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Guacamole's off the cuff reactions to the God Delusion

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  • #31
    Originally posted by Boxing Pythagoras View Post
    Interesting. I've usually read that Alexandria was noted for precisely the opposite-- that it was, since its establishment, a place where disparate religions came together. I've never heard it described as a "hotbed" of anti-Semitic feeling. I'd love to read more about that, if you have any sources which you could recommend.
    The Anguish of the Jews: Twenty-three Centuries of Antisemitism by Edward H. Flannery would be where I'd start. Antisemitism. A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution edited by Richard S. Levy has an entry by Sandra Gambetti called the "Alexandrian Pogrom" which is also very useful. She also has a book called The Alexandrian Riots of 38 C.E. and the Persecution of the Jews. A Historical Reconstruction

    And as Adrift pointed out Philo of Alexandria mentions an attack on Jews in Alexandria in 38 AD in Flaccus where thousands of Jews were killed (see the work itself and Pieter Willem van der Horst's Philo's Flaccus: the First Pogrom. Van der Horst also has an article available called The Egyptian Beginning of Anti-Semitism’s Long History.

    I'm always still in trouble again

    "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
    "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
    "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

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    • #32
      And then Dawkins was right...

      My off the cuff reaction to the rest of chapter 1, entitled "Undeserved Respect" is that Dawkins is largely correct in most of his assertions. I will point some interesting points he makes here for the sake of completeness, but a lot of what he says could be heard from the mouth of many different pundits.

      This end of this chapter regards the kind of wide berth of deference that many, but especially the media, gives to religious topics.

      A widespread assumption, which nearly everybody in our society accepts—the non-religious included—is that religious faith is especially vulnerable to offence and should be protected by an abnormally thick wall of respect, in a different class from the respect that any human being should pay to any other.


      Dawkins is probably correct about that. I think that, in general, people should rigorously examine their ideas. As a theist and a christian, I do not believe that God is offended by our asking probing questions. He gave us brains and made us capable of reason precisely because he wants us to be intellectually vigorous. That said, it is no sin to simply want to coast by in life and accept the pronouncements of the learned. It can lead to mistakes, but I respect that not everyone wants to examine things as deeply as I. Nevertheless, I want to encourage those looking for answers to look hard for answers.

      Some of his critique strikes me as a little bit off. I think he's confusing our society's habit to create sanitized euphemism for everything, rather than just deferring to religious sensibilities when he writes,

      ...we have a pusillanimous reluctance to use religious names for warring factions. In Northern Ireland, Catholics and Protestants are euphemized to ‘Nationalists’ and ‘Loyalists’ respectively. The very word ‘religions’ is bowdlerized to ‘communities’, as in ‘inter-community warfare’. Iraq, as a consequence of the Anglo-American invasion of 2003, degenerated into sectarian civil war between Sunni and Shia Muslims. Clearly a religious conflict—yet in the Independent of 20 May 2006 the frontpage headline and first leading article both described it as ‘ethnic cleansing’. ‘Ethnic’ in this context is yet another euphemism. What we are seeing in Iraq is religious cleansing. The original usage of ‘ethnic cleansing’ in the former Yugoslavia is also arguably a euphemism for religious cleansing, involving Orthodox Serbs, Catholic Croats and Muslim Bosnians.


      I agree that "ethnic cleansing" was euphemistic in the case of the Shia-Sunni civil war, but I also think you'd have to be a half-wit to not realize that it was religious conflict. However, in the case of Isis attacking the Yezidis, this is both religious and ethnic cleansing, and in Bosnia, while there was a stark religious demarcation in the conflict, it was also a case of ethnic conflict as well--disparate communities with different histories, customs, beliefs, and languages were killing each other. It was accurate to call it ethnic cleansing. I just wish they would have called a spade and spade and gone with genocide. One of my pet issues is the medias' abetting of the governments on this. Of course the problem is that if you call it "genocide" and show "genocide," then people expect you to do something. Well, I guess some moral self-deception is important for all of us sometimes.

      It's a good end to the chapter, with topics worth discussing -- like the heirarchy of rights--should religious freedom trump freedom of expression, etc. He illustrates some of these issues with a number of citations, for example about a kid wearing a t-shirt to school that read "Homosexuality is a sin, Islam is a lie, abortion is murder. Somethings are just black and white." He also wrote, in excellent detail--I learned several points I did not know--about the chaos surrounding the Dutch newspapers publishing cartoons about Mohammed, and about some other newspapers pouring fuel on the fire by reprinting the comics. My first reaction was outrage at the attempted acts of censorship, but Paul's encouragement to the Romans about proper Christian conduct also occurred to me: "If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with all people." I suppose that really bothers me if I'm being honest about it, is the sheer belligerent churlishness of some who want to press their 'freedom of religion' and 'freedom of speech' and see how far they can get. Atheists, Christian, Mulsim, or otherwise, stop it.

      fwiw,
      guacamole
      Last edited by guacamole; 02-10-2017, 10:51 AM. Reason: Addled by illness, I made foolish mistakes.
      "Down in the lowlands, where the water is deep,
      Hear my cry, hear my shout,
      Save me, save me"

      Comment


      • #33
        Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
        The Anguish of the Jews: Twenty-three Centuries of Antisemitism by Edward H. Flannery would be where I'd start. Antisemitism. A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution edited by Richard S. Levy has an entry by Sandra Gambetti called the "Alexandrian Pogrom" which is also very useful. She also has a book called The Alexandrian Riots of 38 C.E. and the Persecution of the Jews. A Historical Reconstruction

        And as Adrift pointed out Philo of Alexandria mentions an attack on Jews in Alexandria in 38 AD in Flaccus where thousands of Jews were killed (see the work itself and Pieter Willem van der Horst's Philo's Flaccus: the First Pogrom. Van der Horst also has an article available called The Egyptian Beginning of Anti-Semitism’s Long History.
        Thanks, I'll look into these. I was aware of the Pogrom in 38 CE, as well as Manetho's rewrite of Exodus. I was also aware that Jews were not able to receive the full benefits of citizenship due to the religious traditions inherent in Hellenic government, though I'm not sure how accurate it would be to classify such a thing as anti-Semitism.
        "[Mathematics] is the revealer of every genuine truth, for it knows every hidden secret, and bears the key to every subtlety of letters; whoever, then, has the effrontery to pursue physics while neglecting mathematics should know from the start he will never make his entry through the portals of wisdom."
        --Thomas Bradwardine, De Continuo (c. 1325)

        Comment


        • #34
          Originally posted by shunyadragon View Post
          Radical Nationalism like other revolutions in Europe.
          Fair enough.

          The undercurrent of anti-Semitism/anti-Jewish beliefs led to Jews being primary targets of ethnic cleansing and persecution. In Russia things do not change much when people took off the Orthodox cross and put on the sickle and hammer, then again when the winds changed they took off the sicle and hammer and put back on the Orthodox cross.
          As Adrift adequately put, what does this have to do with the discussion of how or if atheism was a primary motive for purging religiosity in a given society?
          Ladino, Guatemalan, Hispanic, and Latin, but foremostly, Christian.
          As of the 1st of December, 2020, officially anointed as this:

          "Seinfeld had its Soup Nazi. Tweb has its Taco Nazi." - Rogue06 , https://theologyweb.com/campus/forum...e3#post1210559

          Comment


          • #35
            Originally posted by guacamole View Post
            That said, it is no sin to simply want to coast by in life and accept the pronouncements of the learned.
            Even if those "pronouncements of the learned" are not Christian-- or even theist?
            "[Mathematics] is the revealer of every genuine truth, for it knows every hidden secret, and bears the key to every subtlety of letters; whoever, then, has the effrontery to pursue physics while neglecting mathematics should know from the start he will never make his entry through the portals of wisdom."
            --Thomas Bradwardine, De Continuo (c. 1325)

            Comment


            • #36
              Originally posted by Boxing Pythagoras View Post
              Even if those "pronouncements of the learned" are not Christian-- or even theist?
              Indeed. I am knowingly heterodox to most serious thinkers on this. Partially, because all of this back and forth between serious intelligent people, and their pale imitators on places like t-web, myself included, are so much tempest in a Neptunian Teapot for all the actual good they do. I'd rather people be good than be smart. Being smart sometimes helps with goodness, and sometimes, I hesitate to say often, does not.
              "Down in the lowlands, where the water is deep,
              Hear my cry, hear my shout,
              Save me, save me"

              Comment


              • #37
                Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                The Anguish of the Jews: Twenty-three Centuries of Antisemitism by Edward H. Flannery would be where I'd start. Antisemitism. A Historical Encyclopedia of Prejudice and Persecution edited by Richard S. Levy has an entry by Sandra Gambetti called the "Alexandrian Pogrom" which is also very useful. She also has a book called The Alexandrian Riots of 38 C.E. and the Persecution of the Jews. A Historical Reconstruction

                And as Adrift pointed out Philo of Alexandria mentions an attack on Jews in Alexandria in 38 AD in Flaccus where thousands of Jews were killed (see the work itself and Pieter Willem van der Horst's Philo's Flaccus: the First Pogrom. Van der Horst also has an article available called The Egyptian Beginning of Anti-Semitism’s Long History.
                Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.
                Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
                Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
                But will they come when you do call for them? Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1, Act III:

                go with the flow the river knows . . .

                Frank

                I do not know, therefore everything is in pencil.

                Comment


                • #38
                  Originally posted by shunyadragon View Post
                  Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.
                  But again, even if this were true (it isn't), doesn't your prophet expect/condone this?

                  Source: Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh by Bahá’u’lláh

                  And when the days of Moses were ended, and the light of Jesus, shining forth from the Day Spring of the Spirit, encompassed the world, all the people of Israel arose in protest against Him. They clamored that He Whose advent the Bible had foretold must needs promulgate and fulfil the laws of Moses, whereas this youthful Nazarene, who laid claim to the station of the divine Messiah, had annulled the laws of divorce and of the sabbath day—the most weighty of all the laws of Moses. Moreover, what of the signs of the Manifestation yet to come? These people of Israel are even unto the present day still expecting that Manifestation which the Bible hath foretold! How many Manifestations of Holiness, how many Revealers of the light everlasting, have appeared since the time of Moses, and yet Israel, wrapt in the densest veils of satanic fancy and false imaginings, is still expectant that the idol of her own handiwork will appear with such signs as she herself hath conceived! Thus hath God laid hold of them for their sins, hath extinguished in them the spirit of faith, and tormented them with the flames of the nethermost fire. And this for no other reason except that Israel refused to apprehend the meaning of such words as have been revealed in the Bible concerning the signs of the coming Revelation. As she never grasped their true significance, and, to outward seeming, such events never came to pass, she, therefore, remained deprived of recognizing the beauty of Jesus and of beholding the Face of God. And they still await His coming! From time immemorial even unto this day, all the kindreds and peoples of the earth have clung to such fanciful and unseemly thoughts, and thus have deprived themselves of the clear waters streaming from the springs of purity and holiness….

                  © Copyright Original Source

                  Last edited by Adrift; 02-10-2017, 09:14 PM.

                  Comment


                  • #39
                    Originally posted by guacamole View Post
                    Do the new Atheists really believe that we'd live in some kind of Utopia without religion?
                    I don't know and I don't care. There is nothing new about my atheism, and I don't believe for a minute that people would suddenly starting being nice to each other if they only stopped being religious.

                    Originally posted by guacamole View Post
                    Haven't we tried this in the former Communist states?
                    I don't think so.

                    Originally posted by guacamole View Post
                    Anyone who wants to dispute that the murderous Communist regimes of the Twentieth Century were not atheistic should try some google fu.
                    I'm not denying that those Communist regimes were run by atheists. I deny that the leaders' atheism had anything to do with their being murderous.

                    [Posted before reading any further in this thread. Apologies for any repetition of comments.]
                    Last edited by Doug Shaver; 02-10-2017, 11:32 PM.

                    Comment


                    • #40
                      Originally posted by Adrift View Post
                      But again, even if this were true (it isn't), doesn't your prophet expect/condone this?

                      Source: Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh by Bahá’u’lláh

                      And when the days of Moses were ended, and the light of Jesus, shining forth from the Day Spring of the Spirit, encompassed the world, all the people of Israel arose in protest against Him. They clamored that He Whose advent the Bible had foretold must needs promulgate and fulfil the laws of Moses, whereas this youthful Nazarene, who laid claim to the station of the divine Messiah, had annulled the laws of divorce and of the sabbath day—the most weighty of all the laws of Moses. Moreover, what of the signs of the Manifestation yet to come? These people of Israel are even unto the present day still expecting that Manifestation which the Bible hath foretold! How many Manifestations of Holiness, how many Revealers of the light everlasting, have appeared since the time of Moses, and yet Israel, wrapt in the densest veils of satanic fancy and false imaginings, is still expectant that the idol of her own handiwork will appear with such signs as she herself hath conceived! Thus hath God laid hold of them for their sins, hath extinguished in them the spirit of faith, and tormented them with the flames of the nethermost fire. And this for no other reason except that Israel refused to apprehend the meaning of such words as have been revealed in the Bible concerning the signs of the coming Revelation. As she never grasped their true significance, and, to outward seeming, such events never came to pass, she, therefore, remained deprived of recognizing the beauty of Jesus and of beholding the Face of God. And they still await His coming! From time immemorial even unto this day, all the kindreds and peoples of the earth have clung to such fanciful and unseemly thoughts, and thus have deprived themselves of the clear waters streaming from the springs of purity and holiness….

                      © Copyright Original Source

                      Ducks, Bobs and Weaves avoid the reality of 2000+ years of history. The above has been repeatedly responded to in another thread. The Baha'i Faith has never advocated oppression of Jews as the history of Christiaiity has done, ie Martin Luther.

                      The issue is the actual history of violent ethnic cleansing, and persecution of Jews since Constantine, again . . .

                      Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.
                      Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
                      Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
                      But will they come when you do call for them? Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1, Act III:

                      go with the flow the river knows . . .

                      Frank

                      I do not know, therefore everything is in pencil.

                      Comment


                      • #41
                        Originally posted by shunyadragon View Post
                        Ducks, Bobs and Weaves avoid the reality of 2000+ years of history. The above has been repeatedly responded to in another thread. The Baha'i Faith has never advocated oppression of Jews as the history of Christiaiity has done, ie Martin Luther.

                        The issue is the actual history of violent ethnic cleansing, and persecution of Jews since Constantine, again . . .

                        Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.
                        Why are you so upset with Christians for what your very own Baha'i prophet said that the Jews deserved for not accepting Jesus?

                        Comment


                        • #42
                          Originally posted by Adrift View Post
                          Why are you so upset with Christians for what your very own Baha'i prophet said that the Jews deserved for not accepting Jesus?
                          Not upset.

                          Ducks, Bobs and Weaves avoid the reality of 2000+ years of history. The above has been repeatedly responded to in another thread. The Baha'i Faith has never advocated oppression of Jews as the history of Christiaitity has done, ie Martin Luther.

                          The issue is the actual history of violent ethnic cleansing, and persecution of Jews since Constantine, again . . .

                          Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.

                          There is nothing in citation that would indicate that the Jews deserved the 'physical persecution, ethnic cleansing. In the Baha'i Faith it refers to a spirtual state and consequences, not physical.
                          Last edited by shunyadragon; 02-11-2017, 03:20 PM.
                          Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
                          Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
                          But will they come when you do call for them? Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1, Act III:

                          go with the flow the river knows . . .

                          Frank

                          I do not know, therefore everything is in pencil.

                          Comment


                          • #43
                            Originally posted by shunyadragon View Post
                            Not upset.

                            Ducks, Bobs and Weaves avoid the reality of 2000+ years of history. The above has been repeatedly responded to in another thread. The Baha'i Faith has never advocated oppression of Jews as the history of Christiaiity has done, ie Martin Luther.

                            The issue is the actual history of violent ethnic cleansing, and persecution of Jews since Constantine, again . . .

                            Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.
                            Of course you're upset. That's why you spammed the exact same thing you posted in post #40. That's usually what you do when you get upset. You go into skipped record mode.

                            Why can't you just own up to the fact that the prophet of your very own faith, Bahá’u’lláh, acknowledged God's righteous judgement through persecution against the Jewish people for failing to accept Jesus? It's right there in black and white for anyone to see. Bahá’u’lláh is no better than Luther in that regard.

                            Comment


                            • #44
                              Originally posted by shunyadragon View Post
                              Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.
                              First Shuny, Christians did not persecute Jews for two thousand years, and second not all Christians persecuted Jews.
                              Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                              Comment


                              • #45
                                Originally posted by Adrift View Post
                                Of course you're upset. That's why you spammed the exact same thing you posted in post #40. That's usually what you do when you get upset. You go into skipped record mode.

                                Why can't you just own up to the fact that the prophet of your very own faith, Bahá’u’lláh, acknowledged God's righteous judgement through persecution against the Jewish people for failing to accept Jesus? It's right there in black and white for anyone to see. Bahá’u’lláh is no better than Luther in that regard.
                                Not upset.

                                Ducks, Bobs and Weaves avoid the reality of 2000+ years of history. The above has been repeatedly responded to in another thread. The Baha'i Faith has never advocated oppression of Jews as the history of Christiaiity has done, ie Martin Luther.

                                The issue is the actual history of violent ethnic cleansing, and persecution of Jews since Constantine, again . . .

                                Adrift pointing out does not help, Christians tool on the torch of vengeance, persecution and diligent efforts at ethnic cleansing for 2000+ years.
                                Glendower: I can call spirits from the vasty deep.
                                Hotspur: Why, so can I, or so can any man;
                                But will they come when you do call for them? Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part 1, Act III:

                                go with the flow the river knows . . .

                                Frank

                                I do not know, therefore everything is in pencil.

                                Comment

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