Thinking Christian Comments
Original Post A Quick Dawkins Note
That's a pretty good quote; I like this one too--
“it is as easy for me to believe that the universe made itself as that the maker of the universe made himself, in fact much easier; for the universe visibly exists and makes itself as it goes along, whereas a maker for it is a hypothesis.”
Tom,
Religion in general and CHristianity in particular are about a lot of different things to a lot of different people. I think your comment pigeon-holes Christianity as only about forgiveness.
I am suspect of claims that there is One Big Christianity. If we look around in everyday life and historically speaking too, we see that CHristianity quickly becomes Christianities. It is too easy to forget that Christianity is composed of a wide variety of sects. Or, at least it is too easy to forget the diversity of Christianities when we are talking to those challenging the veracity of the faith. The forgetting is sort of like circling the wagons up, suring up any weakpoints so that we can present a united front under the name Christianity.
Jacob, I wasn't pigeon-holing as if forgiveness were the only thing true about Christianity. Forgiveness is a major theme of Christianity; and it would be my position that any "sect" for which that is not true is not Christianity.
Ron, the maker did not make himself. God is a necessary being, eternally existent.
DL:
You’re confused: the onus is on you, not on me. You are the one making absolute moral claims against the infinite God based on your own personal subjectivist/relativist principles. That’s incoherent. Your discomfort in my pointing it out doesn’t magically permit you to turn the tables in order to evade that incoherence.
Jacob:
You have a good point about Christian disunity... but trust me, we are well aware of our sin against unity—against the Body of Christ: we have our own nails that we throw at each other. But, this actually supports the bigger point of the clear evidence of sin and the need for repentance... and a Savior.
With respect to "one big Christianity," you are also correct... but that's a bit beside the point... and C.S. Lewis wrote a three-part book precisely to address that very issue. It's called Mere Christianity with "mere" not understood in the exclusivist sense but bare minimum every Christian shares. There are a few things I don't agree with Lewis on: I think he's gone slightly too far in whittling down Christianity... and therefore making his position prone to compromise. But all-in-all it's an excellent book... and you may be surprised at the underlying unity. If honest, I think you'd be hard pressed to assert the Christian position unreasonable... even if you don't buy it.
Holopupenko and Tom,
Nails certainly are thrown. Tom just threw one when he asserted that if forgiveness isn't part of your beliefs, then you don't qualify as a Christian. We always seem so quick to draw boundaries between orthodoxy and heresy, right interpretations and wrong interpretations.
My point about One Big Christianity isn't beside the point. It is the point, at least the point of much conversation, as CS Lewis attests. I don't think its unreasonable, I think it is quite reasonable insofar as there are lots of reasons given.
My point though is I just don't think there is some kind of underlying strucuture that we can discover or find that will reveal to us the essense of Christianity--or the Right Beliefs that make up the Real Christianity. The way I read Lewis isn't so much that he is finding or discovering something--he was making something, asserting an underlying unity, sort of like Tom's assertion about foregiveness. Unity isn't found, its made. Unity is made most clearly when "we" divide ourselves off from "them," when we seperate out those orthodox believers from the heretical believers.
Jacob, this strikes me as a kind of historical revisionism based perhaps on the very questionable though currently prominent belief that all opinions must be accepted as equally valuable. That's the only explanation I can think of for questioning whether someone who denies the doctrines of forgiveness can claim to be a Christian. Historic Christianity has forgiveness at its very core. That's one of the least controversial or contentious doctrines of them all!
Some other doctrines have been historically held but recently challenged, especially the deity and centrality of Christ, and his actual life, death, and resurrection. So be it. My position, which I think is still historic Christianity, is that these things are essential to historic Christianity, and a religion that denies these things is something else. They can be that religion if they like, but they are not historic Christianity, nor are they Biblical Christianity.
A certain amount of division is okay with me, in a way. That is, it pains me that some in the Christian tradition are walking away from the historic beliefs, and I am not at all glad about that; but if they walk away, it must be clear that there is something real they are walking away from, and that others are remaining with it. We cannot pretend that they are still of the same belief when they believe different things.
Tom,
Division is OK because "we" could never define the limits of our beliefs if it weren't for those that believed differently. Unity is forever illusive. Historically speaking, there are always fractures and splits running through the various believers and their interpretations.
But the real gritty problem is who defines the limits of the institutionalized faith. And where exactly do those limits fall. That brings us to the question of power and how power is implicated in contemporary belief.
No, Jacob, in my opinion it brings us to the question of how the faith is defined and understood. You consistently (always?) want to bring every question around to power, but not every question is about that. Life is not a one-note tune.
Tom,
I agree that not every thing in life is about power. But defining who is included and who is excluded, what is a correct interpretation of the faith and what is not a correct interpretation of the faith, is one of those questions of power.
You may not see it as power, but that is because I would venture to say that you sit comfortably at the center of your faith community. Who sits at the margins? Can you see them?
Saying that God is essential and timeless sounds like a One Note Tune to me--indeed the Only Real Tune.
Jacob,
I didn't see Tom trying to define who is included and excluded. I saw him trying to point out that Christianity is not "basically guilt."
I think this is about power, but it is more about the power that atheists are trying to gain in defining religion as basically about guilt, rather than listening to what religious people say their own religion is about. One of the main problems with these "new atheists" is that they are very unwilling to listen to religious people.
macht and Tom,
When Tom says that foregiveness is an essential aspect of Christianity and that those who do not share this beliefe are not Christian, that is the act of exclusion. It creates a boundary between those with the correct interpretation and those with the incorrect interpretation.
A more formal and institutionalized instance of exclusion, where orthodox and heretical beliefs can be seen most clearly, is the case of Carlton Pearson. He is an evangelical graduate of Oral Roberts University that used to be on one side of the boundary until his interpretations varied on a few key Beliefs. He was then found to be a heretic and was thus formally excluded from the faith community.
Carlton Pearson preaches the 'gospel of inclusion.' In some ways, Tom seems to be advocating an exclusivist gospel, a gospel composed of Right Beliefs (forgiveness would be one of those Right Beliefs).
Where in the Bible is free will spoke of? Free will is a big topic of discussion on this blog, but Biblically speaking, not so much. Where does Jesus talk about our free will?
Deuteronomy 30:19
This day I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live
Deuteronomy 11
1 Love the LORD your God and keep his requirements, his decrees, his laws and his commands always.
8 Observe therefore all the commands I am giving you today, so that you may have the strength to go in and take over the land that you are crossing the Jordan to possess,
13 So if you faithfully obey the commands I am giving you today—to love the LORD your God and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul-
Exodus 19:
5 Now if you obey me fully and keep my covenant, then out of all nations you will be my treasured possession. Although the whole earth is mine, 6 you [a] will be for me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.' These are the words you are to speak to the Israelites."
8 The people all responded together, "We will do everything the LORD has said." So Moses brought their answer back to the LORD.
Genesis 3:
2 The woman said to the serpent, "We may eat fruit from the trees in the garden, 3 but God did say, 'You must not eat fruit from the tree that is in the middle of the garden, and you must not touch it, or you will die.' "
6 When the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye, and also desirable for gaining wisdom, she took some and ate it. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it.
Matthew 19:
16Now a man came up to Jesus and asked, "Teacher, what good thing must I do to get eternal life?"
17"Why do you ask me about what is good?" Jesus replied. "There is only One who is good. If you want to enter life, obey the commandments."
18"Which ones?" the man inquired.
Jesus replied, " 'Do not murder, do not commit adultery, do not steal, do not give false testimony, 19honor your father and mother,'[d] and 'love your neighbor as yourself.'[e]"
20"All these I have kept," the young man said. "What do I still lack?"
21Jesus answered, "If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me."
22When the young man heard this, he went away sad, because he had great wealth.
Charlie,
Ahh, long lost verse 21. See? It's an investment, not a giveaway. 
Not many takers, though.
Sorry, Charlie, these don't count as examples of free will. They are examples of choices, not free will. Computers run IF/THEN statements, too.
Go sell your possessions. Not many folks have followed through on that one. Yet so many still claim to follow Jesus. Ummm....
I wonder what that says about the thousands of people that buy into the likes of Joel Osteen and his preaching the 'gospel of wealth.'
Sorry DL, you are wrong.
Just because you can call them both
IF/THEN statements does not make them the same.
Try reading them like a person would.
Yes, Jacob, I do present an exclusivist gospel. There are right and wrong beliefs. I even go so far as to say that the core historic shared Christian beliefs are the right ones, and that beliefs contrary to those are wrong. Some beliefs (like time and mode of baptism, for one example among many) are questionable, but others (like the fact of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection, and forgiveness in his name, for example) are not. I do not apologize for this.
Free will is a form of philosophical terminology that is not explicitly used in the Bible. The concept is everywhere, starting with the section Charlie quoted.
Tom,
I don't expect an apology for your exclusivist interpretation. I'm just pointing out that it is a power relationship that defines right beliefs from wrong beliefs.
Reading 'free will' back onto the Bible is bad historiography, but typical faith-practice. It reminds me of Cold War era interpreations that saw the Soviet Union in the book of Revelations; or more recently, interpretations that see Vlad Putin as the antichrist.
If we look hard enough and creatively enough, I dare say we can find exactly what we are looking for in the Bible, exactly the right justification for our beliefs, exactly the right figure of evil to point our finger at, exactly the right way of being a Christian.
Jacob,
What makes my historiography bad, why are you being exclusivist, how did you come to know the Truth of the matter, and what is the point of your power grab?
Since St. Augustine wrote of our being created with free will and maintaining exercise of it in The City Of God between 414-418, as did Rabbi Saaida, in the tenth century, as did the Talmud Sanhedrin in 90 BC, I don't see how you can make any claim against the historicity of the concept.
Charlie,
Reading present day concepts back onto primary data is bad historiography. So, to say the Bible talks about or implies 'free will' is bad historiography because you take a philosophical concept developed well after Jesus' day and impose it on the Bible.
REading 'free will' onto the Bible is akin to reading the Soviet Union into the Bible. Neither existed during Jesus' day. Both are anachronistic. Its like saying Jesus drove a Toyota.
Why am I being exlcusivist? Why not? My point is that to include some interpretations and exlcude others is a power relationship that has concrete consequences for people.
I've never claimed to know the Truth of the matter.
My point isn't a power grab. I just enjoy pointing out to people that our interpretations of the Bible (and the world for that matter) are not innocent and powerfree. We are implicated in relations of power when we exclude some and include others.
Jacob,
How about failing to read comments at 1:56?
The concept was clearly defined by 400 and was read out of the Bible by Augustine.
Maimonides is well known for his defense of free will in the 12th century, Saadia in the tenth and the oldest post-Biblical authority in Jewish teaching, the Mishna, affirms free will.
Charlie,
Show me in the Bible where 'free will' is mentioned. Show me where Jesus talks about 'free will.' Point it out to me. Use that referential epistemology and show it to me in concrete words.
And while your at it, show me where the 'Soviet Union' is mentioned in the Bible. A lot of folks argued for that one too.
When you show me 'free will' in the Bible, I'll show you Jesus driving a Toyota.
Jacob:
Show me you can detect "the day after tomorrow" directly with your five primary senses, and I'll show you an atheist who can reason clearly. (Showing me words in a book or on a computer monitor that symoblize the concept "day after tomorrow" will be a false start... not to mention silly.)
Holopupenko,
Nice try. Lets stay on topic. Show me 'free will' in the Bible. I mean, I can show you that many people in the Bible called Jesus 'Rabbi' and 'teacher.' Why can't you show me that Jesus talked about 'free will'?
Jacob, talk about imposing on the past! You're saying that the only way Jesus or any other Biblical figure could have made any reference to free will was by using our terminology. Please, now, be reasonable. This is serious chronological chauvinism.
Tom, CHarlie and Holo,
Am I imposing on the past? Or am I asking you to put your claims to a concrete test?
We all know that 'free will' is not in the Bible. I'm asking for intellectual honesty here. You three are infering from versus in the Bible that they mean free will. Which is fine. But my point is that an inference that free will is in the Bible, is not the same thing as 'free will' actually being in the Bible.
I already did, Jacob.
You realize that neither Jesus nor Moses spoke English though, right?
Intellectual honesty?
Charlie,
Right. We both agree that nobody spoke English then. And I'm sure that we can agree that if the Bible is the inerrent word of God, then the problem of translation is a moot point. Either its inerrent or not.
St. Augustine on defending free will as well as God's Grace, circa 425.
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers...athers/
1510.htm
THat's nice. Apologists have long defended the doctrine of free will. But nowhere is that doctrine supported by a concrete reference to 'free will' in teh Bible. The doctrine rests on inference.
It's not a matter of translation.
It is a matter of your new demand that the phrase "free will" appear in the mouth of Christ.
At first you claimed I was erroneously applying our (supposedly) modern concept of free will anachronistically.
Now you see, of course, that there is nothing so modern about it since exegesis from all eras demonstrate an acknowledgment of the concept.
Jacob, how is one to respond to this?
We all know that 'free will' is not in the Bible. I'm asking for intellectual honesty here. You three are infering from versus in the Bible that they mean free will. Which is fine. But my point is that an inference that free will is in the Bible, is not the same thing as 'free will' actually being in the Bible.
What's your point? That we can't make inferences?
The acceleration of gravity on the surface of the earth is about 32 feet per second squared. But that's not written anywhere in gravity. An inference that there is a certain value for the acceleration of gravity is not the same as "the acceleration of gravity" actually being in nature.
Free will is not written in the scripture, but the inference is very easy to make and to support. It's as clear in the Scripture as gravity is in nature.
(Some implications of free will--its scope, extent, and interaction with divine sovereignty--are worthy of investigation. But that doesn't mean it's not there at all.)
I think, Charlie and Holo, that Jacob is playing games with us, that this is going to go nowhere, and that it's not worth pursuing. If he can argue this with an apparently straight face, he can argue anything. When someone takes that kind of stance, it's quite often the case that they are arguing for the sake of arguing. Such arguing is intended to needle, not to move toward understanding. I think that may be what Jacob is doing.
Jacob, if you can find some way to show us otherwise, please do so; otherwise I'm going to exercise my rights as host and cut this off here.
Less than two minutes to find out just what concrete references Augustine was making.
I guess since there is no truth out there one need never even look.
Oops.
Sorry, Tom.
I missed some comments there.
Please feel free to delete my latest.
Tom,
This is your blog. I suffer what I must.
Cutting off conversation is a likely tactic for dealing with disagreement. It is basically the same tactic that evolutionary theory supporters use against ID supporters. Or the Congressional Republicans use to silence Congressional Democrats about the war. That seems to be the best way to sure up an argument against challenges.
But more to the point, on this issue I am concerned about clarity. Many Christians talk about free will as if it is right there in the Bible. But it is not. It is an inference. My point: call a spade a spade. You all are overplaying your hands.
Am I needling you all? Yes, because I think there is a lot of sloppiness to your argument. It hurts your case more than it helps.
Inferences are always easy to make and there is usually some sort of evidence to support them. Why is it that your inference about free will in the Bible is any different than others' inferences about the Soviet Union in the Bible? Both supporters can point to evidence.
And just because you infer something, doesn't make it the truth, it only makes it an inference. So I say infer free will all you want, but don't bandy an inference around as if it were the Truth and in plain black and white ink on the page for all to see.
And Tom, your analogy between free will and gravity is nice but weak. The one thing free will and gravity have in common is their metaphysicality. No one has seen gravity and no one has seen free will in the Bible.
Jacob:
First there's this: I think there is a lot of sloppiness to your argument; and then there's this: The one thing free will and gravity have in common is their metaphysicality. No one has seen gravity and no one has seen free will in the Bible.
Do you have even the smallest idea about that which you speak, i.e., about the crazy equivocation you propose? If this nonsense was fast-fissionable, an explosion of such a large concentration of it would rival the Tsar Bomba 50 MT thermonuclear test of 31 October 1961 by the Soviets... who were, by the way, officially atheistic.
Holo,
I'm sorry. I don't understand your comment. Have you seen gravity? Have you seen free will? I haven't.
Jacob:
No… but neither have I seen “justice” or the “scientific method” or “the day after tomorrow” or the “rules of chess” or “atheism” with any of my five primary senses. Are you suggesting these are also the same kinds of thing as gravity or electromagnetism (or are you suggesting they don’t exist just because you can’t experience them directly with any of your five primary senses)? That is incredible question-begging based on an underlying and deeply-illicit equivocation.
Well, since you’ve done it so openly and categorically (“The one thing free will and gravity have in common is their metaphysicality”), and since the force of gravity is measurable, by which SI units do you propose we “measure” free will? You’d be helping DL out because then he could correlate the data into some mathematical formalism and make predictions. You’d be helping Paul out who thinks “it’s all neurons” anyway.
PLEASE take a course in philosophy (or at least do some serious reading) before you walk into more cow-pies of your own making. Christians are “sloppy arguments?!?” Gee-Wilikers!
Folks, this is the face of atheism: neither makeup nor a facelift help ideas like these.
Holo,
You continue to infer from something that I write that I am an atheist. You're still incorrect, just like the last time you made that inference. Try again.
What am I saying that makes you incorrectly infer that I am an atheist?
Do we measure gravity? Or do we see with our eyes the effects of this invisible force we call 'gravity'? Rocks fall and we attribute that to the force of 'gravity.' And anyway, the invisible force we call 'gravity' is not a constant, it is dependent on conditions of possibility.
'Justice' is a metaphor that we use to help signify the value of things in our lives. Or, better yet, we can actually see lawyers at the US Department of Justice doing all sorts of things. The DOJ is real enough that I can go touch it if so desire.
Holo,
You say I should take a philosophy cours. If only you knew what I did to make a living.
Jacob: My comments stand as they are.
Fair enough. Stand where you wish.
I don't see any importance to any of it It has been proven, to me anyway, that Jesus never existed, same with Paul/Saul, and Nazareth did not exist until the 2nd century. Try this link and debunk what is there:
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com, it is a very detailed site.
Another good read on how the bible came into being is located at:
http://cassiopaea.org/cass/biblewho1.htm
I'm sure that the apologists will be crying foul, but I have yet to have a minister return to me with anything but a call for faith. Faith is useless, kinda like prayer.
Then we can touch on how the early christian leaders lied, intentionally, to gather believers.
‘There is nothing so easy as by sheer volubility to deceive a common crowd or an uneducated congregation.’
– St. Jerome (Epistle. lii, 8; p. 93.)
"I will only mention the Apostle Paul. ... He, then, if anyone, ought to be calumniated; we should speak thus to him:
‘The proofs which you have used against the Jews and against other heretics bear a different meaning in their own contexts to that which they bear in your Epistles.
We see passages taken captive by your pen and pressed into service to win you a victory, which in volumes from which they are taken have no controversial bearing at all ... the line so often adopted by strong men in controversy – of justifying the means by the result."
(St. Jerome, Epistle to Pammachus, xlviii, 13; N&PNF. vi, 72-73)
For great is the value of deceit, provided it be not introduced with a mischievous intention. In fact action of this kind ought not to be called deceit, but rather a kind of good management, cleverness and skill, capable of finding out ways where resources fail, and making up for the defects of the mind ...
And often it is necessary to deceive, and to do the greatest benefits by means of this device, whereas he who has gone by a straight course has done great mischief to the person whom he has not deceived."
(Treatise On The Priesthood, Book 1).
Clearly the Christians have used ... myths ... in fabricating the story of Jesus' birth ... It is clear to me that the writings of the Christians are a lie and that your fables are not well-enough constructed to conceal this monstrous fiction.'
– Celsus (On The True Doctrine, c178 AD)
The Manichean bishop (and opponent of Augustine) Faustus said:
"Many things have been inserted by our ancestors in the speeches of our Lord which, though put forth under his name, agree not with his faith; especially since – as already it has been often proved – these things were written not by Christ, nor [by] his apostles, but a long while after their assumption, by I know not what sort of half Jews, not even agreeing with themselves, who made up their tale out of reports and opinions merely, and yet, fathering the whole upon the names of the apostles of the Lord or on those who were supposed to follow the apostles, they maliciously pretended that they had written their lies and conceits according to them."
Ignatius Loyola (1491-1556), the tireless zealot for papal authority – he was the founder of the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits) – even wrote:
"We should always be disposed to believe that which appears to us to be white is really black, if the hierarchy of the church so decides."
"What harm would it do, if a man told a good strong lie for the sake of the good and for the Christian church ... a lie out of necessity, a useful lie, a helpful lie, such lies would not be against God, he would accept them."
– Martin Luther
'I was already Bishop of Hippo, when I went into Ethiopia with some servants of Christ there to preach the Gospel. In this country we saw many men and women without heads, who had two great eyes in their breasts; and in countries still more southly, we saw people who had but one eye in their foreheads.'
St Augustine
(Sermon 37; quoted in Taylor, Syntagma, 52; Diegesis, 271; Doane, Bible Myths, 437.)
Believe it or not, Augustine devoted two whole treatises to the topic of lying. The first of these, 'De mendacio' ('On Lying'), written in 395, discussed the pros and cons of lying.
On balance, of the eight kinds of lie which he identified (each with several sub-types!) he excused 'jocular' lies, was 'uncertain' about others (depending on motive and the likelihood of being believed) but questioned the morality of the remainder.
The second tract 'Contra mendacium', written in 422, cautioned the brethren against lying. Evidently they needed the warning.
"One never errs more safely, methinks, than when one errs by too much loving the truth, and too much rejecting of falsehood."
– St Augustine, Retractations, Book
"It is usual for the sacred historian to conform himself to the generally accepted opinion of the masses in his time.'
– St Jerome (P.L., XXVI, 98; XXIV, 855).
With so many lies by the early church leaders, obviously copied into the text over time to fill in the gaps, it is incredible to me that anyone could follow this as Truth.
But then, I expect many poison pens over the"Jesus never existed" comment with nary a statement that can disprove the above statements. Most of the quotes above came from :
http://www.jesusneverexisted.com...d.com/
lying.htm
Once purged of the insane, plagiarism’s, illegalities, contradictions, and the perverse, the Bible could be printed on match book covers while increasing it’s usefulness.
Christianity is safer than a lobotomy, but just as effective.
Commenting by HaloScan
