This post is too windy, I'm excerpting and replying in part only.
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Originally Posted by foundit66
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So you think that threats from an invisible being superceded governments who employed soldiers with sharp sticks that killed...... and that the only reason those governments established their rules was because they feared a god???
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I most certainly do. So should you if you have even a modicum of common sense and knowledge of history. Ever hear of the Crusades?
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I think the clearest demonstration of the absurdity of this situation is to compare TWO DIFFERENT PEOPLE.
One? A man who is subject to BOTH the government AND the imaginary god.
Two? A man who is ONLY subject to the imaginary god, because that man happens to be king...
The Old Testament alone is a perfect example of how uncivil kings can be...
I point to a long list of transgressions of people who committed violent blood-shed BECAUSE THEY THOUGHT their god told them to commit genocide...
But again, you want to give credit TO religion...
... and predictably, there's absolutely no mention of how many times religion has TORN DOWN civilizations... 
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I've yet to see religion tear down a civilization. Civilizations are destroyed by MEN, not religion. I've never sat in a mass in which my priest stated that Catholicism says we have to destroy another civilization. Sorry, no sale.
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ROFLMAO!
AGAIN, LOGIC is not your friend...
Did the Israelites believe Pharoah to be divine?
OF COURSE THEY DID NOT
You have a group of people who did NOT believe in the "divinity" of their ruler, yet they FOLLOWED the ruler anyways...
WHY?
Because the Pharaoh KILLED people who threatened him.
The Pharaoh would have KILLED Israelites who refused to obeyed him.
LOOK at the biblical transaction that occurred when Moses showed up and said "God says we need to go from here"...
Did the Israelites all go "Well, Since OUR God said so, I guess we should go regardless of what the Pharaoh (who is not our God) thinks..."?
NO. The Israelites DID NOT say that, and they DID NOT LEAVE Egypt until the Pharaoh said it was okay.
Pharaoh with an army TRUMPED God amongst Israelites who KNEW Pharaoh wasn't God...
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That's a real bastardization of the Bible if I ever heard one. The slaves left Egypt after several demonstrated plagues followed by Moses telling the pharoah that the next plague would be of his own doing. He ordered that all first born males of Israel be killed. Instead, Egypt's first-born were killed and the pharoah was forced to set the Israelites free.
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THAT is what established civilization. The threat of REAL punishment.
The fact that the peasants must do what the king says, otherwise the king would kill the peasants.
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Peasants have risen up against kings many times in the name of religion. Apparently, some religions are stronger than threats of violence by despots. Pity you never learned that.