Christianity

[Harry Baird]

Harry? What am I to say about you? You exist in, as I know, a Manichaean conundrum. You say that god is impotent in our world

Not impotent, no. Just not omnipotent.

and, effectively, that this world is ruled by powers & principalities that carry on without regard to 'justice' or really anything but their own 'self-serving desire'.

Not ruled by, but invaded by; beset by - although, sure, having since gained some ruling power in at least some areas or senses.

However, you are lit-up with a burning sense of opposition to that reigning injustice.

As is God (in my conception).

You make an effort to argue, therefore, from a personalized position

Most of my ethical principles are not personal but shared, albeit that some people don't take/apply them to their full extent.

That which has been more personal in forming my views is my experiences with the "powers & principalities" to which you allude.

within a 'no-god world'

I do see God as active in the world, albeit that God's presence and activity is often hard to perceive. I am not sure how to explain why that is.

but, of course, this is really hopeless since you know, at the deepest level, there is no hope at all.

There is plenty of hope, although, again, at times, it is sometimes hard to see.

Now, there's one person you missed in your list. Go on. Do Alexis Jacobi.

[tillingborn]

Do you have examples that clearly show another media outlet contradicting themselves about the examples you gave?

the major media say one thing -- like, "Hunter Biden's laptop was a fake," or "certain vaxxes (J&J, AZ) are good," or "Russia fixed our last elections," and then later are exposed as having lied about these things

Clearly you don't. No surprises there.
Then there's this:

Give me the story.

Here. Let me get you started.

"At one time, there were only Neanderthals upon the Earth..." [fill in the plausible story here]

That's not how the story starts. At no time were there only Neanderthals upon the Earth. Neanderthals, so the story goes, like Homo Sapiens, evolved from a common ancestor; Neanderthals probably in Europe, Homo Sapiens in Africa. Homo Sapiens spread out of Africa and whether by out-competing, genocide or inter-breeding, Homo Sapiens became dominant,

"...and after that, human beings were modern humans, and there were no more Neanderthals.

Here; educate yourself Immanuel Can: https://humanorigins.si.edu/evidence/ge ... anderthals
Your insistence that there was an "original mating pair" is you trying to shoehorn a Biblical narrative into science, where it has no place. No two humans share exactly the same DNA, so there has never been a unique sequence that all human beings have to have to qualify. It is the small variations that make some individuals more successful at mating that become more prevalent in a population. That doesn't mean that suddenly two individuals can't breed with the rest of the population, as your hypothesis implies; it just means that after many generations some group of adaptations mean an individual could no longer successfully breed with an ancestral counterpart.

[Belinda]

Alexis Jacobi wrote:

in South Africa we must take into consideration the people who took over the system and, as it is happening, run it into the ground. You are quite aware that I am referring to Black Africa itself. And you are also aware of the perception that *they cannot run a country* and they cannot *manage civilization*. And so we must then note that they never wanted it in the first place, did they? It was *imposed* on them by Europeans and European culture.

Apartheid was in force in South Africa, and Apartheid was found by more civilised standards to be against human rights. "European culture" is not monolithic but dynamic rather like Xianity is dynamic.
How to attain human rights in sub-Saharan Africa is via self determination and democracy. Romantic attachment to 'European culture' as was in some idealised notion of 'European' has been shown by Hitler and Co, to be wrong.

[Dubious]

You would know much more about these apologetic web sites than I do; I'm sure you have some favorites! Why not point out a few? I

Already done, in my response to AJ. Try https://www.reasonablefaith.org/. If you read all of that, and don't find a question answered there, get back to me, and we'll talk.

Anything Craig says requires no historical or scientific probability of being true; it only requires belief to make it uncompromisingly true as biblically accepted...aside which, he's not going to jeopardise the very foundation on which his business is based like any evangelist where Jesus and the bible become the centres of their mini-empires.

You invariably come along with W. L. Craig in providing the definitive answers as insurmountable proof for your beliefs which I'm requested to read all of prior to having any further conversations with you. Do you seriously believe anything would change if I did? It seems WLC remains your main source in providing credibility!

But it's really not necessary; I'm just as likely to gain a very good idea of his views in a quite detailed and long debate with Sean Carroll as in the following...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0qKZqPy9T8

Let others who remain interested decide whose credibility is most in question.

Certainly WLC is no dummy! It takes brains to forge a coherent argument however dubious and unrelated to reality it may be - something you are thoroughly incapable of simply relying on negation to circumvent all arguments deemed contrary; a consistent series of retreats when an argument defeats your ability to respond repeated innumerable times of which you’ve been reminded an equal number of times. It gives the impression not only of dishonesty and hypocrisy but also intellectual cowardice.

Craig and his type, though more intelligent than most of his followers, is a manufacturer of truth whose core of revelation is the bible. It’s opposite to those who seek to discover it rather than invent it. If biblical truth were inviolable, as you would have it, we wouldn’t even have antibiotics or any knowledge of how life came to be and zero knowledge of the universe, it's extent or any of its processes.

God has always been the shortest route in justifying any explanation. One time and for a very long time, that wasn't a problem but now it is.

[attofishpi]

Well said Dubious.

[Dubious]

My view is, of course, that there is a *higher dimension* of mystical belief that can abandon the ladder entirely and can resolve to hold to *important essences* which only really have to do with meaning & value. How can one get to that *higher dimension* then? Purification of the seeing mechanism.

That's one of the differences between me, you and most others. I don't think in terms of 'higher dimensions' since it begs the question, higher compared to what? Why should a mystical belief which amounts to some strange amorphous experience or feeling enveloping one be denoted in terms of some higher dimension which in itself means nothing.

Least of all - and I mean that literally - would I degrade or delimit that kind of experience by assigning any such explicit quality as 'meaning or value'. When it comes to the mystical, I prefer to remain silent in experiencing the wordless unencumbered by any definition. The mystical is an encounter with one's own unknown, a burrowing, an Erda kind of mystique emerging from the underground. One can never really know oneself since we can never know what may emanate from there...except it being impersonal which temporarily dissolves one's personality, the conditions of I. What remains is what floats.

[attofishpi]

Like a Bondi cigar.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Apartheid was in force in South Africa, and Apartheid was found by more civilised standards to be against human rights. "European culture" is not monolithic but dynamic rather like Xianity is dynamic. How to attain human rights in sub-Saharan Africa is via self determination and democracy. Romantic attachment to 'European culture' as was in some idealised notion of 'European' has been shown by Hitler and Co, to be wrong.

If you have followed what I have so far written on this topic you will know that what you describe here I fully understand and I also have taken it into consideration. I very well understand that the South African situation, which certainly included apartheid, came to be seen as intolerable. World-opinion, certainly, turned against it. And I made it clear that I grew up with parents who were in various ways involved in this same opposition, as was the near entirety of popular culture at that time. And were you to have asked me to give an opinion on the matter I would have responded as did popular culture.

So 'the righteous' triumphed. The bands played. The ceremonies were performed. The idealism celebrated. The leaders stepped forward and made their pronouncements. Heroes were honored. The villains vilified.

And a slow descent began, which proceeds today, toward ruin.

The righteous, with perplexed expressions, do not know quite what to think. So they double-down on versions of the original story: the Whites have too much power still. The injustice still determines the outcome. In order for the new South African project to succeed, therefore, the revolution must continue. Etc., etc., etc.

I find that on some levels at least I cannot disagree with this analysis. Why is that? Because, evidently, I *buy into it*. And any other view that I would take, according to the Reigning Narratives, places me among the unrighteous.

So with that said I return to my principle point: The narratives of *righteousness*, powerful as indeed they are, determining as indeed they are, and permitting no opposition, go forward in many different areas. There is celebration. And things, generally speaking, and inexorably, tend not to improvement and successful outcomes, but to something unlike that.

Therefore, I have to examine from a more critical perspective 'civilized standards' 'human rights' and also the well-established condemnatory posture, presented as 'righteousness' and as 'goodness', against what you describe as "romantic attachment to European culture". And then, which is even more difficult (it is employed as the *ultimate block* and an insurmountable hurdle, you make it plain that if I take any position that stands opposed to "civilized standards' 'human rights (etc.) that you and others see this as aligning with "Hitler & Co".

This is how a General Narrative functions.

How to attain human rights in sub-Saharan Africa is via self determination and democracy.

This is a 'declarative statement' which arises out of the Narrative of Righteousness, but is it, in fact, true? You seem certain. I am not at all certain. But I am, as I say, susceptible to the power in the narrative declaration. I do not want to openly oppose it for fear of being associated with unrighteousness.

Self-determination and 'democracy' are ur-European categories! They are *impositions* made by Europe on peoples who did not in any sense conceive of these as necessary. And, in my observations, when they are imposed it is often the case that factions far more interested in power alone, and something like dictatorial control, seem more often than not to emerge. The righteous, as per usual, frown in bafflement and concern. And they ramp up their core argument all over again. That the cause of disarray, or chaos, of degeneration, is . . . [fill in the blank]

This statement interest me: What is shown to be wrong. It is good for you and for one with your position to know and with certainty what is 'wrong' and also what is 'right'. I have not been as convinced that I do know. Or, once I was highly certain that I did know and now I doubt.

So here is what I say more or less in summation: our history presents us with a narrative that exclaims with certainty that the trajectory it defines as 'good' and 'necessary' is the right one. The right one? What does that mean? It means, I think literally, that what is unfolding unfolds because it is metaphysically sound and also necessary. It arose and is part-and-parcel of what I could say is perceived, consciously at times, unconsciously most other times, as 'God's will'. I kid you not. When once 'God's will' was declared a veritable force, a 'real thing', now the idea submerged and went underground. It operates at another level though. No one on this forum, except the old-school god-believer, could assert the idea of God or God's will for the Earth. And yet among an entire class of people the core idea, the metaphysical assumption, is evermore dominant and powerful.

Even within that paradigm however (God's will or metaphysical determination, or evolution according to an unfolding plan) it is actually possible to make a whole other set of assertions about what is needed and what 'does good'. It seems to be a question of where one stands in relation to that set of definitions.

[Immanuel Can]

Then there's this:

Give me the story.

Here. Let me get you started.

"At one time, there were only Neanderthals upon the Earth..." [fill in the plausible story here]

That's not how the story starts.

Red herring. You know what I'm asking. In any supposed "phase" of evolution, there had to be a mating pair to produce the alleged genetic "step forward."

Give me the story of how it could happen without that.

[Immanuel Can]

You would know much more about these apologetic web sites than I do; I'm sure you have some favorites! Why not point out a few? I

Already done, in my response to AJ. Try https://www.reasonablefaith.org/. If you read all of that, and don't find a question answered there, get back to me, and we'll talk.

Anything Craig says requires no historical or scientific probability of being true;

That's a pretty ridiculous claim, even on the face of it: and obviously merely ad hominem. You haven't faced the facts.

If you watched any of the videos, you'd know that's obviously, verifiably untrue. And you'd be a little embarassed you tried that ruse, because anybody who watched them would see through it instantly.

I'm interested, though...you've had the link for a long time now, and could have watched even just a couple of the videos -- in which case, you'd have been better informed than to risk the claim above.

But you didn't. That's apparent, because you clearly have no clue what's in them.

Why not? Each video is only 6 or 8 minutes long...it's not a long time to consider an answer you claim to have been wanting...

[Alexis Jacobi]

My view is, of course, that there is a *higher dimension* of mystical belief that can abandon the ladder entirely and can resolve to hold to *important essences* which only really have to do with meaning & value. How can one get to that *higher dimension* then? Purification of the seeing mechanism.

That's one of the differences between me, you and most others. I don't think in terms of 'higher dimensions' since it begs the question, higher compared to what? Why should a mystical belief which amounts to some strange amorphous experience or feeling enveloping one be denoted in terms of some higher dimension which in itself means nothing.

Least of all - and I mean that literally - would I degrade or delimit that kind of experience by assigning any such explicit quality as 'meaning or value'. When it comes to the mystical, I prefer to remain silent in experiencing the wordless unencumbered by any definition. The mystical is an encounter with one's own unknown, a burrowing, an Erda kind of mystique emerging from the underground. One can never really know oneself since we can never know what may emanate from there...except it being impersonal which temporarily dissolves one's personality, the conditions of I. What remains is what floats.

Defending a philosophical stance, and certainly defending *higher dimensions*, will necessarily involve me in a project of recapitulation of my own trajectory. My own *style* is, of course, to cite references as if I am submitting a theory to the Academy. You indicate to me, in clear and also strenuous prose, that you do not recognize any category within the domain of consciousness that involves 'higher' and 'lower'. I definitely do. But how could I possibly make my case to you? and why would I try? In the end it all seems to revolve around not so much proving it to you or anyone, but to cementing my own reasons why I believe that these are 'real categories'.

What I can say, however, is that what you describe as 'meaning nothing', which is a declaration that actually comes first (that nothing means anything, that there is no *meaning* and thus no *higher meaning*), and what you describe as an 'amorphous feeling' (a feeling without a body or a distinguishable shape) is of some *material* that has tended to be the most valued and the most (permit me the term) transforming within all 'high' cultures. Ah, but there I have lost you already. Why I am completely uncertain. Given your tastes in music, your capacity to 'value' what others cannot distinguish, I cannot at all see (effectively I mean justify) your denial of these essentially metaphysical categories. How do you pull that one off? I try to guess and I come up short.

So this is why I try, more or less 'only', to try to see you and categorize you and people who see like you, on the scale of a causal chain leading from one point to another. The notion of *higher dimension* has died. In the same way that God died. What seems 'inevitable' therefore is the end of the possibility of *seeing* anything that has to do with 'that world'. What vanished therefore? A concept-path. Why did it vanish? Well that is a rather complex question as you surely (obviously?) know. So one could make the statement that when 'god' died so then did poetry and 'higher allusion'. And so did the idea of 'high' and 'low'. Everything is now seen mono-dimensionally and on one plane. I now feel embarrassed using the qualifier 'higher'. You've given me a complex (!)

So if I go along with you I will simply agree to *close off* those conceptual pathways. According to you this would be an act of sobriety, of coming down out of unreal clouds, a faded 'world' that in truth never did exist. That is, I will imitate you in your particular trajectory and, I would imagine, wind up in a place similar to where you now are.

However, though you indicate what I might describe as a certain stubbornness to be seduced, as you might see it, by mere language to pull you back to consider what I present as something 'real' -- you nevertheless can form a paragraph like this:

The mystical is an encounter with one's own unknown, a burrowing, an Erda kind of mystique emerging from the underground. One can never really know oneself since we can never know what may emanate from there...except it being impersonal which temporarily dissolves one's personality, the conditions of I. What remains is what floats.

Declarative. Certain. Explanatory. Conclusive.

A transposition of terms as well . . .

[ThinkOfOne]

Unfortunately "Christianity", as the word is typically understood, does not have the teachings of Jesus as its foundation. Rather its foundation is based upon the teaching of those other than Jesus. There's no reasonably escaping this fact. As such, there have been and are very few of what you call "Christians". To insist on calling them "Christians" seems folly.

If you agree with what I wrote, then why have you been busting @sculptor's chops for using the word as it's typically understood? For all intents and purposes, what he has been referring to as Christians are Christians. Those who follow the teaching of Jesus instead of the teachings of those other than Jesus are not Christians as the word is typically understood.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Harry ….

I have been concluding that because I define different gods than you do, I therefore concomitantly define different ethics.

Though I believe I can grasp, and to a degree appreciate and emulate aspects of your ethical imperatives, I still remain within the “problem of power” that I revealed.

What I am able to do is, and as I said, envision an internal world of applied ethics while also allowing what amounts to another value-set to be appreciated and understood. That which I explained through the Vedic Model.

Australia will never be returned to the Aboriginal. North America will never be returned to the Native Tribes. However, some restitution will likely be given in one form or another.

I have opted to man a position on the side of ‘continuation of conquest’ as a sound principle. I know this grates in your ears and in your heart as something utterly horrible and unjust. I understand. But I have not arrived at my decision without some ethical weighing. But again ethics with (apparently) different foundations.

I do not think assimilation is comparable to genocide. In my view it means ‘absorbing into the cultural body of another’. Yet I do not deny that in North America the Natives fought against the invaders and were defeated and crushed.

I lieu of a fuller reply I submit this provisional one (tapped out on my phone).

[henry quirk]

If you agree with what I wrote, then why have you been busting @sculptor's chops for using the word as it's typically understood? For all intents and purposes, what he has been referring to as Christians are Christians. Those who follow the teaching of Jesus instead of the teachings of those other than Jesus are not Christians as the word is typically understood.

I agree what passes for Christianity, what is considered Christian, has little to with what Jesus did and said. Multiple times I've referred to this as institutional. Where sculptor and I part company is that he says that's all Christianity is.

Call the two what you like -- Christianity and Christendom, true Christianity and institutional Christianity, Jesuism and Paulism -- there are two. The first is a moral code derived from the life and thinking of Jesus; the second is the commodifying machine.

The problem, of course, is those who follow the first -- the Christian anarchists, for example -- will say they have no obligation to adopt a new placeholder, a new name, for their belief. When they say Christian, they mean that moral code derived from the life and thinking of Jesus Christ. Those who follow, are consumed, by the second take Christian to mean sumthin' else entirely.

I suppose, then, we must consider which of the two has the rightful claim on the placeholder.

I don't know that common or conventional usage ought be the determiner.

[Alexis Jacobi]

But you didn't. That's apparent, because you clearly have no clue what's in them.

Please post one link to one of those videos. Select one that you feel presents something important that those you communicate with would do well to understand.

Then there would be something tangible to examine and discuss.