Philosophy is Dead

@failures art,

failures art wrote:

Arjuna wrote:

God came down from heaven to save us by allowing himself to be tortured to death... although he didn't actually die. Debunk away dude.

As I said before, the mythology is built on the notion that a god or gods can even exist. If you can't demonstrate this, then how exactly are you supposed to argue that they did any of the things they claim?

More to the point, you are requesting a negative proof. Debunk a negative? How about a positive? For instance, we examine that a story in a religion relies on other stories to be true. We can take something like a world flood which is integral to the historical account of a given religion, and then examine that this claim is not supported by our studies of soil/sediment. If no such flood happened, then the outcome of said fictional flood is debunked as a product.

I wasn't asking for a negative proof. I was pointing out that the doctrine of the propitiatory sacrifice doesn't make sense.

God... no God.. it's poetry. It's language. You can swim in the waters of another person's perspective or stay anchored in your own. By my nature I seek to understand. That's why for me, the word god has many meanings. As with the word truth, it's not a bad idea to examine what we mean by the word...

Aristophanes has Socrates saying "There is no such thing as Zeus." What's the meaning?

Aristotle offers proof of God. What was he proving?

Paul says Christians seek neither empirical or logical proof. Then what is their basis?

All of these questions are prompts to explore the varied landscape of humanity.

Whether or not God as you define the word corresponds to anything that is... that's an exploration of your conceptions and experience. Obviously it's personally significant to you.

failures art wrote:

Arjuna wrote:

There are unique aspects of Christianity. Like the spiritual trail of the oppressed.

This is perhaps the least unique thing about Christianity. Spiritual trials are perhaps the least common denominator of religion itself. Show me a religion where there is no spiritual trial.

The word I used was TRAIL, not trial. The message of Jesus as described in the gospels is heavily focused on the experience of victimization. So why did it become the state religion of Rome? This is a fascinating question to me.

failures art wrote:

Or you get it, and it's not valuable.

Finding a way free of the grip of bitterness and it's deforming affects is the trail I was referring to. It wouldn't be valuable to one who knows no bitterness.... therefore that one wouldn't "get it."

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@Arjuna,

You ask
The message of Jesus as described in the gospels is heavily focused on the experience of victimization. So why did it become the state religion of Rome? This is a fascinating question to me.

I do not have the answer but I found that to be a very interesting question myself

All I have to offer is what I wonder about!
examples : Could jesus have had such a impact on society that the ruling power could not erase it from the minds of the people no matter how many christians they killed? Could the best way to deal with the problem be to allow some christian churches to remain as long as they would conform to the wishes of the ruleing power.
The ruling power could have even started their own churches they could have called them catholic churches and killed off all others that were in opposition to them.

Maybe not all of christianity could be taught only a partial version of it as it was a threat to the ruleing power!

I find it odd that about the time of jesus's so called birth that the well established therapeutae were being recorded in history. This concludes my sunday service for today. lol

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Therapeutae

1 Reply

@Arjuna,

God is an infinite moral form, and as such offers endless opportunity for dispute, war, bloodshed and torture... In fin ites cannot be De fin ed... That does not stop fools from trying..

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@reasoning logic,

Thanks! I think it's traditional to conclude church services with a song. Got one?

My own testimony is:

Christianity developed close to the hub of the world's over-land trade routes.

That makes it hard to rule out influence from anywhere between Rome and Central Asia. Then, as the Catholic Church coalesced out of the the religious soup of the time, significant images and concepts became christianized.

As western christianity evolved, it was a forum for conflicting spiritual perspectives pursued by numerous monastic organizations. And in some areas it was inextricable with what we would call secular authority.

Any simple narrative is going to be leaving something out. But simplifying history is the only way to pull meaning out of it.

One simple truth is that Rome was the cradle of Christianity. Rome is also a unifying background image throughout the history of Europe.

Another simple truth is that when people convert, they change the religion they've adopted by bringing their own values and images into it.

So Christianity changed Rome. What part of the Roman perspective is embedded in Christianity?

The Romans were generally unconcered with the religious practices of those they governed. Order was their ideal.

My song:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DsyPhvrEzPU&feature=related

1 Reply

@Fido,

Are you sure that god is not what your culture's ruling power wants it to be for the most part?

1 Reply

@Arjuna,

http://www.snotr.com/video/3727

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@reasoning logic,

Beautiful. How does a blind person read music? Brail?

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@Arjuna,

Quote:

The message of Jesus as described in the gospels is heavily focused on the experience of victimization. So why did it become the state religion of Rome? This is a fascinating question to me.

Is it not obvious? The mistake was to execute Jesus for no known offence in Roman Law. To admit the offence in law would draw attention to what was offensive to authority. He got talked about. He had followers. His message spread and not without a lot of barbaric repression. In some places it might be passed on to crowds and in others whispered in dark corners. The meek will inherit the earth is music to the ears of victims and there were a large number of victims and they carried out all the essential tasks. Like today in fact.

A lot would depend on what Jesus had been doing for twenty years before he began his mission. And so far there is nothing but the Gospels to try to derive what His socialisation consisted of and the intelligence he brought to bear on those experiences. But small was beautiful and one should love thy neighbour. And that the human race is doomed if it thinks otherwise. Jesus is the first to see the rust in the girder and know its destiny unless treated and to have given it wide publicity by being lynched under Roman Juridsdiction and on the desk where the buck stops. When you are the girder you have rust on Ignore.

Thus a sociological situation exists as such a message spreads, or infects if you prefer, this large class of slaves and victims. And it is an error to think that because Jesus and the Emperor Constanine appear close to each other in a sentence or paragraph they were not hundreds of years apart. It was in 312 AD that Constantine proclaimed the Edict of Milan and legalised the Christian religion. The Roman Citizens proved incapable of reproducing themselves so dissolute and hedonistic were they. So to keep up the numbers slaves were freed. Selected ones. Slaves bred, freed slaves bred and by the time Constantine arrived the numbers of people broadly sympathetic to victims were very large and also indespensible, especially to the army. Much like now as well. I daresay someone 1/8th black, or even 1/64th, is generally, not specifically of course, sympathetic to freedom movements of any sort.

Whatever variations philosophers might produce in their thinking we can be pretty sure that all victims think the same with no variation.

It was political expediency. How to get the Christian to smite the Visigoths he left for later. A mission to free the victims of the Visigoths would suffice.

The main error is imagining we have any sort of grasp on what went on in that hot and dusty area of the middle and near east between 33 AD and 312 AD on the basis of a few history lectures only partially heard. Especially when most of us have only a very vague idea of what went on last week.

1 Reply

@spendius,

I don't think it is my place to decide what you mean by your words, Spendi. I can only hope that what I get out of them is something resembling what you put into them. Any opinion of mine about how to phrase your thought better could just as easily be an indication of failure on my part to comprehend the full intended meaning.

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@spendius,

spendius wrote:

But small was beautiful and one should love thy neighbour. And that the human race is doomed if it thinks otherwise. Jesus is the first to see the rust in the girder and know its destiny unless treated and to have given it wide publicity by being lynched under Roman Juridsdiction and on the desk where the buck stops. When you are the girder you have rust on Ignore.

Thanks!

I have a tendency to stray into ideology. I do it without much concern for whether what I'm thinking has anything to do with anything other than my own world. Recognizing that, I do it anyway.

Virgil set out to write the Roman Iliad and Odyssey in the time of Augustus. There's something ironic about his story. By identifying Troy as the origin of the Romans, he explains that the Romans are the offspring of the victims. The story of Troy is turned upside down. The Greeks are evil. They had no right to destroy Troy. Alternate origin myths also refer to disenfranchisement and victimization as their heritage. And in the end... they are invictus.

The origin of Christianity is a culture that also orbits around a heritage of adversity and a celebration of the redemption of the victim. But the Israelites knew only fleeting worldy dominion. By the time of Christ the formula had already been translated into the realm of spirit.

Both cultures have an earthy character in comparison to the Greek and Iranian perspectives to which they've been wedded in Christianity. I see this as the essential dynamism of the religion.

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@reasoning logic,

reasoning logic wrote:

Are you sure that god is not what your culture's ruling power wants it to be for the most part?

There was a time in Egypt when a pharroe went against his religion, perhaps teaching a version of Judaism, but that sort of thing does not get beyond the next drought... Normally, religion seeks the support of authority as much as authority seeks the support of the religion... So, yes; as you say, and very likely so....St. Paul Romanized Christianity... Jesus was tearing stuff down, and the early Christians tried to reconcile with Judaism, but Paul, a citizen of Rome made Christianity palatable to Romans if not the Emperor...

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@Fido,

Fido wrote:

God is an infinite moral form, and as such offers endless opportunity for dispute, war, bloodshed and torture... In fin ites cannot be De fin ed... That does not stop fools from trying..

so then whats the point of a god then .... ?

1 Reply

@north,

north wrote:

Fido wrote:

God is an infinite moral form, and as such offers endless opportunity for dispute, war, bloodshed and torture... In fin ites cannot be De fin ed... That does not stop fools from trying..

so then whats the point of a god then .... ?

Why do people believe??? The answer to that is as numerous as believers are many... With many, hope makes God, with others, love makes God, and with others still, the need for justice, some time, some place; and some people need eternal life because they cannot face death... As people need they find the point of God, but inevitably the subjective, individual experience of God puts people at odds with others... What ever the point of God, death, pain, ignorance and domination by others is the result... I remember learning of the injustice of God at an early age, and I must confess it pointed me toward philosophy, and judging by Jesus and the Bible generally, God is no one to look to for justice on this earth... So that becomes our business...

1 Reply

@Fido,

Hi I am writing this post with the intention of posting it retroactively because my allocated supervised time has come to an end. So I firstly want to say thanks to you lot, esp. Spendius and Failures Art, for engaging with me on this thoroughly heated and riveting discussion. I realise that we (me and the pro-godders), are arguiing against the tide of history. In college isn't it written that God died on the cross, some two thousand years ago. Nevermind the addedum in the Bible that he came back to live (which was added at a later date from the rest of the Bible 'proper', and so does not carry the same weight.

Along these lines, God IS dead and science reigns supreme. Never mind philosophy, which was but only a syllalogy with thesim back in its early days, when the greeks (say Pythagoras, Plato and Euripedes) invented the damn thing. So where does that leave us? With a world of strictly 'scientific' politicians, who only pay heed to bow when the Pope flashes his frock, for knowledge that if they ever completely refuse to pay homage to the almightly one that many of us still love, then bad things lie in store.

And so as Philosophy, or rather reading, teaches us to be clever, and engagement with fellow disenchanted thesbians or nonsbians even (is that the right word?), teaches us how to debate, History teaches us the venir and socio-political self investigations surely must teach us some of the workings proper of the world's metahistories, how do we learn about God? I will now stake my territory as a former Atheist by want of progressions Agnostic then Buddhist then Christian (multifaither), I think that I have travelled a complete journey in regards to what I believe in. And sure I remember the time when I was comforted to see what my beliefs were, as they were replicated by the British mainstream media. But now that I have changed how does that feel? Well for a start I have learnt how to stay silent when the conversational dialogue is pacing with a momentum of which I have no chance of turning. But then at other times, I have found in myself the courage to speak out. Such as at an anti-war meeting some years ago, when I raised my voice in opposition to some sixth-form do-gooders, who were trying to derail the meeting with their middle-all-the way particular brand of politics. And I still remember the clap I got after saying what I thought about the whole matter, as feeling both invigorating and well deserved.

So that even though we all must stand at the edge of the mainstream opinions from time to time. Surely for all of us, with a forgiving and well reasoned approach, will hopefully one time be given our shot at the apple, when the time is right. Cheers.

2 Replies

@john2054,

john2054 wrote:

Hi I am writing this post with the intention of posting it retroactively because my allocated supervised time has come to an end. So I firstly want to say thanks to you lot, esp. Spendius and Failures Art, for engaging with me on this thoroughly heated and riveting discussion. I realise that we (me and the pro-godders), are arguiing against the tide of history. In college isn't it written that God died on the cross, some two thousand years ago. Nevermind the addedum in the Bible that he came back to live (which was added at a later date from the rest of the Bible 'proper', and so does not carry the same weight.

Along these lines, God IS dead and science reigns supreme. Never mind philosophy, which was but only a syllalogy with thesim back in its early days, when the greeks (say Pythagoras, Plato and Euripedes) invented the damn thing. So where does that leave us? With a world of strictly 'scientific' politicians, who only pay heed to bow when the Pope flashes his frock, for knowledge that if they ever completely refuse to pay homage to the almightly one that many of us still love, then bad things lie in store.

And so as Philosophy, or rather reading, teaches us to be clever, and engagement with fellow disenchanted thesbians or nonsbians even (is that the right word?), teaches us how to debate, History teaches us the venir and socio-political self investigations surely must teach us some of the workings proper of the world's metahistories, how do we learn about God? I will now stake my territory as a former Atheist by want of progressions Agnostic then Buddhist then Christian (multifaither), I think that I have travelled a complete journey in regards to what I believe in. And sure I remember the time when I was comforted to see what my beliefs were, as they were replicated by the British mainstream media. But now that I have changed how does that feel? Well for a start I have learnt how to stay silent when the conversational dialogue is pacing with a momentum of which I have no chance of turning. But then at other times, I have found in myself the courage to speak out. Such as at an anti-war meeting some years ago, when I raised my voice in opposition to some sixth-form do-gooders, who were trying to derail the meeting with their middle-all-the way particular brand of politics. And I still remember the clap I got after saying what I thought about the whole matter, as feeling both invigorating and well deserved.

So that even though we all must stand at the edge of the mainstream opinions from time to time. Surely for all of us, with a forgiving and well reasoned approach, will hopefully one time be given our shot at the apple, when the time is right. Cheers.

Jesus is an historical fact, and whether God is or is not, God alone can make evident, which for some is already done...I am contented with the situation as it stands, letting God take care of God, and me taking care of myself, and my business... I see no problem with people believing in God, but trust in God, which often means trusting those who push God, and exploit God, and use God to exploit people, instead of using the head God apparently gave them to plan rationally for the future and adspt is foolish bordering on criminal...

1 Reply

@Fido,

Quote:

I see no problem with people believing in God, but trust in God, which often means trusting those who push God, and exploit God, and use God to exploit people, instead of using the head God apparently gave them to plan rationally for the future and adspt is foolish bordering on criminal...

Yes, I agree that trusting in the lies of other people isn't desirable. It would depend on what you place that trust in. Replace "god" with "king" or "government" in your statement.

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@Cyracuz,

Quote:

Replace "god" with "king" or "government" in your statement.

Don't do that Fido. It's the road to slavery, revolution and destitution.

1 Reply

@Cyracuz,

Cyracuz wrote:

Quote:
I see no problem with people believing in God, but trust in God, which often means trusting those who push God, and exploit God, and use God to exploit people, instead of using the head God apparently gave them to plan rationally for the future and adspt is foolish bordering on criminal...

Yes, I agree that trusting in the lies of other people isn't desirable. It would depend on what you place that trust in. Replace "god" with "king" or "government" in your statement.

Knowledge of all sorts has the element of trust in it... Most knowledge is cultural, and was found or proved by others, and we do not need to do the experiments ourselves, or learn by trial and error... We read books or take a course and we know without the heavy lifting... It is trust, but what is said of physical reality can be proved again and again while what is said of infinite moral forms has no proof whatever...

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@spendius,

spendius wrote:

Quote:
Replace "god" with "king" or "government" in your statement.

Don't do that Fido. It's the road to slavery, revolution and destitution.

It is sort of difficult is it not; to be guided by infinite moral forms and still have some trust is fallable humanity, but it must be done... Whether one is master, or a king, or a president or just another joe, since there is a relationship there between that one and yourself, why not make the best of it, make the relationship work for the ends for which is was designed??? The prospect of slavery was not one to be welcomed, but people accepted it to have their lives, and so master and slave related through that form to each have their lives... I am not suggesting that all forms are equal, and serve both parties equally, but that every form that gets the partys into the future alive has some virtues... So, we must have some trust because trust is essential to all relationships, but no one should trust to the point of abuse of self or others...

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@john2054,

john2054 wrote:

how do we learn about God?

If it had ever been possible to see my own beliefs reflected in those around me, I wouldn't be so protective of them. The language I would put to them would be offensive to many and misunderstood by most of the rest.

To stand with others and know that inside we're all the same even though our outward forms are different... that's as close to religion as I've come.

So I appreciate and deeply respect those who speak from conviction.

2 Replies

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