MrSquicky, I think that humanity's understanding of God might have evolved some since the genesis of genesis. I hope so, anyway. Don't let that particular myth loom so large as to block out the bigger picture.
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quote:Originally posted by TomDavidson: What you call a "belief" in Love, Jim, I would simply call a more functional definition of "love."
hmm... a belief that defines itself, perhaps? there's something here that's tingling my spidey sense (in a good way) and I can't quite put my finger on it.
quote:Orignially posted by Mr Squicky: You have a very different way of looking at the world than I do then
Did more than do. But yes... that's the very defect I was talking about. My particular brokenness, now healed, or at least healing, is my ability to undermine and second guess all the love in the world. I am glad to hear that you don't share that.
I didn't get at all from DD that he meant a less rigorous proof. All I did was suggest that I didn't think "Love" and "Proof" were two words that went together and he got rather riled.... so I elaborated to explain what I meant. If he will accept "signs" or "evidence" rather than "proof" I doubt he has a beef with me.
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quote:If you consider the role that God had designed, will-less slaves whose role was to worship him, I don't know that this was as much love as it was vanity.
I'd really like to know how you drew this conclusion. The scriptures don't support the idea that God created us without 'will.'
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boots, I don't know that I'll be able to convey the way I see this without spending a lot of time I don't have, but, short version, that myth (and the associated structures, supporting myths, and worldview) has, to me, an ongoing, profound, largely negative impact on our culture. I'll hunt up my very long posting from a thread from like 3 years ago that I think touch on this.
There are reasons for the evil in our culture and in your religion and the type of thinking typified and fostered by a mythological structure with this as its creation story seems to me to be one of them.
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quote:I'd really like to know how you drew this conclusion. The scriptures don't support the idea that God created us without 'will.'
Without knowledge there is no choice. Without choice there is no will. Adam and Eve lived like animals in the field.
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As provable as any emotional state, I suppose. We could test her brain for the chemical triggers that we know are usually present when "love" is felt -- but generally we humans wind up having to use behavior in an external context to judge inner context, simply because we don't have the technology available to see someone else's internal context.
I agree with Jim that "love" and "proof" don't go together well when you're being rigorous about the definition of "proof," but I think "proof" as another word for "demonstration" or "accumulated evidence" works fine here.
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: Adam and Eve lived like animals in the field.
I don't commonly see the story interpreted this way. And, indeed, it makes no sense to talk of the Sin of Adam if he and Eve indeed had know knowledge of right and wrong.
My own way of reconciling this is to think that "the knowledge of good and evil" is a misinterpreted phrase... the way I've often heard it put is that the fruit did not represent the ability to understand good and evil, but the desire to choose for themselves what good and evil meant. YMMV, though.
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boots, I'm going to reemphasize something from before.
I get the at you believe that your religion is both beneficial and true. However, I'm sure you'll acknowledge that Christians (as the group of people who practice a religion they call Christianity) historically and at present has many negative elements.
I'm saying that those elements are in part due to
quote:its definition of paradise as static and materialistic, it's denigration of free-will, and it's celebration of absolute obedience to authority.
Perhaps you don't see that in this particular myth or at least in the way that you interpret it. However, do you agree that these are bad things and that they have been and continue to be a part of many conceptions of Christianity?
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: boots, I don't know that I'll be able to convey the way I see this without spending a lot of time I don't have, but, short version, that myth (and the associated structures, supporting myths, and worldview) has, to me, an ongoing, profound, largely negative impact on our culture. I'll hunt up my very long posting from a thread from like 3 years ago that I think touch on this.
There are reasons for the evil in our culture and in your religion and the type of thinking typified and fostered by a mythological structure with this as its creation story seems to me to be one of them.
Don't worry about it. YOu don't nee to explain yourself to me. I'm just suggesting that, even though we don't always get it right, you don't have to toss the baby out with the bath. Your idea of God ()relationship with God) doesn't necessarily have to depend on ancient myth.
edit to respond to your newer post: Sure. As I've said, our understanding evolves. I am not a big proponent of a static paradise, denigration of free will, or absolute obedience to authority. I think these are things we have gotten wrong. I think that we can get beyond them and still celebrate a relationship with God - a better relationship, from my perspective.
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: I'm saying that those elements are in part due to
quote:its definition of paradise as static and materialistic, it's denigration of free-will, and it's celebration of absolute obedience to authority.
Perhaps you don't see that in this particular myth or at least in the way that you interpret it. However, do you agree that these are bad things and that they have been and continue to be a part of many conceptions of Christianity?
Again, you aren't talking to me, but I agree they are bad things. I do not agree that they are endemic to Christianity... indeed, one of the reasons I think those things are bad is my Christian perspective.
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quote:And, indeed, it makes no sense to talk of the Sin of Adam if he and Eve indeed had know knowledge of right and wrong.
Part of the authoritarian parenting type is an inventing or over-focus on things the child did wrong in order to foster a sense of guilt, encourage unquestioning obediance, and dampen individuality.
If you define God as good before you look at them, then you can invent interpretations that make sense in this context. Without this assumption, taking it as written, however, I think God comes across as an evil entity.
And this is a problem when you are trying to force "This being loves me and defines goodness." into stories where God is acting evil and without love. It's like someone in an abusive relationship recasting the character of the person they "love" and rewriting what acutally happens to make it so that person loves them. It transforms you in ways you aren't even aware of.
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quote:I do not agree that they are endemic to Christianity
I never said that they are endemic to Christianity. I said that they are evident in many interpretations of Christianity. Do you disagree?
Also, your Christian perspective leads you to believe that absolute obedience to authority is a bad thing? What about when that authority is God? I could be wrong, but I thought yuo were the one who recently posted something from either Lewis or Chesterson that said something along the lines that our goal should be to replace our judgement with God's judgement.
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boots, My conception of the doesn't rely on just Christianity and I rejected the Old Testament as scripture back when I was still Catholic.
But, just because I think that this deity is evil doesn't mean that he doesn't exist. And, if he doesn't exist, it doesn't mean that belief in him doesn't have serious effects on both the secular and spiritual world.
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Going back to the story that Puppy told about his 15 month old daughter getting shots. To a certain extent, the "story" we have of God was recorded by the fifteen month old.
MrSquicky, I don't need to change your mind, but I am curious as to why you form your opinion of God from scripture you recognize as flawed? Or other people's opinions that you also recoginze as flawed? There are other choices. Your perception of God doesn't have to depend on any of that.
If you were finding God without all that stuff, what would you find on your own?
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Well, I *do* think that denigration of freewill-- that is to say, utter denial of it-- *is* endemic to a materialist perspective.
But many? well sure... but I could as easily say that denial of moral responsibility is a part of many interpretations of atheism. If you wish to paint Christianity as a bogey then you will likely find Christians less than receptive to your message.
As for the Lewis quote... I believe Scott R posted it and, while I like that one, I view it very differently than you do and, indeed, than it reads. That is drastically colored by what I think Christianity means when it talks about dying to yourself and, in doing so, gaining your true self and true freedom. I do not know if my view is orthodox or would be applauded or derided nor by whom. I don't know for sure whow to even explain it except to say that I think what Christianity means in self-denial and taking up your cross is essentially self defense: killing your false egos because if you don't they will kill you. That's a ludicrously simplistic summary, though, and admittedly VERY colored by my personal journey.
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: Do most Christians believe that? Or do they believe that it is either written directly by God, dictated by him, or inspired by him?
And if that's the 15 month old, how old are we now? Are we going to get any older? If so, how?
I can't speak for most Christians. I would say an absolute "no" to the first two, and a qualified yes to the third.
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quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: Going back to the story that Puppy told about his 15 month old daughter getting shots. To a certain extent, the "story" we have of God was recorded by the fifteen month old.
Worth noting with a few asterisks. Thanks, Kate.
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D'Oh. I accidentally deleted a post up there that came right after boots's "The story was written by the 15 month old." post. This is what I took out.
quote:Do most Christians believe that? Or do they believe that it is either written directly by God, dictated by him, or inspired by him?
And if that's the 15 month old, how old are we now? Are we going to get any older? If so, how?
edit: One of the things that many types of Christians, both here and in the wider world, have said about atheists/people like me who don't believe in a transcendental, judging deity is that people can't be good without God making them/influencing them/being there to reward or punish. They've said that it is not in people's nature to want to do good.
To me, this is a sign of serious immaturity and it looks to me like it is specifically their belief in Christianity (their version) that is stunting their moral development.
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Thanks, Jim. It is a very loose metaphor! Lots of asterisks required.
MrS, I've edited instead of double posting. And we have sometimes cross posted while I was doing this. So you don't miss any of my precious drops of wisdom (heh), see above.
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quote:MrSquicky, I don't need to change your mind, but I am curious as to why you form your opinion of God from scripture you recognize as flawed? Or other people's opinions that you also recoginze as flawed? There are other choices. Your perception of God doesn't have to depend on any of that.
If you were finding God without all that stuff, what would you find on your own?
I don't form my opinion of the divine from just this. I form my opinion of one potential definition of the God or of some aspects of the divine from this. I'm open-minded about this sort of thing. I don't think that a deity must be good or one that I necessarily agree with.
I also look at the concrete communities that have grown up around this structure and the effects that the various beliefs have had on them.
I left Catholicism in part because of their elevation of the Old Testament to sacred status, but also because it didn't fit me in a multitude of other ways.
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Mormons definitely believe that the Bible was recorded by imperfect human beings trying their best to understand legitimate godly events. So yes, it was written by "the 15-month-old".
I've received a lot of pushback from other Christians on this topic, though. It's one of the subjects that bothers Bible perfectionists the most about Mormonism.
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quote:I think what Christianity means in self-denial and taking up your cross is essentially self defense: killing your false egos because if you don't they will kill you.
That's what I call "being an adult" and "being a healthy individual". There's no aspect of giving up my judgement for someone else's in that to me, but rather aggressively pursuing responsibility. In that vein, I reject the idea that my life is redeemed by anyone else's blood and suffering than my own. My judgement, my blood, my responsibility. I'll accept all the help I can get as long as you're not taking away my agency. I have no wish to re-enter the Garden of Eden and live a paradise where the right thing is whatever someone else tells me to do. edit: To me, that is at least as much a retreat as selfishness and false egos.
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Puppy, I think it bugs them about Catholics, too.
MrSquicky, for me the OT is sacred because it is the cultural relationship with God from which Jesus came. Which is important. Otherwise, no more "correct" than other culture's stories of thier relationship with God. I am often struck by how much truth is found in other mythologies and in the striking similarities.
(They haven't kicked me out for this yet. Sshhhh)
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How do you know that the fundamentalists aren't right? What if God really does dangle "sinners" over a fire and save only the ones it is his whim to save? What if nothing you do matters as to whether you'll go to heaven or not?
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: I don't know that I'll be able to convey the way I see this without spending a lot of time I don't have, but, short version, that myth (and the associated structures, supporting myths, and worldview) has, to me, an ongoing, profound, largely negative impact on our culture. I'll hunt up my very long posting from a thread from like 3 years ago that I think touch on this.
There are reasons for the evil in our culture and in your religion and the type of thinking typified and fostered by a mythological structure with this as its creation story seems to me to be one of them.
I don't mean to say that you are being unreasonable or insulting, but you definitely seem to hold the position that Christianity in particular and myth in general has been bad for the world. Forgive me if I mistook that.
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: How do you know that the fundamentalists aren't right? What if God really does dangle "sinners" over a fire and save only the ones it is his whim to save? What if nothing you do matters as to whether you'll go to heaven or not?
Then that would suck. I would be screwed anyway, so I'm certainly not going to stake my life on the truth of that proposal! And it doesn't really fit the evidence.
This is where the faith comes in.
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I meant asterisks to call attention to it, not as exceptions or caveats.
Squick, I, also, call it being an adult and a healthy individual. But I also think that the whole element of doing it yourself has a funddamental flaw... and it's also what I think people should be talking about hwen they say no one can be good without God. the thing that is missing there is the word "enough".
No one can be good *enough* without God. No one can earn the right to be loved... not nowhere, not nohow. The point which I see in the sacrifice on the cross here is that, as Paul said, "while we were still sinners, Christ died for us." It was a gift, of love, to those who didn't deserve it. Whether or not it actually happened, it is a perfect myth and metaphor for a healthy soul-- salvation is to be found in receiving the gift of Love without claim. Once you can accept that gift, everything else falls away. Once you learn of love... really learn to receive it... obedience doesn't become a matter of obedience anymore-- it merely becomes a choice, which you make because you are loved and, as such, you can now love in return.
I am probably not making heavy weather of it, but that's what I see as the message and point of Christ and Christianity: Jesus says "I love you. Extravagantly and without limit. To the point of death. You can accept love and be free, or you can reject it and struggle, stuck in the rut of trying to be good enough to earn your stature as a free man. But that struggle is an impossible, if noble one, and will end in your doom if you don't learn to receive that which you do not deserve."
But, again, I'm probably not speaking well...it's rare that a man who attempts to speak for God does.
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boots, If you reject Original Sin next you'll be following my heretical path.
You won't necessarily be screwed though. If God can be evil, he can also lie. As I said, in the as written myth, I think that the snake is the good guy in the Garden of Eden. There's another force, even in that myth structure. The God of the Old Testament may want us to be slaves, to accept that it is right to do things like kill our sons without even questioning it if he says so, but there is a liberating force too.
In your case, the question becomes more like is the liberating force Jesus, and (and this is the more interesting one for me) has the evil Old Testament God been able to pervert and insinuate Jesus's message such that you are back to worshipping the bad guy again and aspiring to become slaves.
And then, change evil Old Testament god into forces in human nature and belief structures and see if maybe that's a possibility.
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I think the point I may not be getting across is that God doesn't change, our understanding of God changes and (we hope) matures. It isn't the OT God vs Jesus. It is Jesus helping to change our understanding of God as recorded in the OT.
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quote:it's also what I think people should be talking about hwen they say no one can be good without God. the thing that is missing there is the word "enough".
You are definitely wrong on this count. The statements have been akin to "If I didn't believe in God, I would go out and do X." Where X is something like murder people or rape or whatever. They are very, very clear on this. edit: Just realized I missed your "should" in there. This isn't relevant then. Sorry./edit
Also, I reject, whole heartedly the Christian God's grace and the putative sacrafice on the cross. Are you saying that I can't be a healthy adult?
If the redemption on the cross was a matter of just love, I woudn't have as strong a feelings on it as I do. However, it's not. It's redemption. It's "You are bad/doomed/etc. without this." It's not just about love. It's about power and submission. It's also about saying that people like me are evil or, as you said, incapable of becoming healthy adults.
quote:Once you learn of love... really learn to receive it... obedience doesn't become a matter of obedience anymore-- it merely becomes a choice, which you make because you are loved and, as such, you can now love in return.
Obedience for the sake of obedience is not being good. Obedience without understanding isn't love in the way that I recognize it. It's submission. I want to do the right thing. I want to have a positive impact on others.
If you want to help me do this, tell me how. Show me how. Jesus did a great job of this. He gave us an example. As he did, so we also must do (ref. It is my blood that redeems me.) What we do to the least of his people, that we do unto him (and to ourselves). And then his followers largely abandoned these ideas (and killed other sects that focused on them more strongly).
But saying, give up your judgement for mine. Stop being yourself. That's not love to me. I would never do that, not even to a child. I teach when I love because I want them to be fully themselves, fully the thing that I love. Not what I tell them to be edit:, even if it is the right thing.
quote:I think the point I may not be getting across is that God doesn't change, our understanding of God changes and (we hope) matures. It isn't the OT God vs Jesus. It is Jesus helping to change our understanding of God as recorded in the OT.
How do you know?
Aren't there plenty of cases where outside things have polluted what you see as True Christianity?
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quote:it's also what I think people should be talking about hwen they say no one can be good without God. the thing that is missing there is the word "enough".
You are definitely wrong on this count. The statements have been akin to "If I didn't believe in God, I would go out and do X." Where X is something like murder people or rape or whatever. They are very, very clear on this.
How does the fact that some people assert that they would not be good at all demonstrate that Jim-Me is "definitely wrong" to say that he thinks that people should be talking about "good enough." He didn't assert that there weren't people who did otherwise.
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I don't think that we should become someone we are not (I may disagree with Lewis here) I think God wants us to be who we are really are. Free from all the crap that gets in the way of our being fully ourselves. I think that God doesn't want us to abandon our own judgement, but for our judgement to mature so that it is more God-like.
I think that we are created good. God intends us to be good. Stuff gets in the way of that. We are free to stray from that, that world isn't perfect and neither are we. We make choices, sometimes, that make the world even less perfect. Eventually, our choices get better and we come closer to being what we are meant to be. Kingdom of God.
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boots, But is that actually even Christianity by the definition of any of the major sects of it? That certainly wasn't what I learned in 12 years of Catholic school. edit: Actually, sorry, again, that's not true. I was looking at created good as saying that we are born good, but that's not a fair asssesment.
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quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: I think God wants us to be who we are really are. Free from all the crap that gets in the way of our being fully ourselves. I think that God doesn't want us to abandon our own judgement, but for our judgement to mature so that it is more God-like.
Easier than just saying it over again... or am I now giving up my autonomy to Kate? (KIDDING!)
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But Jim, you just said that our role (edit: in that I mean how we show our love in this relationship) is to obey God as well as, as far as I can tell, saying that I can't possibly be a healthy adult. How does that jive up with what boots said.
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quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: I think God wants us to be who we are really are. Free from all the crap that gets in the way of our being fully ourselves. I think that God doesn't want us to abandon our own judgement, but for our judgement to mature so that it is more God-like.
That's what I interpret that particular quote by C.S. Lewis to mean.
I also wanted to chime in and say that I'm enjoying the discussion, even though I haven't been participating in it. I appreciate what Mr. Squicky brings to the table, it's a viewpoint I don't often hear.
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dkw, Yeah, like I edited, I was reading boots as saying that we are born good, which is definitely not what the Catholic Church teaches, but it's also not really what she said. And now that I think of it, it would apply to your global application of Christ's sacrifice concept as well.
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quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: But Jim, you just said that our role is to obey God as well as, as far as I can tell, saying that I can't possibly be a healthy adult. How does that jive up with what boots said.
I have sometimes chosen to trust my judgement instead of God. I usually find myself feeling as I often did as an adolescent when I, "should have listened to Dad." It doesn't make me bad, it didn't make my father love me any less. I just sometimes hurt myself or others.
Now I do still trust my judgement of what I think God wants rather than someone else's judgment of what I think God wants. Those are a different kind of submitting to authority. I will still make mistakes, but I can't do it any other way. And I do pay careful attention to what people who know more about this than I do have to say.
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I've found, and maybe this is not true for other people, that very often telling people the right thing to do isn't all that effective. Much better is teaching them why it is the right thing to do. If we were talking about listening to God that would be one thing, but obeying, especially in the way obedience was expected in the Old Testament, doesn't work for me. If God tells me to kill my son (metaphorically), he better come across with a good explanation as to why. If someone else goes along with it without question, I can't accept a God who thinks that is a good thing.
edit: And, because I feel like that takes away from my earlier point, a loving God who wants us to be more ourselves would be teaching and telling us to listen, not commanding and telling us to obey.
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Hmmm... I misspoke, then. I meant that obedience becomes not a matter of obedience anymore.
But there's also varying reasons, and things, to obey. I think Christian Morals are largely a matter of what's good for us... absolutely *not* a matter of "you're going to hell if you do and not if you don't"... at least not in a punitive sense. More in the sense of "this way lies danger. Keep out."
I also didn't mean to say that you can't be a healthy adult... again, I have a very difficult time expressing my own position on the matter... and the concept of Jesus as "the Way" is part of my thoughts, but I mean it in a much broader sense than you are interpreting it.
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It's likely I misread you. I'll look at with the different perspective.
quote:Squick, I, also, call it being an adult and a healthy individual. But I also think that the whole element of doing it yourself has a funddamental flaw... and it's also what I think people should be talking about hwen they say no one can be good without God.
Could you explain how this isn't saying that I can't be a healthy adult if I reject Jesus's sacrifice? If I can't do it myself _and incidentally, I pretty much agree with that particular sentiment), what else do I need?
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On the point of the account of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden being written by a 15 month year old. It is my understanding that God dictated to Moses the story and he wrote it down. Some incarnation of the story MAY have been handed down through the ages in written form or in oral tradition.
As a side note we have NO idea how long Adam and Eve remained in the garden before partaking of the fruit. I could have been days, it could have been a millennium or more.
I've enjoyed lurking in the discussion.
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