Faith closes the mind. It is pure idol worship.

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WrongBrain
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18 Nov 2014, 7:03 pm

God is a God of stupidity, wrath, slavery, and eternal punishment. Is it any wonder why many people are the way they are?

I believe in God, but loathe Him more than I loath all my enemies combined.



aghogday
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18 Nov 2014, 9:43 pm

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=alRNbesfXXw[/youtube]

Thanks for the YouTube links. This one is definitely worth watching. :)


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18 Nov 2014, 10:14 pm

GnosticBishop wrote:
RhodyStruggle wrote:
I think it is not the concept of faith itself, but what one places one's faith in and to what end, that causes problems.

One cannot practice Euclidean geometry without having faith that parallel lines never meet, yet no harm is ever caused by this faith.


True. That is not the case with religion.


'Religion' is too abstract a concept to truth-consistently include in such an unqualified statement. It's not 'religion' or even a particular religion which, when made the object of faith, causes harm. IMO it's the doctrines prescribing in what manner a given church, cult, sect, tradition, etc. must practice their religious beliefs, which result in harm.

GnosticBishop wrote:
For the evils of religion to grow, read any scripture literally.


My own holy-book contains a commandment prohibiting me from believing anything I read. There is no exception carved out for that which may be read in my holy-book.

GnosticBishop wrote:
Any and all harmless beliefs are allowed by Gnostic Christians. We know that any myth can be internalized for good results and as esoteric ecumenists, we enjoy knowledge of all the myths that man has created about Gods.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oR02cia ... =PLCBF574D


There are some things I like about Gnostic Christianity, but as an extreme epistemological skeptic (I strongly doubt that 'knowledge' is a valid concept) I certainly have issues with it as well. Mr. Freke touched on part of that briefly towards the end of that video, with his reference to Gnosticism having a history of elitism. I don't see how it could possibly be otherwise, since knowledge (as a discursive function, i.e. as-the-concept-is-employed, regardless of whether or not there is any sound basis for employing it) preserves kyriarchal structure when mapping information from one social space to another. Or as Sir Francis Bacon put it, far more eloquently if less precisely, "Knowledge is itself power."

GnosticBishop wrote:
When there is a victim is when that view changes. Then you see why Christianity annihilated Gnostic Christianity. We do not let the evils of forced literalism go unopposed. To a tyrant like Constantine, we were poison. One of his first commands to his new Church was to kill off the free thinkers and of course, his new tool, his Church, did as bid. It was quite a ride for free thought for the next 1,000 years.


Your reasoning is flawed. Not all [Christians who are not Gnostic Christians] are [literalist Christians]. 'Faith' doesn't imply 'faith in Biblical literalism' unless you further qualify it thus. Hell, 'faith in Biblical inerrancy' doesn't even imply 'faith in Biblical literalism' unless you further qualify it thus.

GnosticBishop wrote:
We must discriminate and judge constantly. Every law is a compulsion on all of us to judge.


How do you mean? In what sense do you mean 'law', and what do you suppose a law compels us to judge? I constantly sit in judgment of the laws of men, including those laws claimed by men to be the laws of God as well as those claimed by men to be those of Nature; most often I judge these laws dysfunctional, crippled by displacements (e.g. in time and/or in social stratification) between the law-makers and those to whom the laws are applied. But as for the judging of men themselves, I deem only that anyone who believes himself wise enough to judge others is more likely to be a tyrant than to be correct in their self-evaluation.

GnosticBishop wrote:
It is my view that all right wing literalists and fundamentals hurt all of us who are moral religionists, --- as well as those who do not believe.


Sure, but that's because they're right-wing (supportive of the preservation and expansion of extant social hierarchies). Religion's just their amplifier.


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18 Nov 2014, 10:49 pm

RhodyStruggle wrote:
Lukecash12 wrote:
RhodyStruggle wrote:
I think it is not the concept of faith itself, but what one places one's faith in and to what end, that causes problems.

One cannot practice Euclidean geometry without having faith that parallel lines never meet, yet no harm is ever caused by this faith.


Seems like I run into a brick wall every time I try to establish that "faith" in the modern sense isn't faith in the original sense at all.


Possibly you're running into said wall because the statement you're attempting to establish is too strong to be literally true. They're certainly not the same thing, but they're both instantiations of a common abstract concept (the assertion of an axiom, a proposition which is assumed within a well-defined scope to be true, as a basis for further reasoning). So 'faith in the original sense' may not be "equal" (semantically isomorphic) to '"faith" in the modern sense' (which means what, precisely? where do we Discordians fall with respect to modern "faith"?) but clearly they're objects of a common category. Whereas "not at all" would seem to imply that no such commonality exists.

If you think I'm being pedantic, that's quite possibly valid - I can't always tell. By analogy, if you'd said "a human isn't an orangutan at all" I'd be likely to make the same argument. Humans and orangutans are both primates, so "not at all" is still too strong a statement, even though they're not "equal." I think this is a valid and important point to make, but I won't take offense if you disagree :)


Pistis doesn't have anything to do with an axiom except when axioms are incidentally used in the process envisioned by the term. The best way to explain the word in a manner conducive to modern people understanding it is that an individual pistis is a persuasion/argument and different pistis are expected to be weighed against one another. This is not at all the same as the modern definition because so many today would like to say that faith is a process outside of reason, when the original definition literally meant the process of reason. It is practically the antithesis of it's modern variant.


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Lukecash12
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18 Nov 2014, 11:00 pm

GnosticBishop wrote:
Lukecash12 wrote:
GnosticBishop wrote:
Faith closes the mind. It is pure idol worship.

Faith is a way to quit using, "God given" power of Reason and Logic, and cause the faithful to embrace doctrines that moral people reject.

The God of the O.T. says, ?Come now, and let us reason together,? [Isaiah 1:18]

How can literalists reason with God when they must ignore reason and logic and discard them when turning into literalist?

Those who are literalists can only reply somewhat in the fashion that Martin Luther did.
?Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.?
?Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.?

This attitude effectively kills all worthy communication that non-theists can have with theist. Faith closes the mind as it is pure idol worship.

Literalism is an evil practice that hides the true messages of myths.

We cannot show our faith based friends that they are wrong through their faith colored glasses.

Regards
DL


Sadly, modern Christians are unaware that in Koine Greek "faith"/pistis explicitly involved logic. Pistis is a reasoned out conclusion. So truly faith in it's modern sense is an anachronistic concept. Furthermore, most anyone with a deeper knowledge of the original languages, as opposed to people like fundamentalists, has the understanding that the bible doesn't rule out anything scientific in nature. In fact the bible doesn't even talk about science except in a few notable exceptions like Job, which surprise, surprise folks turned out to be accurate (Job describes gravity, a heliocentric solar system, etc.).

It is purely a theological book and in Romans chapter 2 Paul makes an explicit reference to arguments from teleology and history. Nowhere in the bible does it ask for people to suspend using logic. One of the main mistakes that people make is when they take to the notion that the bible despises philosophy and reasoning, because Paul criticizes the "vain philosophy of the Greeks". This is silly because Paul was referring to the Greeks and in Acts it even establishes why he felt Greek philosophy was irrational. Not to mention that philosophy is clearly practiced by biblical writers, just look at Proverbs and Ecclesiastes.


Well put and no argument from me on this.

I agree that religionists are supposed to analyse all things.

Jesus always preached to seek God. He never sais seek me yet look at how Christians have become idol worshipers of a man who said he was not God.

Regards
DL


Well now that we've established something I'd like to ask something of you: would you care to elaborate why you view gnostic texts as historically accurate? I'm fascinated to hear your answer. Who do you like to read on the topic? Why do you think the canonized texts are inaccurate? What do you think happened at the Nicene council?


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18 Nov 2014, 11:03 pm

It's a stepping stone, and only a phase within societal development in it's anti-intellectual form.

Other than that it's a way of preparing oneself to wrap their mind around the counter-intuitive when when it's simply too foreign to emotionally/intuitively believe even if intellectually acknowledged to be true.



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18 Nov 2014, 11:17 pm

Lukecash12 wrote:
Pistis doesn't have anything to do with an axiom except when axioms are incidentally used in the process envisioned by the term.


You skipped right past that whole "the assertion of an..." construct, which pretty clearly established that I was referring to a process involving the invocation of axioms as opposed to the axioms themselves.

Can you describe how pistis can be performed in the absence of any posited axiom? Not a rhetorical question. I lean towards a coherence theory of truth myself, but I believe axiomatizations may be a necessary sine qua non of discourse, if not of grokking the truth. If you've figured out how to get by without them, I want in! But if not, then your charge that the invocation of axioms is only incidental to pistis is unsupported.

Lukecash12 wrote:
The best way to explain the word in a manner conducive to modern people understanding it is that an individual pistis is a persuasion/argument and different pistis are expected to be weighed against one another.


Right. Like how by contemplating various negations of the Parallel Postulate of Euclidean geometry, you can get hyperbolic and elliptical geometries. Such pointless navel-gazing would serve as a basis for the development of Riemannian geometry, which made possible general relativity. (I had good reasons for choosing that particular example :) )

Lukecash12 wrote:
This is not at all the same as the modern definition because so many today would like to say that faith is a process outside of reason, when the original definition literally meant the process of reason. It is practically the antithesis of it's modern variant.


You're basing your 'modern definition' on a specific, non-exhaustive subset of the set of all persons professing religious faith. Does that make those who still understand faith, including religious faith, as being the process of reason, practitioners of faith as per the 'post-modern definition'? :lol:


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19 Nov 2014, 12:20 am

RhodyStruggle wrote:
Lukecash12 wrote:
Pistis doesn't have anything to do with an axiom except when axioms are incidentally used in the process envisioned by the term.


You skipped right past that whole "the assertion of an..." construct, which pretty clearly established that I was referring to a process involving the invocation of axioms as opposed to the axioms themselves.

Can you describe how pistis can be performed in the absence of any posited axiom? Not a rhetorical question. I lean towards a coherence theory of truth myself, but I believe axiomatizations may be a necessary sine qua non of discourse, if not of grokking the truth. If you've figured out how to get by without them, I want in! But if not, then your charge that the invocation of axioms is only incidental to pistis is unsupported.

Lukecash12 wrote:
The best way to explain the word in a manner conducive to modern people understanding it is that an individual pistis is a persuasion/argument and different pistis are expected to be weighed against one another.


Right. Like how by contemplating various negations of the Parallel Postulate of Euclidean geometry, you can get hyperbolic and elliptical geometries. Such pointless navel-gazing would serve as a basis for the development of Riemannian geometry, which made possible general relativity. (I had good reasons for choosing that particular example :) )

Lukecash12 wrote:
This is not at all the same as the modern definition because so many today would like to say that faith is a process outside of reason, when the original definition literally meant the process of reason. It is practically the antithesis of it's modern variant.


You're basing your 'modern definition' on a specific, non-exhaustive subset of the set of all persons professing religious faith. Does that make those who still understand faith, including religious faith, as being the process of reason, practitioners of faith as per the 'post-modern definition'? :lol:


1. Whether or not you or I think reasoning has to be done with axioms has nothing to do with pistis. There are those who are against axioms, those that are for them. They all use pistis/reasoning. Sextus Empiricus' pistis (a founder of pyrrhonian skepticism), for example, was specifically used to deny axioms.

2. Don't see how that established anything new but sure bro.

3. Would you rather I used the expression "popular definition"? I'm a modern person too and my understanding of "faith" isn't unique. It can be observed in most modern literature on the subject and in many different congregations (especially Protestant ones) that this anti-reason definition is prevalent. Of course a good deal of them still agree with science and think that faith is something outside of it, but there are still those who use their "faith" to contradict reason.


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19 Nov 2014, 3:05 pm

Moving without Knowing IS Faith.

Faith IS knowing without Moving.

Faith IS Knowing.

Knowing IS Faith.

Faith IS NOT Knowledge.

Knowledge NOT IS Faith.

And truly it is almost impossible to understand these metaphors for someone who has NOT
DIRECTLY EXPERIENCED ALL PARAMETERS OF FAITH.

FAITH IS INCLUSIVE OF EXPERIENCE.

EXPERIENCE OF INCLUSIVE IS FAITH.

FAITH IS INCLUSIVE AND NOT EXCLUSIVE.

EXCLUSIVE NOT AND INCLUSIVE IS FAITH.

FAITH IS TRUST.

TRUST IS FAITH.

TRUST IS TRUTH.

TRUTH IS TRUST.

GOD IS TRUTH.

TRUTH IS GOD.

LOVE
IS
TRUST
TRUST
IS
LOVE.

LOVE

IS GOD.

GOD IS

LOVE.

PATH TO GOD IS FAITH.

FAITH IS GOD TO PATH.

FAITH IS EMOTION NEVER WORD ALONE.

ALONE WORD NEVER EMOTION IS FAITH.

FAITH IS NEVER ALONE

ALONE NEVER IS FAITH.

ALLONE GREATEST GIFT GRACE OF FAITH IS NEVER ALONE INSTEAD ALLONE.
ALLONE INSTEAD ALONE NEVER IS FAITH OF GRACE GIFT GREATEST ALLONE.

In other words the emotion of faith is a very important emotion for success in life, no matter what it is connected to per complex language and human verbiage in cultural and or religious way.


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20 Nov 2014, 9:21 am

Faith without facts is for fools.

Regards
DL



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20 Nov 2014, 11:16 am

GnosticBishop wrote:
Faith without facts is for fools.

Regards
DL
I actually agree with this one.


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aghogday
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20 Nov 2014, 12:03 pm

Image

First of all, that's a picture of my cat up there, but somewhere along the line I lost my horns AND recently got them back. ;)

That's kind of a joke and it's kind of not.

The human archetype of the fool, nah, not the one they talk about in the locker room in grade school, is the trump of fool per the human who has gained one in being with KNOWING GOD and has relative free will, with TRUE POWER AND FEARLESSNESS TO VEER FROM THE social norm PER what some folks describe as fool AS pejorative.

Religion generally speaking THROUGH THE course of human history is all about the TRIBAL NORM, AND SHAMING FOLKS IN CALLING THEM FOOL, IF THEY DO NOT DO WHAT THOSE WHO SUBJUGATE THROUGH FEAR DEMAND, PER THE ULTIMATE FEAR FOR MOST PEOPLE OF BEING THE OUTCAST AND NO LONGER GAINING SUBSISTENCE, a real INSTINCTUAL FEAR for MOST FOLKS IN history past GREATER but still remaining, although technology replaces some of the reliance of dependence on the 'tribe' per flesh and blood direct contact with humans for SUBSISTENCE.

The 'Perfect' example is all the SO-CALLED FOOLS, historically speaking, who did not BELIEVE JOHN 3:16 AS LITERAL FACT AND WERE KILLED AS HERETIC FOOLS, UP TO BEING BURNED AT THE STAKE.

THE WORD FACT is a relative term, and human reason is what the Human archetype of the 'FOOL' Utilizing RELATIVE FREE WILL EXCELS IN.

HOWEVER, THAT'S NOT ALL, AS KNOWING GOD GOES BEYOND THE MIND OF CULTURE AND WHAT MOST PEOPLE CONSIDER FACT.

SOME SO-CALLED FACTS CAN BE considered details that describe some minor dust on the face of GOD as SCRIBED BY Science but GOD IS Tapestry and NEVER FACT ALONE.

FAITH IS KNOWING GOD, AND NEVER LIMITED BY FACT OR KNOWLEDGE.

IN MY FIRST HAND EXPERIENCE OF MOVING METAPHORICAL MOUNTAINS

I WOULD HAVE NEVER BEEN ABLE TO DO IT WITH FACTS ALONE

AT ALL.

OF COURSE THE REAL MAN JESUS COULD TELL YOU THAT TOO,

IF HE EVER EXISTED.

But that matters not as Truth exists and TRUTH IS GOD

WITH SPECKS OF FACTS HERE AND THERE that unfortunately as it may be as history shows

SO-CALLED FACTS CAN AND DO litter the face of GOD, too.

But in straight talk withOUT the metaphorical and mystical leanings that come natural to me now that I KNOW GOD, without so-called FACTS, ALONE, IN my opinion WHAT MOST PEOPLE in the pews of churches consider faith per just believing something the pastor said or they read in a BOOK WITHOUT TRULY KNOWING GOD per INNER KNOWING (in what CAN be described as proof) LIKE Jesus is the only Son of GOD is not faith at all and YES pejorative foolishness.

However the REASON FOLKS WILL BE TRUE PEJORATIVE FOOLS IS FOR FEAR OF NOT BEING ACCEPTED BY THEIR PEERS.

This is A BASIC HUMAN INSTINCTUAL FEAR, AGAIN, THAT PSYCHOPATHIC LEANING HEARTLESS FOLKS, IN THE CLERGY FOR THOUSANDS OF YEARS NOW STILL USE TO CONTROL OTHER HUMANS THROUGH ILLUSORY FEAR, repression and oppression of their human nature, particularly reproductive freedoms.

AND MOREOVER FOR MATERIALISTIC COLLECTIVIST GAINS, INSTEAD OF the REAL HUMAN NATURE that MOST people innately DO share to SHARE WITH OTHERS AND COOPERATE IN LOVE, a FLESH AND BLOOD CONNECTING emotion, instead of COLLECTING lifeless BYPRODUCTS OF THEIR CULTURAL ENVIRONMENTS that become an artificial extension of their humanity.

KNOWING GOD IS KNOWING GOD, NOT A SECOND HAND STORY.

But there are many second hand stories that CAN PROVIDE A PATH TO KNOWING GOD, AND RARELY ARE ANY OF THESE PATHS WITHOUT FLAWS, AS FLAWS ARE WHAT MAKE TAPESTRY WHAT IT IS, TOO. :)

IN OTHER WORDS GOD IS GOOD ALL THE TIME.

ONE JUST HAS TO BE ABLE TO SEE AND KNOW THE TAPESTRY OF GOD TO GET IT.

FACTS ALONE WILL NEVER DO IT.

AND YES I HAVE THE DOCUMENTED 'FACTS' THAT PROVE IT.

AND THE GAME GOES ON.... WITH THE FOOL AT THE BEGINNING AND THE END OF ALL THAT IS REAL.....AT THE NUMER ZERO.

SINCERELY,

WITH REGARDS AND A SMILE OF COURSE
:)

AS THE FOOL ALWAYS HAS SOMETHING TO SMILE ABOUT. ;)

WITH A WINK TOO....


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20 Nov 2014, 1:32 pm

AspieOtaku wrote:
GnosticBishop wrote:
Faith without facts is for fools.

Regards
DL
I actually agree with this one.


Thanks.

Regards
DL



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20 Nov 2014, 1:37 pm

aghogday wrote:
[img]

AS THE FOOL ALWAYS HAS SOMETHING TO SMILE ABOUT. ;)

.


That is why he is a fool.

Regards
DL



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20 Nov 2014, 1:45 pm

Ah .. But you FAILED to mention the wink. :)


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20 Nov 2014, 1:50 pm

But true it is a well known FACT that misery loves company and that's the part that makes life even more amusing for the fool as simply more inspiration for LIGHT aka muse for light.

There is no escaping God.


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