Whoever is not with me is against me…
September 28, 2007
George W. Bush? Well, yes. But this sentence is being used by someone else too. Jesus, the son of God himself said it (Matt 12:30) And yes, I can see it clearly all around me. This seems to be a common thing to say among Christianity (yes, I’m pounding on Christians again… I promise someday I’ll pound on someone else). Here’s what I don’t get though. Even among Christians there are gaps as wide as the Grand Canyon. Just recently I’ve learned that some Christians believe in the big bang and evolution, while others insist on intelligent design, creation or whatever else they call it these days. So how does that work, dear reader? When did you decide that the big bang and evolution are in fact the “truth”… but at the same time believe in the Christian God? Is that just another version of making the Bible what you want it to be, rather than taking it as what it is? How do you decide which part to take literally and which part (Adam, Eve, the snake, the apple and the creation of planet Earth in seven days) to disqualify? Help me understand. Am I against you, because I’m not with you?
The Bible is a book consisting of the Old Testament and the New Testament, and according to any Christian I know it’s the book of God, and therefore it is all true.
Of course those people sort of bend their rules too. For instance, an acquaintance of mine, has a “thing” for pretty women. He’s married of course, but he likes to look (who doesn’t). When confronted with Matt 5:29 which states you should pluck out your eyes if you look at a woman with lust, because you’ve just committed adultery in your heart, he told me it’s not to be taken literally. Whew… good for him I guess, because it says in the Old Testament (Lev. 20:10) that the penalty for adultery is death.
I have yet to see the rich man (Matt 19:21) sell what they have and give to the poor, because it’s kind of difficult for rich people to go to Heaven. Any bet that Bill O’Reilly keeps his money and counts it frequently.
We all know of course the atrocities of the Old Testament, so there is no need for me to mention every single one of them. But then I still don’t understand how it’s possible to go from Catholics to Protestants to Presbyterians to Baptists (etc etc etc) and hear them all say that they are true Christians. You have me confused, people. I’ve heard of many Christians say that they experienced God in some way, and since they experienced him that is evidence for his existence. Huh? What about those who experienced Allah? Isn’t that evidence that Allah exists? How can you claim evidence for your god and at the same time deny the same evidence for a Muslim?
Yes, I realize that I have been all over the place again. Just writing what came to mind today as I was reading through some of the posts of the past few days.
I really should be packing. Off to Germany… to the country of the Pope. 
Yikes!! Well, at least they have good beer.
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32 Responses to “Whoever is not with me is against me…”
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Great article, MissPDX!!
You have the right to post against Christianity. As a resident of a nation where Christians are within the majority religion, it tends to affect your life more than other religions.
I would agree that anyone that tries to make God into something they’re more comfortable with rather than what He says he is, is practicing a modern form of idolatry. Its actually pretty common, and has historical precedent with God’s own chosen people. So, we haven’t improved much, have we?
In terms of what one should believe specifically about creation, its never been a matter of how, its a matter of Who. If you’re looking for a science lesson in Genesis, sorry. If you’re looking for the Party responsible, its right there.
Can’t help your friend when he looks at other women, but I can say this: if its serious enough that God says you ought to pluck your eye out, maybe your friend should get more familiar with his shoes by looking down. But, lets use simple common sense here. Does anyone seriously think God expects us to be walking around with eye patches like pirates, because we all would be?
No.
Does he expect us to understand He’s trying to make a point that what we think is just as important to Him as what we do?
Yeah.
As to the rich selling off what they have for the poor, well some have, but you missed the point. For the rich man, what he didn’t want to give up the most was…his riches, and Jesus knew that. So, he hit him where it hurts. He didn’t have to give up his riches, just be willing to. Big difference. For you or me, it may be something else earthly we’re not willing to give up. If you read further on, the disciples figured the rich guy was a goner, as Jesus said it was essentially impossible for a rich man to go to Heaven. What Jesus pointed out was, what would be impossible for a man to do, that is to say, get to Heaven, is not impossible for God to make happen.
As to people claiming their own religious experiences and feelings as being genuine, let me ask you this: have you ever had a feeling, say of love for someone or vice versa that wound up really being nothing, not genuine? I submit that people can be mistaken about what they feel as to their beliefs, no matter how sincere they were at the time. For myself, I don’t rely solely on what I have felt and experienced, although it counts for alot. I also rely heavily on the facts. There’s plenty of them out there if you’re willing to look with an open mind.
Aren’t you trying to make the Bible something that you are comfortable with by telling me what God meant or didn’t mean? If he didn’t mean something, why did he say it? Or Jesus for that matter.
Common sense, you say. Yes, my common sense says it’s plain stupid… and yet, you choose which of the things that God says are to be taken literally and which aren’t.
Let’s take it further… did God NOT mean it when he said to hold slaves? I mean, let’s use common sense here… Slavery is illegal.
Let’s take it even further… did God NOT mean it when he asked to kill your children when they “misbehave”? If he didn’t mean killing then what did he mean? And why didn’t he just say what he really meant? Or did we simply learn that this book is full of (I’m sorry for the language) crap that simply does not make sense, when you use common sense?!
Okay, so you are asking me to compare my feelings that I had, say, for my ex-husband, which wound up being nothing with the feelings towards an imaginary entity that may or may not be out there? Come on! This is silly. Yes, people can be mistaken… but let me assure you, if you told that to someone of a different belief they would be seriously insulted by you right now… Because to them their “facts” (WHAT FACTS???) are just as real as yours and to discard their beliefs as possibly being a mistake is just absurd.
I grew up in a religious country, have been to religious education, have done research for I don’t know how many years. My mind was as open as a child’s mind and later an adult’s mind can be. I have not found a single fact (EVIDENCE) that confirms the existence of any kind of god.
You make it sound like studying Scripture is like wearing an old pair of shoes. Hey, there’s alot in there that’s tough to deal with. As they say, “Anything worth having is worth working for”.
“Let’s take it even further… did God NOT mean it when he asked to kill your children when they “misbehave”?”
This is a fundamental(if you’ll excuse the pun)misconception and the main source of frustration for people when they’re trying to understand Scripture.
There are things in the Bible that are ‘to us’ and things that are ‘for us’
Huhwuzzat?
IF you’ll go into any reading of Scripture with the question, “Is this passage something to me personally or is it something for my benefit?”, you can usually figure it out.
Now, I make no claims to being a Bible scholar, but I don’t think you have to be one in order to see the difference between a passage that on the face of it sounds totally ‘out of bounds’ to you and one that could apply directly to your situation in the here-and-now. Case in point is the ‘killing the kids’ point you brought up. Is it ‘to me’ that I go kill my son? Of course not. Is it ‘for me’ to have an understanding of how God was dealing with the Israelites that way, at that time, and why?
Sure.
Well, to address your ‘facts’ question, I’d say the archeologist’s shovel is the first place. Up to this point, there hasn’t been one thing discovered in that part of the world that contradicts the Bible narrative. That is to say, if it were ‘crap’ as you say, something would have shown up by now, I would think.
One case in point, the walls of Jericho. Now, according to the story, God made the walls collapse with the Israelites doing their version of cruising the boulevard with the volume on 11. Archeologists don’t agree as to particulars, but they do agree that the walls indeed collapsed. They have no dog in the hunt as to whether God was responsible or not. They’re just looking for scientific evidence. So, did someone walk by Jericho hundreds or thousands of years later, see the collapsed walls, and decide to write a story explaining how walking around and blowing trumpets did it, or the other way around?
Its been my experience that you’ll find whatever it is you’re looking for. If you’re looking for reasons not to believe the God of the Bible is who He says he is, you find plenty. If you’re sincerely looking for the truth, you’ll find that too.
I am looking for evidence. But I don’t need to disprove anything that is not there. It is not a scientist’s job to disprove… it’s their job to find evidence for evolution… for things that exist.
You do exactly what every other Christian does, reading into the Bible what YOU want there to be, not what is actually there. You read it with the mind of a person who lives in the 21st century and just cannot pluck his eye out for looking at another woman, who knows how sick and wrong it is to kill your child for misbehaving. It’s as simple as that. You know I made my point and there is nothing you can say to make it different other than saying that the Bible does not mean what it says… because YOU don’t think it means what it says.
You will never find real evidence because you’re not looking for real evidence.
“If you’re sincerely looking for the truth, you’ll find that too.”
What you really mean, is if I’m sincerely willing to ignore all evidence that points to evolution, that makes the world older than 6000 years, if I’m willing to blindly believe without asking for any kind of evidence that I’ll find it. Well, I can tell you that I will not close my eyes to the evidence of science just to open it to the Bible that is full of contradictions and atrocities.
…to the Bible that is full of contradictions and atrocities and the Christian truth.
Greetings! Just surfing blogs and paused to read yours.
>”I still don’t understand how it’s possible to go from Catholics to Protestants to Presbyterians to Baptists (etc etc etc) and hear them all say that they are true Christians.”
Your lack of understanding is likely due to the confusion caused by the Protestant Reformation. For 500 years, that quarter of the Christian faith has continued to splinter into dozens and dozens of groups, often with seriously conflicting doctrines.
The Catholic Church, which pre-dates the Reformation and comprises the majority of Christianity, states that the plan of salvation includes all of the world, including Christians, Muslims, atheists, and even you. Christ died for everyone. No exceptions. Christ died for Hitler, Ghengis Kahn, and Vlad the Impaler. Everyone.
Among Christians, we are unified into one visible Church by virtue of our common baptism. Some of us Christians are closer in communion than others. Catholics refer to those Christians outside the Catholic faith as our seperated brothers and sisters. Make no mistake, Catholics see all Christians as part and parcel of the Catholic Church. All Christians are Catholics’ brothers and sisters, whether those Christians care to recognize Catholics or not. We are one body in Christ.
You might consider reading Unum Sanctum and Lumen Gentium. Both are short documents, less than a chapter in most modern books.
Here’s a short, easy to read primer on Unum Sanctum:
http://www.crisismagazine.com/may2007/shea.htm
Chapter 2 of Lumen Gentium describes the People of God:
http://www.ourladyswarriors.org/teach/lumegent.htm
God bless…
Aaaaah yes… in their hearts they’re all Catholics, part of the Collective that calls itself the one real religion. Of course without ever entering the elite… Right. I’m shaking my head at this.
I will quote Dianna Narciso who wrote the excellent book “Like Rolling Uphill”:
The fundamentalist knows he’s right. He’s got the right deity, the right religion, the right church, and the right interpretation of his holy book. He is saved and the next guy probably isn’t. Definitely those Catholics aren’t saved - unless you ask them….
…. I don’t think anything can be done to end the elitism of Christianity as long as the concepts of Hell and salvation are a part of it. If mankind needs to be saved and the only way to do it is through their god Jesus, there is nothing but elitism in the cards. They can’t escape it.”
Interestingly: Personal experience seems to be the fallback for people who are otherwise nonbelievers. It’s their last shred of evidence. Now you just need to show them that what you feel can be wrong…
Man, it’s getting pretty deep around here…
Ok, so despite the biblical statements to the contrary, it’s perfectly acceptable to be a Rich Christian. Despite the biblical statements to the contrary, it is NOT OK to stone disobedient children.
It’s OK to disobey the church and follow a false prophet - we’ll call you “Separated Siblings” instead of “Heretics”… It’s not your fault you are misguided, it’s the 500-year old Protestant Reformation that vexes you so.
Salad Bar Christianity. Aside from being politically and culturally expedient, it’s the ONLY TRUE PATH TO JESUS.
I wanna yak, and I’m not talking about a long-haired buffalo,
Rival
First off, what’s wrong with wearing an eyepatch like a pirate? Yarr.
RivalArrival has the perfect phrase to describe this: “Salad Bar Christianity.” Take what you want, leave the rest. It’s one of the favorite arguing points of atheists: even the most die-hard, self-professed “Real Christians” pick and choose what parts of the bible they follow. Slavery, public stoning, eye for an eye, the most brutal of the Abrahamic laws are simply no longer socially viable. They’re forced to pick and choose because if they followed the bible literally, from cover to cover, we’d constantly be killing each other over a million slights, both real and imagined.
Even if slavery weren’t as socially unacceptable and illegal today as it was three hundred years ago, and people were free to stone sinners in the public square, the problem is that there are so many internal inconsistencies in that ultimately incoherent and self-conflicting book that following every rule in it would be impossible. Maybe that’s the whole point in having a bible: if, in any situation, there are two (or, in many cases, many more) parts of the bible that prescribe different courses of action, then virtually any course of action can be justified by reading one verse instead of another.
Even the most die-hard, old-fashioned, fundamentalist Christians are forced to go down one side of the Salad Bar or the other, because the book itself is so self-contradictory.
That’s why it’s a favorite arguing point for atheists, because it works against every Christian - and, if you know your way around the Qu’ran and the Talmud and the Torah and everything else, it applies most easily to other Abrahamic religions, too.
Oh, and Rival - I’m saving that “Salad Bar” line for future reference. That’s a good one.
I’ll warn my mail carrier that a big bag of cash should be coming soon… Or you can just attribute to rivalarrival, whichever you prefer
You all spend a lot of time talking about something that “doesn’t exist”. If you do not believe that their is a god/God, why not spend more time contributing to something you do believe in. Maybe I should make a site called the unicorn myth and make continual posts about how unicorns don’t exist and how I wish people would stop talking about them and including them in books.
As for Christianity, I am one of them. However, your points are valid when you start talking about different denominations and the downfalls of them. To be a “true” Christian, the bible is the only thing that should be referenced, not “church doctrine” or man’s tradition. You can say the Bible is false all you want and I will disagree whole-heartedly, but I agree that denominations will never be correct because they are a “man-made” creation to explain something that is not always explainable.
Why is it not OK to just say “I don’t know” when you don’t know?
Ben,
Your confusion stems from the fact that you think we’re fighting God. We’re not: there is no God.
What we’re fighting is BELIEF in God, and how all the misguided belief systems (that’s redundant, isn’t it? Misguided belief system?) are fouling up the world we live in.
If people used their belief in Unicorns as a reason to commit atrocity, idiocy, and bigotry, you can be damn sure that some a-unicornist group will stand up and say “There are no unicorns”
We DO say “We don’t know”: I am an atheist-agnostic. I don’t know that there is a God so I don’t believe in God. I do go one better: Not only do I say “I don’t know”, I ALSO say “And neither do you.”
Would you care to demonstrate your own lack of agnosticism?
Moving on:
You suggested that the various denominations would also be wrong - there can be only one right path.
Tell me: Do you follow the commandments as they are written? Because if you haven’t killed or stoned a whole lot of people for violating them, I’d say that you are practicing your own denomination of Salad Bar Christianity.
Ben..
The Bible was written by humans, not any god of any sort. Therefore IS errant….and skewed, to say the least. It is used as a marketing and control tool to sway the masses into believing that everything written in it (the Bible) is from your God.
2000 years now…..and STILL no proof. What a sad saga!
Ben..
And what’s with the “mine is better than yours” attitude???
You have nothing to show but false promises.
“I am looking for evidence. But I don’t need to disprove anything that is not there. It is not a scientist’s job to disprove… it’s their job to find evidence for evolution… for things that exist. ”
Never said that was science’s primary job to disprove anything in the Bible. I find it interesting that you think Job One for science is to prove evolution. I guess we should forget about a cure for cancer, eh?
Point I was trying to make in the Jericho example is the Bible as an ancient text indicates the walls collapsed, and by golly, archeologists confirmed that they did. Whether its Jesus, Jericho, or Genesis I’m thinking that your position is that its all myth. If that’s the case, evidence, as you put it, should be able to settle the matter.
I’m still waiting.
“You do exactly what every other Christian does, reading into the Bible what YOU want there to be, not what is actually there.”
The first rule of generalizations is that they’re all false, including this one. Sorry, couldn’t resist.
I’m sure I’m guilty of putting some of my own notions into what I’m reading from time to time, but its not my intent. That’s the difference. It is easier to paint with a broad brush and condemn everybody at once…its just not accurate.
As to the overall reactions here, I refer to 1 Corinthians, chapter 1, starting at verse 18. Paul indicates that for folks that don’t believe, its all going to sound pretty stupid and impossible. Certainly, he was totally against the followers of the Way, and I used to think the Bible as a fairy tale collection myself.
My, how things can change.
Okay, so the walls collapsed… all that proves is that one of the guys who wrote the bible paid attention to what was happening in the world. Nothing more and nothing less.
My generalization seems to be true, because all the answers from Christians here sound incredibly familiar. And I’m not talking about this post only. Look around and see for yourself. If you still want to deny it then, so be it. If it makes you happy, keep your eyes closed.
When did I ever say that science should not find ways to cure cancer? Did I say it is science’s number one job to prove evolution? No, I did not say that. Stop twisting my words around to make them fit you… I’m not the bible… I can’t be interpreted like that.
Oh, well, of course the bible refers to people who don’t believe, because they know they wrote a fantasy story and they need to convince you beforehand that there are people like me who will doubt it.
I’m going on vacation now…
Guitanguran,
I’ve got a book that says the walls of Jericho collapsed. Are you suggesting that because the book accurately described this fact on page 297, the information on pages 323 to 497 are also accurate?
Even the 323 to 497 describe in great detail the creation mythology of the ancient Norse, Inca, Maya, Japanese, and Native American?
The purpose of Science is to discover and manipulate reality. No more, no less. Science need not disprove any of the fantastical accounts borne of the minds of men: The men who bear those accounts are burdened with the need to demonstrate them.
You admit that you allow yourself to see what you want to see in the Bible… Why should I follow your philosophy instead of any of the other pre-constructed distributions, or one of my own design?
As far as your quote about it sounding impossible - there are several solution sets that satisfy the criteria of sounding impossible to the non-believers yet possible to the believers. One of those is that the believers gain some sort of additional capability that the non-believers lack. Another is that the believers lose the ability to differentiate the possible from the impossible. Unfortunately, the situation described doesn’t allow for neutral, independent evaluation. Kinda like a con game, or any of those perpetual motion “inventors”.
Nullily,
Rival
The job of science isn’t to prove evolution or cure cancer. It’s to find out the how and the why of everything, to be able to reproduce the results at will in order to accomplish any number of different goals. That’s why they prove evolution, time and time again: because it explains the why, and natural selection explains the how. That’s why they try to cure cancer, because they can figure out the how and the why and then use that information to save lives.
That’s also why science and the bible will forever be opposites: because the bible doesn’t want anyone else to explain how or why. It wants us all to be perfectly happy with: how is because god did it, why is because god wanted to. And when you start with a premise like that, reproducible results are simply impossible, and in fact, results aren’t possible, either. Prayer has, time and again, proven to be a hoax, a form of pure interpretation, and incapable of producing results in a properly scientific setting. Science interprets results, not wishes, and that’s why the two are eternal enemies: you theists love to pretend that you have ultimate answers, but science proves you don’t even have simple ones.
You think discovering that the walls of Jericho actually collapsed proves your bible true? First off, if I were you, I’d stay as far away from that bloody, genocidal bloodbath as possible. According to the story, your god-warriors wiped out a whole town of innocent people for no other reason than that their god promised them the land. Second, even if the walls do exist in a ruined form, using that as proof of the whole biblical fantasy would be the equivalent of me pointing out that ligers (crosses between tigers and lions) actually exist, and therefore the entire pantheon of Dungeons and Dragons monsters must exist. Hey, watch out, there’s a beholder behind you. (Never mind that the cross-breeding produces huge, brutish, and quite retarded animals. Hey, kind of appropriate, no?)
And, I guess, since the movie “Independence Day” showed an actual White House, that must mean that it’s non-fiction, right? And since there are indeed burnt-out bars in London, that proves that “Shaun of the Dead” is an accurate historical document. Guitanguran, putting a kernel of truth into a myth is what myths are all about. People didn’t believe in the Egyptian gods because their mommies and daddies told them to; it was because every year, the river flooded, and the crops changed, and the seasons turned, just like their priests said they would. That was proof enough for them - but you and I can probably agree that the crops were going to be ready for harvest anyway, right? And the river still floods these days, still the same time of year - not because Hapi made the river flood, but because the rainy season occurs. Complex meteorological patterns have a whole lot more to do with it than a river-god from pre-dynastic times.
Actually, let’s face it: monsters, aliens, and zombies are actually easier to believe than this tripe about god - either Hapi or Yhwh.
Calling the bible an accurate historical text is all fine and good until you remember that it also says that the Earth is suspended on giant pillars, that the universe is six thousand years old, that light was created days after the sun, and that man was created as-is, without any mention of earlier human-like ancestors. Oh, and that three brothers can survive in a furnace on pure faith, that whales (or giant fish, it can’t make up its mind) usually spit out perfectly healthy old men after three days, and that old prophets ride flaming chariots to heaven. Uh, yeah. The first set of assertions are utterly disproved by science; the second set are so outlandish as to be clearly fictitious.
Even worse, it can’t get its own lies straight. Tell me, Guitanguran, because I’ve always wanted to know: was man created before animals, like in Genesis 2:18-19, or was man created after the animals, as in Genesis 1:25-27? The fact that this ancient fairy-tale book drops one incoherent paradoxical lie after another should be a clue that it can’t be taken seriously as a historical document. That there happen to be a handful of actual facts used in its making doesn’t make it any more factual than “Night of the Living Dead,” however.
Oh, but at least it can be used as a moral compass, right, even if you realize that it’s all just flowery metaphor? Indeed, there’s the “love thy neighbor” stuff, and the rules against murder and adultery, right? And a seriously unhealthy preoccupation with sexual behavior. And a clean pass for slavery. And plenty of reasons to go publicly stone someone to death.
And yes, there are actual agnostics here, Guitanguran, but I’m not one of them. I’ll go right out there and say it: I believe there is no god. And I’d love to see you use a single argument that disproves that belief - that can’t also be used to disprove yours.
Do I know it for a fact, like I know the color of my shirt? No. But it’s in the same realm of possibility as werewolves, vampires, and leprechauns. I can’t prove it, because I can’t prove that there isn’t a god - proving something does not exist is notoriously difficult by scientific standards. It’s easy enough to disprove the idea of a loving, personal god that is interested in the daily activities of humans, as well as the divinity of Jesus. (Jesus, after all, did promise he would appear if we grouped together and asked him to, right? So grab a friend and pray for Jesus to appear before you. You *know* he can, right - because he did it after the “resurrection,” right? Yeah, let me know if that works for you.) Far more difficult to disprove is a god that is completely and utterly unlike anything the in the Christian mythos, for instance, a god-like creature that somehow non-magically created the solar system, and then moved on, completely unconcerned with the workings of his creation and maybe even unaware of our existence. Or maybe a god-like creature that died a long time ago. But, of course, in this case, it’s still enough that you Christians are thoroughly wrong in every tangible respect, as well as that it’s still in the same realm of probability as vampires and werewolves.
>>The job of science isn’t to prove evolution or cure cancer.
Well, ouch! Wasn’t that a slap on the fingers.
Well, while those are perfectly respectable goals of science, the true, overriding goal of science is to help us learn, understand, and use information. What we do with that information is different for different branches of science - cancer research might be one scientist’s particular flavor, while another’s might be development of alternative energy, or, all too common, research and development for the commercial or military sectors. It’s all science, but the paramount goal of all these different fields is, first and foremost, the gathering of usable information.
That’s why I say that it’s the direct opposite of religion, which has an explicit and implicit interest in restricting and denying information. Where the bailiwick of science is to expose the truth, religion’s main operation has been to pretend that all the answers worth knowing are already answered in the form of a one-size-fits-all holy book. No new information is to be gathered for religion - well, except for that wonderfully creative period in early Catholic history when every monk and his brother was churning out wildly imaginative, pseudo-scientific stories about the nature of heaven, the hierarchy of angels, the structure of hell, the relationship between the parts of the Trinity, and so on. (None appeared in the bible, of course, but much of it still became part of the Catholic view of heaven, earth, and hell. Fascinating reading, too, by the way.) Religion requires faith, the belief in something without evidence; science requires experiment, which eliminates faith by supplying the evidence.
In fact, let’s not forget what the very first transgression against the biblical god was, according to its own narrative: knowledge. If it’s supposed to be literal, then god had literally denied mankind knowledge in the form of the fruit of a tree, and punished the entire species for the fact that his precious proof-of-design models, Adam and Eve, wanted that knowledge. If it’s supposed to be a metaphor for something else, then what could that metaphor be? It symbolizes the fact that the one real threat to faith - a relationship with god - is nothing other than knowledge. And any god - metaphorical or no - that feels so utterly threatened by just having us know something is no friend of mine, and an enemy of the scientific method.
Knowing isn’t just half the battle. It is the battle.
Now, what to do with that scientific knowledge? Build better bombs, better warplanes? Yeah, we do that, much to my chagrin. Build better bridges? Too rarely, but yes, that too. Reach out into the cosmos to understand even more of the universe we live in? Oh, we do a whole lot of that. Dive to the depths of the ocean to understand even more of the life we have right here on Earth? Hell yeah. Try to peer into the very core of our own planet to better understand how planets elsewhere are put together? Absolutely.
That was my point: it’s all science. Not one of those tasks is the job of science - they’re all merely end products of science. The only job of science is to know, to give us a means to know anything and everything about our universe.
And yes, to know if there’s a god, too. I think the days of Stephen Jay Gould’s NOMA - No Overlapping Magisteria, which said that science and religion lived in separate jurisdictions and had no business crossing - are rapidly disappearing. Whatever it is that religion is supposed to be able to answer for us, it has failed miserably for thousands of years, and it has been revered for its failure because people are told that even the failure of religion is further proof of god. What utter nonsense. Science, especially in the last century or so, has unlocked more mysteries of the universe - and discovered many more for future generations to unlock - than religion has ever even pondered. (And, really, what did religion ever have for an answer to such inquiries into the nature of life, the universe, and everything in it? “God did it?” What a cop-out. When that’s the only answer you have for anything, it gets old real fast.)
So, MissPDX, perhaps that sounded harsher than it was meant to be. All I meant was to substitute a slight difference in word choice, not to completely refute the argument.
Darque… I understood. I said it with a smile.
You make me think. I like that. So keep slapping.
I figured as much, MissPDX - but, you know, once you get on a roll, it’s so hard to stop. It doesn’t hurt that it’s a legitimate reason for complete skepticism with the assistance of science - take nothing on faith, the truth is out there, trust no one… or is that X-Files…
** It’s siege mentality **
Those not with us are against us. (Luke 11:23 NIV)
As a secular humanist, I always marvel that the big-4 monotheisms, three of which became empire building ideologies, continue to charm otherwise intelligent people.
They are historically late arrivals whose common foundations are very much this-worldly. The myth spinners present Zarathustra, Moses, Christ, and Mohammed as demigods touting ineffably silly moralized cosmic battlegrounds of good-v.-evil, ending in an apocalypse.
Among middle eastern religions, Zoroastrianism invents apocalyptic. The World Savior comes to renew his creation, raise the dead, punish the wicked “children of darkness”, and dwell with his obedient “children of light” forever in a blessed realm.
A terrible judgment visited upon the unrighteous gets taken up into Judaism, appearing in the book ascribed to Daniel. Thereafter, Judaism produces two important non-canonical apocalypses: Jubilees and 1Enoch. Xianity draws inspiration from the revenge soaked Jewish documents to produce the “Apocalypse” of John of Patmos.
They key to understanding all apocalypses within the middle eastern group of religions lies in realizing that each gets created during a time of foreign invasion, occupation, or internecine sectarian violence. Luke 11:23 presents a defiant siege mentality, as do the synoptic gospels and the letters of Paul.
Each world-ending revelation is a product of an impotent desire for revenge which can not be expressed except in words, words veiled in obscure symbols and arcane references.
Ahura Mazda, Yahweh, God, and Allah are ethical equivalents of comic book super-villains. These gods are dead. Their remaining pulp myths enjoy maniacal cult followings. And, their theologies are so much fan fiction.
The middle eastern tale of how the “Hero who fights the chaos monster ” became “Lord of the Apocalypse” gets well told in Norman Cohn’s excellent, very readable “Cosmos, Chaos, and the World to Come” Yale Univ Press.
bipolar2
Wow, got a real lively group here.
As I’ve said from the outset. If you’re looking in Genesis for a science textbook, you’ll be disappointed. This is just me postulating, but had the actual science behind the creative process been posted in Genesis, quantum physics, sub-atomic particles and all, who would have understood it before now? For that matter, who would have believed it?
As I’ve also said at the outset, its never been a matter of how or when. That is for science to discover.
It is about Who. Always has been.
Another thing I find interesting is the duality of abhorring the genocide of God and the same time denying He existed to perpetrate it in the first place. If its fiction, who cares? If its not, well then we’re dealing with the ethical problem of cruel God killing swarms of infidels and innocents alike. But then that would entail believing He existed, huh?
Speaking of dualities, its also interesting that many of the same people that decry the genocidal violence and won’t accept the idea that God as the Creator has the right, are 100% in agreement with a woman’s right to choose. If a woman can choose to kill something being created within her body, it doesn’t seem fair to beat up a non-existant God/Creator just because He’s able to do it on a larger scale, if in fact He existed to do it in the first place.
** Listening to the superior man . . . Master Kung **
Xianity has such a grip on American minds — don’t know much biology . . . or world history . . . or cross-cultural analysis. Choking on regurgitated ignorance, what a terrible way to die.
Xian doctrine is irrational, otherworldly, and impractical. It promises much, and delivers nothing. Four hundred years of increasing opposition have not yet rid the West of the rotting corpse of its dead god.
Chinese culture was far luckier. From that very rational, this worldly, and practical book, The Analects, attributed to Confucius (500 BCE — that’s 500 years before the alleged birth of Jesus!):
6:20 Fan Ch’ih asked what constituted wisdom. The Master said, “To give one’s self earnestly to the duties due to men, and, while respecting spiritual beings, to keep aloof from them, may be called wisdom.”
15:23 Tsze-kung asked, saying, “Is there one word which may serve as a rule of practice for all one’s life?” The Master said, “Is not RECIPROCITY such a word? What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.” [trans. S.R. McIntyre 2003]
No god is needed to police human behavior. All ethics is irreducibly social. Harming others can not be generalized; otherwise, no culture could exist.
No faith, no creeds, no priests, no heaven, no hell, no big daddy in the sky, no pie-in-the-sky bye-and-bye.
No fear.
bipolar2
Guitanguran,
“Another thing I find interesting is the duality of abhorring the genocide of God and the same time denying He existed to perpetrate it in the first place.”
There is no duality - Claims of the former are evidence of the latter.
“If a woman can choose to kill something being created within her body, it doesn’t seem fair to beat up a non-existant God/Creator just because He’s able to do it on a larger scale, if in fact He existed to do it in the first place.”
This statement demonstrates why logic should be a mandatory part of education from Kindergarten through college.
“Women are to Abortion as God is to Genocide” only works if there is, in fact, a God. “Women are to Abortion as Fanatical Groups of People are to Genocide” is an absolutely piss-poor analogy, but it is the one you are really suggesting.
Hemisperically,
Rival
Well, I’m just not sure since I never took logic in Kindergarten, but I think you just made my point.
Either you can blame God for genocide, or disregard Him since He doesn’t exist and it never happened, but not both.
So which is it?
Guitanguran,
False dichotomy. The atrocities occurred, committed by people claiming to be agents of God.
But, Thanks for playing! Had you taken that course in Kindergarten, you wouldn’t be likely to make this all-too-common mistake in this, or any other aspect of your life.
Rack-and-Pinionly,
Rival
Guitanguran, there’s no dissonance between disbelieving gods and opposing the very real influences of people who do believe. There isn’t even any dissonance between disbelieving the Christian god and despising him as a character, much the same way you might despise any archetypal character from fiction. Even within the supernatural narrative told by the bible, it’s plain to a neutral, unbiased observer that this god of yours didn’t do mankind any favors, what with the original sin, plagues, flooding, playing favorites, pitting one against the other, and pain and suffering used for the sake of a shallow morality play.
You know, Emperor Palpatine was evil, too, complete with genocide, manipulation, and greed. We can agree that he’s a singularly nasty character. Fictional, but evil nonetheless.
In fact, disbelieving the myth makes the connection even stronger: by not subscribing to the fiction and the attendant social observances, we are that much more keen to notice the influence of these man-made religions. By insulating ourselves from the emotive appeals and blatant distractions, we can analyze evidence rather than trust gut feelings. You might just see a charity organization, but we see a forced-conversion scam that demands faith for medicine, for instance. In the same way, we look at the creation story that your religion purports to be true, and we see a bogeyman tale told to keep the villagers placid and pliant. We look at the history of the church, and we see the ugly truth of the all-too-real history of genocide and mayhem caused by people who carried a cross in one hand and a sword in the other.
And history is repeating itself, as we speak. Once again, these self-proclaimed god warriors are busily trying to march soldiers into yet another bloody Crusade, pitting “Christian values” against “Islamofascism.” What a crock. They’re both theocrats, looking to install their own religious doctrines as law. The only failing of all these Muslim nations is that they didn’t have active and strong enough atheists to keep all this religious nonsense away from government.