quote:Not all religions are based on faith. Some are definitely based on reason. In some ways, you can thank people like Ingersoll for that.
If the religion makes moral "ought" statements ("people ought to do X"), then that religion is based on faith, meaning at least one premise not suitable to obective proof.
posted
Of which religions do you speak when you say they are based on reason? I still think that even those religions that have reason as a large component must have, at their core, assertions that cannot be proven empirically. Otherwise it isn't religion, it's science.
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quote:But they had a direct line to God at that point, and had made covenants to obey him. He was accepted as a source of reliable information.
But the reliability of that information is precisely the point at issue! You cannot argue that God is good because he says so, and then argue that he is truthful because he is good.
Not to be tiresome with the Nazi analogy, but the SS accepted Hitler's word as good, too. My whole point is that you cannot take the accused's justification at face value. If Yahweh had a good reason for killing all those people, fine, let him tell us all about it. Until and unless that happens, I can only judge on the results I see : Genocide, massacre, and misery.
Incidentally, it's not like the Canaanites were angels. They had themselves come into the Fertile Crescent in much the same manner, putting populations to the sword as they went, justifying their actions by 'Our God commands it!' Just how are the Jews any different? Why is their god a better source than the Canaanite gods? Just because they won?
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posted
I have a bizarre question that I have been wondering for some time now. I mean no offense by it, I am trying to understand. During my time on Hatrack, I have noticed that it is a common thing for agnostics to be very disturbed by God's behavior in the Old Testament. A lot of their poignant questions are pointed towards Christians who believe in (and give more weight to) the New Testament which professes such things as love and faith.
What of those who believe in the Old Testament and not the New? Namely, the Jews. I have not ever (to my recollection) heard people specifically asking Jewish people how they can believe in such an evil, horrible, war-mongering God. If it is pointed at any group, it is specifically Christians.
Is this due to being disturbed that God seems to "change" so drastically from the Old to the New? Is it somehow less disturbing to believe in a killing, apparently ruthless God when he is at least consistent in that nature?
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posted
I think it's mainly because most of the religious people that regularly argue about it on this forum are Christians. If there are any Jews reading this, though, comrade beverly raises a good point. How can you believe in such a murderous god?
As for the New Testament, I'm not convinced it's any better than the Old. OK, I can save myself from eternal hellfire by bowing the knee and worshipping. I could no doubt have saved myself from a few beatings by giving the school bully my lunch money, too, but I don't think that made him morally superior.
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As I said on the first page, the Old Testament was part of what initially pushed me away from all three monotheistic religions, not just Christianity, since all three worship the same god.
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KoM, I am intrigued that you find the New Testament as distasteful as you find the Old. You see, I can understand someone being disturbed by the Old Testament. I guess the New Testament alone isn't very specific on what happens to people who didn't get a chance to understand the gospel in this life and therefore knowingly reject it. It seems that Christian's beliefs differ from group to group or even individual to individual on what happens here. Most say they don't know and trust God's judgement on the issue.
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posted
King of Men, your argument appears to be that Christianity uses circular arguments. However, you're right! It does! In another thread, I made reference to the biblical definition of faith (or at least I meant to). Ready for it?
Hebrews 11:1 Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
Basically, by definition faith not only doesn't require proof, it requires that there be NO proof. Why do people believe this stuff? Because the have faith. As far as I can work it out, faith is a matter of choice. People believe because they choose to, and when that choice is made, the rest of the world will begin to match the belief system a person adopts, even if someone else would interpret the same evidence differently.
Did Hitler's Generals have faith in Hitler's vision? If so, they would probably argue the evil of the jews pretty much the same way (until they got tired of you and had you killed, that is.) Faith has been reponsible for some really horrible things in history. The only reason the ones in the old testament don't seem as horrible to believers is that they have chosen to believe it isn't horrible. That, in a nutshell, is why I no longer believe. I can certainly understand how people do, though.
BTW, faith has also been responsible for some really good things. Most of the time, bad things happen when people put their faith in a living person, or a person's interpretation of the moral code or religion, and not the religion itself. At least that's how I choose to see it, because I can't bring myself to believe that al religion is avil.
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quote:But the reliability of that information is precisely the point at issue! You cannot argue that God is good because he says so, and then argue that he is truthful because he is good.
But you cannot argue he is bad if the nature of morality itself requires knowledge of God to discern.
In other words, your moral information that calls God bad can be no more reliable than mine which calls him good.
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|demosthenes|, I would actually broaden that. I think that a fanatical devotion to any ideology can easily result in evil, regardless of how pure or good the ideology itself may be.
posted
Idemo, I look at it as being similar to having trust in the character of a person you know well who stands accused of an unkind action that is out of character for them. You have experiences with that person that lead you to believe that they would not act in the way someone has accused them of.
Those of religious faith trust in the experiences they have had with God. I understand that agnostics think that is a bunch of huey, but the religious count it amongst their everyday experiences.
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quote: First, experience includes the stories we are told by others. Most experience, in fact.
No way. I find your (edit: second) statement very odd.
Do you mean to say that we filter what we percieve through the framework of our culture and upbringing?
quote: Second, it's rather large hubris to believe that we can experience enough in our own lifetimes, interacting with a small percentage of people on a tiny portion of the earth (not to mention the Universe), to draw meaningful conclusions about life. It is necessary to draw on the experiences of others to do so.
I should probably have said "he, and others, observed/measured/experienced" and "based on these experiences".
And he *is* an agnostic, *not* an atheist, though the essay is confusing on whether he believes there is a God or gods, or not.
quote: Is there a God?
I do not know.
Is man immortal?
I do not know.
One thing I do know, and that is, that neither hope, nor fear, belief, nor denial, can change the fact. It is as it is, and it will be as it must be.
We wait and hope.
XI
When I became convinced that the Universe is natural -- that all the ghosts and gods are myths, there entered into my brain, into my soul, into every drop of my blood, the sense, the feeling, the joy of freedom.
next
quote: The walls of my prison crumbled and fell, the dungeon was flooded with light and all the bolts, and bars, and manacles became dust. I was no longer a servant, a serf or a slave. There was for me no master in all the wide world -- not even in infinite space. I was free -- free to think, to express my thoughts -- free to live to my own ideal -- free to live for myself and those I loved -- free to use all my faculties, all my senses -- free to spread imagination's wings -- free to investigate, to guess and dream and hope -- free to judge and determine for myself -- free to reject all ignorant and cruel creeds, all the "inspired" books that savages have produced, and all the barbarous legends of the past -- free from popes and priests -- free from all the "called" and "set apart" -- free from sanctified mistakes and holy lies -- free from the fear of eternal pain -- free from the winged monsters of the night -- free from devils, ghosts and gods. For the first time I was free. There were no prohibited places in all the realms of thought -- no air, no space, where fancy could not spread her painted wings -- no chains for my limbs -- no lashes for my back -- no fires for my flesh -- no master's frown or threat -- no following another's steps -- no need to bow, or cringe, or crawl, or utter lying words. I was free. I stood erect and fearlessly, joyously, faced all worlds.
And then my heart was filled with gratitude, with thankfulness, and went out in love to all the heroes, the thinkers who gave their lives for the liberty of hand and brain -- for the freedom of labor and thought -- to those who fell on the fierce fields of war, to those who died in dungeons bound with chains -- to those who proudly mounted scaffold's stairs -- to those whose bones were crushed, whose flesh was scarred and torn -- to those by fire consumed -- to all the wise, the good, the brave of every land, whose thoughts and deeds have given freedom to the sons of men. And then I vowed to grasp the torch that they had held, and hold it high, that light might conquer darkness still.
Let us be true to ourselves -- true to the facts we know, and let us, above all things, preserve the veracity of our souls.
If there be gods we cannot help them, but we can assist our fellow-men. We cannot love the inconceivable, but we can love wife and child and friend.
We can be as honest as we are ignorant. If we are, when asked what is beyond the horizon of the known, we must say that we do not know. We can tell the truth, and we can enjoy the blessed freedom that the brave have won. We can destroy the monsters of superstition, the hissing snakes of ignorance and fear. We can drive from our minds the frightful things that tear and wound with beak and fang. We can civilize our fellow-men. We can fill our lives with generous deeds, with loving words, with art and song, and all the ecstasies of love. We can flood our years with sunshine -- with the divine climate of kindness, and we can drain to the last drop the golden cup of joy.
To get back to your point about "devils", should I behave as if there are devils when there is no evidence for them, or should I behave on what has been "shown" to exist and, if devils are shown to exist, then act on that knowledge?
posted
Well, I've co-opted the definition of faith from the bible, because I think it's a really good one, but in my reasoning you can have "faith" in anything, whether it be an ideology, a religion, or a person. Putting faith in the wrong thing leads to trouble. Just look at any woman who keeps going back to an abusive spouse because he's "good at heart, and he promised he'd change." She is absolutely certain of what she hopes for, and sure that the change she does not see will come to pass. Textbook example of faith in precisely the wrong thing.
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posted
I have to go and won't be able to post until tomorrow evening. Night, all. Thanks for the many posts in this thread.
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Idemo, that is a very good example. I agree that faith is a trait of everyday life rather than just a religious issue. And yes, that woman returning to an abusive spouse has ill-placed her faith. Posts: 7050 | Registered: Feb 2004
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quote:Well, I've co-opted the definition of faith from the bible, because I think it's a really good one, but in my reasoning you can have "faith" in anything, whether it be an ideology, a religion, or a person. Putting faith in the wrong thing leads to trouble. Just look at any woman who keeps going back to an abusive spouse because he's "good at heart, and he promised he'd change." She is absolutely certain of what she hopes for, and sure that the change she does not see will come to pass. Textbook example of faith in precisely the wrong thing.
That's even broader. Great. Posts: 10886 | Registered: Feb 2000
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quote:To get back to your point about "devils", should I behave as if there are devils when there is no evidence for them, or should I behave on what has been "shown" to exist and, if devils are shown to exist, then act on that knowledge?
If someone is exhibitng convulsions, involuntary behavior, or other symptoms associated with possession, and someone comes up to that person, says "I cast you out, foul demon" and the symptoms stop, why would you accept a "scientific" explanation that it was psychosomatic over the explanation that there was a demon?
In other words, if devils do exist, isn't it potentially very bad to act as if they don't?
quote:But you cannot argue he is bad if the nature of morality itself requires knowledge of God to discern.
Valid, but I dispute your premise. Plainly, many atheists are good and moral people by either your standards or mine. Therefore, morality does not require knowledge of God, and is indeed compatible with outright rejection of God. This being so, I can judge Yahweh by the same standards I apply to Hitler.
Mind, I'm not saying Yahweh is equally bad. After all, the population of the entire Middle East in those days probably didn't reach six million. And the Jews, nasty though they were, didn't have the industrial machinery of the death camps available to them. It's even possible they wouldn't have used it if they had; slave labour is so much more useful, after all.
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quote: If the religion makes moral "ought" statements ("people ought to do X"), then that religion is based on faith, meaning at least one premise not suitable to obective proof.
No, if a religion says people ought to do "X" because "Y" will happen on earth, then that religion (that statement) is based on reason.
If a religion says "people ought to do X" because God says so and leave it at that, then that religion, that statement, is based on faith.
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quote:Plainly, many atheists are good and moral people by either your standards or mine.
Only in the narrowest sense - the portion of morality which does not require knowledge of God. If morality is duty, it can be divided into duty to self, duty to others, and duty to God. If you claim the third category does not exist, then you are not leading a fully moral life by the definition who thinks it does.
quote:Therefore, morality does not require knowledge of God, and is indeed compatible with outright rejection of God.
posted
Dag, I wonder if you could clarify how ambivelance can cause as great an evil. If you mean a person failing to prevent an evil they could have.... I don't know. I'm having trouble with this one. Perhaps I should have said that people with misplaced faith have caused a great deal of evil. I really can't think of any great evils that have been caused by mad crusades of the ambivalent.
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quote:No, if a religion says people ought to do "X" because "Y" will happen on earth, then that religion (that statement) is based on reason.
Nope. Because it requires an unspoken premise that "Y is desirable." If this unspoken premise is objectively proveable, then it relies on some other premise, and so on until a first, unprovable (in the scientific or "rational" sense) is arrived at.
quote:If a religion says "people ought to do X" because God says so and leave it at that, then that religion, that statement, is based on faith.
You've just jumped to the first principle premise, while leaving it out of the "because Y will happen" premise.
posted
Might I suggest that the occurrance of "possession" may not be a part of our everyday experience because we don't interact with people who regularly open themselves to demon possession?
While I don't have any first-hand accounts, I do have accounts from trusted sources. An example: there is a certain sort of "magic" practiced in Brazil that is rather disturbing. Therefore it is more common for LDS missionaries (the source of my personal knowledge on the matter) in that part of the world to see the influence of of devils and demons than here in the US in their everyday lives.
Might people in Jesus' culture and time more frequently invited such influences? I don't know. I have also heard it suggested that some of the cases of possession may have simply been certain kinds of sickness that was not well understood. Certainly not all the cases, though, since the accounts describe Christ carrying on conversations with the demons involved.
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quote:Dag, I wonder if you could clarify how ambivelance can cause as great an evil. If you mean a person failing to prevent an evil they could have.... I don't know. I'm having trouble with this one. Perhaps I should have said that people with misplaced faith have caused a great deal of evil. I really can't think of any great evils that have been caused by mad crusades of the ambivalent.
Not just sitting by while big bad things like crusades, or genocide, happen (especially if the bad things are caused by fanatics), but also sitting by while insiduous suffering spreads.
posted
Once again, King of Men, you are using a nonreligious definition of morality. Morality, for a Christian, means following God's Commandments. It just so happens that that usually matches up with the generally accepted secular vision of morality meaning goodness to others, etc. Nevertheless, the two Commandments from Jesus are "Love the LORD your god with all your heart soul mind and strength" and "Love your neighbor as yourself." It is assumed that if you follow the rule to love, you will generally not do things like steal or kill or whatnot. According to most Christians I know, those two commandments generally pre-empt all the stuff in leviticus about not eating pork, etc. because they come straight from Jesus.
By the Christian definition of morality, you CAN'T be moral without acknowledgment of God, because you aren't following fully half of his commandments, the following of which defines morality.
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Duty, like respect, is a line that travels two ways. Even a feudal lord had duties to his vassals, including that of rendering fair judgment. If there is no reciprocity, then 'duty' is no more than a synonym for extortion.
Let me ask you a hypothetical question. Suppose you were presented with incontrovertible evidence that God exists, and is evil. However, he'll let you off Hell if you bow down and worship him with all your heart. Would you bend the knee?
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posted
Again with the even broader and the goodness and... yeah.
Though I can't decide whether I would assign equivalent moral culpability to the actors of the evil and the idle wafflers. I suppose it would depend on the nature of the evil (wow, way to take the relativist's cop-out, there... oh well). I'm not even sure to what extent degree of moral culpability matters to me.
quote:Suppose you were presented with incontrovertible evidence that God exists, and is evil. However, he'll let you off Hell if you bow down and worship him with all your heart. Would you bend the knee?
I don't know, simply because I'm not sure how strong my resolve is.
posted
To expand on the idea, how many atheists keep the Sabbath holy? Or refrain from taking the Lord's name in vain? Two of the Big 10. How many pay tithing? Or pray?
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posted
It's truly abhorrent that people are still starving in America, a nation where the most concentrated wealth in the world can be found, but I have a very difficult time ascribing the same sort of moral repugnance to a passive allowance of an evil as I do to an active and malicious causing of an evil. I look upon someone who walks past a beggar on the other side of the road with less revulsion than I would one who stabs him in the eye.
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But what about someone who stabs 1 person in the eye compared to someone who walks by 100,000,000 beggars in the street?
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But beverly, the new covenant doesn't include the ten commandments. They just work well as a moral code, so we still use them. If Hammurabi's code woutl fit on a glossy poster, we would probably see that around, too. The new covenant is just the two commandments I posted above, right?
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quote: Suppose you were presented with incontrovertible evidence that God exists, and is evil. However, he'll let you off Hell if you bow down and worship him with all your heart. Would you bend the knee?
It is the same moral dilemma I might be put into by any number of evil people trying to exercise control over me. When threatened, which of us would stand our ground and which of us would beg for mercy? How can we truly know unless we are in the situation?
But how is the question relevant? I personally believe God is good. Not just a kinda good, but so amazingly, gloriously, brilliantly good that we would be ashamed of our pock-marked, ill-formed personal moralities in comparison when we behold and comprehend Him. Therefore, I try my best to bend the knee, despite my own arrogance, pride, doubt, and other human failings. If I believed He were evil, I wouldn't try to follow Him at all except perhaps out of fear.
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Idemo, interesting point. As far as my own faith is concerned, I believe the Big 10 to still be "in force". I don't know how others believe though.
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I have heard it said that the opposite of love is not hate, for with hate, there is still passion. The opposite of love is indifference. You make a very good point, dag. I don't know what the math of morality comes out to, though. I would probably still despise the murderer more, just because of my personal conception of morality. I have no illusions it's the definitive one. What about you? Which one is worse? The murderer or the capitalist.
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posted
Beverly : Quite so. Now let me put it another way. Suppose you met a man with the power to have you tortured for the rest of your life; but he'll let you off if you agree to worship him. Oh, and, incidentally, he is "so amazingly, gloriously, brilliantly good that you are ashamed of your pock-marked, ill-formed personal morality in comparison when you behold and comprehend Him." That is to say, he really is an extremely good person : Kind to animals, gives generously to the poor, cares for his parents. He's just going to torture you if you don't do as he says. How is that different from the scenario you describe? And what are you going to do?
[ November 30, 2004, 10:00 PM: Message edited by: King of Men ]
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quote: If there are any Jews reading this, though, comrade beverly raises a good point. How can you believe in such a murderous god?
I don't. Read the entire Tanakh -- in Hebrew, to understand the actual words, with all their nuance -- and preferably a good commentary, because the Written Torah was never meant to be understood without the Oral Torah. Then I'll be happy to explain, case by case, why I don't believe God to be "murderous."
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quote:Kind to animals, gives generously to the poor, cares for his parents. He's just going to torture you if you don't do as he says
I'm going to take a page from rivka's book. If you want to discuss Christian doctrine, I'll be happy to (although not now, I'm going to bed). If you want to discuss charicatures of Christians doctrine, you can find lots of people to do that with you on the atheist/agnostic boards.
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