The Christian faith Is founded on two basic beliefs. The first is that an almighty god does indeed exist; that he must be obeyed and worshipped before he will bestow his favours upon his supplicants. This notion immediately assumes that there is some reward which is unattainable without submitting to this supposed almighty God.

The second basic belief is that the spirit of mankind lives on after death, that there is another rewarding life beyond the grave. A subordinate assumption follows that the chosen Christian faith is a path to heaven and a blissful hereafter.

These two basic notions stand together. If either God or life after death is not true- the whole structure of Christianity must collapse. Yet there is absolutely no scientific proof that either assumption is true. But it is true in the minds of very many people.

This is scary stuff These two beliefs have been accepted as fact by hundreds of millions of people for thousands of years. If it is true, we should give it serious attention, if it is not true, society has been totally fooled and we should give that serious attention. Information supporting the Christian faith was and is derived from the Bible. So let us look rationally at its message to see if the Bible is a reliable foundation for these beliefs.

The Bible is divided into two parts, the Old and the New Testaments, The Old Testament is ancient Hebrew sacred texts written before Christ. Careful study would indicate that the New Testament was written by second or third generation Christians somewhere between 50 and 100 AD.

THE OLD TESTAMENT

The god, Yahweh, became the special deity of the Hebrew people. Deut.7:12-16, tells us of his promises to the Hebrew people, "The Lord thy God shall keep unto thee the covenant and the mercy which he swore unto thy fathers; and he will love thee and bless thee.,.. Thou shall he blessed above all people; there shall not be male or female barren among you or among your cattle and the Lord will take away from thee all sickness". No barren people or cattle and no sickness!!! The above has the ring of political promises with no possibility of fulfillment.

The Old Testament constantly refers to the gods of other nations and warns its people of punishments should they be led away from worshipping Yahweh. Each surrounding nation had its special god. There was Ashtoreth, goddess of Zidonia- Chemosh, god of Moab; Molech. god of Ammon: Baal-Zebub, god of Ekron; the gods of Egypt, and many other gods. All these nations. including the Hebrew, used the idea of a special god to unite their people. The more fierce the god, the better the response. It was a matter of power The Hebrew god Yahweh, was called the god of gods (Josh,22:22). he was said to be mighty and terrible regarding not persons, (Deut. 10:17), jealous, (Deut. 6:14-15). angry and cursing, (Deut. 29:27, Mal, 2:2) he loved vengeance (Deut. 32:35), and to oppress (Hosea 12:7), Is this the Christian god who is said to be loving and just, or another god? One wonders in what way Yahweh offered different promises or better protection than Ashtoreth, Molech or Baal.

Yahweh was said to be so powerful that he caused "the shadow to return backwards ten degrees". This means that the earth not only had to stop rotating: it had to reverse direction! Absurd of course, but the Hebrews did not know that the earth was forty thousand kilometres in circumference and rotated at about 1,600 kilometres per hour. How long do you think it would take for the earth to slow down and then reverse- a month; six months? Then where would the energy come from to start it all up again and what about the moon, would it also slow down? But what was the purpose of this grand display of their god's power? It was solely that Hezekiah could he assured that his boil would be healed!! That is right, look it up for yourself in 2 Kings 20:9-11.

The love of god in the Old Testament is solely directed to the Hebrew nation and Its people. There are many requests in its pages for help from god and praise to god, but I could not find one statement of god's love for other nations, even with the aid of my very good concordance.

Yahweh seemed to have no concern or kindly interest in any nation except the Hebrews. An example can be found in 1 Samuel 152-3. "Thus saith the lord of hosts. 1 remember that which Amalek did to Israel, how he laid wait for him in the way, when he came up out of Egypt. Now go and smile Amalek and utterly destroy all that they have and spare them not. but slav both man and woman and infant and suckling, oxen, sheep- camel and ass". You may think that this could be fair revenue, but was it ? The above punishment was for resisting the passage of many thousands of Israelites passing through their land four hundred years previously! The god of the Old Testament was very partisan to Israel in his justice and demands. His protection and favours were solely directed to benefiting the Hebrew nation.

I here are many stories in the Old Testament where the Hebrew people were instructed by their god to make war on their neighbours in a ruthless and vicious manner. They were positively encouraged to take virgins as spoils of war! (Numbers 31:9-35. Deut. 20:14, Deut. 2.1:10-11, Isa. 13:16),

These days, one hears reference to the value of the Hebrew ten commandments. They are often regarded as a standard of moral law. In fact, most are religious laws such as observing the Sabbath day and not bowing down to idols. There are only four commandments which could be called punishable moral laws. They are. Thou shalt not kill; Thou shall not commit adultery; Thou shall not steal; Thou shall not steal; Though shalt not commit false witness. Of course they are good laws, although limited. Yet each of these four commandments had god's instruction or approval for being broken. Here is just one text for each, among several references. Josh- 10.10. 2 Sam. 12.11, Ex. 3,22, I Kings 22:22-23,

The Old Testament gives many contradictory statements about the attributes of god. The research for the following paragraph was done by W.P.Bell, and G.W.Foote and others.

See "The Bible Handbook",

God is not the author of evil, Deut.32:4. Ps. 19:7-8,

God is the author of evil. Isa.45:7, Jer.l8:l lEzek.20:25

God is unchangeable, Num.23:19 Ezek,24:14, Mal.3:6,

God is changeable, Ex,33:3,14, 1 Sam. 2:30, 2 King. 20:1-6. Jona.3:10.

God cannot lie. Num. 23:19, Prov. 12:22.

God sends lying spirits, 1 King.22;23, Jer. 4:10, Deut, 2:30, Ezek.l4:9.

God sees and knows all, Job.34:21-22, Ps,139:7-12, 15:3.

God does NOT see or know all, Gen. 3:9, 11:5, 18:21,

God is found by those who seek him, Prov, 8:17.

God is NOT found by those who seek him. Prov.l:28, Ps 18 41

God is just, Gen. 18:25, Deut, 10:18, Ezek. 18:25.

God is NOT just. Ex. 20:5, Deut, 14:21, 2 Sam. 24:17.

God is impartial. Gen. 18:25, Deut, 10:18-19.

God is NOT impartial. Gen, 4:4-5, Mal. 1:2-3.

God never repents, Num.23:19, 1 Sam,15:29, Mal 3:6,

God often repents, Gen.6:6,Deut.32;36, 1 Sam.l5:35.

God will keep his anger forever, Jer. 17:4,

God will NOT keep his anger forever, Jer. 3:12.

God is just and merciful, Ps.ch.l36, Job 4:17, Zeph.3:5.

God is unjust and cruel. Judg. 18:7-10, Num. ch. 31, Deut.2:30-36, 3:6, 7:1-6, 20:16, Josh. 10:28-43, ch. 12

The above references are but a small sample of the very many contradictions found in the Old Testament. There are literally hundreds of irreconcilable statements relating to genealogies, to historical events, unfulfilled promises, statements of law, scientific impossibilities and absurdities. Yet Christians proclaim the same god as their god who is further revealed in the New Testament. To understand the callous times in which the Old "testament was set and how they feared other religions, read Num. 25:1-9

The Old Testament has one very important advantage over the New Testament in that punishment for disobedience ends at the grave. Eternal punishment is a New Testament notion not an Old Testament one. The word hell appears thirty one times in the King James translation of the English Old Testament. The Hebrew word is ‘sheol’ meaning the unseen state. Not once does the text infer punishment after death. Eccles. 3:19-20 tells us "That which befalleth the sons of men, befalleth beasts, even one thing befalleth them: as one dieth so dieth the other. Yea they all have one breath; so that a man hath no pre-eminence above the beast,... All go into one place.... and all turn to dust again Who knoweth the spirit of man goeth upward and the spirit of the beast goeth downward?" (Obviously no one can know.)