Reasons for believing in the bible?

Well, I am not sure if this is in the right forum, mods please move if need be. Also, this has nothing to do with the supposed Rapture

But any ways, I know most people here are free thinkers. I am too, I wouldn't want it any other way But there is something that disturbs me, and worries me more and more each day..

I can't figure out why people believe in the Bible. Please, don't take this as any sort of jab towards Christians, I was one for most my life. But I can't figure out why people are so certain that this religion is true. I just can't personally believe in something that has been manufactured by the Elite.

I just can't be sure with all the corruption in this world. All the lies, the bad people that think money will buy their way into Heaven..

But why do people state with such certainty that the religion is true? I know there have been prophecies that have been fulfilled, but are they just vague general prophecies that could be done by anyone? Or are they legitimating signs from God?

I am not trying to start a fight here, just curious for your opinions about religion. I know there have been tons of threads like this before, but I felt that none of them catered to my specific question.

Are people brainwashed?
Are they just going with the flow, believing out of fear?
Do you think religion is just a form of control over the people?

I also feel that Jesus and the Lord will let any good soul into Heaven. I have led a good life, I know the true greed of the world, and I know how things work. Like most on ATS, I am just a curious person that wants to determine things for themselves.

But good enough on the rant, let me know please!

reply to post by WillNiendick


Sounds to me like your asking for answers to questions you already know the answers to.

When I finally studied the Bible completely on my own, I found that I could not accept the New Testament anymore.

But rather than being pitched into angry atheism, I realized that I did have a strong core belief in God. And that all the little nitpicky problems I'd had with God and religion in general fell away once I ditched the New Testament.

So I believe there is one creator God. That Jesus was a Jew whose life was seriously manipulated after his death for political gain, and has been continuously manipulated for the past 2,000 years.

And that God will judge my life based on my actions. I now study the "OT" in its original form for insight into how I should live and conduct myself, with the understanding that it is a collection of oral history, real history, poetry, metaphor, etc., all mixed together. Where you draw the lines in your own mind really doesn't matter. I refuse to argue about whether a particular verse is actual history or what.

The only thing that really matters is how you live your life and how you treat others.

But that is true of all humans regardless of belief.

I think that most humans end up embracing what their families and friends embrace. The human being is a communal beast, and if the community includes a book that everyone believes is divinely inspired, then most people will simply allow that to be the way it is if they want to remain as part of that community.

It's the same as rooting for the same baseball/football team as everyone around them, wearing the same general style of clothes (t-shirt, jeans, sneakers), watching the same TV shows, liking the same kind of music (country-western) and voting the same party ticket. That's the kind of thing that creates a community, and human beings instinctively need a sense of community in their lives.

Yes, there are those who don't, and as people, they're no better or worse than the vast majority who do. Hell, even the non-sheeple come here to be a flock of ATS sheep, so that need for community even reaches the hardest core dissident, and forces him/her to find some level of association with others of his/her kind.

The bible is the foundational center of community for millions of people. It's been that way for a long time, and for most people, it's less about the bible itself than about being one with their community in belief that the bible is accurate and trustworthy. For others it's the Quran, and for others still, it's the Bhagavad Gītā. It's a tangible connection that holds specific communities of people together, and community is a necessary part of being human.

reply to post by WillNiendick


Believing in the Bible. To me this is like saying I believe in Forrest Gump. You don't "believe in" the Bible although many do and there is an entire philosophy and thousands of religions based on it.

You need to understand the Bible. You need to look at what happened, what they say happened and try to guess why it happened the way they say or why it happened differently. You have to decide what was behind the editing and assume what would the Book be like without editing? Would it even be assembled together or would these be tablets and scrolls people took individually and at face value. I can tell you that many of the histories detailed in the Bible actually did happen. You need not believe in a God above the whole thing but to say it never happened is taking the whole atheist - agnostic position a bit too far. Cutting off a whole nose to spite a face.

Ancient astronaut theory sorta made me look at it differently.

And the realization all the holy books everywhere all have the same exact message - treat others the way you want to be treated.

Originally posted by Schkeptick
When I finally studied the Bible completely on my own, I found that I could not accept the New Testament anymore.

But rather than being pitched into angry atheism, I realized that I did have a strong core belief in God. And that all the little nitpicky problems I'd had with God and religion in general fell away once I ditched the New Testament.

So I believe there is one creator God. That Jesus was a Jew whose life was seriously manipulated after his death for political gain, and has been continuously manipulated for the past 2,000 years.

And that God will judge my life based on my actions. I now study the "OT" in its original form for insight into how I should live and conduct myself, with the understanding that it is a collection of oral history, real history, poetry, metaphor, etc., all mixed together. Where you draw the lines in your own mind really doesn't matter. I refuse to argue about whether a particular verse is actual history or what.

The only thing that really matters is how you live your life and how you treat others.

But that is true of all humans regardless of belief.

And I believe just the opposite. You can trash the OT. I only believe the New Covenant.

But this is certainly true and can be found also in between the pages of that Book
...in fact, as the premier directive.

The only thing that really matters is how you live your life and how you treat others.

One reason to believe would be religious experience.

Originally posted by 547000
One reason to believe would be religious experience.

But why would you believe the entire thing? I can see if it were all the same author - but it isn't.
It is pretty trusting to take the entire Book literally as factual because of an "experience." Not to say it doesn't happen all the time. Faith is trust and little more than that. That is the beauty of faith. No evidence.

Thanks for your feedback people, much appreciated.

Someone mentioned the ancient astronaut theory, this is what made me see things differently too. I am not usually one to go and chase after the fountain of youth, but this has some extreme hardcore evidence.

reply to post by WillNiendick


Keep searching for the answers! They are in there and every time an Archeologist digs up something else it shows the Bible was right...

WAIT... It will come to you, good luck!

I think people believe in the Bible because they are always hearing that it's "The Word Of God" from the Church and all of the Church members, and the preacher. Hitler said it best, if you tell a lie to the people enough times, they will believe it. I live in the Bible Belt, and people will approach me holding a Bible and telling me this is the "Word." I ask them, have you read it, researched it, looked up the root words, studied it's history? I have yet to come across anyone who has even read it, and by the way, the Bible is so confusing, it takes an intelligent mind to de-cypher it in the first place. Here is my take, God didn't write a book, and Jesus didn't write the NT. Men wrote both, men with an agenda and a plan of control. And it works great! I have a neighbor lady who swears that the Earth is only 6000 years old, that Dinosaur bones were put there by Satan to foll Christians, and that all ET beings are Satan's Demonic Army.

Originally posted by newcovenant

Originally posted by 547000
One reason to believe would be religious experience.

But why would you believe the entire thing? I can see if it were all the same author - but it isn't.
It is pretty trusting to take the entire Book literally as factual because of an "experience." Not to say it doesn't happen all the time. Faith is trust and little more than that. That is the beauty of faith. No evidence.

If God made you bleed and gave you holes on your palms and gave you the markings of the crown of thorns, then would there be any dispute that you were just making it up or it's mostly subjective? The way I see it, if you ask God, you get what you need to believe. People keep treating religious experiences like they're always open to interpretation but my own experience was quite specific. My experience means nothing to you, so seek your own. But to me it confirmed the truth of the crucifixion and ressurection.It validates the basic truth of the NT and the claims of the OT.

The only thing such a book and belief serves to do is limit the human mind.

A few reasons:

- Voluntary mental retardation,
- An adult's need to believe in a fairy tale,
- Someone who has no life and wants to give it a "purpose",
- Someone who has too much time on their hands (possibly because of the above point) and wants to get up on sunday mornings to go to church,

Should I continue?

Originally posted by Magnum007
A few reasons:

- Voluntary mental retardation,
- An adult's need to believe in a fairy tale,
- Someone who has no life and wants to give it a "purpose",
- Someone who has too much time on their hands (possibly because of the above point) and wants to get up on sunday mornings to go to church,

Should I continue?

reply to post by WillNiendick

I can't figure out why people believe in the Bible

Because in the bible you'll find words written about a man that understood God. He showed the path all men should walk. If you understand that path its very easy to believe his words.

But why do people state with such certainty that the religion is true?

Sheep need a leader...

Are people brainwashed?

Yes....

Are they just going with the flow, believing out of fear?

Yes... following the crowd

Look at a meat factory where they slaughter cows....same idea really

Do you think religion is just a form of control over the people?

Yes...

People don't read the bible they listen to others read it for them.

At its core , the most valuable thing that you need to realize is quite simple. The bible teach s that man is born with a body and a soul , but originally he was designed to be a triune being (body , soul,spirit)
The Spirit is the only part of man that can know God.
The Spirit is part of God himself or that is to say made of God stuff somehow and it surpasses my understanding , but the closest I can come is this : God places a part of himself within you that allows you to know him.
This is the `born again` thing us crazy cristains talk about

The rest of the bible stuff? who knows , I personally believe that the old testaments mostly alien influenced(and the gods of the OT was not God at all) and Jesus came to end it , but that's just my opinion , and not many people would accept this.

Originally posted by 547000
One reason to believe would be religious experience.

One person's religious experience is another person's paranormal experience. That's not evidence of anything but the fact that there's stuff that may or may not exist that you can't explain.

But, I'm sure that your experience came with a DVD tutorial that explained exactly what it meant, and there was also a signed statement of authenticity in the package to ensure that you knew the source of the experience.

It's odd that if someone experiences something that makes them think twice about the claims of traditional religious dogma, then it's Satan coming as "the deceiver" to lead them astray, but if some 4 yr old kid, whose dad is a preacher, comes out of a fever and says that he went to Heaven and hung out with Jesus, then it's true and hard evidence that the bible is 100% true. As if the kid wasn't already programmed to see Jesus and Heaven if his little brain started feeling the slippery slope greasing up on him.

Maybe it's the other way around. Have you ever even considered that maybe the real deception is the bible? I mean, the book contradicts itself over and over again, and then Jesus says right there in its own pages that "By their fruit you shall know them." Any book that has such sketchy fruit shouldn't be trusted as a history book, and a science book, and definitely not treated as holy scripture. Hell, the thing itself instructs you to not believe it, and that's pretty amazing that it (in essence) debunks itself as the word of God with that one statement of its primary character.

reply to post by WillNiendick


I'm surprised nobody has said "faith". That is the answer I've always heard and it never satisfied me. The cherry-picking is what bothers me more than anything. In the same moment, a person will refer to the bible to justify his bigotry yet totally ignore the passages that surround it.

And the bible has very few references to itself. There is no biblical reason to believe that the bible has all the books God intended for people to read or if some of the ones that did make it aren't just somebody's idea of a joke. It's the same blind logic that gave birth to concepts like the holy trinity and the rapture.

I'm a believer but I'm not under any illusion that the western bible is the infallible word of God nor do I think that is a sin to question it. If you keep asking why, why, why, why, they will eventually say "faith".