If you call a tail a leg…
June 13th, 2008 by jack
…how many legs does a dog have?
Four. You can call a tail a leg, but that does not make it a leg.
Barack Obama may call himself a Christian, but that does not make him one.
This article by Cal Thomas questions Obama’s belief in the core belief in Christianity:
Mr. Obama can call himself anything he likes, but there is a clear requirement for one to qualify as a Christian and Mr. Obama doesn’t meet that requirement. One cannot deny central tenets of the Christian faith, including the deity and uniqueness of Christ as the sole mediator between God and man and be a Christian. Such people do have a label applied to them in Scripture. They are called “false prophets.”
Be that as it may, what is perhaps more interesting to me is this:
Mr. Obama’s campaign for the conservative Christian vote, which has largely gone to the Republican presidential candidate in recent elections, has been dubbed the “Joshua Generation Project.” Joshua, Moses’ successor, led the Israelites into the Promised Land.
Joshua did more than that. He led, at God’s command, the nearly complete destruction of everything and everyone in the Promised Land. “They devoted the city [Jericho] to the LORD and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it—men and women, young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys.” (Joshua 6:21) “When Israel had finished killing all the men of Ai in the fields and in the desert where they had chased them, and when every one of them had been put to the sword, all the Israelites returned to Ai and killed those who were in it. Twelve thousand men and women fell that day—all the people of Ai. For Joshua did not draw back the hand that held out his javelin until he had destroyed all who lived in Ai.” (Joshua 8:24-26)
Only Gibeon was spared, because the Gibeonite messengers tricked Joshua into a treaty by telling him their city was far away. As for the rest:
28 That day Joshua took Makkedah. He put the city and its king to the sword and totally destroyed everyone in it. He left no survivors. And he did to the king of Makkedah as he had done to the king of Jericho.
29Then Joshua and all Israel with him moved on from Makkedah to Libnah and attacked it. 30 The LORD also gave that city and its king into Israel’s hand. The city and everyone in it Joshua put to the sword. He left no survivors there. And he did to its king as he had done to the king of Jericho.
31Then Joshua and all Israel with him moved on from Libnah to Lachish; he took up positions against it and attacked it. 32The LORD handed Lachish over to Israel, and Joshua took it on the second day. The city and everyone in it he put to the sword, just as he had done to Libnah. 33Meanwhile, Horam king of Gezer had come up to help Lachish, but Joshua defeated him and his army—until no survivors were left.
34Then Joshua and all Israel with him moved on from Lachish to Eglon; they took up positions against it and attacked it. 35They captured it that same day and put it to the sword and totally destroyed everyone in it, just as they had done to Lachish.
36Then Joshua and all Israel with him went up from Eglon to Hebron and attacked it. 37They took the city and put it to the sword, together with its king, its villages and everyone in it. They left no survivors. Just as at Eglon, they totally destroyed it and everyone in it.
38Then Joshua and all Israel with him turned around and attacked Debir. 39They took the city, its king and its villages, and put them to the sword. Everyone in it they totally destroyed. They left no survivors. They did to Debir and its king as they had done to Libnah and its king and to Hebron.
40 So Joshua subdued the whole region, including the hill country, the Negev, the western foothills and the mountain slopes, together with all their kings. He left no survivors. He totally destroyed all who breathed, just as the LORD, the God of Israel, had commanded. 41Joshua subdued them from Kadesh Barnea to Gaza and from the whole region of Goshen to Gibeon. 42 All these kings and their lands Joshua conquered in one campaign, because the LORD, the God of Israel, fought for Israel.
(Joshua 10)
Is this what Obama wants for those who do not follow him?
This entry was posted on Friday, June 13th, 2008 at 12:49 pm and is filed under Campaign 2008, religion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
June 13th, 2008 at 1:02 pm
Yes, Jack, Barack Obama is planning to sack your villages, but it was supposed to be a secret. How did you find out?
June 13th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
Well, it must have been his rejection of “whitey” culture.
June 13th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
CAL THOMAS !!!!!!
Does a “core belief in Christianity” make a person more qualified to be President and Commander in Chief of the United States of America?
Joe, what do YOU think about this?
June 13th, 2008 at 1:51 pm
I cannot think of a single thing that makes Obama qualified to be president.
June 13th, 2008 at 2:19 pm
Does anyone know how Cal Thomas came across this “Joshua Generation Project” name? I trust his accuracy but would like verify.
June 13th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Read the article.
June 13th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
Obama seems to be doing an excellent job of NOT saying “My religion is better than yours, nyahh, nyahh.” If the result is that he ticks off folks like Cal Thomas, who wouldn’t vote for him anyway, so be it.
Better than getting (keeping?) every non-Christian in the world mad at the holier-than-thou U.S.
June 13th, 2008 at 4:39 pm
Jack, I didn’t read the article or even more than a couple sentences of your post but the fact that you would sit there and question someone’s Christianity, Obama’s or anyone else’s, kinda sickens me. It’s sort of one of the worst possible qualities I can think of from “the church” as it is with regard to the congregation. It’s a bit pharisitical, for one, and two, it’s between God and the individual. If He’s given you His book, you know where you are. It’s not for me to say whether you are a christian or not either, that’s between you and God. Whether or not I think you have any qualities at all that resemble Christ, that’s another story, but I have no right to say you’re not a “true” Christian. Besides, when a fellow is not right with Christ it is your job to privately indicate to the person that it is your belief they need to change their ways, then bring another believer if they don’t, etc. etc. ( you know the drill ). The idea that you would sit back in your chair and spew what can only be seen as self-serving idioms as such is revolting. You hypocrite.
June 13th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
“I didn’t read the article or even more than a couple sentences of your post….”
Then you missed the point of my post, Kevin. Nothing new there, I suppose. If you cannot be bothered to read, perhaps you should not bother to comment on what you have not read.
It is unlikely, then, that you will read this comment either, since more than two sentences apparently strains your attention span (no wonder you are a liberal), but I will say this for those with a better reading abilities:
June 13th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Some of the replies to Jack are just plain silly. Any “ism” has some sort of core definition that isn’t up for debate, and if people don’t like that “ism”, they can define their own. Christianity is a belief system with its own core doctrines, like any other “ism”, and it’s no more “judgemental” to call Ron Paul a liar if he were to call himself a “marxist” than it is for Cal Thomas or anyone else to say that Obama’s stated views do not square with core Christian doctrine.
If Obama does believe his stated views are “Christian”, then I’d say he’s confused, and I wish him well. If he knows better, but would rather lie to the public in order to get elected, then he isn’t the first politician to do that.
June 13th, 2008 at 6:05 pm
“Then you missed the point of my post, Kevin.”
No, I don’t think I did. Your insistence that I don’t get it doesn’t change the fact that you are positioning Yourself as the ultimate decider of who is a Christian and who is not.
Enjoy.
June 13th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
Typical evangelical tripe. If you do not agree with my interpretation of what make a Christian a Christian, you can’t be one. There are plenty of Christians who do not believe 100% that Jesus is it for everyone on earth. Many a Jesuit priest understand that God can be found in the Hinu, Muslem and Jewish religions as well. This is like saying that all of Catholics who use birth control and are not really Catholic.
June 13th, 2008 at 10:03 pm
It appears that Cal Thomas made the corolation between Obama and his words not being that of a Christian-not Jack. And if Obama actually stated these misconceptions and representations then I would totally agree that he is no Christian. At least of any known Christian faith I’m aware of. Is this something a Universalist would believe? I don’t know.
When Obama talks, he hears what he says and then he believes it-just because he said it. This is also the same feeling Obamamites get. I know it doesn’t make sense to reality believeing individuals but that isn’t what Obama is about. He is still trying to identify with himself, find his Chi and find a topic that he has ANY knowledge about and understands. Without Heaven or Hell there is no checks and balances. No, Obama is not any kind of Christian I know.
BTW If GOD won’t let me be an angel, I’m going to ask him if I can come back as an AC Cobra!
June 13th, 2008 at 11:25 pm
Kevin,
I got a question for you. If someone claims to be an ‘all American’ long distance runner, but they are morbidly obese and smoke cigarettes, is it not reasonable to question their claim?
Enjoy
June 13th, 2008 at 11:27 pm
1/2, thanks for the ad-hominum attack.
There are certain Christian essentials, which make it different from Mormonism, Islam, Bhuddism, Hinduism, New Age, etc. To say otherwise is to render language meaningless.
It is ok, these days, to say that you are a Unitarian Universalist and a believer in reincarnation, for example, because UU is defined as basically a search for truth, as opposed to Truth itself. You could probably call just about anything, short of human sacrifice, “Unitarian Universalism”, and no one could argue with you.
Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Atheism, and etc. are different. Each has a core set of truths, and inevitably some of those core truths are at odds with those of other faiths. I wouldn’t think of telling a Muslim that someone can be a Muslim who believes that Jesus is the son of God, because I know enough about Islam to know this isn’t so.
Likewise, Christianity has certain essentials. It’s not flavor of the month. To the extent that more than one faith shares a belief or perspective, you may conclude that they all reflect a greater or more profound truth, or that the others reflect elements of the greater or more comprehensive truth found in one of them. The latter seems simpler and therefore more likely to me.
June 14th, 2008 at 4:28 am
>> “Then you missed the point of my post, Kevin.”
> No, I don’t think I did.
Yes, you did. It wasn’t about Obama’s claim to be a Christian at all. That was just the intro. The real point was about the “Joshua Generation Project.”
Too bad you have the attention span of, well, a liberal, and could not read that far.
June 14th, 2008 at 11:03 am
]]That was just the intro. The real point was about the “Joshua Generation Project.”
If it’s really just about something called the “Joshua Generation Project”, then the question of whether he is a Christian or not is just the nitro rather than the intro.
Jacob, you just described me to a “t”.
Seriously though, question the person’s character or resemblance to Christ but we’re none of us in the position to say someone is or is not a Christian. Besides, from the distance of a campaign can anyone really tell? I might just as easily surmise that Bush is no Christian based on the way he’s behaved. I still leave it open that God might know a lot better than me in that regard.
June 14th, 2008 at 11:24 am
“we’re none of us in the position to say someone is or is not a Christian”
If a candidate makes any claim in order to attract voters, it is imcumbent upon those voters to examine that claim.
June 14th, 2008 at 12:54 pm
Kevin,
““we’re none of us in the position to say someone is or is not a Christian””
Sorry pal, I think some guy, you may have heard of him called Jesus of Nazereth? Well HE said
‘Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.’
In short you can judge them by the ACTIONS. The passage ‘judge not lest ye be judged’ revolves around intentions. So please don’t go there.
June 15th, 2008 at 9:26 pm
You get that Kevin. These guys know the hearts of men and THEY have been gifted by God with the ability to judge others. Hey, if you join their particular sect you can do it too. Oh, but don’t cite the sins of them and their sect brothers as reasons they they might not really be 100% Christian either. You see they don’t WANT to sin (its called repenting) so they can act anyway they want as long as they “feel bad” about it later. Convenient, eh?
June 15th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
The Troll shows his astounding ignorance once again.
June 16th, 2008 at 12:08 am
Troll,
Either you willfully misread what I wrote, or you never got passed a 2nd graders reading comprehension level. Pick one.
It this simple boy, you know people by what they do, what they say and who they keep company with.
June 16th, 2008 at 8:21 am
“It this simple boy, you know people by what they do, what they say and who they keep company with.”
Kevin, if you truly aren’t the liberal you say you are not, I would break ties with Troll quick. His friendship and alignment with you doesn’t bode well!
June 16th, 2008 at 3:04 pm
“In short you can judge them by the ACTIONS.”
Yet one’s actions are based on one’s heart and state of mind. You cannot judge one without judging the other - especially if you want to make further judgement on the belief system of the person and/or the ultimate dispensation of the soul involved.
So if you claim the ability to judge another person’s true Christianity, you claim to know his heart - clearly God’s territory not yours, imo.
June 16th, 2008 at 3:10 pm
Nonsense, Troll. If one denies the divinity of Christ and denies that one needs Christ to be saved, then he is not a Christian, no matter what he claims.
June 17th, 2008 at 9:47 am
Yack,
Who said anything about denying the divinity of Christ? Not I and as I stated there are many, many Christians who do have the hubris you and your ilk have to conclude that only Christians can find God.
This article is really a great piece of…um…work. Some quotes:
“Evangelicals and serious Catholics might ask if this is so…”
Serious Catholics? Are YOU serious? And what about the rest of Christianity or are they not REALLY Christians?
Two paragraphs later it morphs to:
“Again, that is contrary to what evangelicals and most Catholics believe.”
Now its MOST Catholics not just the serious ones - again the rest of Christianity is excluded from such generalizations.
But HERE is the real crux of the issue and what the oped man has a reall problem with regarding Obama:
“I don’t presume to have knowledge of what happens after I die.”
Presumption is the real issue. Obama refuses to PRESUME therefore according to the many in the evangelical sect (who do presume about many things) he is not a TRUE Christian. I am sure Obama would never PRESUME to know if, say, Ted Haggard is really a Christian. He would say that Ted’s faith is between him and God and not up to the judgement of men. He would be right, imo.
June 17th, 2008 at 11:10 am
Troll,
““I don’t presume to have knowledge of what happens after I die.”
Presumption is the real issue. Obama refuses to PRESUME therefore according to the many in the evangelical sect (who do presume about many things) he is not a TRUE Christian.”
If YOU were Christian or of any other faith, I’m sure that your religion would spell out in their holy texts what your fate was going to be when you die. Christianity is a religion of FAITH-faith in the word. That is how GOD set it up. Duh? Just remember that when you take on the mantle of leadership, you will be scrutinized to see if you are capable. Your religious beliefs are part of that factor. If Obama wanted to be the president of sheep in America, fine. I don’t have a dime in it. That would be up to the sheep and sheepherders. But he wants to be president of the people. I am people. I will call Obama out for ignorance and scams. Get real.
June 17th, 2008 at 11:49 am
TAC,
There is a great distinction between FAITH and KNOWLEDGE. You do not know what will happen to you after death any more than anyone else (unless you want to continue your claim of god status which is apparent in these posts). You have FAITH on what you BELIEVE will happen to you. That is how God set it up is right - DUH right back to you.
“I will call Obama out for ignorance and scams.”
I see no ignorance or scam except in the posts of the self-righteous on this blog. Again it is apparent that the biggest issue you all have with Obama’s faith is that he makes no PRESUMPTIVE judgements on others. Sounds like just the quality one needs in a leader. Would be a dramatic improvement of the one we have currently.
June 17th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
Faith is the presumption of knowledge, Troll. Obama will not presume, thus, his faith is questionable.
June 17th, 2008 at 3:30 pm
Troll,
“Yet one’s actions are based on one’s heart and state of mind.”
True. Which is why it is written ‘good fruit comes from good trees.’
“You cannot judge one without judging the other”
So? If one uses actions to discern the state of the heart, that is fine according to the NT. If one tries to read ‘a state of the heart’ into the action that is not OK. For example:
1. John vandalized the neighbors car, he must have issues. This is legit judgment according to the NT
2. John washed the neighbors car for free. He must be eying his neighbors wife. This is NOT a legit judgment according to the NT.
In the first case the act is negative and a negative act starts in the heart. In the second case a good act is not just left at that, the judger is insinuating.
June 17th, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Eric,
One point you might find surprising (and now that I’ve read the OP/ED this is all sort of hilarious)(but a good discussion nonetheless), I certainly believe in Christianity as the direct route (and I know the other side of the argument would kill me if I didn’t clarify “only” route).
My biggest beef is presuming to know where others’ hearts lie. I can speak for myself. I have been taught, vigorously and to my very core, “the way, the truth, and the light. . .” A good evangelical will try to teach you that too, and just as vigorously, let me tell you. I think that is where I stop short. (I think even Christ made references to not wasting your time with people who weren’t interested, though I know the evangelical church doesn’t dwell on those passages much).
As fierce a defense of Obama as I might choose to put together for any reason, I think he is a politician, just like the rest of them, including Pat Robertson, including GWB, including Haggert and the one with the wide stance.
I think an honest critique of what one puts forth about their beliefs is just fine. I don’t think anyone has the ability to go so far as to say Obama, Jack, Jacob, Joe :), or you is not a Christian. Compromised belief systems? Maybe. But let’s leave the decision making to God. If one thinks they can do anything but, they are deluding themselves. In the end we’re all going to be judged.
June 18th, 2008 at 6:12 am
“In the end we’re all going to be judged.”
In the end, those who believe in Christ will be washed clean. Those who do not will be judged.
June 20th, 2008 at 8:40 am
Yack said:
“Faith is the presumption of knowledge, Troll. Obama will not presume, thus, his faith is questionable.”
See - presumption is the key to Yack’s faith. The issue, though is what you are presuming and what Obama refuses to presume. If you make presumptions regarding other’f faith, you are in the E-club. If you refuse to make presumptions about other’s faith - you are no Christian (presumably according to the E-club).
June 20th, 2008 at 8:46 am
“In the end, those who believe in Christ will be washed clean. Those who do not will be judged.”
So according to Yack, he and the rest of the E-club will not be judged. That explains many of THEIR actions.
June 20th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Only my friends are allowed to call me “Yak,” Troll, and I spell it without the C.
So tell me, Troll, what is this “E-club” of which you speak, and to which of our actions are you referring?
June 20th, 2008 at 2:16 pm
I am just phonetically hispanicizing your name, Yack. I thought it appropriate given your stance on things and the liberties you take with mine.
As to the E-club that is just my short-hand for the Evangelical Sect. If you are IN the E-club or subscribe to their rules, you are a good Christian - if not, you are deemed by club memebers to be non-Christian and damned by God.
As to the actions I am referring to, I don’t think it will take you long to put together a long list of (rather infamous) E-club member actions that may not be particularly moral that are quickly forgotten since (apparently) these members will not face Judgement (according to club members, conveniently).
June 20th, 2008 at 2:36 pm
All I do is shorten your name to “Troll.” Now, with Puffalump….
Well, I don’t really hold much to that Evangelical stuff myself. I find their services to be more entertainment than enlightenment, and I won’t even go into that whole “speaking in tongues” thing. Be that as it may, those things are form only. It is the substance that is important. That substance is generally contained in the Creeds, particularly the Apostle’s Creed.
There is, of course, The New Revised Version of the New Revised Version of the Book of Common Prayer, or Meditation, It’s the Same Thing Really for the more liberal amongst us.
“I don’t think….”
AT LAST! SOMETHING WE CAN AGREE ON!!
Now, you had some actions in mind, what were they? Or have you forgotten already?