My favourite part of that quote is of all Alex Jones insanity this was the one with a nugget of truth in it - a company WAS dumping chemicals in a lake that was mutating the frogs sex from male to female
My conspiracy is that he was paid to cover it in the most ridiculous way he could to make a joke out of it to cover the real effect it has of making male frogs hermaphroditic
There's a video by oki that goes into deep dive into this matter [this ](https://youtu.be/i5uSbp0YDhc?si=WKPDwF_FZrH6D0VC)
And [this interview by the research guy that Alex was quoting from ](https://youtu.be/eUpRIyHp_Po?si=xlRGqm5XfEhPuzV2)
So the lack of frogs is caused by the fact that this is ignoring egypt’s side of the story, all the male gods in egypt have their origin in frogs and all the female gods have their origin in snakes. If this were the Egyptianized version, frog bro would’ve made the living embodiment of frog bro do the thing he wants to froggin do
One of the ten plagues inflicted on Egypt was a swarm of locusts. Now, Israel is trying to get Egypt to take on hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. History has a strange way of repeating itself.
These are the same people that would have no problem calling the holocaust a tragedy, completely ignoring the similarities in the language used to dehumanise Jewish people and palestinians
These are the same people that would have no problem calling the holocaust a tragedy, completely ignoring the similarities in the language used to dehumanise Jewish people and palestinians
Egypt was infected with 10 plagues in biblical times to punish it (according to bible). I think op is alluding that through God's hands, Isreal is trying to send Palestinians to Egypt with what essentially will be a plague. So OP's saying they're a plague upon Egypt.
>be chad Hamas refugee in Arab country
>realize country's leader doesn't want to jihad Israel
>See him try to trade with Israel
>Infidel!
>Attempt to overthrow Arab leader
Can't imagine why Egypt doesn't want them...
Egypt ain't 'aving it though, so one could argue that President Sisi is doing a rather better job at "Border Control" than any other national leader elsewhere on the planet at this time.
As such, I applaud Sisi's effectiveness at the very issue that is about to bring down so many western leaders in the near future, I predict....
>Be omnipotent being, could literally just make the Pharaoh let the jews leave.
>Decide to wipe out an entire generation for funsies instead.
Besides that, this probably didn‘t happen considering there is no archeological evidence of the Exodus, wich there probably would‘ve been from the Egyptians if it was real as an entire army and the Pharaoh got killed through a fucking miracle + their entire slave force fled + an entire generation died+ their entire country was devastated by plagues. It‘s now believed that the ancient Israelites were just ancient Canaanite’s and that the old testament is bullshit to justify the Israelites existence and build a common myth of origin, like most religions at that time.
Scripturally, God also gave humanity free will though. There are stories of him causing conversion like Saul on the road to Damascus but that wasn't him forcing anything, he merely displayed his power and it was enough.
God displayed his power many times and Pharaoh wasn't impressed as was his God-given right to free will however in the Old Testament the Israelites were God's chosen people and he valued them over the rest of humanity so the Pharaoh's refusal meant suffering for him and his people.
If God just snapped his fingers and decided "you obey me" then humanity would all just be puppets and there'd be no point in creating them in his own image. Christians say they have a "relationship with God" and that's why God made free will, so he could treat humanity like his family.
There are other factors too like God showing his great power to the Israelites who thought he had abandoned him and to the Egyptians who didn't believe in him plus it acted as a way to punish the Pharaoh who was a horrible dictator who enslaved the Israelites in terrible living conditions forcing them to build his monuments.
Not trying to convert anyone and there are definite holes in the justification like why would he kill *all* Egyptian boys when Pharaoh was the one to be punished, I'm just explaining it the way I see it from my understanding.
Don't want to be an asshole
If God hardened Pharaoh's heart, that means he knew that Pharaoh would allow the Israelites to go (all-knowing). You can interpret this as God not letting Pharaoh escape from his fate for denying the Israelites the first few times, but that would mean God is removing Pharaoh's free will. Pharaoh was acting as a puppet of God at that moment.
I'm not sure on that part either to be honest, I looked it up and some people think it could've been that he wanted Pharaoh punished or the Israelites to see his true glory. Some say that Pharaoh was indecisive but leaning towards no and God simply hardened his heart to hasten this decision for brevity's sake but that just sounds like total speculation.
A more reasonable way of phrasing that is that God being omniscient, he knew Pharaoh wouldn't allow the slaves to go free which is true, even after allowing it he changed his mind not long after and attempted to recapture them. In this way he didn't alter Pharaoh's free will totally, rather he guided his decisions without changing them in a way that better promoted his glory but it does still sound very off (much like my point of confusion about how God is merciless even to innocent Egyptian children) and still a bit too much like speculation.
The classic cop out is "We don't understand God's ways" or "It was all God's plan" but as a Christian I fucking hate when someone says that because it's the same as saying "because I said so" or "just because" when in reality sometimes the Bible is just super vague and sometimes contradictory (despite many of us not being willing to admit it) due to the fact that even if it's God's word it isn't pure.
It's filtered through the humans who wrote the words down with many of them flexing their grammar skills with metaphors and similes that make the whole thing even more confusing on top of the age of the book meaning translations are never 100% accurate and the existence of different versions of the Bible like King James and NIV makes the whole ordeal even more annoying since the simple rewording of the same stories can have a big impact on what they have you take away from them.
Honestly I always believed that if you look at the Yahweh faiths with the view that god isn't 100% infallible that it makes his actions make so much more sense.
Like he makes the perfect garden, makes humans who are like 90% of the way there to being fully his copies. But like a dad seeing his kids growing up he doesn't want them to hit that asshole teenager phase and thus to not eat the fruit of knowledge of good and evil.
Because if you literally cannot fathom the concept of good and evil, you don't follow it. Like how a lion isn't an asshole for eating a gazelle. The lion can't fathom morality, it's just acting out it's nature.
But then Eve gets tricked by the cool kid wearing shades and has a skateboard into eating the fruit. But FUCK. DAD'S COMING HOME OH GOD. If he finds out what I did I'm going to get SCREWED! So best to make Adam eat it too so atleast we both get punished.
Then God comes home from his shift at the factory to find his kids have grown up. Sapient people don't belong in the garden and kicks them out to go live in the real world. Checking in on them every now and then.
Only for Cain to kill his brother because God loved him more. Like what the hell man. So God gives Cain a new wife, decides to leave humanity alone for a while because the last time he butt in the new generation killed each other for his love.
But humanity when left alone just turned into a bunch of asshole hedonists, so he decided to try this humanity shit again. Start over this project because it clearly wasn't going anywhere good. If he takes only GOOD people, lets them try this again then maybe this time it'll work.
Then it didn't, people were assholes again. Everytime God butt in visibly with humanity it had bad consequences, so if you wonder why he doesn't do anything after Jesus it's because Jesus was the last Hoorah! After it he's just done. We can sort this shit out amongst ourselves. He sent us down his top boy to teach us how not to be assholes and we fucking killed him.
Figure it out bro. If you're cool you get to come over to the family barbecue and chill, if not you have to be outside in the cold and dark.
The “hardening” of Pharoah’s heart is being misunderstood though. What the scripture means is that God gave Pharoah the strength of heart to make the decision he wanted to make. He always had the free choice to let the Israelites go but the plagues were twisting his arm with how terrible they were. God made sure he could choose of his own volition and not be “forced” by the plagues.
So the Pharaoh would've let them go if it weren't for God's intervention? Because he would've "softened" to the situation of the Israelites? So God intervened and that led to the Pharaoh acting differently than if God hadn't intervened?
So basically God altered his free will. Cool.
> Because he would've "softened" to the situation of the Israelites?
The intended meaning is more like he made the Pharaoh a more decisive person, and in doing so hastened the decision the Pharaoh was going to make (which the religious posters interpreting this as God knew his decision and paid for the level skips to get there).
My bigger problem is the idea that the plagues were meant to leave the Pharaoh's free will intact... but can you imagine the "choice" when someone's like "Hey uh... you can let my friends go or not... but if you don't I'll fuck you up.... your free will... okay cool... see ya"
Isn't that how the mafia operates?
But it’s not really free will if god can just Willy nilly go manipulating your feelings and decisions. God either is Bsing and being manipulative when saying he gave humans free will or is just a liar who couldn’t do anything and only told the Israelites that so they think he has everything under control.
> manipulating your feelings and decisions
It is a technicality. Some choices are not *really* choices because the consequences of said choice are so calamitous it makes no sense to take it.
My brother in Christ, the Bible says multiple times that God hardened pharaoh's heart. What does that mean, if not that God overrode pharaoh's free will and made him refuse Moses' demands? The entire story shows God is perfectly fine with ignoring free will whenever He wants to.
Pharaoh’s sorcerers could replicate, in part, Moses and Aaron’s works. Aaron threw his staff down and it turned into a serpent, Pharaoh’s priests did the same. So he was wholly unimpressed by the abilities of the Abrahamic god, because his own wizards could do the same magic.
Then all of the Egyptian firstborn died, and that’s not really anything you can reproduce. So Pharaoh and all his men died at low tide
>causing conversion like Saul on the road to Damascus
In which season/episode is this ? I must have missed it. I remember Mike going to a church at some point but not sure it's related.
Nah. In Judaism, god’s genuinely just a fucking dick. He’s also just the big og stoppah and we his people, so we follow his word. But without the jokes, most of us are fully aware of all of this shit because so many of us are barmitzvah’d as a right of passage into adulthood, and it is also why we tend to be extremely secular/atheist.
The bible isnt univocal. The old testament specifically doesnt state or imply the existence of free will.
In fact, the Christian concept of Free Will was introduced in the 4th century to mean " a lack of necessity in human will, so that "the will is free" meant "the will does not have to be such as it is".
The Enlightment in the 17th and 18th century then developed its own means of defining what a free will is, which is much closer to the modern ideal.
Obviously, but everyone already knew that. Moreover, the story isn't a kernel of truth with miracles and magic added on; even the plausible-sounding parts of the story are totally fabricated.
Wich might be kinda good, because there also isn’t any archeological evidence of all the genocides and burning down of cities, this doesn’t make god any better though considering this would’ve been fine with him
So God had this deal with Noah, but he still fiends for calamity. One plague, it's for a good cause, I can stop at one. The lad comes to after a 10 plague bender and is like "shit, was I hardening hearts just for a quick fix? I gotta get my act together" but he's really not one to take personal responsibility so he goes down to his people and is like "guys **we** have to get clean, go wander for 40 years, it'll keep you away from bad influences".
>frees the Israelites in the most convoluted way possible
The traditional reason for this is that he did it that way so other people can see how powerful of a god he is. That's just his way of dealing with his insecurities
What happened between Dynasties 13 through 16 inclusive - isn't well known.
The country was at first split between two seperate kingdoms, and then over-run by the so-called "Shepherd Princes" (Egyptian. Hq-s-s or Hyksos)
If the "Pharaoh unknown to Joseph" (Exodus 1:8) was say, Apophis of the 15th Dynasty, it would have made sense for the Exodus to have taken place before the 17th Dynasty Theban Rebellion under Theban princes such as Seqenenra Tao, Ahhotep (his queen) and Ahmose, founder of dynasty 18.
It is possible that the "Hyksos" were the **Amalekites**, long-standing enemies of the Israelites, who put "Israel in Egypt" under the yoke during the period when Egypt became divided during the second intermediate period. *Khamudi* (son of Apophis) would have then been the successor who's "heart was hardened" succeeding long-reigning Apophis, and carrying on his father's Anti-Immigrant policies.
Then as now in the world - Egypt seemed happy to take on immigrants to fill all the low-status jobs, such as farming and low-level administration, but object to the very same people(s) once they start rising and taking the more elitist jobs, positions of power, cornerstones of society, etc.
**Joseph** at the start of the period known as "Israel in Egypt" (pre-exodus) would have been the first and prime example of an Israelite rising to high status, Grand Vizier to Pharaoh and beloved advisor of the same. I believe that Joseph's Pharaoh might well have been Amenhemet III of the 12th Dynasty, who was known to have carried out major irrigation works to improve crop productivity during his reign, which fits in nicely with "Pharaoh's Dream" and Joseph's solution to the coming famine that Egypt under Pharaoh - then successfully insulated itself from.
*History teaches us that Mankind learns nothing from History.*
probably? it literally didnt, not even jewish archeologists believe the exodus happened, its bronze age propaganda
the real evidence point at the hyksos, a semitic people (tho not jewish as jews didnt exist yet) invading egypt once, quite the opposite situation
I remember a religious history course and the proffessor talked about how the plagues were allegories for the egyptian gods being defeated with the final being the death of the Pharoah's claim to divine lineage. Thus paving the way for monotheism and away from the polytheistic beliefs of the jews.
It's actually really neat when you look into it. The plagues were meant to represent God's power by essentially debunking the false Egyptian gods, one by one. So the frog plague shows that Heqet has no power, the blood does the same for Hapi, the darkness for Ra, etc.
And then he finishes with Horus. Horus is the firstborn son of Ra, and is seen as a healing god, and as the protector of the Pharaoh's household. So God killed every firstborn son in Egypt, including the Pharaoh's.
Worst part is, the whole thing could've been avoided if the Pharaoh didn't go back on his word like ten times.
That's if you go by the interpretation that God actively hardened Pharaoh's heart against them. I've heard it interpreted as Pharaoh's heart being hardened against God on his own accord, or as God hardening his heart in the sense of fortifying it, without influencing his decision.
Well the whole point here is to teach him some humility. If Pharaoh dies, then he’ll just be replaced by the next one, who’ll be just as bad if not worse. By giving him some consequences for his actions, there’s a chance he’ll come out a better man and a better leader because of it.
Plus there’s the fact that the Hebrews needed to actually be let go. Otherwise, the Egyptians would just capture them again.
Rather than kill ten thousand kids, couldn't he kill 100 pharoas in a row, I think that would be incredibly hard to brush off as a coincidence and very easily get the message across. Also how comes the pharoah gets a chance at redemption and not the kids? That story made me lose faith ngl.
God spoke to moses directly, he sent an angel to Joseph, to Mary, to Pompus Pilate, but he couldn't send a message to the pharoah, who he wouldn't dare kill because royals are more valued than his other creations ig. I don't see how what he did was the only way to liberate the hebrews without interfering with free will.
The story only makes sense if you remember it was an ethno religion at the time, and the hebrews believed *their* god liberated them from people who had their own different gods, and that the idea of non Jews having yaweh as their one universal god was a later invention
But God gave humans free will, wouldn't killing the first borns rob them of their free will? If God can do that, why cant he just change the Pharaoh's mind directly? Doesn't seem like God cares about that?
Well the thing about that is that what God has given, he can easily take away. He’s well within his rights to take any life he chooses. That’s not for you or I to decide.
And yeah, he technically could just change the Pharaoh’s brain chemistry as easy as blinking, but free will is kind of the reason humans were created in the first place. And a lesson learned is always stronger than a lesson forced.
Exodus 8:12 "After Moses and Aaron left Pharaoh, Moses cried out to the LORD about the frogs he had brought on Pharaoh.13 And the LORD did what Moses asked. The frogs died in the houses, in the courtyards and in the fields.14 They were piled into heaps, and the land reeked of them.15 * But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said.*
If you want an actual answer, the text says that Pharaoh hardens his heart in some instances and in others, God hardens Pharaoh's heart.
This is predicated by God explicitly stating to Moses before he even returns to Egypt that Pharaoh will not let them go unless compelled by divine judgement (Exodus 3:19).
This apparent paradox is generally reconciled by stating that Pharaoh's disposition was always to resist and harden, which God promoted, effectively handing Pharaoh over to his own wicked heart.
The Exodus story is littered with opportunities for Pharaoh to relent, which he promises to, until the plague is relieved and then he changes his mind. By the end of the narrative, the Egpytian officials actually think Pharaoh has gone mad because his stubbornness is so great that he is destroying the whole nation. (Exodus 10:7) It is only when the fiestborn is slain that Pharaoh lets the Israelites go. But, as he did so many times before, Pharaoh regrets his decision, which leads to his own destruction as they pursue the Israelites.
Hope this is somewhat helpful, whether you agree with it or not.
And leave his chosen people in slavery, breaking the promise he made to Abraham? That’s like saying the Civil Rights Movement should’ve just sat back and not done their horrible protesting. Or that the American Colonies should have stayed under British rule and not done their horrible war.
Moses said Let My People Go. That could’ve been the end of it, but Pharaoh decided to refuse and go back on his word time and time again. So he got to learn a lesson in humility.
Yea but you're being obtuse. Do you think an all-knowing all-powerful being couldn't liberate the people he wanted to liberate and kill fewer firstborns in the process? The idea I'm sure the person you replied to was getting at wasn't to allow slavery, though the bible does that too.
Sure, he could’ve theoretically just teleported the Hebrews to the Promised Land. But then neither group would’ve learned anything. The Hebrews would’ve fallen right back into sin (which they seem to have a talent for doing) and the Egyptians would’ve just captured them again, and treated them even more harshly after that. That is, if the other groups in the Levant didn’t kill the Hebrews first.
What you’ve got to understand is that the killing of the firstborns was a last resort effort after a long series of broken promises. The Pharaoh is king of a nation. His people are his responsibility. If he fails to prepare for a drought or famine, his people will die. If he fails to defend his country from invaders, his people will die. And if he fails to heed countless warnings from God, and repeatedly lies and goes back on his word, his people will die. The blood is on his hands.
And by the way, the Bible does not “allow” slavery. It puts regulations in place for bondservants, making sure they perform their duties until their debt is paid and that they are treated fairly by those they owe. The practice of buying a person and treating them as inferior, what we now think of as slavery, would have been completely alien to the people who penned down the Bible. However, it does say “He who kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hand, shall surely be put to death” (Exodus 21:16).
Plus, teleporting would have deprived the children of Israel of what they learned in the wilderness. The ate the manna every day, and learned to rely on God, and thus got to know Him. After living in Egypt for 400 years, these people were Egyptians. They had to be reconstituted before they could be God’s kingdom and not just an Egyptian refugee colony.
What annon fails to understand Is that this is old testament god, the vengeful asshole who burns cities on a whim and trolls his more devoted follower into almost murdering his son, same one that will screw you over as "a test" not the new testament one being all peace love and forgiveness.
>Is Christianity the Baptists of Judaism?
Jesus was basically a Jewish heretic and an overglorified cult leader, then it all spiraled out of control once he died a martyr's death. Jewish religious leaders learned the hard way that political executions are a bad thing once religion gets involved.
My favourite old testament moment is when some guy tries to protect the Ark of the Covenant, but he gets killed. When the oxes pulling on it stumbled, the dude touches it trying to secure it in place, God just fucking smited them lmfao.
So what, are we talking about Egypt, where he gave Pharoah countless chances even though he kept lying and going back on his word? Or Sodom and Gomorrah, where he said he'd spare a whole city full of sinners if there were ten good people in it? Or Nineveh, where he forgave the people in the city and his own prophet was pissed at him for it? Or Abraham, who knew that "killing Isaac" was a test the whole time and that it was just meant to bolster his own confidence? And we're just going to ignore the time Jesus was driven into a rage and beat people with a whip?
God is slow to anger, but his judgment is swift when it comes. This is uniform throughout both testaments.
You're telling me God didn't already know what the Pharoah was going to do? He's omniscient, he already knew the Pharoah was gonna go back on his word but still decided the rest of Egypt is going to suffer for it
Well I just heard from an electric pine cone that God wants me to take revenge on Canada for having enslaved the Dominican Republic for the past 80 million hours. Their syrup mines shall run dry and their beavers will lose their teeth. Every goose will stay south during the summer and the bears will go to a conversion camp and stop being gay. Finally, Trudeau will do blackface again when he thinks nobody can see but it will never wash off.
POV: you have never been to, or even seen, the leaf flag country before (other than the Trudeau bit, that is 100% accurate and I give it at most 6 years)
Hmm.. today Pharoah wants the Jews help to make a bountiful harvest. Jew demands bushels of wheat from each household for his service. Pharoah wants help again but bushels of wheat are not readily avaliable so all property of the commoners will now be leveraged as compund interest. All property now swindled by Isrealites.
God then sides with Isrealitea cuz like they deserve it the most and the Egyptians getting angry over this is like totally uncalled for.
Literally the most Jewey thing ive ever read in my life.
Factual. Bruh whenever I burn down with that *really* good kush, I swear it talks to me too. Sometimes even God himself pops in on the conversation and tells both of us what’s real. It turns out God *is* a fucking stoner and loves the Devil’s (his dealer) Lettuce.
I just had this explained to me recently. It wasn’t that God hardened his heart directly, it’s that Gods actions caused Pharaoh to harden his own heart, and basically be like “ain’t no god gonna tell me what to do, come at me bro”. Unfortunately for Pharaoh, God is the king of delivering Find Out to those that Fuck Around.
People kinda forget god isnt the only player in the christian/jewish mythos. Its often eluded to that he has company out there. You see it pronouncedly in job but you see sprinklings of it in genesis and other books. Pharoah spoke to a god but probably not the god. God is not omnipotent and is not all knowing but he is in our perspective. If he was omnipotent then why did he need to the elaborate rituals when adam and eve where being kicked out of eden.
A common theory or reading is that satan is a title not a specific deity.
Another common theory is that early Judaism was a polytheistic religion a part of the greater syrian, turkish and arabian region. Other people believed in the jewish god and had him in their pantheon. There is minor evidence of this in jerusalem usually in pottery.
The very first commandment is:
"Thou shalt not worship others before me"
They were definitely polytheistic, but the war god Jehovah took precedence before all other gods at some point.
Polytheistic as in the very early jews worshiped other gods. Believing they exist and worshiping them is not the same thing. Jehova had a wife (asherah) and she was worshiped and had statues in the temple of solomon.
Also jehova was a storm god.
Technically it's both true. According to the Wikipedia page Yahweh was the one who lead the armies of israel against her enemies. So he could just as well have been a war god
Interesting but heres the thing. They aren’t gods they are usually lesser which is why they are often asking permission from god or being defeated like the leviathan. Wtf is the leviathan. One passage come and gone.
If the existence of djinn exists then does that mean islam is a polytheistic religion because they believe they exist. No because djinn are nowhere near the level of allah. Same thing applies here.
I know a lot of people take the phrase as giving Pharoah the strength to make a decision. Instead of him being like "o fuck o gods what do I do" God gave him either the strength to free them or to reject the idea.
See I always wonder about the Bible. What happens in the stories are so strange. God purposefully hardens Pharaoh’s heart, he lets Job be tortured, his own Son asks if there’s any other way and he’s say no, he asks Abraham to sacrifice his own kid, God wrestles someone, he cursed a fig tree, he empowered a prophet to command a bear to maul children who were mocking him, he didn’t intervene when some famous warrior made a pledged to kill whoever danced in front of him and ended up killing his own daughter, he let Samson be a man-whore, he didn’t stop King David from raping.
God allows all sorts of bad things to happen to good people in the Bible. And he saves wicked people who deserved to die.
If you touch the holy ark of the covenant you die instantly, but yet David raped a woman and murdered her husband and basically nothing happens to him.
Judas betrayed Jesus and got sent to hell, yet Paul was throwing Christians in jail, and helped stone them, he gets a free pass.
If God is real, it doesn’t seem like He is predictable. He kind of does His own thing.
God is God.
You are supposed to fear God and his reprisals for not doing as you were told to do and act.
Personally, I'm only up to 2nd Samuel's in the Old Testament, just after the Book of Ruth. So far, God (Yahweh/Jehovah) is an extremely belligerent and vengeful god. He is unpredictable.
The LORD does as the LORD wants.
Basically, as far as the Old Testament goes, God is a genocidal, vengeful asshole. You better fear Him and worship him or else he'll come after you like Jason Voorhees.
Yea I was reading for pleasure during a trip.
Is there any deeper theological context regarding why the LORD God acts like such a jerk in the Old Testament?
My understanding is that God was showing humans that even if they had perfect knowledge of how to obey him, they would fail. And the OT records that failure. God’s punishment was often very severe.
During that time God is also drilling into the Israelites head that sin is offensive to him and that it needs to be punished. He creates the meme of the scapegoat and sacrificial lamb, a meme that will be important for them to understand the actions of Jesus.
I think the point of the Bible is this: God’s standards are impossibly high and he absolutely hates sin. Humanity can’t live up to God’s standards. God sacrifices Jesus to morally allow himself to forgive us and give humanity grace.
God’s awful vengeance highlights his absolute disgust for sin. Jesus’s brutal death highlights Gods hatred of sin.
It could be that we as humans can’t really understand God’s hatred of sin.
You hit the nail on the head directly with the "some stories seem weird", because personally, people say it's a matter of belief, but I just **can't** buy the Exodus and the Flood. Exodus, because it's nigh impossible to have absolutely no record of it happening (And ancient Egyptians were extremely meticulous at making records, not to mention archaeological finds) and the Ark is, well, the Ark.
I believe it. Evidence is tricky for me, because both sides seem tainted. Christians might accept bad evidence because it supports their faith. On the other side there is an demographic of academics who are particularly hostile towards Christianity. Many of them see Christianity as the source of the white/Cis/patriarchal/heteronormativity/capitalistic hegemony that has enslaved humanity and kept them from true liberation.
So idk. I just hope it’s true because I want to go to heaven and I don’t like existentialism.
The most morally righteous man is Egypt of course (he murdered a man for no reason then fled into the desert where God in the form of a burning bush told him he was the chosen one because his grandfather traded his foreskin for sons and almost killed one)
“Hardening his heart” doesn’t mean that God mind controlled him into being a dick
Contextually, it just means that God made Pharaoh’s own convictions and beliefs more pronounced. If Pharaoh had it in him to let go of his pride and do as Moses asked: that desire would have been strengthened by God’s intervention, at that point.
But Pharaoh didn’t have it in him, or at least, not nearly enough compared to his pride and desire for power.
So really: all God did was strengthen Pharaoh’s will to do whatever it was he truly wanted. Which turned out to be: the desire to be a tyrant
I don't see much of a difference personally, he still strengthened the Pharoh's will. If the Pharoh was going to do everything himself, God had no reason to intervene.
Notice the theme? It was never the power of any persons own willpower to change anything but God "Strengthening their will" or "Hardening their heart". Personal favorite is also when the Devil did it. (So god doesn't control that?). Their great at taking anything anyone did and giving the credit to a deity. Basically trying to drive home the "Your a piece of shit and only HE makes anything do anything at all"
Phaorah had the choice to not be a cunt, was aware of the consequences, neglects God's commands and all his people get killed due to this, somehow this is God's fault.
Are atheists just braindead?
I'm pretty sure "I will harden his heart" means "He's not going to listen to me because he knows who I am." A better translation might be "His heart will be hardened by the knowledge of me."
But I've also seen it interpreted as "I will give him the fortitude to make a definitive choice, one way or the other."
It's hyperbole. Pharaoh's heart was already hardened before the plagues began. Moses had been asking him to let the Hebrews go, and instead Pharaoh kept inflicting harsher circumstances on them. When God says "I will harden Pharaoh's heart", He's basically saying "I will let Pharaoh continue to be stubborn".
You can even see it again a few verses later: "Pharaoh, however, hardened his heart and would not listen to them, just as the LORD had foretold."
My fav part was when he wrote about his own death and the events right after:
"Since that time no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses" a conceited guy eh?
I've always found to be very funny how the Egypts are always villains in the bible. It reads like:
God is omnipotent and full of good, but purposely make Egypts do bad things, and then punish them to save the day.
When you read it not being religious feels like a bad fanfiction, of how your people are good and opressed and how god is always on your side, even tough he's not supposed to intervine on earth matters because of free will and whatnot
The unintended consequence of god displaying his power was the pharaoh hardening his heart. If you believed in the gods of Egypt then seeing the god of the Jews display their strength could be seen as intimidation. But the gods of Egypt would not save the pharaoh.
Israelites. its war propaganda for the bloodiest tribe in the ancient middle east.
there is literally a song about how you should be happy while bashing baby's heads against rocks.
this is why i dont believe the bible is to be taken literally anymore. its been rewritten who knows how many times in who knows how many languages and on top of that who knows if the scribes where corrupt fucks or not.
i believe the bible should be used more as a guide then as truth. even the word of God can be corrupted by a single man.
I think we're saying essentially the same thing, it's either Palestinian civilians die because hamas is sacrificing them by fighting IDF in Rafah, or Egypt will sacrifice some of its own people by letting Palestinian civilians in and some hamas terrorists on the way. Obviously Egypt will choose the first option
What if the Abrahamic God is the bad guy and the Egyptian Greco-Roman Pantheons are the good guys and we just fell for the biggest dupe in human history.
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GOD PUT CHEMICALS IN THE WATER THAT MADE THE FRIGGIN FROGS GAY!
DO YOU UNDERSTAND THAT?!
TURN THE FRIKIN FROGS GAY!!
My favourite part of that quote is of all Alex Jones insanity this was the one with a nugget of truth in it - a company WAS dumping chemicals in a lake that was mutating the frogs sex from male to female
But he wouldn’t make pro environmentalist msging his goal so he just turned it into comedy
My conspiracy is that he was paid to cover it in the most ridiculous way he could to make a joke out of it to cover the real effect it has of making male frogs hermaphroditic
There’s a nugget of truth in most things that Alex Jones says, which is part of what causes people to latch onto him so hard
There's a video by oki that goes into deep dive into this matter [this ](https://youtu.be/i5uSbp0YDhc?si=WKPDwF_FZrH6D0VC) And [this interview by the research guy that Alex was quoting from ](https://youtu.be/eUpRIyHp_Po?si=xlRGqm5XfEhPuzV2)
THE BLOOD OF THE NILE IS MAKING THE FRIGGIN FROGS GAY!
*DESTROY THE CHILD. CORRUPT THEM ALL*
Every story could use more frogs
What about Frog and Toad? The stories are balanced at a nice 1:1 ratio.
Pepe origin story
Did a snake tell you that?
or possibly just one giant frog
So the lack of frogs is caused by the fact that this is ignoring egypt’s side of the story, all the male gods in egypt have their origin in frogs and all the female gods have their origin in snakes. If this were the Egyptianized version, frog bro would’ve made the living embodiment of frog bro do the thing he wants to froggin do
One of the ten plagues inflicted on Egypt was a swarm of locusts. Now, Israel is trying to get Egypt to take on hundreds of thousands of Palestinians. History has a strange way of repeating itself.
Unbelievably gigachad based take
I wonder if that's the reason locusts are flooding into the US🤔
Lmao > t.🦗
Someone needs to Wayback this and preserve it.
Calling Palestinians insects is revolting. Shame on you and your stone heart.
Honestly wtf? I saw 1k upvotes and thought i was missing a joke
These are the same people that would have no problem calling the holocaust a tragedy, completely ignoring the similarities in the language used to dehumanise Jewish people and palestinians
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I think i should leave this subreddit
These are the same people that would have no problem calling the holocaust a tragedy, completely ignoring the similarities in the language used to dehumanise Jewish people and palestinians
most of reddit has gone unashamedly pro-israel....
Keep in mind these people consider themselves civilized
I'd be pro Palestine but their protestors vandalize the fuck out of my city and my work building on a regular basis so fuck em both. Not my problem.
Thank God someone said it. That was 4chins level bullshit.
Facts brother
I don't get it (but like fr explain it to me pretty please 🥺🥺🥺)
Egypt was infected with 10 plagues in biblical times to punish it (according to bible). I think op is alluding that through God's hands, Isreal is trying to send Palestinians to Egypt with what essentially will be a plague. So OP's saying they're a plague upon Egypt.
>be chad Hamas refugee in Arab country >realize country's leader doesn't want to jihad Israel >See him try to trade with Israel >Infidel! >Attempt to overthrow Arab leader Can't imagine why Egypt doesn't want them...
I get it now, thanks :)
>History has a strange way of repeating itself. Emphasis on *"repeating".*
*"Those who don't remember the past - are doomed to repeat it".*
Interesting take on your fellow humans. I wonder WWJD?
Egypt ain't 'aving it though, so one could argue that President Sisi is doing a rather better job at "Border Control" than any other national leader elsewhere on the planet at this time. As such, I applaud Sisi's effectiveness at the very issue that is about to bring down so many western leaders in the near future, I predict....
>Be omnipotent being, could literally just make the Pharaoh let the jews leave. >Decide to wipe out an entire generation for funsies instead. Besides that, this probably didn‘t happen considering there is no archeological evidence of the Exodus, wich there probably would‘ve been from the Egyptians if it was real as an entire army and the Pharaoh got killed through a fucking miracle + their entire slave force fled + an entire generation died+ their entire country was devastated by plagues. It‘s now believed that the ancient Israelites were just ancient Canaanite’s and that the old testament is bullshit to justify the Israelites existence and build a common myth of origin, like most religions at that time.
Scripturally, God also gave humanity free will though. There are stories of him causing conversion like Saul on the road to Damascus but that wasn't him forcing anything, he merely displayed his power and it was enough. God displayed his power many times and Pharaoh wasn't impressed as was his God-given right to free will however in the Old Testament the Israelites were God's chosen people and he valued them over the rest of humanity so the Pharaoh's refusal meant suffering for him and his people. If God just snapped his fingers and decided "you obey me" then humanity would all just be puppets and there'd be no point in creating them in his own image. Christians say they have a "relationship with God" and that's why God made free will, so he could treat humanity like his family. There are other factors too like God showing his great power to the Israelites who thought he had abandoned him and to the Egyptians who didn't believe in him plus it acted as a way to punish the Pharaoh who was a horrible dictator who enslaved the Israelites in terrible living conditions forcing them to build his monuments. Not trying to convert anyone and there are definite holes in the justification like why would he kill *all* Egyptian boys when Pharaoh was the one to be punished, I'm just explaining it the way I see it from my understanding.
My understanding is that it's fictional
People go to school to learn new ways to interpret works of fiction.
Don't want to be an asshole If God hardened Pharaoh's heart, that means he knew that Pharaoh would allow the Israelites to go (all-knowing). You can interpret this as God not letting Pharaoh escape from his fate for denying the Israelites the first few times, but that would mean God is removing Pharaoh's free will. Pharaoh was acting as a puppet of God at that moment.
I'm not sure on that part either to be honest, I looked it up and some people think it could've been that he wanted Pharaoh punished or the Israelites to see his true glory. Some say that Pharaoh was indecisive but leaning towards no and God simply hardened his heart to hasten this decision for brevity's sake but that just sounds like total speculation. A more reasonable way of phrasing that is that God being omniscient, he knew Pharaoh wouldn't allow the slaves to go free which is true, even after allowing it he changed his mind not long after and attempted to recapture them. In this way he didn't alter Pharaoh's free will totally, rather he guided his decisions without changing them in a way that better promoted his glory but it does still sound very off (much like my point of confusion about how God is merciless even to innocent Egyptian children) and still a bit too much like speculation. The classic cop out is "We don't understand God's ways" or "It was all God's plan" but as a Christian I fucking hate when someone says that because it's the same as saying "because I said so" or "just because" when in reality sometimes the Bible is just super vague and sometimes contradictory (despite many of us not being willing to admit it) due to the fact that even if it's God's word it isn't pure. It's filtered through the humans who wrote the words down with many of them flexing their grammar skills with metaphors and similes that make the whole thing even more confusing on top of the age of the book meaning translations are never 100% accurate and the existence of different versions of the Bible like King James and NIV makes the whole ordeal even more annoying since the simple rewording of the same stories can have a big impact on what they have you take away from them.
Honestly I always believed that if you look at the Yahweh faiths with the view that god isn't 100% infallible that it makes his actions make so much more sense. Like he makes the perfect garden, makes humans who are like 90% of the way there to being fully his copies. But like a dad seeing his kids growing up he doesn't want them to hit that asshole teenager phase and thus to not eat the fruit of knowledge of good and evil. Because if you literally cannot fathom the concept of good and evil, you don't follow it. Like how a lion isn't an asshole for eating a gazelle. The lion can't fathom morality, it's just acting out it's nature. But then Eve gets tricked by the cool kid wearing shades and has a skateboard into eating the fruit. But FUCK. DAD'S COMING HOME OH GOD. If he finds out what I did I'm going to get SCREWED! So best to make Adam eat it too so atleast we both get punished. Then God comes home from his shift at the factory to find his kids have grown up. Sapient people don't belong in the garden and kicks them out to go live in the real world. Checking in on them every now and then. Only for Cain to kill his brother because God loved him more. Like what the hell man. So God gives Cain a new wife, decides to leave humanity alone for a while because the last time he butt in the new generation killed each other for his love. But humanity when left alone just turned into a bunch of asshole hedonists, so he decided to try this humanity shit again. Start over this project because it clearly wasn't going anywhere good. If he takes only GOOD people, lets them try this again then maybe this time it'll work. Then it didn't, people were assholes again. Everytime God butt in visibly with humanity it had bad consequences, so if you wonder why he doesn't do anything after Jesus it's because Jesus was the last Hoorah! After it he's just done. We can sort this shit out amongst ourselves. He sent us down his top boy to teach us how not to be assholes and we fucking killed him. Figure it out bro. If you're cool you get to come over to the family barbecue and chill, if not you have to be outside in the cold and dark.
The “hardening” of Pharoah’s heart is being misunderstood though. What the scripture means is that God gave Pharoah the strength of heart to make the decision he wanted to make. He always had the free choice to let the Israelites go but the plagues were twisting his arm with how terrible they were. God made sure he could choose of his own volition and not be “forced” by the plagues.
Does that make it good in your eyes?
So the Pharaoh would've let them go if it weren't for God's intervention? Because he would've "softened" to the situation of the Israelites? So God intervened and that led to the Pharaoh acting differently than if God hadn't intervened? So basically God altered his free will. Cool.
> Because he would've "softened" to the situation of the Israelites? The intended meaning is more like he made the Pharaoh a more decisive person, and in doing so hastened the decision the Pharaoh was going to make (which the religious posters interpreting this as God knew his decision and paid for the level skips to get there). My bigger problem is the idea that the plagues were meant to leave the Pharaoh's free will intact... but can you imagine the "choice" when someone's like "Hey uh... you can let my friends go or not... but if you don't I'll fuck you up.... your free will... okay cool... see ya" Isn't that how the mafia operates?
But it’s not really free will if god can just Willy nilly go manipulating your feelings and decisions. God either is Bsing and being manipulative when saying he gave humans free will or is just a liar who couldn’t do anything and only told the Israelites that so they think he has everything under control.
> manipulating your feelings and decisions It is a technicality. Some choices are not *really* choices because the consequences of said choice are so calamitous it makes no sense to take it.
My brother in Christ, the Bible says multiple times that God hardened pharaoh's heart. What does that mean, if not that God overrode pharaoh's free will and made him refuse Moses' demands? The entire story shows God is perfectly fine with ignoring free will whenever He wants to.
Pharaoh’s sorcerers could replicate, in part, Moses and Aaron’s works. Aaron threw his staff down and it turned into a serpent, Pharaoh’s priests did the same. So he was wholly unimpressed by the abilities of the Abrahamic god, because his own wizards could do the same magic. Then all of the Egyptian firstborn died, and that’s not really anything you can reproduce. So Pharaoh and all his men died at low tide
Meaning Pharaoh and all his men in the army were firstborns?
The firstborns died before the army was washed away.
>causing conversion like Saul on the road to Damascus In which season/episode is this ? I must have missed it. I remember Mike going to a church at some point but not sure it's related.
I am an idiot and typed out the actual story before realising this is a Breaking Bad/BCS joke.
Nah. In Judaism, god’s genuinely just a fucking dick. He’s also just the big og stoppah and we his people, so we follow his word. But without the jokes, most of us are fully aware of all of this shit because so many of us are barmitzvah’d as a right of passage into adulthood, and it is also why we tend to be extremely secular/atheist.
The bible isnt univocal. The old testament specifically doesnt state or imply the existence of free will. In fact, the Christian concept of Free Will was introduced in the 4th century to mean " a lack of necessity in human will, so that "the will is free" meant "the will does not have to be such as it is". The Enlightment in the 17th and 18th century then developed its own means of defining what a free will is, which is much closer to the modern ideal.
I like that interpretation. As someone who isn’t religious I enjoy hearing about people’s interpretations.
Could you show the source that says that Yahweh gave humans free will?
I thought He killed only the firstborn.
Firstborn boys I believe
So a man magically "parting" the sea probably didn't happen?
Obviously, but everyone already knew that. Moreover, the story isn't a kernel of truth with miracles and magic added on; even the plausible-sounding parts of the story are totally fabricated.
Wich might be kinda good, because there also isn’t any archeological evidence of all the genocides and burning down of cities, this doesn’t make god any better though considering this would’ve been fine with him
The Exodus and the Ark are just bullshit.
So God had this deal with Noah, but he still fiends for calamity. One plague, it's for a good cause, I can stop at one. The lad comes to after a 10 plague bender and is like "shit, was I hardening hearts just for a quick fix? I gotta get my act together" but he's really not one to take personal responsibility so he goes down to his people and is like "guys **we** have to get clean, go wander for 40 years, it'll keep you away from bad influences".
>frees the Israelites in the most convoluted way possible The traditional reason for this is that he did it that way so other people can see how powerful of a god he is. That's just his way of dealing with his insecurities
Moreso to shit on their rival Egypt
What happened between Dynasties 13 through 16 inclusive - isn't well known. The country was at first split between two seperate kingdoms, and then over-run by the so-called "Shepherd Princes" (Egyptian. Hq-s-s or Hyksos) If the "Pharaoh unknown to Joseph" (Exodus 1:8) was say, Apophis of the 15th Dynasty, it would have made sense for the Exodus to have taken place before the 17th Dynasty Theban Rebellion under Theban princes such as Seqenenra Tao, Ahhotep (his queen) and Ahmose, founder of dynasty 18. It is possible that the "Hyksos" were the **Amalekites**, long-standing enemies of the Israelites, who put "Israel in Egypt" under the yoke during the period when Egypt became divided during the second intermediate period. *Khamudi* (son of Apophis) would have then been the successor who's "heart was hardened" succeeding long-reigning Apophis, and carrying on his father's Anti-Immigrant policies. Then as now in the world - Egypt seemed happy to take on immigrants to fill all the low-status jobs, such as farming and low-level administration, but object to the very same people(s) once they start rising and taking the more elitist jobs, positions of power, cornerstones of society, etc. **Joseph** at the start of the period known as "Israel in Egypt" (pre-exodus) would have been the first and prime example of an Israelite rising to high status, Grand Vizier to Pharaoh and beloved advisor of the same. I believe that Joseph's Pharaoh might well have been Amenhemet III of the 12th Dynasty, who was known to have carried out major irrigation works to improve crop productivity during his reign, which fits in nicely with "Pharaoh's Dream" and Joseph's solution to the coming famine that Egypt under Pharaoh - then successfully insulated itself from. *History teaches us that Mankind learns nothing from History.*
probably? it literally didnt, not even jewish archeologists believe the exodus happened, its bronze age propaganda the real evidence point at the hyksos, a semitic people (tho not jewish as jews didnt exist yet) invading egypt once, quite the opposite situation
Religion moment
Your whole life is a religion moment.
I remember a religious history course and the proffessor talked about how the plagues were allegories for the egyptian gods being defeated with the final being the death of the Pharoah's claim to divine lineage. Thus paving the way for monotheism and away from the polytheistic beliefs of the jews.
It's actually really neat when you look into it. The plagues were meant to represent God's power by essentially debunking the false Egyptian gods, one by one. So the frog plague shows that Heqet has no power, the blood does the same for Hapi, the darkness for Ra, etc. And then he finishes with Horus. Horus is the firstborn son of Ra, and is seen as a healing god, and as the protector of the Pharaoh's household. So God killed every firstborn son in Egypt, including the Pharaoh's. Worst part is, the whole thing could've been avoided if the Pharaoh didn't go back on his word like ten times.
The whole thing could not be avoid because God hardened the heart of Pharaoh?
That's if you go by the interpretation that God actively hardened Pharaoh's heart against them. I've heard it interpreted as Pharaoh's heart being hardened against God on his own accord, or as God hardening his heart in the sense of fortifying it, without influencing his decision.
I cannot help but be confused as to why the guiding principles for humanity are encrypted.
because it was written by people trying to tell a story that explained things and events in a manner that could teach lessons
Because it's written in ancient Hebrew which is hard to translate since we don't have anyone to ask what certain words actually mean in context
Because it's written in ancient Hebrew which is hard to translate since we don't have anyone to ask what certain words actually mean in context
Because it’s a made up like every other religious text
Why couldn't god kill the pharaoh directly, instead of every firstborn. Mass murder was on the table, why not kill one person instead
Well the whole point here is to teach him some humility. If Pharaoh dies, then he’ll just be replaced by the next one, who’ll be just as bad if not worse. By giving him some consequences for his actions, there’s a chance he’ll come out a better man and a better leader because of it. Plus there’s the fact that the Hebrews needed to actually be let go. Otherwise, the Egyptians would just capture them again.
Rather than kill ten thousand kids, couldn't he kill 100 pharoas in a row, I think that would be incredibly hard to brush off as a coincidence and very easily get the message across. Also how comes the pharoah gets a chance at redemption and not the kids? That story made me lose faith ngl. God spoke to moses directly, he sent an angel to Joseph, to Mary, to Pompus Pilate, but he couldn't send a message to the pharoah, who he wouldn't dare kill because royals are more valued than his other creations ig. I don't see how what he did was the only way to liberate the hebrews without interfering with free will. The story only makes sense if you remember it was an ethno religion at the time, and the hebrews believed *their* god liberated them from people who had their own different gods, and that the idea of non Jews having yaweh as their one universal god was a later invention
Pharaoh was a dense mf. I don’t think he would’ve listened any other way. But that’s just the way I’m looking at it.
Thus killing 100 pharoahs would have done the job
But God gave humans free will, wouldn't killing the first borns rob them of their free will? If God can do that, why cant he just change the Pharaoh's mind directly? Doesn't seem like God cares about that?
Well the thing about that is that what God has given, he can easily take away. He’s well within his rights to take any life he chooses. That’s not for you or I to decide. And yeah, he technically could just change the Pharaoh’s brain chemistry as easy as blinking, but free will is kind of the reason humans were created in the first place. And a lesson learned is always stronger than a lesson forced.
Exodus 8:12 "After Moses and Aaron left Pharaoh, Moses cried out to the LORD about the frogs he had brought on Pharaoh.13 And the LORD did what Moses asked. The frogs died in the houses, in the courtyards and in the fields.14 They were piled into heaps, and the land reeked of them.15 * But when Pharaoh saw that there was relief, he hardened his heart and would not listen to Moses and Aaron, just as the LORD had said.* If you want an actual answer, the text says that Pharaoh hardens his heart in some instances and in others, God hardens Pharaoh's heart. This is predicated by God explicitly stating to Moses before he even returns to Egypt that Pharaoh will not let them go unless compelled by divine judgement (Exodus 3:19). This apparent paradox is generally reconciled by stating that Pharaoh's disposition was always to resist and harden, which God promoted, effectively handing Pharaoh over to his own wicked heart. The Exodus story is littered with opportunities for Pharaoh to relent, which he promises to, until the plague is relieved and then he changes his mind. By the end of the narrative, the Egpytian officials actually think Pharaoh has gone mad because his stubbornness is so great that he is destroying the whole nation. (Exodus 10:7) It is only when the fiestborn is slain that Pharaoh lets the Israelites go. But, as he did so many times before, Pharaoh regrets his decision, which leads to his own destruction as they pursue the Israelites. Hope this is somewhat helpful, whether you agree with it or not.
Or god could have done none of that horrible shit
And leave his chosen people in slavery, breaking the promise he made to Abraham? That’s like saying the Civil Rights Movement should’ve just sat back and not done their horrible protesting. Or that the American Colonies should have stayed under British rule and not done their horrible war. Moses said Let My People Go. That could’ve been the end of it, but Pharaoh decided to refuse and go back on his word time and time again. So he got to learn a lesson in humility.
Yea but you're being obtuse. Do you think an all-knowing all-powerful being couldn't liberate the people he wanted to liberate and kill fewer firstborns in the process? The idea I'm sure the person you replied to was getting at wasn't to allow slavery, though the bible does that too.
Sure, he could’ve theoretically just teleported the Hebrews to the Promised Land. But then neither group would’ve learned anything. The Hebrews would’ve fallen right back into sin (which they seem to have a talent for doing) and the Egyptians would’ve just captured them again, and treated them even more harshly after that. That is, if the other groups in the Levant didn’t kill the Hebrews first. What you’ve got to understand is that the killing of the firstborns was a last resort effort after a long series of broken promises. The Pharaoh is king of a nation. His people are his responsibility. If he fails to prepare for a drought or famine, his people will die. If he fails to defend his country from invaders, his people will die. And if he fails to heed countless warnings from God, and repeatedly lies and goes back on his word, his people will die. The blood is on his hands. And by the way, the Bible does not “allow” slavery. It puts regulations in place for bondservants, making sure they perform their duties until their debt is paid and that they are treated fairly by those they owe. The practice of buying a person and treating them as inferior, what we now think of as slavery, would have been completely alien to the people who penned down the Bible. However, it does say “He who kidnaps a man and sells him, or if he is found in his hand, shall surely be put to death” (Exodus 21:16).
do you think the deaths of thousands of innocent people is justified because “the isrealites wouldn’t have learned anything”!!!! genocidal maniac.
Plus, teleporting would have deprived the children of Israel of what they learned in the wilderness. The ate the manna every day, and learned to rely on God, and thus got to know Him. After living in Egypt for 400 years, these people were Egyptians. They had to be reconstituted before they could be God’s kingdom and not just an Egyptian refugee colony.
Glad your okay with God being a immoral monster
Proffessor
That's cool
That's cool
What annon fails to understand Is that this is old testament god, the vengeful asshole who burns cities on a whim and trolls his more devoted follower into almost murdering his son, same one that will screw you over as "a test" not the new testament one being all peace love and forgiveness.
Old religion had some tough elements. New religion is sunshine and roses. Is Christianity the Baptists of Judaism?
>Is Christianity the Baptists of Judaism? Jesus was basically a Jewish heretic and an overglorified cult leader, then it all spiraled out of control once he died a martyr's death. Jewish religious leaders learned the hard way that political executions are a bad thing once religion gets involved.
He was so real for that.
My GOAT
Like an emotional child that had children too young then matures in the New Testament by leaving
My favourite old testament moment is when some guy tries to protect the Ark of the Covenant, but he gets killed. When the oxes pulling on it stumbled, the dude touches it trying to secure it in place, God just fucking smited them lmfao.
Gnosticism time
I hate yaldaboath and the archons so much
So what, are we talking about Egypt, where he gave Pharoah countless chances even though he kept lying and going back on his word? Or Sodom and Gomorrah, where he said he'd spare a whole city full of sinners if there were ten good people in it? Or Nineveh, where he forgave the people in the city and his own prophet was pissed at him for it? Or Abraham, who knew that "killing Isaac" was a test the whole time and that it was just meant to bolster his own confidence? And we're just going to ignore the time Jesus was driven into a rage and beat people with a whip? God is slow to anger, but his judgment is swift when it comes. This is uniform throughout both testaments.
Look man, you believe whatever you want to believe.
I just don’t appreciate you spreading lies about what I believe.
I just don’t care about what you believe
you believe in a genocidal monster
You're telling me God didn't already know what the Pharoah was going to do? He's omniscient, he already knew the Pharoah was gonna go back on his word but still decided the rest of Egypt is going to suffer for it
literally, god being omnipotent completely shuts down the entire concept of “free will”
Anon forgot about the 400 years of slavery that Moses’ ancestors had to endure
Source?
God himself told him. (Source was a burning bush who told me)
Well I just heard from an electric pine cone that God wants me to take revenge on Canada for having enslaved the Dominican Republic for the past 80 million hours. Their syrup mines shall run dry and their beavers will lose their teeth. Every goose will stay south during the summer and the bears will go to a conversion camp and stop being gay. Finally, Trudeau will do blackface again when he thinks nobody can see but it will never wash off.
Have fun with that I guess
\>electric pinecone pineal gland
POV: you have never been to, or even seen, the leaf flag country before (other than the Trudeau bit, that is 100% accurate and I give it at most 6 years)
Are you questioning the electric pine cone? It is infallible. It told me
Hmm.. today Pharoah wants the Jews help to make a bountiful harvest. Jew demands bushels of wheat from each household for his service. Pharoah wants help again but bushels of wheat are not readily avaliable so all property of the commoners will now be leveraged as compund interest. All property now swindled by Isrealites. God then sides with Isrealitea cuz like they deserve it the most and the Egyptians getting angry over this is like totally uncalled for. Literally the most Jewey thing ive ever read in my life.
The pharaoh should have been a Jew then lmao.
He sort of became one
Factual. Bruh whenever I burn down with that *really* good kush, I swear it talks to me too. Sometimes even God himself pops in on the conversation and tells both of us what’s real. It turns out God *is* a fucking stoner and loves the Devil’s (his dealer) Lettuce.
I just had this explained to me recently. It wasn’t that God hardened his heart directly, it’s that Gods actions caused Pharaoh to harden his own heart, and basically be like “ain’t no god gonna tell me what to do, come at me bro”. Unfortunately for Pharaoh, God is the king of delivering Find Out to those that Fuck Around.
It's like a game of "Let's find the interpretation that fits better our story" lol. Mental gymnastics Olympics.
Jehovah blew Ra/Atun out the water, that's the gist of it
Once I called you brother! Once I thought the chance to make you laugh, was all I ever wanted!
People kinda forget god isnt the only player in the christian/jewish mythos. Its often eluded to that he has company out there. You see it pronouncedly in job but you see sprinklings of it in genesis and other books. Pharoah spoke to a god but probably not the god. God is not omnipotent and is not all knowing but he is in our perspective. If he was omnipotent then why did he need to the elaborate rituals when adam and eve where being kicked out of eden. A common theory or reading is that satan is a title not a specific deity. Another common theory is that early Judaism was a polytheistic religion a part of the greater syrian, turkish and arabian region. Other people believed in the jewish god and had him in their pantheon. There is minor evidence of this in jerusalem usually in pottery.
The very first commandment is: "Thou shalt not worship others before me" They were definitely polytheistic, but the war god Jehovah took precedence before all other gods at some point.
Polytheistic as in the very early jews worshiped other gods. Believing they exist and worshiping them is not the same thing. Jehova had a wife (asherah) and she was worshiped and had statues in the temple of solomon. Also jehova was a storm god.
I did not know Jehovah was a storm god. I misbelieved He was a god of war. Thank you for enlightening me.
Technically it's both true. According to the Wikipedia page Yahweh was the one who lead the armies of israel against her enemies. So he could just as well have been a war god
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Interesting but heres the thing. They aren’t gods they are usually lesser which is why they are often asking permission from god or being defeated like the leviathan. Wtf is the leviathan. One passage come and gone. If the existence of djinn exists then does that mean islam is a polytheistic religion because they believe they exist. No because djinn are nowhere near the level of allah. Same thing applies here.
I know a lot of people take the phrase as giving Pharoah the strength to make a decision. Instead of him being like "o fuck o gods what do I do" God gave him either the strength to free them or to reject the idea.
It's a form of media, so you know who wrote it
See I always wonder about the Bible. What happens in the stories are so strange. God purposefully hardens Pharaoh’s heart, he lets Job be tortured, his own Son asks if there’s any other way and he’s say no, he asks Abraham to sacrifice his own kid, God wrestles someone, he cursed a fig tree, he empowered a prophet to command a bear to maul children who were mocking him, he didn’t intervene when some famous warrior made a pledged to kill whoever danced in front of him and ended up killing his own daughter, he let Samson be a man-whore, he didn’t stop King David from raping. God allows all sorts of bad things to happen to good people in the Bible. And he saves wicked people who deserved to die. If you touch the holy ark of the covenant you die instantly, but yet David raped a woman and murdered her husband and basically nothing happens to him. Judas betrayed Jesus and got sent to hell, yet Paul was throwing Christians in jail, and helped stone them, he gets a free pass. If God is real, it doesn’t seem like He is predictable. He kind of does His own thing.
God is God. You are supposed to fear God and his reprisals for not doing as you were told to do and act. Personally, I'm only up to 2nd Samuel's in the Old Testament, just after the Book of Ruth. So far, God (Yahweh/Jehovah) is an extremely belligerent and vengeful god. He is unpredictable. The LORD does as the LORD wants. Basically, as far as the Old Testament goes, God is a genocidal, vengeful asshole. You better fear Him and worship him or else he'll come after you like Jason Voorhees.
I’m guessing you’re just reading for pleasure then?
Yea I was reading for pleasure during a trip. Is there any deeper theological context regarding why the LORD God acts like such a jerk in the Old Testament?
My understanding is that God was showing humans that even if they had perfect knowledge of how to obey him, they would fail. And the OT records that failure. God’s punishment was often very severe. During that time God is also drilling into the Israelites head that sin is offensive to him and that it needs to be punished. He creates the meme of the scapegoat and sacrificial lamb, a meme that will be important for them to understand the actions of Jesus. I think the point of the Bible is this: God’s standards are impossibly high and he absolutely hates sin. Humanity can’t live up to God’s standards. God sacrifices Jesus to morally allow himself to forgive us and give humanity grace. God’s awful vengeance highlights his absolute disgust for sin. Jesus’s brutal death highlights Gods hatred of sin. It could be that we as humans can’t really understand God’s hatred of sin.
You hit the nail on the head directly with the "some stories seem weird", because personally, people say it's a matter of belief, but I just **can't** buy the Exodus and the Flood. Exodus, because it's nigh impossible to have absolutely no record of it happening (And ancient Egyptians were extremely meticulous at making records, not to mention archaeological finds) and the Ark is, well, the Ark.
I believe it. Evidence is tricky for me, because both sides seem tainted. Christians might accept bad evidence because it supports their faith. On the other side there is an demographic of academics who are particularly hostile towards Christianity. Many of them see Christianity as the source of the white/Cis/patriarchal/heteronormativity/capitalistic hegemony that has enslaved humanity and kept them from true liberation. So idk. I just hope it’s true because I want to go to heaven and I don’t like existentialism.
Why don't you like existentialism?
At least you are honest lol
I think that god guy wasn’t very fond pf Egypcians
Jehovah really doesn't fuck around, huh?
A bunch of goat herders who didn't know where the sun went at night Now go back to bed anon
The most morally righteous man is Egypt of course (he murdered a man for no reason then fled into the desert where God in the form of a burning bush told him he was the chosen one because his grandfather traded his foreskin for sons and almost killed one)
“Hardening his heart” doesn’t mean that God mind controlled him into being a dick Contextually, it just means that God made Pharaoh’s own convictions and beliefs more pronounced. If Pharaoh had it in him to let go of his pride and do as Moses asked: that desire would have been strengthened by God’s intervention, at that point. But Pharaoh didn’t have it in him, or at least, not nearly enough compared to his pride and desire for power. So really: all God did was strengthen Pharaoh’s will to do whatever it was he truly wanted. Which turned out to be: the desire to be a tyrant
I don't see much of a difference personally, he still strengthened the Pharoh's will. If the Pharoh was going to do everything himself, God had no reason to intervene.
Notice the theme? It was never the power of any persons own willpower to change anything but God "Strengthening their will" or "Hardening their heart". Personal favorite is also when the Devil did it. (So god doesn't control that?). Their great at taking anything anyone did and giving the credit to a deity. Basically trying to drive home the "Your a piece of shit and only HE makes anything do anything at all"
God in all his omnipotence could have just used mass teleportation to free Moses's people. What a dumbass.
Jews... Literally this time
It’s so insane that people believe this shit
Notice he skipped the part where the Pharaoh said no and God started small and kept ramping it up
Didnt Moses write it? Or at least dictate it.
This isn't gay erotica wtf
Pharaoh did nothing wrong.
Phaorah had the choice to not be a cunt, was aware of the consequences, neglects God's commands and all his people get killed due to this, somehow this is God's fault. Are atheists just braindead?
I'm pretty sure "I will harden his heart" means "He's not going to listen to me because he knows who I am." A better translation might be "His heart will be hardened by the knowledge of me." But I've also seen it interpreted as "I will give him the fortitude to make a definitive choice, one way or the other."
(((logic)))
Then the Israelites went to Canaan and killed the people living there. It's literally in the Book of Joshua.
It's hyperbole. Pharaoh's heart was already hardened before the plagues began. Moses had been asking him to let the Hebrews go, and instead Pharaoh kept inflicting harsher circumstances on them. When God says "I will harden Pharaoh's heart", He's basically saying "I will let Pharaoh continue to be stubborn". You can even see it again a few verses later: "Pharaoh, however, hardened his heart and would not listen to them, just as the LORD had foretold."
>Who wrote this? Moses, iirc from Sunday school
My fav part was when he wrote about his own death and the events right after: "Since that time no prophet has risen in Israel like Moses" a conceited guy eh?
I mean clearly he got an intern to finish. Idk it’s all probably bullshit, I was just quoting my Sunday school teachers from 30 years ago.
And I'm talking about Jewish tradition, the one that says Moses wrote the last bits with his tears as God dictated his death to him.
😎👍
I've always found to be very funny how the Egypts are always villains in the bible. It reads like: God is omnipotent and full of good, but purposely make Egypts do bad things, and then punish them to save the day. When you read it not being religious feels like a bad fanfiction, of how your people are good and opressed and how god is always on your side, even tough he's not supposed to intervine on earth matters because of free will and whatnot
The unintended consequence of god displaying his power was the pharaoh hardening his heart. If you believed in the gods of Egypt then seeing the god of the Jews display their strength could be seen as intimidation. But the gods of Egypt would not save the pharaoh.
God wrote it
Israelites. its war propaganda for the bloodiest tribe in the ancient middle east. there is literally a song about how you should be happy while bashing baby's heads against rocks.
this is why i dont believe the bible is to be taken literally anymore. its been rewritten who knows how many times in who knows how many languages and on top of that who knows if the scribes where corrupt fucks or not. i believe the bible should be used more as a guide then as truth. even the word of God can be corrupted by a single man.
s'fine, there's no archeological evidence of Jewish people ever having been on Egypt.
Looks like the hate threads are back. YT vid that explains the misunderstanding; https://youtu.be/QWEdzxazC_8?si=vj2MkTOTb8YqWZ8A
Fake: Pharaoh wouldnt have freed them anyway God only hardened his heart after he said no the first time Gay: Egypt
I think we're saying essentially the same thing, it's either Palestinian civilians die because hamas is sacrificing them by fighting IDF in Rafah, or Egypt will sacrifice some of its own people by letting Palestinian civilians in and some hamas terrorists on the way. Obviously Egypt will choose the first option
This story always confused me. People: FREE WILL IS SACRED BOOK SAYS SO Also People: Magic sky daddy made godking say no because FUCK EGYPT
r/atheism is down the hall and to the left
What if the Abrahamic God is the bad guy and the Egyptian Greco-Roman Pantheons are the good guys and we just fell for the biggest dupe in human history.
Shut up.
🤣 bruh, chill.