badgerx16

Belief does not require empirical evidence. Proof destroys belief.

Schrodinger's Hypochondriac.

Where might that have been ? Antarctica is the only area of land without any permanent residents. Anywhere other than Palestine would have been unacceptable, as the entire Jewish faith is based around Jerusalem. As for an 'indigenous population', there has been a Jewish presence in that area ever since since Judaism came into existence.

If you had been tasked in the early 20th century with deciding where a potential Jewish state should be created, where would you choose ? This was an obvious and easy choice, as set out in the Balfour Declaration in 1917; "His Majesty's government view with favour the establishment in Palestine of a national home for the Jewish people, and will use their best endeavours to facilitate the achievement of this object, it being clearly understood that nothing shall be done which may prejudice the civil and religious rights of existing non-Jewish communities in Palestine, or the rights and political status enjoyed by Jews in any other country. " ( Not sure if this can be extrapolated from any part of Ezekiel's prophesies ).

"Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of a spiritless situation. It is the opium of the people." Karl Marx - Critique of Hegel's Philosophy of Right

Hedging their bets.

There is no connection between the prophesies of Ezekiel and the post WW2 history of the Middle East. Perhaps you could answer this, who are the true 'People of God', Christians who follow the teachings of His son, or Jews, who rejected and condemned him ?

Nor do you, if you were being honest. ;=)

Your Nostradamus act isn't convincing.

That explains why GAZPROM, you know - that giant Russian petrochemical company, is one of the major partners developing the Leviathan gas field.

Earth was designed by Deep Thought to determine the ultimate question to Life, the Universe, and Everything.

How is making someone blind or otherwise disabled the act of a God who is fair and grants us free will ? Unless, like Glen Hoddle, you believe they are being punished for transgressions in an earlier incarnation ?

Where is the evidence that the Bible is, in fact, His word ?

I used to tell the junior IT Techies at work that the Architect in The Matrix was based on me.

"....... Of course you are my bright little star, I've miles And miles Of files Pretty files of your forefather's fruit And now to suit our Great computer, You're magnetic ink" ( In the Beginning - The Moody Blues )

There are estimated to be 2 trillion galaxies in the observable universe. There are between 200 billion and 400 billion stars in our galaxy alone, and it is estimated that there may be 100 billion planets. If Man is so important to God, that's an awful lot of wasted effort.

The whole Jesus story was a set up, ( as if Judas had a choice ), and if you are God, you can do what you want. It's 'Do as I say" not 'Do as I do'. Most religious texts are a control mechanism.

King Henry VII's mother was 13, and a widow after the death of her second husband, when he was born. Placing current day social and moral values on events several hundreds, if not thousands, of years in the past is moot.

Up to 2013 the age of consent in the Vatican City was 12, in is still 14 for girls who are married.

It is, but probably has no real connection to the life of Jesus.

Turks, Christmas Day was set by the early Catholic Church to effectively overwrite the pagan festival celebrating the Solstice. They made the decision to name it as Jesus' birth date as it falls conveniently close to a point 9 months after the suggested date of his death, and there is an ancient historical tradition of matching the birth and death dates of religious prophets. So, to give ML:G a Get Out of Jail Free card, he could quite legitimately say that he was taking part in a pagan tradition. Also, if you follow one of the Russian Eastern Orthodox faiths, Christmas Day falls on Jan 7th, as they use the Julian calendar. And curiously, in England and Wales, Christmas Day did not become a Bank Holiday until 1971. Before then it was counted as a Public Holiday through tradition, without being enshrined in Law.

Because their contracts of employment state that they can take the day off. There is no legal right to not working on Christmas day.

They could always remove the concept of offside from the rulebook. Why not just rely on the position of the players' feet, as they do in rugby and the NFL to determine if a ball has gone out of play. Far easier to judge and accept.

It is highly unlikely that December 25th is actually the date of Jesus's birth, it is, however, the date of a pagan festival that the early Christian church wanted to subvert. Similarly, Easter is a floating date, and therefore not directly related to the last week of Jesus' life. Rather it again borrows a pagan concept related to phases of the moon, another festival the early church wanted to take control of.

MOTD is going to have a field day tonight.