If he influences later, that means he changed his opinion! As one of the two opinions must be unperfect, god can't be perfect!
Btw god revoked quite much stuff in the new testament, which means that he must have changed his opinion. As god is perfect, and changing his opinion means that he is not perfect, god can't exist. quod erat demonstrandum.
But that's just it. How do you know that God didn't intend to create a changing, evolving universe? The Universe changes and evolves, people change and evolve, so God's law sometimes changes and evolves. Any religious person will agree to this. As a Muslim, I believe the central belief of One God, and following His Commandments never changes. The specific laws might change or evolve, but the belief never changes.
Paul's Christianity however, does present a major change in belief from that of the Old Testament, and even that of Jesus and his desciples. They even argue about it in the Bible, and call each other hypocrites. This is a problem for Christians to resolve.
Getting back to the question at hand, all I'm arguing is that since it remains impossible to prove or disprove the existence of God, it is still a viable explanation for the existence of the universe, the beginning of life, and the mechanism of evolution, and should not be ignored.
OK Smitty, I'll bite. I'm no expert on history or Palestinian/Israeli relations. However I know that creating a refugee situation is no way to solve a refugee situation. That's exactly what happened. Now everyone is surprised that Palestinians want to have their homes back. I'm not saying I agree with everything every Palestinian has done in the past, a lot of their actions have clearly contradicted Islamic teachings, but I do notice that while specific methods of Palestinians are highlighted a lot in the media (i.e. suicide bombings, rocket attacks etc...), some equally horrible things are also done by the Israelis (i.e bulldozing people's homes while they are still inside, shooting at and killing school children, preventing water and medical supplies from reaching whole communities etc...).
As for hating Jews, this is not a teaching of Islam
"They are not all alike. Of the People of the Scripture (i.e. Jews and Christians) there is a staunch community who recite the revelations of Allah in the night season, falling prostrate (before Him). They believe in Allah and the Last Day, and enjoin right conduct and forbid indecency, and vie one with another in good works. They are of the righteous." (Quran 3:113-114)
The Quran recognizes goodness and righteousness wherever it is. This is not an endorsement of every Christian and Jewish practice, many are condemned in the the Quran, like taking Jesus as a god etc...
As for those who would argue that religion is just a means of controlling the masses, actually this is a human practice, not a religious practice. Yes, religions are used to control people, but so are secularist ideas, communist ideas, nationalist ideas etc... Greedy, power hungry people come from every nation, and they will use whatever means they can to gain authority, including religion. But that does not change the teaching of the religion.
"Lo! Allah enjoineth justice and kindness, and giving to kinsfolk, and forbiddeth lewdness and abomination and wickedness. He
exhorteth you in order that ye may take heed." (Quran 16:90)
The people who do injustice will be judged all the more harshly for their manipulation of religious ideas. But still, this does not effect whether belief in a Creator is scientific or not. Hitler used Darwinist ideas to justify the slaughter of millions of Jews. Should we forbid evolution to be taught because of the actions of Hitler? Once again, to restate my point of view, while creationism as taught in the Bible is unscientific, and should be kept in a religious studies or social studies class, the idea of intelligent design is perfectly logical, and presents no threat to science. The real threat to science is the practice of closing the door on ideas, and areas of study, as many evolutionists have tried to do with intelligent design.
