the Bible says they existed". To be honest, I've barely given them much of a thought until now. :P


Winning Position: The Son of God

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"In the end, we only regret the chances we didn't take."

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Country: United States

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