Organized religion is bullshit. I agree to that, who does not?
Nevertheless, there is some value to biblical stories if you can interpret them (if you have reading comprehension which most adults lack to be honest).
Obviously, there is a Satan. Satan is a literally vehicle to explain why certain behaviors are bad (like e.g.: killing). There is no literal devil horned creature in existance, duh, that is not what I mean. Satan is a metaphor.
Additionally, obviously there is perfect knowledge. The problem is that it does not seem to be attainable by one single human being, but humans have some potential to understand perfect knowledge. At least, they can accept its existance as an abstract idea.
Actually, in statistics, perfect knowledge is a useful concept that we sometimes use to think about data collection and drawing inferences. I use it all the time to determine if I have collected enough data. For example, when I ask myself: "do I have enough data to predict the next outcome in a series perfectly, or do I need more data to do so". A set of data is good enough if you can reliably predict the next outcome in a series without error and thus you have attained perfect knowledge about a particular subset or system. The absolute knowledge about everything in statistics though is something that we call LaPlace's dream. He was a mathematician, but obviously LaPlace's dream will continue to be a dream. Unless the Universe is deterministic and once manages to perceive every particle in the universe at the same time and knows all its relationships with one another. Even then, it would only be possible if the universe was strictly deterministic as LaPlace assumed, but I don't think it is.
I think the biblical 'free-will' is the equivalent to the scientific 'quantum-behavior'. Unpredictable by common quantifiable rules and ordinary statistic and thus preventing a human realization of LaPlace's dream and perfect knowledge. Yet, not enough to reject the idea of perfect knowledge, even if humans are only destined to realize it as an abstract idea. (certain monks of certain Eastern spiritual traditions would disagree of course).
(One could imagine a 4 dimensional being with perfect knowledge of 3 dimensional space though, as in e.g.: Rick and Morty Season 2 Episode 1).
Lastly, there is "my people". The Bible passage I am referring to here is from Hosea, where God laments about his children (arguably all humans) that forget their ways and stop following his law and therefore:
By swearing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing adultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood.
I.e.: they perish because they forget to follow the laws of a society and thus reap death as their reward. This is followed by the statement: "My people shall perish for lack of knowledge."
This passage if read completely is clearly applicable to all of mankind, thus my people refers to all humans, as god is the speaker in the passage. Hence, if you place "my people" in its appropriate context there is "my people" as long as you believe that there is mankind. However, when the Bible was written the word mankind did not exist yet, or the writer just did not use that word in the context. Idk, I was not a writer 5000 years ago. (This is from the Old Testament)
And, of course, taking single elements form the text enables the manipulation of the meaning so that it can be used to divide humans against each other, which is not exacty Biblical, but has been the favourite pass time of the Catholic church for most of its existance. The Catholic church, obviously not being supported by the Bible at all as it is just a political institution. Neither, is the label of Christian btw., the word Christian does not exist in the Bible. Most likely it was a term invented by the pagans around the year 0 to describe early Christian's as mentally retarded. The original Latin word is Cretin, meaning mentally feeble in a positive sense in Latin. (to remind people that mentally feeble people are human's after all and that they should not be shunned for they feeble minds)
Albeit, most people do not take the time to reflect on religious text and thus they fail to learn form them. Instead, they flock to organized religions. Conveniently all of those institutions forget the respective teachings of their Holy books when it suits them. Sometimes, I guess, also out of neccessity, survival instincts and all.
Great points.
Exactly that is why I love the subject but I don't take the stories as factual sadly some people (including my own family and friends) do take them as being actual truth.
Exactly and I'm not anti spirituality it's just that most people do these things in a mindless way.
Yeah and that is always a problem. Ignorance is the worst thing.
I think that stupidity and evil go hand in hand.
Or ignorance and evil if you will.
You can never let other people do your thinking.
You have to (double) check everyhthing for yourself.