Ah, Cap'n, you're warmin' the cockles of my heart. You're pulling some of my favorite "verses" from Paine's masterpiece.

You should know, however, that the publication of this book cost Paine his career, stature, & standing in society. He was a Father of our Revolution, but died broke & shunned.

It's always been dangerous to speak the obvious truth. It gets one labelled an infidel.

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"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither breaks my leg, nor picks my pocket."

Thomas Jefferson

No, I'm totally an ignoramus as to the history of T. Paine. Can you give me a shortened breakdown of what happened and how/why ?

Each of those churches shows certain books, which they call revelation, or the Word of God. The Jews say that their Word of God was given by God to Moses face to face; the Christians say, that their Word of God came by divine inspiration; and the Turks say, that their Word of God (the Koran) was brought by an angel from heaven. Each of those churches accuses the other of unbelief; and, for my own part, I disbelieve them all.

Sounds like ME. I've argued this very point around and around with my very religious father.

Every sect., denomination and other faith busies itself pointing fingers at other faiths and calling them false religions or misguided or whatnot.

This is HUMANS screwing up these ideas and thoughts of a God and the divine.

Would God design it so that each of us had to search and sift through all religions in hopes of finding the ONE correct one ?

Bizarre logic to ME.

That's not to say that they're all CORRECT either. They all contain the imperfection introduced by humans and human motivation(s) though. It's as confused as it can get. This is why I agree with his statement:

My own mind is my own church.

Well ok. I've gotten to here so far:

PUTTING aside everything that might excite laughter by its absurdity, or detestation by its profaneness, and confining ourselves merely to an examination of the parts, it is impossible to conceive a story more derogatory to the Almighty, more inconsistent with his wisdom, more contradictory to his power, than this story is.

In order to make for it a foundation to rise upon, the inventors were under the necessity of giving to the being whom they call Satan a power equally as great, if not greater, than they attribute to the Almighty. They have not only given him the power of liberating himself from the pit, after what they call his fall, but they have made that power increase afterwards to infinity. Before this fall they represent him only as an angel of limited existence, as they represent the rest. After his fall, he becomes, by their account, omnipresent. He exists everywhere, and at the same time. He occupies the whole immensity of space.

I'm finding this writers urge to tear down Christianity interesting. But it's getting kind of ... I'm trying to think of the word.

He goes on and on and on and on and on. Reminds us (me) of those people and ideas he is criticising. I suspect this work could have been much shorter. I'll read it all, but just not right now.

Thomas Paine Cliff's Notes:

1737-Born in Thetford, England to a Quaker father & Anglican mother
Parents paid to send him to school til age 12, though they were impoverished (father was a corset maker)
1750-apprenticed to a corset maker
1756-fled from his apprenticeship to become a seafaring merchant
1759-returns to England & sets up shop as a corset-maker (what else?) in Sandwich, Kent; later that year, he is married & his business fails shortly thereafter
1760-wife died during labor
1761-became an excise officer
1765-fired for falsifying paperwork
1766-asks to be reinstated, which happens later that year; at about the same time he becomes an ordained minister in the Church of England
1767-also begins a side career as a teacher
1771-remarries
1772-published The Case of the Officers of Excise, a 21-page article and his first political work; in it, he successfully lobbies parliament for a pay-raise
1774-meets Ben Franklin in London
Oct. 1774-Franklin writes Paine a letter of recommendation for a job in Philadelphia; Paine separates from his wife just before he leaves & arrives in America in late November; contracts typhoid on his voyage & barely lives (five others aboard his ship die of fever); Franklin's doctor nurses Paine back to health over the next six months

From Wikipedia: "Paine was also an inventor, receiving a patent in Europe for a single-span iron bridge, even though through a lack of funds, the bridge was in a field in Paddington, London. He developed a smokeless candle, and worked with John Fitch on the early development of steam engines. This aptitude for invention, coupled with his originality of thought, found him an advocate more than a century later in the famous inventor Thomas Edison. Edison championed Paine's achievements and helped restore him to his proper place in history."

1775-America appears as if it will stay loyal to the Crown
January 10, 1776-Common Sense is published; sells 120,000 copies in the colonies (though the population is only 4 million) and an astonishing 1/2 million copies world-wide; shit is never the same thereafter; the book single-handedly ignites a firestorm in the colonies that will lead to the American Revolution

More from Wikipedia: "Paine's strength lay in his ability to present complex ideas in clear and concise form, as opposed to the more philosophical approaches of his Enlightenment contemporaries in Europe, and it was Paine who proposed the name United States of America for the new nation. When the war arrived, Paine published a series of important pamphlets, The Crisis, credited with inspiring the early colonists during the ordeals faced in their long struggle with the British. The first Crisis paper began with the famous words:
THESE are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value.– Published on 23 December 1776"

FAMOUS WORDS INDEED, AND NONE EVER RANG SO TRUE!

1781-is part of the team that heads to France to negotiate for peace; his role earns him a land-grant near New Rochelle, NY
1791-Paine moves to England and writes The Rights of Man, another very famous treatise; sensing this will also cause a shit-storm, he moves to France before its publication

Again, from Wiki: "The book appeared on March 13, three weeks later than originally scheduled. It was an abstract political tract published in support of the French Revolution, written as a reply to Reflections on the Revolution in France by Edmund Burke. The book— which was highly critical of monarchies and European social institutions— sold briskly but was so controversial that the British government put Paine on trial in absentia for seditious libel. He later published a second edition of the Rights of Man in February 1792 which contained a plan for the reformation of England, including one of the first proposals for a progressive income tax."

1793-Paine begins early drafts of his most controversial work yet, The Age of Reason. It would be published in 1795. This is the beginning of the end of Paine. He was nearly universally shunned after its publication, though Monroe & Jefferson remained allies til the end.
Dec. 1793-France begins excluding foreigners from public life; Paine is imprisoned
July 1794-Paine narrowly escapes execution, Robespierre falls, and James Monroe negotiates Paine's release
1800-Paine meets with Napoleon, who purportedly sleeps with a copy of Rights of Man beneath his pillow; later, Paine states that Napoleon is the completest charlatan that ever existed."
1802-Paine returns to America after an invitation from Thomas Jefferson
June 8, 1809-Paine dies in Greenwich Village in lower Manhattan. He was 72. Only six mourners came to his funeral, two of whom were black (most likely freedmen). The great orator and writer Robert G. Ingersoll wrote:

"Thomas Paine had passed the legendary limit of life. One by one most of his old friends and acquaintances had deserted him. Maligned on every side, execrated, shunned and abhorred -- his virtues denounced as vices -- his services forgotten -- his character blackened, he preserved the poise and balance of his soul. He was a victim of the people, but his convictions remained unshaken. He was still a soldier in the army of freedom, and still tried to enlighten and civilize those who were impatiently waiting for his death, Even those who loved their enemies hated him, their friend -- the friend of the whole world -- with all their hearts. On the 8th of June, 1809, death came -- Death, almost his only friend. At his funeral no pomp, no pageantry, no civic procession, no military display. In a carriage, a woman and her son who had lived on the bounty of the dead -- on horseback, a Quaker, the humanity of whose heart dominated the creed of his head -- and, following on foot, two negroes filled with gratitude -- constituted the funeral cortege of Thomas Paine."

And last, from Wiki:

"A few years later, the agrarian radical William Cobbett dug up and shipped his bones back to England. The plan was to give Paine a heroic reburial on his native soil, but the bones were still among Cobbett's effects when he died over twenty years later. There is no confirmed story about what happened to them after that, although down the years various people have claimed to own parts of Paine's remains, such as his skull and right hand."

And perhaps one of my favorite Paine quotes:

"How different is [Christianity] to the pure and simple profession of Deism! The true Deist has but one Deity, and his religion consists in contemplating the power, wisdom, and benignity of the Deity in his works, and in endeavoring to imitate him in everything moral, scientifical, and mechanical."

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"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither breaks my leg, nor picks my pocket."

Thomas Jefferson

I'm getting the feeling I might disagree with some of what Mr. Paine is saying

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"A dog barks when his master is attacked. I would be a coward if I saw that God's truth is attacked and yet would remain silent."
-John Calvin

What I'm saying is nobody can "prove" it either way, even if they believe or don't believe with all their heart. This is a fact, not just my opinion. I'm saying the term is unnecessary because it really describes everyone.

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The distinction is in the belief rather than the proof. A theist believes God exists, an atheist believes on God exists, and an agnostic believes the existence of God can never proved or disproved.

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Election 2008 – Addicted to Placebos

No, no, no. Atheism isn't belief - it's the lack of a belief. As I said, if God doesn't exist, how are atheists to prove it? One cannot disprove something that doesn't exist.

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To fill a world with ... religions of the Abrahamic kind, is like littering the streets with loaded guns. Do not be surprised if they are used. - Richard Dawkins

Philosophy is questions that may never be answered. Religion is answers that may never be questioned

MY CAPSLOCK KEY IS BROKEN LOL - Will be stumbled upon several times on the web.

Clash

And I have a feeling Mr. Paine would disagree with just about everything you have to say. Especially in regards to the veracity of the Bible.

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"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither breaks my leg, nor picks my pocket."

Thomas Jefferson

But I think CYDdharta was right in moving the question away from "proofs".

Being a theist, an atheist, or an agnostic really has nothing to do with what you can or cannot prove. Not every theist thinks he/she can provide an absolute proof that God exists, and naturally very few atheists think they can absolutely prove God does not.

The question isn't what you can or cannot prove, the question is what do you think (or "believe", for these purposes it means the same thing).
The theist says, "I think God exists."
The atheist says "I think God does not exist"
The agnostic says "I don't know what to think; I have no conviction either way."

It was quite common for writers of that age to go on ad nauseum. I find most writings from the Enlightenment period in bad need of editing (save perhaps Jefferson's grand Declaration, which did undergo many, many revisions to make it as succinct as possible).

Keep in mind that the Americas were established, in part, on the basis of fleeing from religious injustice. The wrong-doings of the Church were fore on everyone's mind at the time. You literally have to try to put yourself in the shoes of a late 18th century Western human. Paine had a point to make, he passionately believed in it, and he spared no effort to ram it home clearly. Nothing less, nothing more.

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"The legitimate powers of government extend to such acts only as are injurious to others. But it does me no injury for my neighbor to say there are twenty gods, or no God. It neither breaks my leg, nor picks my pocket."

Thomas Jefferson

Exactly.

Wrong. You can choose not to follow any religion (lack of belief) and still not be an atheist. Atheists believe that there is no God. This would be disproved if someone showed them that a god existed.

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Not so. It is the atheist, if any, who has no conviction. A lack of belief as Rotten put it.

The agnostic has the conviction that there can exist no knowledge of deities. Or anything else supernatural for that matter. Simply because there can be nothing to base such knowledge upon, except pure thought.

To say that any which agnostic is merely a polite or politically correct version of the atheist may be correct since words change constantly in society. In that 'street'-sense, the agnostic may or may not have any conviction. But by original definition, it's the acknowledgement (conviction) that manifestation of the supernatural cannot be known simply because it always transcends what we consider to be our own reality. Hence "super" + "natural".

Divinity must be confined to a realm that transcends the natural world, or physical reality (henceforth merely 'reality'). Otherwise it's not divinity. And it doesn't matter if reality is said to be this or that; - divinity will always transcend it. If divinity enters reality - as it must if it's able to leave evidence of itself - then it no longer transcends reality and can no longer be divine.

No. A god could not pretend not to transcend the natural world without loosing divinity. The alien could easily pretend to be divine, though. Just as people have been known to do for various reasons. But the pretense can only succeed because of our impressionable minds (such as messing with my rib and make me believe that divinity did it), not because divinity can actually be present as divinity within the natural world.