# Answering an Atheists Challenge



## sean (May 24, 2007)

In a lengthy debate with an atheist (actually a zen buddhist), I was presented with the following arguments. I've talked with him about many subjects of theology, and he seems quite knowledgeable. I've just exhausted my course and don't want to answer him with anything less than Biblical truth and intelligent insight. So, I was just wondering how any of you would respond to the following (i apologize for the length):

On the subject of Adam and Eve's "marriage" (he claims that adam and eve were not married in the modern sense of the term because no official ceremony was performed and thus uses the example against Biblical support for marriage):
"the very WORD wife means a help-mate. Yahweh created the other animals and brought them before ha-adam AS MATES also but he did not choose any of them so Yahweh had to make a woman as his help-mate. tell me: are two wolves who mate and stay together automatically considered married? of course not. then why are you trying to sneak a ceremony into Genesis? you are trying to shoehorn a later doctrine -- marriage -- into Genesis! God made the male hyena for the female hyena but that does not make them married."

On the subject of the celibacy of those who choose not to get married (he asserts that he has no desire to wed and denies that fornication is wrong):
"so Yahweh PREFERS we suffer? this also puts the cart before the theological horse. you are saying, "if you cannot [control sexual urges], get yourself a wife so you can [copulate]." is that not a bit backwards? why would Yahweh put sex hormones -- the self-same hormones that causes EVERY OTHER animal in our family to mate -- if He would PREFER that we do not?"
*Edited at my discretion 

On the subject of the Law being given to make guilty mankind:
"you cannot pretend that what goes for "god" now is what they thought way back then. in fact, the further back we go in any religion, the more anthropomorphic the gods are. Yahweh (actually, El) was more like a super-human in their imaginations than the 21st-century Christian flavour of god. look: there are two options. either He MADE the law up or He is merely a sounding board to tell us what these ultimate unchanging laws are. there can be no third option. the first means that God is arbitrarily deciding right and wrong -- SELF-righteous. the second means that God is not the highest authority and that this "ultimate unchanging morality" transcends even Him.
this is what puts theism and morality between the rock and the hard place."

On the subject of Old Testament concubines: 
"as an aside, how many concubines did the righteous Solomon have and at what point was that "not cool" with Yahweh?"

On the subject of the Song of Solomon:
"the Song of Solomon is perceived by Christian scholars as a relationship between the church and Christ. period. there is nothing to do with monogamy among men and women in there."
*Of course I agree with this, but I also believe that it applies to the husband/wife relationship.

On the subject of God raising up and calling to Himself sinful men such as Lot, David and Solomon for His own Glory:
"uh, [let's just say, "Lotting"] your daughters for the GLORY of GOD!? that is PRETTY gross, d00d. playing patty-cake with a few HUNDRED random women for the GLORY of GOD?! i think not. these people got some pretty peculiar rewards in their lives. between Solomon getting a few hundred and Lot [ahem...] his daughters, i cannot possibly imagine how this sits well with you. if God said, "glorify me by [you can guess] your two daughters, " would that make it right? then why was Solomon praised by later prophets? why was Lot considered the ONLY noble moral man in Sodom and Gomorrah? why did David get such a lavish kingdom for conquering -- MURDERING -- these people? sorry, Charlie, but that does not make "common sense" to call these people sinners when Yahweh provided the very PROVIDENCE by which they succeeded in doing whatever it was they did!"
*Again, edited.

On the subject of sin being inherent in human nature:
"then point out in the brain where "sin" is so that we can remove it. if "sin" is a biological part of our make-up, then you can find it using even the simplest fMRI. help mankind out and tell us where it is! but no. it is not there, is it? we find nothing but NATURAL causes and effects in our brains. i wish it were not so, but your hypothesis is nothing more than wishful thinking on your part.

there are NO varying degrees of evil -- sin -- in His [God's] eyes."

I appreciate any insight you may have.


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## RamistThomist (May 24, 2007)

sean said:


> In a lengthy debate with an atheist (actually a zen buddhist), I was presented with the following arguments. I've talked with him about many subjects of theology, and he seems quite knowledgeable. I've just exhausted my course and don't want to answer him with anything less than Biblical truth and intelligent insight. So, I was just wondering how any of you would respond to the following (i apologize for the length):
> 
> On the subject of Adam and Eve's "marriage" (he claims that adam and eve were not married in the modern sense of the term because no official ceremony was performed and thus uses the example against Biblical support for marriage):
> "the very WORD wife means a help-mate. Yahweh created the other animals and brought them before ha-adam AS MATES also but he did not choose any of them so Yahweh had to make a woman as his help-mate. tell me: are two wolves who mate and stay together automatically considered married? of course not. then why are you trying to sneak a ceremony into Genesis? you are trying to shoehorn a later doctrine -- marriage -- into Genesis! God made the male hyena for the female hyena but that does not make them married."



Hyenas and wolves are not created in the image of God, were not given the cultural mandate, were not assigned to be priests and kings and stewards of God's creation, ec.



> On the subject of the celibacy of those who choose not to get married (he asserts that he has no desire to wed and denies that fornication is wrong):
> "so Yahweh PREFERS we suffer? this also puts the cart before the theological horse. you are saying, "if you cannot [control sexual urges], get yourself a wife so you can [copulate]." is that not a bit backwards? why would Yahweh put sex hormones -- the self-same hormones that causes EVERY OTHER animal in our family to mate -- if He would PREFER that we do not?"
> *Edited at my discretion



The celibate person probably isn't suffering. 

This looks more like "he doesn't really like God's law." Ok, if it is a matter of likes and dislikes, so what? He needs to show that it is *wrong* of God to do so, but that implies an absolute moral standard whereby to make assignations of right and wrong. 



> either He MADE the law up or He is merely a sounding board to tell us what these ultimate unchanging laws are. there can be no third option. the first means that God is arbitrarily deciding right and wrong -- SELF-righteous. the second means that God is not the highest authority and that this "ultimate unchanging morality" transcends even Him.
> this is what puts theism and morality between the rock and the hard place."



Cf. the responses to Euthyphro's dilemma. God's law is a reflection of his holy character. He "answers" to his holy character. There is a third option for precisely this reason. 



> On the subject of Old Testament concubines:
> "as an aside, how many concubines did the righteous Solomon have and at what point was that "not cool" with Yahweh?"



It stopped being "cool" with Yahweh after wife number 1. Just because God didn't condemn it (actually, he implicitly did) doesn't make it right--he is using a form of the argument from silence fallacy.



> On the subject of the Song of Solomon:
> "the Song of Solomon is perceived by Christian scholars as a relationship between the church and Christ. period. there is nothing to do with monogamy among men and women in there."
> *Of course I agree with this, but I also believe that it applies to the husband/wife relationship.



I deny that it has anything to do with the Church and I don't see how a sensible reading of it challenges monogamy.



> On the subject of God raising up and calling to Himself sinful men such as Lot, David and Solomon for His own Glory:
> "uh, [let's just say, "Lotting"] your daughters for the GLORY of GOD!? that is PRETTY gross, d00d. playing patty-cake with a few HUNDRED random women for the GLORY of GOD?! i think not. these people got some pretty peculiar rewards in their lives. between Solomon getting a few hundred and Lot [ahem...] his daughters, i cannot possibly imagine how this sits well with you. if God said, "glorify me by [you can guess] your two daughters, " would that make it right? then why was Solomon praised by later prophets? why was Lot considered the ONLY noble moral man in Sodom and Gomorrah? why did David get such a lavish kingdom for conquering -- MURDERING -- these people? sorry, Charlie, but that does not make "common sense" to call these people sinners when Yahweh provided the very PROVIDENCE by which they succeeded in doing whatever it was they did!"
> *Again, edited.



He keeps saying stuff like this is *wrong* or *bad*, but what justifies him saying something is wrong or bad apart from an absolute moral standard. And even if he does posit an absolute moral standard, what justifies him positing an absolute moral standard apart from an absolute personal God who has revealed himself?



> On the subject of sin being inherent in human nature:
> "then point out in the brain where "sin" is so that we can remove it. if "sin" is a biological part of our make-up, then you can find it using even the simplest fMRI. help mankind out and tell us where it is! but no. it is not there, is it? we find nothing but NATURAL causes and effects in our brains. i wish it were not so, but your hypothesis is nothing more than wishful thinking on your part.
> 
> there are NO varying degrees of evil -- sin -- in His [God's] eyes."



I will let more capable men than I address this question, suffice to say that no theologian says that sin is in the *brain* (call him on that point. Ask for sources). We do say it is in the heart (and we are speaking metaphorically). And then call him on the distinction between brain and mind.


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## panta dokimazete (May 24, 2007)

I'll give a shot to a couple - I am not trying to be exhaustive by any stretch, just giving you a entry point.



> On the subject of Adam and Eve's "marriage" (he claims that adam and eve were not married in the modern sense of the term because no official ceremony was performed and thus uses the example against Biblical support for marriage):
> "the very WORD wife means a help-mate. Yahweh created the other animals and brought them before ha-adam AS MATES also but he did not choose any of them so Yahweh had to make a woman as his help-mate. tell me: are two wolves who mate and stay together automatically considered married? of course not. then why are you trying to sneak a ceremony into Genesis? you are trying to shoehorn a later doctrine -- marriage -- into Genesis! God made the male hyena for the female hyena but that does not make them married."



GOD instituted marriage (see Gen 2) and officiated over the first marriage ceremony.

22 Then the LORD God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man, and he brought her to the man.

23 The man said,
"This is now bone of my bones
and flesh of my flesh;
she shall be called 'woman, '
for she was taken out of man."

24 For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.


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## Dagmire (May 24, 2007)

sean said:


> "you cannot pretend that what goes for "god" now is what they thought way back then. in fact, the further back we go in any religion, the more anthropomorphic the gods are. Yahweh (actually, El) was more like a super-human in their imaginations than the 21st-century Christian flavour of god.




Where is he getting that?


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## panta dokimazete (May 24, 2007)

Dagmire said:


> Where is he getting that?



Good point - it is important to make him back up his assertions with facts.


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## larryjf (May 24, 2007)

> On the subject of sin being inherent in human nature:
> "then point out in the brain where "sin" is so that we can remove it. if "sin" is a biological part of our make-up, then you can find it using even the simplest fMRI. help mankind out and tell us where it is! but no. it is not there, is it? we find nothing but NATURAL causes and effects in our brains. i wish it were not so, but your hypothesis is nothing more than wishful thinking on your part.


I may be way off here, so please correct me if i am...

You can not point to the object of sin any more than you can point to the object of human nature. Sin is a corruption of human nature and is in every cell of mankind. It is not confined to our vision, yet it is found there as we lust after others. It is not confined to our mouth, yet it is found there as we curse others. 

This is why we consider mankind to be "total depraved." Not in the sense of being as bad as we can be, but in the sense of being depraved in our entirety.


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## sean (May 24, 2007)

Dagmire said:


> Where is he getting that?



I don't know - I haven't asked him. I'll be sure to do that in my reply. I really appreciate all of you who have responded so far...


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## larryjf (May 24, 2007)

> On the subject of Adam and Eve's "marriage" (he claims that adam and eve were not married in the modern sense of the term because no official ceremony was performed and thus uses the example against Biblical support for marriage):



Our Lord attributes marriage to Adam and Eve...

[bible]Mat 19:3-9[/bible]

And He is an excellent expositor of Scripture


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## panta dokimazete (May 24, 2007)

> What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.



Remember GOD institutes and joins.


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## Dagmire (May 24, 2007)

> On the subject of the Law being given to make guilty mankind:
> "you cannot pretend that what goes for "god" now is what they thought way back then. in fact, the further back we go in any religion, the more anthropomorphic the gods are. Yahweh (actually, El) was more like a super-human in their imaginations than the 21st-century Christian flavour of god. look: there are two options. either He MADE the law up or He is merely a sounding board to tell us what these ultimate unchanging laws are. there can be no third option. the first means that God is arbitrarily deciding right and wrong -- SELF-righteous. the second means that God is not the highest authority and that this "ultimate unchanging morality" transcends even Him.
> this is what puts theism and morality between the rock and the hard place."




That isn't a sound argument at all. He's looking at it all backward. He, as a _created_ being, is looking at the _Creator_. God says "This is the way things are" and he's going to turn to God and say "No, that isn't the way things are"? Nothing God does is arbitrary, because he's God. Everything we know is relative to God.

We are temporary; God is eternal.

We are wicked; God is good.

We are limited; God is infinite.

We are arrogant; God is humble.


Morality is _defined_ by God, not decided by him. It cannot be arbitrary, because it is based directly off of the only thing that existed before creation. 



What he said about sin doesn't make any sense, either. For one thing, he's vastly overestimated our knowledge of the brain and our ability to identify its parts and functions. But he also doesn't seem to know what sin is. It's not like a tumor. It's behavioral. It starts in our most inward parts, the hidden parts that we can't even recognize. It starts in our motivations and in our desires. It is then manifested in our actions. Sin is missing the mark set by a holy God. The mark that is defined by his very being.



This guy sounds really arrogant and obnoxious. God resists the proud. Go find a humbler man and tell him the good news.


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## Dagmire (May 25, 2007)

sean said:


> On the subject of God raising up and calling to Himself sinful men such as Lot, David and Solomon for His own Glory:
> "uh, [let's just say, "Lotting"] your daughters for the GLORY of GOD!? that is PRETTY gross, d00d. playing patty-cake with a few HUNDRED random women for the GLORY of GOD?! i think not. these people got some pretty peculiar rewards in their lives. between Solomon getting a few hundred and Lot [ahem...] his daughters, i cannot possibly imagine how this sits well with you. if God said, "glorify me by [you can guess] your two daughters, " would that make it right? then why was Solomon praised by later prophets? why was Lot considered the ONLY noble moral man in Sodom and Gomorrah? why did David get such a lavish kingdom for conquering -- MURDERING -- these people? sorry, Charlie, but that does not make "common sense" to call these people sinners when Yahweh provided the very PROVIDENCE by which they succeeded in doing whatever it was they did!"
> *Again, edited.





No man has ever been found righteous by the law. What this guy is not understanding is that these men had _faith_ and that was accounted to them for righteousness. It is written that there is none righteous, not even one. It is a mistake to look at the deeds of those men and suppose them to be good. But the Lord is _merciful_. If He did not delay his judgment and show mercy to many, then we would all be dead from the start. Those men did not gain the Lord's favor with their works, it was freely given them. That's why it is called grace, it is an undeserved gift.


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## Jane (May 31, 2007)

*Answering an Atheist's Challenge*

Sean, let me try to address some of the atheist's issues. I think the issue of the marriage of Adam and Eve has been covered by other people.

As far as his contention that animals that mate for life are married, this is an attempt to put mankind on the level of animals thanks to a belief in evolution. The account in Genesis does not talk about God appearing to the animals and uniting them in marriage. God's relationship with mankind is unique in that it is a covental relationship. If animals are united in marriage, why is it only some species while other species are not monogamous? This is a losing argument. It makes no sense in the long run.

As far as your friend's contention that celibacy is painful, it is not. As far as why God would put sex hormones in people, the answer is so that they can develop adult male or female bodies capable of producing children and having mature sex characteristic. How many men want to walk around with a squeaky high voice and no muscle mass? God expects people to be able to control their sexual desires. It may be a challenge, but He gives us the grace to flee temptation. Of course, we live in such a sex-saturated society that the idea of not committing fornication on a regular basis is ridiculed and seen as down-right abnormal. 

As far as your friend's contention that you cannot detect sin on an fMRI, sin is spiritual. Of course it is not detectable. What is detectable are the effects of sin as outlined in Galatians 5:19-21 and other places in the Bible. This is a false argument. Would a psychiatrist ever do a fMRI to look for the hatred a patient has for his father/mother/sister/brother? No--because he doesn't consider hatred to be something tangible that will show up on a test. It is an emotion; but it is real and causes problems in that patient's life. 

As far as God being more anthropomorphic the further back in time we go, idolatry is one of the chief sins of man. Man has always wanted to worship a god that he is comfortable with--one that is like himself and that he controls. The thing he doesn't want is a pure, holy, just, righteous God who dwells outside of time and space, who made the world out of nothing, and who will judge the world in righteousness by His Son Jesus Christ. As John Calvin said, "Man's heart is an idol factory." This is nothing new. Whenever man chooses what characteristics of God he will accept, he has made an idol. 

I hope this helps you deal with this guy. I find that you have to refute their charges and recognize that their assertions are generally without foundation.


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