Biblical Witchcraft/Sorcery that was commanded by "God" - understanding biblical contradictions

the bible is full of contradictions. tell a preacher this and listen to what he says. nevertheless, a contradiction is a contradiction irregardless of your understanding of it. perhaps the translation is inaccurate.

God commanded sorcery - even a sorcery contest - An Egyptian pissing contest

http://biblehub.com/exodus/7-12.htm
Aaron's Staff Becomes a Serpent
"…11Then Pharaoh also called for the wise men and the sorcerers, and they also, the magicians of Egypt, did the same with their secret arts. 12For each one threw down his staff and they turned into serpents. But Aaron's staff swallowed up their staffs. 13Yet Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he did not listen to them, as the LORD had said."


the God of the Bible blesses those who curse

http://biblehub.com/2_kings/2-24.htm

Elisha Mocked
23Then he went up from there to Bethel; and as he was going up by the way, young lads came out from the city and mocked him and said to him, "Go up, you baldhead; go up, you baldhead!" 24When he looked behind him and saw them, he cursed them in the name of the LORD. Then two female bears came out of the woods and tore up forty-two lads of their number. 25He went from there to Mount Carmel, and from there he returned to Samaria.


http://www.reshafim.org.il/ad/egypt/religion/magic.htm




i also would like to submit the numerous times that the God of the Bible commands his followers to sacrifice humans. more than once he commands people to sacrifice their own family members.

if this can be explained away by my misunderstanding of the Bible, and proven that there are no contradictions in the Bible then I'd love to learn. I'm comfortable with my understanding of the Bible and it's contradictions. So this is not a challenge or an Egyptian pissing contest. The Bible is and always has been one of my favorite books.

I'm trying to understand the purpose of this thread... if it's just to highlight contradictions, then that's not unknown information.

one purpose is to highlight witchcraft and sorcery in the Bible. the other is to hear what people have to say about killing of innocent humans. as i would personally like to hear peoples' thoughts on the whole human and non human animal sacrifices. this is a very touching, real, and personal subject to me.

i saw others posted questions that remained unanswered on the same and similar topics, i am re-approaching the subject to broaden my own understanding, and hopefully help others as well.

the purpose is to promote discussion, preferably non egotistical intercourse, but if some can't repress their desire to be drawn into an Egyptian pissing contest that could be amusing as well.

if you think that by paying attention to this subject matter that i am buying wasted time then i would not disagree with you. it may benefit myself, personally, to focus on and pay attention to more grounding things to balance out my air head.

on the other hand if someone has a better understanding or is aware of intentional mistranslations of the text then that would help my understanding.

i believe that there were intentional mistranslations, omissions, and additions, but I rarely see these discussed.

i also have mixed feelings on where the world is heading, i'm torn on what to think about it, coming to grips with certain things would also help me to focus on grounding. then again there is the saying and ones like it "if you want to help the world, the key is to showing people how to live in it." nonetheless, people with a lot of air in their cosmological make up like myself can benefit from further discussion, understanding and meditation on such subjects

I was just wondering, do you just concentrate on the Hebrew-Aramaic scriptures or do you also read the Christian Greek scriptures?
As in later books spiritism is shunned as the work of the devil.
On human and non human sacrifices I'd suggest you read the bible further, and it may help you to understand why they were originally used and weren't further along in the bible. The Christian Greek scriptures may help you here.

I don't think it's a waste of time to study the bible, if that's what you want but I would stress maybe not just reading parts and thinking you know cause there is much more information, and keeping an open mind.

i prefer the translations of the, or deciphered commentary on the, original languages when available, but i will read all available scripture and commentary on it. i've read the entire Bible more than once. i'm also very interested in the Dead Sea Scrolls, The Book of Enoch, the Book of Jasher, and more.

my problem is probably that my mind is too open.

As in later books spiritism is shunned as the work of the devil.

would you care to share your thoughts or feelings on why this is?

ghost dog wrote: my problem is probably that my mind is too open.

I don't think anybody would fault you for having too open a mind.. if even one's mind can be 'too' open

Would I care to share my thoughts on something that if you had read the bible you would of seen for yourself in later books such as Acts, Galatians?
Not really no. Read it and make up your own mind.

When you're making up a story it's really hard to not have contradictions in it. Especially something written in that time fram at that location. Even modern stories make constant mistakes, check out Movie Mistakes or CinemaSins . As a Jedi you have to understand that it is just a myth mixed with the culture of the time and seasoned with some universal truths.

According to Don Koenig who seems to be what you consider an authority on what is truly christian, the Bible is "the only reliable authority for men to live by". So that either means that reliability and inconsistency go hand in hand or that it is perfectly consistent throughout.

While I'm at it, I'd like to point out that if you are an open-minded person, you will quickly find that books usually are rather short and that it is without exception always a wiser choice to rely on what reality dictates instead. Those of us who are not trying to live by a holy text never struggle with any of the problems all of them have. Of course, we have other worries, living in a world that is so bad at keeping us alive and well, to say nothing of all those who wish us ill in the meantime... Whether magic is good or evil in the eyes of the ceiling cat, however, is really, really not one of those worries.