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Bev, it often looks to me, from the outside, that all a “living prophet” gives you is another series of speeches and writings to interpret. I mean, unless your prophet has time to sit down with every single member of your church and clarify for them exactly what the scripture means for each issue facing them, it’s still a matter of personal interpretation.
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quote:Originally posted by beverly: But it is clear that using these methods, different people will come to vastly different conclusions. Having a mouthpiece for God, helps to unify varying points of view.
So are you claiming, then, that the LDS church is immune to schism or doctrinal conflict, because of its policy of continuing revelation?
quote:You're saying that either a person's faith is completely false or based entirely on evil. You leave no room for a possible system of beliefs that contains both a caring God and a just God. That's what you believe, and that's fine because everyone's belief is a very personal thing. Without ever having stated my own personal beliefs, I've tried to make the point that there are different ways to view a passage of scripture without being inherently evil, all depending on what your personal view of God is. The posts on this thread have shown that there are indeed many different ways to view the interpretation of the Bible.
A just and caring god would be a very fine thing; I am saying that the Yahweh shown in the OT is neither. And then I am further saying that if you throw away these 'bad' miracles because that's not the kind of god you want to believe in, then your hanging on to the 'good' miracles like the resurrection begin to look a lot more like wishful thinking. If one part of the Bible is untrue because it was written by men, then why can't another part be? And this is not a matter of subtle interpretations, either. I do not think I am falsely dichotomizing, here, because people seem to agree with me; the only possibilities I have seen offered on this thread is that "Yahweh had good reasons for killing those children" - this I denounce as evil - and "It didn't actually happen that way" - in other words, the Bible is not literally true.
quote:Yep. It’s pretty shaky sometimes. Fortunately, I’ve got a few other legs to stand on as well. Those of us in the Wesleyan tradition use what we call the quadrilateral – scripture, tradition, experience, and reason are all ways to know God.
But I think I am safe in saying that the Bible is the foundation of all the rest. Being honest, if you had not been raised in a Christian tradition, would you have interpreted whatever spiritual episodes you think you've had in the same way? Might you not have become a pantheist, a mystic, a devout Moslem, a Hindu, or indeed an atheist who sometimes has periods of great contentment? Likewise, you apply reason to your beliefs, but your beliefs are axioms, not results. To put it differently, you reason about what to believe about your god, but not whether to believe in it; that is by definition a matter of faith. So if the Bible is untrue in parts, I think that shakes your other foundations also.
quote:Whether or not you believe that the prophets of the LDS church are indeed prophets of God, it seems to me that having a living prophet to tell you what God actually meant in past scripture is the way to go. Otherwise it's my guesswork against your guesswork.
Yes, but this just puts the guesswork at one further remove. Now you're guessing which one is the real prophet. And my guess is just as good as yours. You haven't solved the actual problem.
quote:What I do know is what the story has come to mean in the Jewish tradition and in the spinoff Jewish group that came to be called Christian – God is a liberator. God is on the side of the oppressed. When God’s people are suffering, God hears their cries. The Exodus stories were the under girding of the American abolition movement, and the civil rights movement. They’re paradigmatic stories.
I think, though, that this is a fairly recent development. There is, I believe, a much longer tradition of using 'God is on our side' to justify oppressing other people; and this strand has not died out yet. Take a good look at the Christian Right, and tell me the Crusading spirit is gone. Considering who is in power hereabouts, I do not think it at all obvious which school of thought will win out in the end. Crusades have rather more glamour. War is out of fashion with youth in the West; but fashions change.
quote:All of which is to say, I don’t know what happened. Maybe there was a plague which a group of slaves attributed to God. Maybe it was wishful thinking. Maybe it was a “that would have shown ‘em” story made up while traveling in the desert. Maybe it happened exactly like the text says. I don’t know and I have no way of finding out.
But how is the story of Jesus any different? Surely this is no minor, peripheral matter, as you could perhaps argue about Exodus, but the very heart of your faith. Why do you believe in these miracles, but not those ones? There are many conceivable ways someone could arrange to survive a crucifixion, after all - especially a man who was by all accounts an inspiring and charismatic speaker. A secret sympathiser among the guards, or some bribe, come to mind. It needn't even be Jesus doing it; even if his followers were poor, the women among them - notorious for being prostitutes - could surely find something to interest legionnaires far from home. A night-time distraction, a substituted body, a staged return - it doesn't sound so far-fetched as all that.
It seems to come down to what you want to believe. In children, this is called wishful thinking. It is not clear to me why the same thing is called, in adults, "faith".
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quote:Whether or not you believe that the prophets of the LDS church are indeed prophets of God, it seems to me that having a living prophet to tell you what God actually meant in past scripture is the way to go. Otherwise it's my guesswork against your guesswork.
You can call what would do absent living prophets guesswork, but there are two thousand years of tradition, scholarship, and writings that don't rely on living prophets. (Edit: aproximately two thousand years since the last book of the Bible was completed.)
quote:After all, if the God of the Bible exists and God has made His will known to man, He appears to have always done it through prophets. I don't think many of us here take the entire Bible to be literal. So you *have* to pick and choose what you think things *really* mean. It seems the only two stable foundations are the above (living prophet to inform) and believing the Bible to be literally, 100% true and perfect.
quote:But I think I am safe in saying that the Bible is the foundation of all the rest. Being honest, if you had not been raised in a Christian tradition, would you have interpreted whatever spiritual episodes you think you've had in the same way? Might you not have become a pantheist, a mystic, a devout Moslem, a Hindu, or indeed an atheist who sometimes has periods of great contentment?
Very likely I would have. The Christian story is the narrative I use to structure my experience. Had I been raised in a different tradition, I likely would have interpreted my experience within the narratives of that society. So what?
quote:Likewise, you apply reason to your beliefs, but your beliefs are axioms, not results. To put it differently, you reason about what to believe about your god, but not whether to believe in it; that is by definition a matter of faith. So if the Bible is untrue in parts, I think that shakes your other foundations also.
I disagree that this is a matter of “faith,” but that is a difference in terminology. As a semi-Tillichian theologian, I do not use “faith” as a synonym for “belief.” And many of my particular beliefs are results, not axioms. I will admit to a strong bias toward belief in God as a starting point, though. And I’ve seen nothing to convince me that this is unreasonable. A-reasonable perhaps, but not anti-reason. And I never said the Bible was untrue. I said it wasn’t a history book (nor a science text, though I didn’t specify that part). There is a difference.
quote: Take a good look at the Christian Right, and tell me the Crusading spirit is gone. Considering who is in power hereabouts, I do not think it at all obvious which school of thought will win out in the end. Crusades have rather more glamour. War is out of fashion with youth in the West; but fashions change.
I am worried about this as well. But rather than abandoning my school of thought I choose to work to promote it. I would prefer that it be the one which “wins out in the end.”
quote: But how is the story of Jesus any different? Surely this is no minor, peripheral matter, as you could perhaps argue about Exodus, but the very heart of your faith. Why do you believe in these miracles, but not those ones?
It’s not – I believe exactly the same thing about the New Testament as I do about the Old. And Exodus is not a minor, peripheral matter – it is absolutely central. I fail to see why something being of importance means I have to subscribe to one particular theory of Biblical interpretation. To quote a favorite theologian – I take the Bible much too seriously to take it literally.
I will admit that I do believe in a literal resurrection, though. Without that I think the rest would probably not matter so much to me. I’m not saying that finding out the whole thing was a metaphor would totally undermine my foundations, but it would make me sad.
quote:It seems to come down to what you want to believe. In children, this is called wishful thinking. It is not clear to me why the same thing is called, in adults, "faith".
Again, I would not call it “faith.” I would call it “belief.” “Faith,” in my lexicon, is more synonymous with “priority” than “belief.” But I suppose that doesn’t really matter for this conversation.
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quote:Very likely I would have. The Christian story is the narrative I use to structure my experience. Had I been raised in a different tradition, I likely would have interpreted my experience within the narratives of that society. So what?
I do not understand how you can dismiss this so cavalierly. If your most fundamental beliefs about the structure of the Universe are a mere accident of where you happened to be born, then how can you possibly take them seriously? Real truth is not dependent on geography!
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I don't mean specific language, I mean language at all. (And why assume I meant English, for Pete's sake? The Bible wasn't written in English.)
I'll try to clarify what I mean -- the Bible isn't God. It points to God, but it is (I believe) mainly human beings trying to throw great big nets of words over experiences and concepts that are too big for language.
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quote:You can call what would do absent living prophets guesswork, but there are two thousand years of tradition, scholarship, and writings that don't rely on living prophets.
Just because there is a long history of people building on other people's guesswork doesn't mean it takes the step into scholarship. Consider alchemy, or for a similar tradition that has survived to the present day, astrology.
quote:I am worried about this as well. But rather than abandoning my school of thought I choose to work to promote it. I would prefer that it be the one which “wins out in the end.
But why fight about which interpretation is the better, when you can sidestep the whole problem by abandoning the book entirely?
quote:I will admit that I do believe in a literal resurrection, though. Without that I think the rest would probably not matter so much to me. I’m not saying that finding out the whole thing was a metaphor would totally undermine my foundations, but it would make me sad.
But if there were no miracles, then isn't Jesus just one more madman who claimed to know the mind of a god? Worthy of being listened to as far as ethics go, perhaps, but no authority on the structure of the Universe. It's not as though we really disagree on what good ethics are, after all. We are discussing a matter of empirical, if untestable short of death, fact : Does Yahweh, or another god, exist?
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quote: I do not understand how you can dismiss this so cavalierly.
I don't think dkw is as obsessed with "being right" as a lot of theists (and a lot of atheists) seem to be.
I'm reminded of a conversation with our uncle, in which he said something along the lines of "But if I'm wrong about Jesus and all of this, than everything I do in the church and everything I work for is just a waste." To which I answered "If that's the way you look at your religion, then yes, it is." The point being that I don't like churches that are more focused on "saving" people and getting converts than they are on simply doing good in the world.
quote: It's not as though we really disagree on what good ethics are, after all.
We don’t? What is our consensus on, for example, affirmative action? Good ethics or bad? How about abortion? Tax rates – should they be flat, or should the rich pay a higher percentage?
quote: We are discussing a matter of empirical, if untestable short of death, fact : Does Yahweh, or another god, exist?
You might be. I’m discussing a slightly different question: does the Christian faith, including the Bible, move us closer to or further from understanding the nature of ultimate reality?
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About ethics, I am talking basic principles, not engineering details. I think we both agree that you should strive not to murder, steal, or harm, and to give restitution where we have accidentally caused damage. I do not know if you are familiar with Torbjørn Egner; he was a Norwegian author of children's books. In one of them he gives the best summation of ethics that I know of, which I'll try to translate :
You shall not trouble others; you shall be reasonable and kind; and otherwise you may do as you choose.
In the original it rhymes and has a catchy tune.
quote:You might be. I’m discussing a slightly different question: does the Christian faith, including the Bible, move us closer to or further from understanding the nature of ultimate reality?
I think, actually, those questions are not different at all. Surely the existence of a god, any god, is a really major fact about 'ultimate reality'! And likewise, the non-existence of any god is a negation of the Christian faith - not the ethics, by any means, but the faith, the belief in a force outside humanity. So I think these are really different formulations of the same question. I do not see how you can argue that belief in something that doesn't actually exist moves us any closer to truth! And I have yet to see you argue for your god's existence if the Bible's miracles are not to be trusted.
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I'm not trying to be smart or anything, seriously, but I'm really confused as to what's going on here. KoM, you asked me to explain my beliefs, and then when I did, you dismissed them as if they weren't good enough reasons. I completely understand that my reasons aren't good enough for you, and that you vehemently oppose them. It's just that I'm not condemning you for your beliefs and I don't understand why you're condemning me for mine.
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Well, as I say, it doesn't give the details of implementation. But how is it incomplete as an overarching structure?
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I didn't dismiss your beliefs, I attacked them for being a total capitulation of all reason. Further, you didn't actually explain your beliefs, you just said that you believed your god had good reasons. Well, why do you believe such a thing in the face of mass murder? As a general rule, we do not look for mitigating circumstances when more than a few deaths are involved.
And I condemn your beliefs because I find them utterly immoral. To give over your own powers of reasoning because 'the Bible told me so'? I stand by my comparison with the Nazi Fuhrerprinzip. To accept such things blindly is to be led into the same kind of trap that broke the honour of the Wehrmacht, and the German people.
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quote:Likewise, you apply reason to your beliefs, but your beliefs are axioms, not results. To put it differently, you reason about what to believe about your god, but not whether to believe in it; that is by definition a matter of faith.
The concept of axioms is not unknown to mathematics and science. In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries there was an attempt in mathematics to do away with as many of them as possible. Ultimately, it failed. Some truths were simply too basic to prove by referring back to anything else. Hence our axioms/postulates. (And entirely different systems of mathematics are created by selecting different postulates to be true.) I think that what you call "faith" or "wishful thinking" a theist calls "axiomatic" or "self-evidently true."
Why self-evidently true, when, as you like to point out, these beliefs are not scientifically necessary? Well, many of the theists here claim to have had a direct revelation of some sort; a spiritual experience of God that an exclusively scientific viewpoint does not explain to their satisfaction. (It may explain it to your satisfaction, but then, you're not the one who has had this experience.)
What to make of the fact that this spiritual experience directs different believers to different beliefs? Well, one simple conclusion is that at least some of them are simply deluded. Another possible explanation is that they are approaching Truth from different angles, and each is right about some things and wrong about others, and that all of their spiritual experiences nonetheless have meaning.
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FWIW, I personally do not consider sexual morality intrinsically important, except insofar as it is a consequence of some deeper moral principle.
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Well, on sexual morality, I think I'll just have to disagree. Be kind and do not hurt anyone; that will serve as well for sex as for anything else. Though it might be more difficult to do, of course, which is where a few implementation details would come in handy. I don't object to rules of thumb for sexual ethics, even quite firm ones; I do object to rules that are not based in the principle of kindness, or doing no harm.
As for duty to others, if you are talking about social contracts, I think that comes under reasonable. People extend protection and service to you, you do the same for them. That's reasonable.
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In any case, I think it's time for me to step out of this thread--at least in terms of posting. Not because anybody's been rude--I think most people here are making an effort to be thoughtful, despite occasional lapses. However, as someone who is neither a theist exactly nor quite an atheist, I think I can't say anything that will speak too well to the beliefs of either group. I think my posts are an annoying distraction in this thread.
I will continue to read it, though, in the hopes that I come away with something useful to me.
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quote: About ethics, I am talking basic principles, not engineering details.
So am I. I think that the differences in ethical systems often come down to a difference in basic principles. Saying we should strive not to murder does not tell us whether we agree that you should never intentionally kill because the “sacredness” (or secular equivalent) of life is a basic principle, or whether we’re not murdering because we respect the rule of law, or whether it’s an enlightened self-interest thing where we agree not to kill because we don’t like the probably consequences. Those basic principles affect when, if ever, we think we (or “the state”) might be justified in killing someone. There is a book called Six Theories of Justice whose author I cannot recall at the moment, that does a good job of setting out the different starting places for a theory of what a “just” economy looks like. Where you start, your basic principles, make a huge difference in where you end up. This is true for all branches of ethics, not just economic. I think a large part of the divisiveness in our current society is caused by differences in basic principles and a lack of discussion of those principles.
quote: I think, actually, those questions are not different at all.
And I think they are. Please realize that when I use the word “God” I’m not talking about a glorified man in the sky (nightgown and white beard optional). The God of classical Christianity isn’t really a “being” at all, regardless of folk theology and popular misconception to the contrary. God is rather the source or ground of being. The undergirding of existence. Pick your language, none of it quite works.
So I don’t ask “does God, as described in the Bible, exist” in the way that you could ask whether Ender, as described by Orson Scott Card, exists. I ask, rather, do the experiences, physical and mystical/spiritual, that fellow humans have described, written down and struggled with for 2000 years help me make sense of my own experiences, physical and mystical/spiritual. And I find that they do.
Friedrich Schleiermacher defined religious experience as “an intuition of the infinite.” He then said that all our stories and doctrines and creeds are attempts to put words around that experience, which is in itself beyond words. I tend to agree with that. Some people choose to use equations to work out their “intuition of the infinite.” I confess to some leanings in that direction myself -- when I was in high school I intended to be a physicist or study abstract mathematics, although my life went a different direction and it’s been almost 15 years since my last calculus or physics class. Some people use language. The language route is certainly messier, but I think it’s just as valuable. I’m glad we have both.
I don't mean to butt in here, but I do have a comment about your saying, in essence, that a person who was raised Christian will use their reason only within that framework and thus come to conclusions that are based on Christianity.
First: You assume that a Christian (or anyone else who is religious) is incapable of thinking. While I know of people who live in closed frameworks of all kinds (including some Christians and some atheists, who reject any thought that isn't from within their dominant belief), not many would call the activity they engage in "reasoning." Most people are not so limited or narrow.
Second: I think you're implying that "true reason" would somehow be independent of any frame of reference. Or, you're saying that an atheistic framework would at least lead to "better" conclusions. I challenge either assumption. First, I don't think it's possible to think without some framework. I also don't see that one framework is necessarily superior to any other. What I do believe is that people can use the framework consciously, and, with reason, expand the frame when needed.
Third: Some ideas are as old as humanity. Should we jettison them? If they became part of (practically?) every culture on earth (e.g., the equivalent of the golden rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you"), AND are a cornerstone of Christianity...what should we do with them? I'm not asking if there are (or are not) universals. We've had that argument already. What I'm wondering is what the heck the difference it makes where a person gets their moral code for the purposes of your argument about thinking outside their own frame of reference.
I happen to think from a Scopatzian frame of reference. It includes Christianity, Catholicism (big C), catholicism (little c), biology, advanced study in Psychology, empiricism, and a healthy smattering of American-style television from the 1950's through 1970's. Plus the traditions within my family. And the odd scraps picked up from a sibiling 18 months older than me. And the fact that my aunt came and lived with us when I was 10. And the strange way I communicated with my grandfather who didn't speak a word of English (nor did I speak any Italian). And the cats I had as a kid. And the dog I never had as a kid. And the way I could run faster than everyone else and was smarter than everyone but this one girl in 3rd grade. And how I hated to read, but loved Tom Sawyer. And wanted to be doctor since the age of whatever. And turned every surface into a drum, and, and and and and and...
Summing ANYONE up by saying they are only able to reason from "within their frame" is only going to be "TRUE" if you allow that frame to be as individualized as the person themself. In which case, you might as well say that every person reasons to the best of their ability given the sum of their knowledge and experience.
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Well, it seems to me, then, that you have redefined your god to the point of pointlessness. Your description is now so vague that it amounts to waving your hands and saying "but dude, like yeah, I definitely felt something, like, big." If you cannot reasonably ask the question of whether an entity exists or not, then I think it is time to stop right sharp and consider whether that entity is actually useful for anything. Like Reverend Thrower in Seventh Son, you have girded your god about with impressive-sounding words, sound and fury that looks impressive enough, until some child sees through the facade and laughs.
I also think that you are claiming the imprimatur of classical Christianity for your beliefs, where none actually exists; perhaps we could ask Dag whether he believes his god is a 'being' or not?
Now, it does occur to me that you might ask the question "does justice exist, or not?" I would hardly want to argue that we should do away with abstract concepts. But the difference here is that the answer is simple : There ain't no justice. Justice is simply the name we gave to some aspects of human relations. It is not defined outside those bounds. Now, you may disagree with this assertion, but I think you'll agree that it has consistency.
As for your experiences, well, it's your life. But it seems to me rather arrogant to think that the electrochemical workings of your brain should have any deeper connection to the groundwork of the Universe. Why should they, after all? They evolved to get the juicier bit of fruit, or an extra bit of sex when the alpha wasn't looking. Expecting them to pierce the pillars of the earth, and see the meaning of the Universe, strikes me as rather hubristic. In short, I don't think this project of yours is grounded well enough.
About ethics, actually, you may have a point. I'll have to think about that one. But if we are going to argue about where ethics comes from - and I agree that this is even more fundamental than what they are - then the truthfulness of Jesus' claims becomes still more important to his claims of being a teacher. After all, doesn't he say that the law comes from his god? If his god does not exist, then doesn't even his ethics become rather suspect?
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I’m sorry that you feel that way. I thought we were making headway in understanding each other, but if you can reduce my post to what you did, I guess I was wrong.
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quote: So I don’t ask “does God, as described in the Bible, exist” in the way that you could ask whether Ender, as described by Orson Scott Card, exists. I ask, rather, do the experiences, physical and mystical/spiritual, that fellow humans have described, written down and struggled with for 2000 years help me make sense of my own experiences, physical and mystical/spiritual. And I find that they do.
Which is ultimately where we part ways. Because as KoM points out, sooner or later this line of inquiry boils down to a question of authority: "I believe this to be true because of X." And if X is just going to be my own interpretation of literature and folktale, or my own derived moral system built on the work of dead Greeks, or something that I thought out over coffee at a truck stop, then ultimately it's my philosophy and not in fact someone else's religion.
There's no appeal to authority here. I can't say "we should do this because Jesus was speaking for God when he said 'X'" -- because if it's all open to interpretation and possibly the work of fallible men, how do I know what Jesus did or did not say, or whether he was speaking for God at all? How do I even know God exists, to provide a reliable baseline for this morality in the first place?
Dana's approach to faith -- which I've never actually criticized publicly, not least because she's completely devoted to it but also because I deeply respect the time and research she's put into that pursuit -- is a fascinating one, and in many ways parallels the typical morality of the most ethical agnostics. It deviates in a few specific ways, of course, but ultimately it winds up producing a largely optional God whose dictums and scriptures can be picked through for the freshest, ripest wisdom.
I'm oversimplifying, I know. But when it comes down to it, this is already my philosophy; I hesitate to call it a religion in my case only because I am reluctant to pretend to speak with divine authority on issues of ethics. But certainly I've already gone through all the greatest works of philosophy and literature produced by man, pulling out the bits that made sense to me and assembling a moral framework that seems simultaneously responsive, fair, and just. In fact, from this perspective, Christians who do the same thing to Christianity are in fact unnecessarily limiting themselves; why are they not rummaging through the scrap heaps of Buddhism and Zoroastrianism for fragments of the human condition? Why, in other words, commit to a given religion and limit your pool of available philosophies if you're going to live your life as if religion is a smorgasbord of philosophies in the first place?
I just don't see the point in having a God that is not an authoritative, omnipresent, and above all useful deity.
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If you feel I have misunderstood you so badly, could you perhaps try to clarify? I don't think I was being particularly insulting, was I?
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I'm curious KoM: Have you ever had a christian (or other theist for that matter) listen to your arguements and then say "Wow, guess I was wrong. There's no god and I'm an atheist now!" I don't mean that as criticism, in part because if it was you could reasonably say the fault was theirs for not listening to reason. You just seem to put much more time and effort in the debate (and to do it better) than most atheists I know, so I wonder if you've had any success convincing anyone.
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No, I’m not insulted. You tend to be rather blunt, but I knew what I was getting in for when I started this. As far as explaining, it will have to wait for tomorrow. I’m overdue to call my sweetie who is in an earlier time zone on business travel. I’ll give you a few thoughts, and work out a longer post in the morning.
quote:Now, it does occur to me that you might ask the question "does justice exist, or not?" I would hardly want to argue that we should do away with abstract concepts. But the difference here is that the answer is simple : There ain't no justice. Justice is simply the name we gave to some aspects of human relations. It is not defined outside those bounds. Now, you may disagree with this assertion, but I think you'll agree that it has consistency.
I do disagree with that assertion. I believe that justice exists, beyond arbitrary definitions. Also love, truth, and beauty.
quote:As for your experiences, well, it's your life. But it seems to me rather arrogant to think that the electrochemical workings of your brain should have any deeper connection to the groundwork of the Universe. Why should they, after all? They evolved to get the juicier bit of fruit, or an extra bit of sex when the alpha wasn't looking. Expecting them to pierce the pillars of the earth, and see the meaning of the Universe, strikes me as rather hubristic. In short, I don't think this project of yours is grounded well enough.
*shrug* So what do you base your deepest meaning on, if not your own experience?
quote:About ethics, actually, you may have a point. I'll have to think about that one. But if we are going to argue about where ethics comes from - and I agree that this is even more fundamental than what they are - then the truthfulness of Jesus' claims becomes still more important to his claims of being a teacher. After all, doesn't he say that the law comes from his god? If his god does not exist, then doesn't even his ethics become rather suspect?
Did I say that God does not exist? I don’t believe I did. Surely you’re not of the opinion that when Jesus said “God” he meant a guy in a nightgown?
quote: I also think that you are claiming the imprimatur of classical Christianity for your beliefs, where none actually exists; perhaps we could ask Dag whether he believes his god is a 'being' or not?
This is at the end, because I tried very hard to resist mentioning four years of grad school and a teaching assistantship in Historical Theology. (Obviously I didn’t try hard enough.) It doesn’t make me more likely than you to be right about the nature of God, but I think it does make me more likely to be right about the historical tradition. But let’s ask Dag anyway – I’d be interested in his take on it.
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Dana, I'm incredibly interested in your take on the nature of God; it seems to be fairly close to my own conception of the divine or...well...the tip of the iceburg of the divine, anyway. But that's neither here nor there--what prompted me to post was curiosity about what your take on Jesus is. What do you see him as having been?
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Tom, I like your ideas about taking the best part of different philosophies instead of limiting oneself to a narrow perspective of life. That seems to make sense, especially if one's definition of God is adaptable anyway.
If you don't mind my asking, I'm curious about your stance on God. Do you believe that some type of god may possibly exist (such as a creator), but not as the god described in the Bible or relevant to our personal existence or future? Or do you believe that god cannot exist and is nothing more than a concept we create in our minds?
KoM, I would like your thoughts on that as well? Additionally, did you grow up in a religious environment or were you raised as an atheist?
The reason why I ask about your religious background is that it seems that any type of response will conflict with your claim that a person's ability to reason is based on how he was raised. Correct me if I misunderstood your assertion.
quote:And then I am further saying that if you throw away these 'bad' miracles because that's not the kind of god you want to believe in, then your hanging on to the 'good' miracles like the resurrection begin to look a lot more like wishful thinking. If one part of the Bible is untrue because it was written by men, then why can't another part be?
I kind of agree with you here. The idea of choosing what God you believe in based on what you want to believe God is does seem to be wishful thinking. But as long as you abide by a basic set of ethics (can we agree that Jesus' code of ethics was pretty decent?), is it a bad thing to believe in God? You seem to imply that it is.
Belief in God isn't entirely about having an authoritative figure. It's also about, to quote dkw, "mak[ing] sense of my own experiences, physical and mystical/spiritual." To be sure, there are many alternative philosophies that attempt to make sense of those issues. But just as a belief in God doesn't provide some people with any satisfactory answers, the alternatives don't always provide satisfactory answers either. So as a result, I piece together a God that seems to make sense with my experiences and perceptions of the world. Maybe that's wishful thinking. Maybe that's incredibly naive. But I don't really understand how that can be negative. And I do think you can explore different philosophies while still having a fixed concept of God.
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I'm with Noemon, dkw; I'd be quite interested in hearing more about your take on Jesus in particular. Heck, I'd also be interested in hearing more about KoM's background, Tom's hodgepodge philosophy, and Dag's take on the "beingness" of God, as well as anything that Noemon and Icarus (should he choose to rejoin the conversation) might add. Despite a few lapses in politeness, this is a fascinating thread, guys. *grin*
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I also feel that Dana's view of God seems to describe my own pretty well, except I don't know what the heck to do with Jesus, so I'm glad Noemon asked that question. Posts: 289 | Registered: Apr 2005
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(btw, it seems like a damned if you do, damned if you don't thing. If you give final authority to the written source, then you are a Nazi monster. If you give the authority for interpretation to a living prophet, then you're substituting someone else's guesswork for your own. If you feel empowered to interpret scripture yourself and discern yourself which stories are embellishments by the human writers, then you have an empty, hodge-podge faith. It's no surprise that a pair of atheists will find every approash to theism somehow flawed, and it's unlikely that they will find anythign too convincing. I thought the questions was/morphed into "How do you justify this?" and that's the question that the theists have attempted to answer. Beyond that, we may simply be at the end of what's realistically possible in this thread.)
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I have apparently spent so much time and effort (on this thread and others) trying to debunk what I see as a caricature of Christian beliefs that I have been negligent in stating what I actually do believe. I loathe the very idea of “a la carte” religion, and the fact that Tom apparently sees my beliefs in that light has taken me quite aback. I’m doing some re-thinking, trying to figure out exactly where I’ve failed to communicate clearly. (I acknowledge the possibility that I might be deluding myself and actually do subscribe to an a la carte philosophy, but I don’t think that’s really the case.)
The fact is, I completely agree with the first 2/3 of the statement “I just don't see the point in having a God that is not an authoritative, omnipresent, and above all useful deity.” I’m not sure about the “useful” part – I don’t agree with the idea of valuing people for their usefulness, and that includes God. I believe that God is omni-present, omni-potent, omniscient, and all the other tenets of classical theology. I tend to use different vocabulary for it, but I am actually a very orthodox theologian. (quit laughing – it’s true.)
Crud. Now I don’t even know where to start.
The beginning I guess, would be authority. What does it mean to say that something is authoritative? I believe in free will, and a corollary to that belief (for me) is that something has authority over an individual only as it is granted by that individual. Authority is a function of relationship and community. So it doesn’t make sense, to me, to talk about anything being intrinsically authoritative. I suppose there is a possible side argument here about authority by force, but I’m going to sidestep it. I don’t believe that God works that way, and I don’t believe that humans who try to work that way will find it ultimately effective. You can compel obedience (or at least offer a choice between it and death) but unless the person compelled acknowledges your authority, they will find a way to rebel eventually.
So – axiom one of Dana’s systematic theology: authority is a function of relationship and web of relationships (community). It is granted by choice.
I do believe that God is an objective reality – it is our knowledge of God that can never be objective. We can know God only through God’s relationship with humans, and relationships are (by definition) subjective. So axiom two – all language about God is metaphor. There are no words in existence that accurately describe the reality.
So, a metaphor. Not my image, but I have heard the quest for God described as a climb up a mountain. Some people believe there is only one right path, others believe that there are multiple paths that eventually reach the same place. I believe that whichever of those is true, each person can only take one path. To try to pick your favorite steps from each will get you nowhere. Although looking at other folk’s maps and pulling insights from them can be useful, a life of faith is not read about, it is lived. You can study many faiths, you can only fully live one. Usually. I guess I know of some people that are trying to live more than one, but I think most of us do a better job with theological monogamy.
So I choose to grant authority to the traditions of my denomination, including the canonization of the books of the Bible as Holy Scripture. Every. Single. Verse. Even the ones I don’t particularly like. They’re part of the package, and I wrestle with them. But here’s the thing – because of what I believe about the Bible, that it is a collection of books, written from multiple viewpoints, over time, I can’t hold up verses, out of context, and say “here is a timeless truth, valid as a propositional statement in all contexts and at all times.” The question is always, “How does this fit in to the overall picture.”
Some of them I find to be in tension with each other. When that happens, I live in the tension. I’m not particularly bothered by it, as I’d find it much more troubling to force a false harmony on diverse viewpoints. No -- a better metaphor – I don’t want to force a false unison on voices that are singing in harmony. But though I am a narrative theologian, and may occasionally approach the Bible as a literary critic, I never approach it as an editor.
Ultimate authority I grant to God, not to the book. But since I believe that God is known only in relationship, and the best way to find that relationship is in community with other people seeking said relationship, it always brings us back to the book. I believe that the Bible is primarily the story of humanity’s developing relationship (and developing understanding of our relationship) with God. It is not primarily a rule book, a history book, a science book, or a philosophy book. It is primarily a love story. (But an authoritative love story!) Like most love stories, the lovers occasionally misunderstand each other. (And like many love stories, it even ends with a wedding.)
And thus when I say that what I mean by the term “God” is “ultimate reality” and that I believe in the God of the Bible, what I am saying is that I believe that ultimate reality is personal and benevolent. I believe that ultimately love triumphs over hate, justice over oppression, peace over violence. Life over death. Notwithstanding all evidence to the contrary, I believe.
And I believe that I have tried so hard to avoid theological “jargon” in this post that I have again watered it down beyond all tolerance. Oh well. In spite of my failings, I hope this clarifies more than it mudifies.
Noemon, Icky, et. al, I will write a post on Jesus, but it will have to wait for another day. I will be offline until late this evening. I’ve probably got enough verbiage here for several days worth of posting anyway.
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No problem Dana, take your time. I'm looking forward to reading what you have to say, but it can wait.
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I'm still not sure I understand why it's okay to approach all the various anecdotes within the Bible and the Christian tradition with skepticism, on the assumption that doing so brings you closer to God, and okay to be a committed but skeptical Buddhist who thinks that, just perhaps, the Golden Path is really just a metaphor and there isn't actually an afterlife, but combining elements of those philosophies into a hodgepodge creates a hopeless muddle.
To me, the problematic part is the claim that human reason can be trusted to effectively recognize the authoritative -- and by authoritative, here I mean ultimately Truthful -- elements that may exist in any one religion. Once you grant that, I don't see why human reason can't be trusted to recognize the authoritative elements of every religion.
The reason I find that problematic, of course, is that once people start going "Okay, this part doesn't make any sense to me. It conflicts with this other part, it seems theologically unsound, and I think it's very obviously a product of its time; it's just a metaphorical myth about the formation of a new tribe, perhaps containing valuable character information about the people of that time and their understanding of God," they're now asserting that they're capable of discerning authoritative scripture and/or dogma -- and, at worst, rejecting scripture they believe is not authoritative.
But what grounds do they have for this approach? What entitles them to their interpretation? What logic, for example, permits half of all American Catholics to still accept the Pope as the mouthpiece of God while continuing to support abortion, on the assumption that maybe the Pope hasn't heard God correctly?
Liberal theology, as much as I sympathize with it -- since, after all, my own ethical standards more closely line up with those of liberal theologians -- doesn't make any sense to me. The whole point of religion, beyond the sense of community, is the improved understanding of the universe and its built-in ethical systems, the ability to get closer to a specific God through His own instructions. Looking at those instructions and saying, "Hm. Well, that one was written by a fallible man," to me, implies that one feels perfectly capable of reaching God on one's own terms, albeit with the guidance of some helpful folktales.
And if that's the case, I think we're actually talking about the original concept behind agnosticism -- the idea that God may or may not exist, and even if He does that He's effectively unknowable, but that it doesn't matter. We all become Unitarians at that point.
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Tom, I couldn't disagree more about the "whole point of religion."
To me, the whole point of religion is to aid in the understanding BY the individual, OF the individual's purpose and "place" in the great (as in vast) realm of existence.
One way SOME religions do this is through "received knowledge" -- that which is passed down (from God, presumably) through some authority figure, an on to the faithful.
Another way is through sacred texts (which some may call the codification of received knowledge -- i.e., an authority figure took up pen or dictated some basic truths).
But those aren't the only way.
And...while it is true that the TRADITIONAL Christian approach is one that heavily relied on appeal to authority, and that Christianity itself was born of an older tradition that also relied on appeals to authority, that does not mean that this is the one and only way that Christians can realize the value of their religion.
In fact, for some of us, "authority" is a very sticky subject. Do I really NEED an intercessor? What is the role of Scripture in my search for my own purpose and place? Does Scripture HAVE TO BE authoritative to be useful in may personal quest?
These are important issues. And while it may seem like we're all just going to turn into Unitarian Universalists if we don't all recognize SOME authoritative "something" I have to ask...so what?
Who do Christians have to satisfy? Does it destroy Christianity if we all don't do it the same? Or does it just make it difficult for non-Christians to figure out what we really stand for? And should any Christian care about that?
There aren't a lot of basic requirements for being Christian. You have to believe that Jesus is the Christ (the savior).
After that...not much else (although some people will try to tell you otherwise, and maybe dkw will have a longer list based on a more thorough understanding than I have of these issues).
But, really, Christianity IS an individual thing. The only reason there's a "religion" (in the organized "churchy" sense of things) is that one of the earliest traditions is to gather together for support, encouragement, and to be more "effective" in whatever we're trying to do.
It's not a card-carrying membership. And even at that, it's not a Bible-carrying membership. Heck, Catholics just a generation older than I am didn't even read the Bible outside of the mass and then it was carefully tailored and explained. And they basically lay claim to the oldest of Christian traditions.
So bother me not with this "authority" thing. And don't try to tell me that my religion must do X for me. I know what I want out of it. And I know what I have to offer in return.
And that's about all I can or will worry about. If it doesn't meet some external standard, I'm not at all worried about it.
If God came to me and said my attitude needed adjusting, I might make the attempt. But I'm not about to go out seeking an increase in "authority" -- been there, done that, not interested.
And yet, paradoxically, I'd be willing to go on record as asserting in the strongest possible terms the right to call myself a Christian.
And to defend vociferously the right of any other person so inclined.
Except for Pat Robertson. His card has been cancelled.
I have it on good authority.
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quote: There aren't a lot of basic requirements for being Christian. You have to believe that Jesus is the Christ (the savior).
But if you believe that, don't you have to believe he's also saving you from something? And doesn't that belief bring with it a fair number of theological implications?
quote: So bother me not with this "authority" thing.
Oh, I won't bother you with it. But I AM curious as to what you get out of being a Christian specifically that you would not get out of being Taoist, Buddhist, or Muslim. You say you assert your Christianity in "the strongest possible terms" -- but why? And why bother? What value is there to "asserting" Christianity when Christianity is being defined as a collection of fables and anecdotes? What moral lessons are available to a Christian that are not available to a well-meaning and determined Hindi?
posted
It seems to me that you're making a choice even when you do follow a path with a stricter reliance on authority. You're choosing to accept that authority. Either way, you're picking what sounds good to you. If the Baptist or LDS tradition in its entirety sounds good to you, you go with it. Who were you to choose the Baptist tradition? What makes you think you can choose between religions, or between denominations of a religion?
Heck, the people who started different religious traditions and Christian denominations were taking upon themselves the power to reject some ideas previously held as true.
People choose their religion, or their denominations, or the specifics of their beliefs, based on what evokes a spiritual response in them. If you're being uncharitable, you might say it's wishful thinking. Otherwise, you might say it felt like revelation to them.
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quote:I don't mean to butt in here, but I do have a comment about your saying, in essence, that a person who was raised Christian will use their reason only within that framework and thus come to conclusions that are based on Christianity.
No, I don't think I said that. If that were true, then no deconversions would be possible. Parents are powerful, but not that powerful! What I did say, however, is that spiritual experience is highly malleable. Surely you cannot believe that, had dkw been unaware of the Bible, she would have interpreted whatever episodes she's had as evidence of the Christian god? It seems to me, then, that such experience cannot be used as proof of one religious tradition in favour of another, because they will inevitably be coloured by whatever beliefs were there beforehand. And since, in this context, atheism is as good a religious tradition as any, spiritual evidence just doesn't apply.
quote:I'm curious KoM: Have you ever had a christian (or other theist for that matter) listen to your arguements and then say "Wow, guess I was wrong. There's no god and I'm an atheist now!" I don't mean that as criticism, in part because if it was you could reasonably say the fault was theirs for not listening to reason. You just seem to put much more time and effort in the debate (and to do it better) than most atheists I know, so I wonder if you've had any success convincing anyone.
Not that I know of, no. But then, I wouldn't necessarily know. But I enjoy arguing, about almost any subject. As for being good at it, I suppose practice makes perfect. Then again, maybe I just have an easily defensible position. It's often easier to argue for truth.
quote:I do disagree with that assertion. I believe that justice exists, beyond arbitrary definitions. Also love, truth, and beauty.
Well, that's fine. It's an issue on which reasonable people might differ. The point is, though, that you can meaningfully ask "Does justice exist outside humanity?" and give an answer to the question. You seemed to be asserting that you could not meaningfully ask the question "Does a god exist?" That's what I object to as vague.
quote:*shrug* So what do you base your deepest meaning on, if not your own experience?
Sure, but I'm not the one claiming that my deepest meaning has any connection to the actual workings of the Universe.
quote:Did I say that God does not exist? I don’t believe I did. Surely you’re not of the opinion that when Jesus said “God” he meant a guy in a nightgown?
Why not? Jesus was a creature of his times, as much as you or I. He didn't have two thousand years of theology to draw on - ok, a certain amount of Jewish tradition, to be sure, but there again, how much would a carpenter's son have learned? And the stories seem to show him as rather contemptuous of the orthodoxy of his times, anyway. It seems to me that the god he describes is a moderately personal one. Anything capable of begetting a son is surely a being!
quote:If you don't mind my asking, I'm curious about your stance on God. Do you believe that some type of god may possibly exist (such as a creator), but not as the god described in the Bible or relevant to our personal existence or future? Or do you believe that god cannot exist and is nothing more than a concept we create in our minds?
KoM, I would like your thoughts on that as well? Additionally, did you grow up in a religious environment or were you raised as an atheist?
Well, certainly a god could exist, though the one described in the Bible is rather full of contradictions; I just don't see the usefulness of the hypothesis. It doesn't explain anything.
My parents, to the best of my knowledge, are about as religious as your average rock; certainly there was no churchgoing in my youth, not that that's very common in Norway anyway. On the other hand, they perhaps do not feel very strongly about it; they had me and my sister baptised to please our grandparents, and I believe my father is still a member of the state church - that is to say, he was enrolled at his baptism and has never bothered to get out, as far as I know.
On the other hand, the Norwegian schools still had religious instruction when I was young, of which I had one stultifyingly boring year. (Not necessarily the fault of the subject matter, I was rather ahead of my classmates and found most of the subjects exceedingly boring.) Plus I was, for some reason, sent to a moderately religous kindergarten. (I must not have been paying attention, as I recall absolutely zero formal instruction there; I base the classification on what my mother told me later. From a later, older perspective, I can see that they were indeed quite religious - there was even a cross on the wall outside - but all I recall of the kindergarten is playing with the Legos, sneaking into the out-of-bounds forest over the fence, and jumping on pillows in the playroom. Oh, and the day I arrived wearing mismatched footwear, chanting an old nursery rhyme going "one-two, one-two, one boot and one shoe." It was a great comic success. Still, they could hardly have let us play as we wanted all day. Maybe there were Bible stories over lunch, or something?)
I do recall coming home once at seven or so and asking my mother "Do you know where I came from? God made me!" I believe she took the opportunity to tell me of the birds and bees, but I don't recall exactly. At any rate, I was probably quite ready to believe her if she said something along the lines of "Well, that's just a story they tell at school" or "Yes, some people believe that." But I don't remember. It could even be that I have mis-recalled my words, that they were more "Do you know what they said at school?" in a disbelieving tone; I had been quite interested in the birth of my sister two years earlier, and may well have argued with the teacher.
The next year, since my mother wasn't a member of the state church, they were able to get me into the comparative religions class taught to heathens, where I fit in much better. (I do believe that, had they both been members, one or both might have left to get me that class; I don't think they were any too enchanted with the Christian instruction I was getting. For my sister it wasn't so much of an issue; by her time, Christian instruction had been found incompatible with religious freedom, even when there was an opt-out class, and the two were merged into a single "religion" class - not "Christianity", as had been the case for me. Though there have been some complaints among Moslems that Christianity is still favoured by the teachers.)
quote:Btw, it seems like a damned if you do, damned if you don't thing. If you give final authority to the written source, then you are a Nazi monster. If you give the authority for interpretation to a living prophet, then you're substituting someone else's guesswork for your own. If you feel empowered to interpret scripture yourself and discern yourself which stories are embellishments by the human writers, then you have an empty, hodge-podge faith.
Well, yes. This is exactly what I am arguing. And I have yet to see anyone put forth a convincing case, or even an unconvincing case, that it is a false dichotomy. (Trichotomy?)
quote:So I choose to grant authority to the traditions of my denomination, including the canonization of the books of the Bible as Holy Scripture.
But wait. Why do any such thing? What do you gain by it; what is explained by this that couldn't equally well be explained by atheism? As a general rule, authorities give something in return for being recognised, if only the most rudimentary of protection. You seem to be taking for granted that there is going to be an authority, and reason from there; but it is the first step I object to. This is again what I said in my earlier post; you reason about what to believe, but not about whether to believe.
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quote:But wait. Why do any such thing? What do you gain by it; what is explained by this that couldn't equally well be explained by atheism?
What do you gain by atheism that you could not have with a rational approach to theism? I think over and over again you mistake why people believe, and what they get out of it. You assume they believe because of the stories of miracles, as evidence; I don't think this is the case. You also seem to think that people choose faith as a way to get answers to questions that could be answered by science and history; dkw has quite clearly asserted otherwise. It seems to me that she is seeking wisdom of another sort. And this doesn't mean that Christianity per se is necessary to that end, but it's the route that she has chosen.
-o-
quote:Sure, but I'm not the one claiming that my deepest meaning has any connection to the actual workings of the Universe.
posted
(And I know I said I would stop cluttering this thread, but I'm bored at the moment, so *shrug* this thread is the most interesting one on the board to me right now.)
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quote:What do you gain by atheism that you could not have with a rational approach to theism?
Well, in the first place, I have my Sundays free, and need not worry about a bunch of rules written down by goatherders. Ask starLisa, on the other side, how much fun that is. But more to the point, atheism is the default position. Every baby is born an atheist; it doesn't need a reason to continue thus. Theism makes an additional assumption, which needs defending.
quote:I think over and over again you mistake why people believe, and what they get out of it. You assume they believe because of the stories of miracles, as evidence; I don't think this is the case. You also seem to think that people choose faith as a way to get answers to questions that could be answered by science and history; dkw has quite clearly asserted otherwise. It seems to me that she is seeking wisdom of another sort. And this doesn't mean that Christianity per se is necessary to that end, but it's the route that she has chosen.
But again, the existence, or not, of a god is a matter of fact. This isn't some airy question of ethics or Platonic ideals we are discussing; dkw has stated
quote:I do believe that God is an objective reality
That's an assertion of fact, to be investigated by evidence. And if it is wrong, then I think the whole "Religion as search for truth" approach falls apart. How can such a vast mistake lead to truth?
quote:Of course you are!
Excuse me, but I'm not. Dkw has offered her own spiritual experiences as proof for the existence of something. She has also said that by explaining those episodes, her faith moves her closer to an understanding of the ultimate reality. That is what I mean by saying that she believes her deepest meanings have connection to the workings of the Universe.
Now, certainly I have beliefs connected to 'spiritual', or at least emotional, experiences, too. I believe, for instance, that my girlfriend loves me, for which I can offer no evidence that would stand up in a court of law, or even in a science journal. But I don't reason from there to atheism!
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