Which Atheism is the One True Atheism?

@Francis,

Francis! Well met. I was going to ask you something:

Years ago, we used to get packets of (Moroccan?) dates and they were labelled "Deglet Nour".
I thought that that was a trade mark, but now Tesco's sell them, and use the same words.

Does deglet nour have a particular significance in the world of dates?

2 Replies

@McTag,

I dated a Deglet Noor, she was a blond Algerian, very sweet.

0 Replies

@McTag,

No, Judaism does not tell its adherents that the way to the kingdom of heaven lies only through its belief system, as would be the case with Islam and the various Christian denominations. And, possibly because of that, Judaism does not generally proselytize or actively seek converts.

Quote:

In the Hebrew Bible the heavens, Shamayim, are the abode of YHWH Elohim (the God of Israel).

Rabbinical Judaism

While the concept of heaven (malkuth hashamaim מלכות השמים, the Kingdom of Heaven) is well-defined within the Christian and Islamic religions, the Jewish concept of the afterlife, sometimes known as olam haba, the World-to-come, is not so precise. The Torah has little to say on the subject of survival after death, but by the time of the rabbis two ideas had made inroads among the Jews: one, which is probably derived from Greek thought, is that of the immortal soul which returns to its creator after death; the other, which is thought to be of Persian origin, is that of resurrection.

Jewish writings[which?] refer to a "new earth" as the abode of mankind following the resurrection of the dead. Originally, the two ideas of immortality and resurrection were different but in rabbinic thought they are combined: the soul departs from the body at death but is returned to it at the resurrection. This idea is linked to another rabbinic teaching, that men's good and bad actions are rewarded and punished not in this life but after death, whether immediately or at the subsequent resurrection. Around 1 CE, the Pharisees are said to have maintained belief in resurrection but the Sadducees are said to have denied it (Matt. 22:23).

Some scholars[who?] assert that the Sheol mentioned in Isaiah 38:18, Psalm 6:5 and Job 7:7-10 was an earlier concept than Heaven, but this theory is not universally held.

The Mishnah has many sayings about the World to Come, for example, "Rabbi Yaakov said: This world is like a lobby before the World to Come; prepare yourself in the lobby so that you may enter the banquet hall."

Judaism holds that the righteous of all nations have a share in the World-to-come.

According to Nicholas de Lange, Judaism offers no clear teaching about the destiny which lies in wait for the individual after death and its attitude to life after death has been expressed as follows: "For the future is inscrutable, and the accepted sources of knowledge, whether experience, or reason, or revelation, offer no clear guidance about what is to come. The only certainty is that each man must die - beyond that we can only guess."

According to Tracey R. Rich of the website "Judaism 101", Judaism, unlike other world-religions, is not focused on the quest of getting into heaven but on life and how to live it
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heaven

Can the other religions all be right?

Doesn't it depend on whether there is even a Kingdom of Heaven? Or a God?

1 Reply

@McTag,

Sincerity and piety makes one right. The good lord can sort through and beyond the trappings of Catholocism, Protestantism, and so forth.

1 Reply

@McTag,

Quote:

Deglet Nour dates are a cultivar of date grown in Algeria and Tunisia.

DegletDeglet Nour is one of more than 100 varieties of dates. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), dates can be classified into two varieties: Deglet Nour and common dates.

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@firefly,

Aren't most Jews born into it like other religions?

1 Reply

@cicerone imposter,

Anyone born to a Jewish mother is considered Jewish. Otherwise, you must convert to be a Jew.

Quote:

According to halakha, the oldest normative definition used by Jews for self-identification, a person is matrilineally a Jew by birth, or becomes one through conversion to Judaism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Who_is_a_Jew%3F

However, there are challenges to this definition. It can become quite a complicated discussion because of the various divisions and sects within Judaism.

1 Reply

@edgarblythe,

Quote:

Sincerity and piety makes one right. The good lord can sort through and beyond the trappings of Catholocism, Protestantism, and so forth.

That seem by the bible this time the new testament to only apply to Christians not Jews or Muslim or Hidunes so we atheists are going to have the majority of the human race with us in hell.

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@firefly,

firefly wrote,

Quote:

It can become quite a complicated discussion because of the various divisions and sects within Judaism.

That much I'm keenly aware of. Even met a doctor while on a flight from Chicago to San Francisco. He was a volunteer for Doctors Without Borders, a Jew who converted to a Buddhist. I also worked for Florsheim Shoe Company.

1 Reply

@cicerone imposter,

Quote:

I also worked for Florsheim Shoe Company.

I don't get the connection between that remark and what we are discussing.

Because Judaism is generally determined by birth to a Jewish mother, one doesn't have to ever practice the religion to be considered Jewish. There are many secular Jews, Jews simply by birth, who identify with Jewish culture and history but not with religious practices or rituals. One can also be a Jewish atheist.I don't think that sort of thing exists with other religions.

1 Reply

@firefly,

Probably not much, but my boss and some of the other management associates were Jewish. I was the first Asian to work in management for Florsheim, and I was the first to hire a woman as an auditor for the company. Progress was encouraged, and I had a couple of other Jewish bosses who have invited some of us for sader.

I was going to mention that I also visited Israel, but that was even further from this discussion.

Also, I know Bob Brodsky; he's Jewish, but does not practice Judism, and is one of the most liberal-minded people I know. He's a real rocket scientist.

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@BillRM,

Couldn't agree more - I am always surprised when I learn that an adult is a 'believer.' Seems to me that it's a crutch - they don't need to be good people; they just need to profess a belief in something that supposedly happened 2,000+ years ago, that was written by people who weren't there and then been translated umpteen times, then interpreted by another umpteen people, all with their own axes to grind. I searched for years to find something, anything, I could believe in, but there's just no there, there. And any supreme being who needs to be worshipped and is willing to condemn anyone s/he hasn't gotten around to proselytizing yet to eternal damnation is playing for the other team, as far as I can tell.

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@edgarblythe,

We have no divisions. We don't need to be part of a group. Because we don't have groups (except some people who are politically active to preserve their rights as atheists), we can't be a cult. We also, therefore, don't need a meeting hall. And since any babies we have are free to believe whatever they like, your condemning atheists' babies to hell is .... particularly damning to your own argument. "God of love," indeed!

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@mngrrrl,

Atheists don't have to worry about going to hell. Hell doesn't exist.

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@mngrrrl,

Wrong, dude. I am a student of the human psyche. I have read of Jung, Freud and Eric Hoffer, and have adapted what they knew to my Biblical studying, as well as Nostradamus. CS Lewis did it with wit and intelligence. You seem to think that if one grows up to responsibility in knowing the Lord he takes leave of his senses. Look around the internet. Atheists cluster like fuzz all over a baby's sucker, deriding people like myself, trying to prove how smart they are. They hang together for support, for their insecurity makes them cultists, like Scientologists and Jim Jones. Please, learn the ways of the Lord, I beg of you. It's never too late, except when it becomes too late.

1 Reply

@edgarblythe,

Given how damn evil by any human standards that the god of the bible is the way of the lord is not something I would care to promote.

Once more however how can any sane adult read that nonsense and give it any credit at all is beyond me,

It does not in any case take hanging together to rejected this nonsense as I did it at age ten with no support at all but just the logic in my ten years old brain.

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@BillRM,

Rerun. Not necessary.

1 Reply

@edgarblythe,

The virgin birth and being the son of god or of a god is a rerun of all reruns story.

In any case rerun or not how in the hell can you grant any belief in such nonsense.

The bible is no more logical or believable then the Egyptian book of the dead or the stories concerning the Greek or Roman gods or any of such nonsense created in the history of the human race.

If you had been born in early Rome I am fairly sure you would not had used your intellect on the subject of religion any more then you do now and would had been going to the temples of the Roman gods.

1 Reply

@BillRM,

Quote:

Given how damn evil by any human standards that the god of the bible is the way of the lord is not something I would care to promote.

Once more however how can any sane adult read that nonsense and give it any credit at all is beyond me,

It does not in any case take hanging together to rejected this nonsense as I did it at age ten with no support at all but just the logic in my ten years old brain.

Why are you considering the Bible only as a source that must be read and interpreted literally? Aren't there other ways of understanding it beyond a strict fundamentalist view?

If faith serves to enrich someone's life, or reduce the fears of death, or promote more moral behavior, or help to give a sense of purpose, or any of the other things that faith might do for someone, why does that bother you, and why would you dismiss it as being "nonsense"? As you've pointed out, people have historically sought something beyond themselves, and their own powers, to believe in. Why is this "nonsense" when it appears to satisfy a basic human need?

What turned you off about religion or the Bible when you were ten? How was it being presented to you?

3 Replies

@firefly,

Would you firefly support any other book that call for the killings of homosexuals or children that talk back or for that matter anyone who work on Sunday Firefly?

Who had a main characters in good odor with god <Moses> ordering his troops to kill women and the children in their arms?

Saving by god command by way of Moses only the women-children that had yet to know a man.

Is that the kind of moral behaviors you would wish to promote Firefly?

Only by not reading this book and by very careful short selections can you get any worthwhile "morals" lessons out of it.

The tens commandments is a wonderful example of this, as to give any credit to the commandment not to kill you do have to overlook that Mosses after coming down with the commandments and finding his people was misbehaving order this loyal troops to kill among the tribes until they could not move their swords any longer.

1 Reply

Which Atheism is the One True Atheism?

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