On 12/9/2016 2:51 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Fri, Dec 9, 2016 at 2:22 AM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]> wrote:
On 12/8/2016 3:52 PM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Fri, Dec 9, 2016 at 12:38 AM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]>
wrote:
On 12/8/2016 3:31 PM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Thu, Dec 8, 2016 at 6:47 PM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]>
wrote:
On 12/8/2016 3:29 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Mon, Dec 5, 2016 at 7:26 PM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]>
wrote:
On 12/5/2016 1:31 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Mon, Dec 5, 2016 at 3:38 AM, Brent Meeker <[email protected]>
wrote:
On 12/4/2016 10:45 AM, Telmo Menezes wrote:
On Sat, Dec 3, 2016 at 6:03 PM, Brent Meeker
<[email protected]>
wrote:
and by doing so you drag in a lot of baggage. There was a group of
atheists in the Dallas area which for a time formed a church and
claimed
to
be a religion for tax purposes. They defined "God" to be whatever
was
good
in the world. The IRS disallowed their claim.
I assume that evoking the American IRS as a a scholarly authority on
such a matter is a joke, right?
But they are as good an authority as any. Unlike theologians they
have
to
make decisions that have real consequences - not just mix word salad.
But this is not a discussion about theology, it's a discussion about
the historical and cultural variations of concepts of god -- it falls
under anthropology and history.
OK, tell me about a historical or cultural variation in which "god"
doesn't
not refer to a person/agent.
Anything pantheistic. Taoism, several gnostic cults, certain native
Americans I think, sufi mysticism, certain denominations of modern
judaism... Ah and the force in Star Wars.
But they don't use the word "god". It's an abuse of language it say that
"god" means "whatever one's religion worships". Paul Tillich tried that
maneuver in the '60s. He said "god" meant whatever one valued most:
money,
fame, power,... If you cut a word lose from common usage then, as the
Caterpillar said to Alice, you can make it mean anything you want.
So you are saying that "god" is reserved for judaic-christian style
deities.
It's not "reserved"; it, like any word, is defined by usage, and the usage
overwhelmingly denotes a being who is immortal, has supernatural powers and
knowledge and should be obeyed and worshipped or placated. It includes the
gods and godesses of Egypt, Greece, Mesopotamia, India, Scandnavia, Mayan,
Aztec,...
I hear people say stuff like "God for me is Nature" all the time. Don't you?
No, I don't. But if I did, I'd take it as metaphor, "I worship
nature." I hear people say, "Time is money." and "Valentino Rossi is a
motorcycle god." but I don't take them literally.
I was raised a catholic and had to go through 6 years of Sunday school
until my father put an end to it (I'm forever grateful to him). Even
there, I could tell that some people were more literalists while
others saw god as "more of a concept". I have the impression that more
educated people had a more abstract and less interventionist
conception of god. Many did not believe in heaven or hell or miracles.
Or that the universe as 6000 years old or any of that nonsense.
And some of those believed in a god, a deist god perhaps. But those who
believed in an impersonal order or force didn't believe in a god -
because "god" refers to a person. It's just a matter of not distorting
language.
Noun 1. God - the supernatural being conceived as the perfect and
omnipotent and omniscient originator and ruler of the universe; the object
of worship in monotheistic religions
2. god - any supernatural being worshipped as controlling some part
of the world or some aspect of life or who is the personification of a force
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/God
Well if you go here you get a different picture:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God
It's not really different. It equivocates on "god" as "sometimes
described" as abstract. But all the examples are of persons and agents.
I am not trying to cut the religious any slack, by the way. I think we
agree on a lot of things.
But isn't it obvious to you that the concept of god was invented as a
personalization of forces like storms and volcanoes and light. That's
why early religions were animist; there was a deer spirit and a wind
spirit and mountain spirit... As civilization developed it seemed that
humans were superior and dominant over all animals and even over some of
inanimate nature - so the concept of god shifted to a great, superhuman
person, a great leader and law giver - especially one who led his
worshippers to victory in war. And of course there must be one greatest
leader (who happens to be the one we believe in). It is only because
science in the broadest sense has shown these ideas to be parochial and
contradictory and incoherent that theologians have been forced to
retreat into abstractions and poetic circumlocutions; while still
currying support from the hoi polloi with images of a stern father or
loving mother god. As Bertrand Russell notes they don't want to speak
plainly of an abstract order, which might as well be Noether's theorem,
because their prestige and influence depends on the idea of a personal
god, a concept that people can understand because He's like them. He's
vain, He loves worship and He gets angry and He demands good behavior
and He saves them from death. So the modern theologians use of the word
"god" is basically dishonest. They are using it as a diversion and they
know it. If someone wants to study or speculate about the foundation of
the world or morals or purpose; that's great. But if they can't show it
has personal, human attributes, it's just fraud to refer to it as "god".
I highly recommend the little book, "The Religion Virus" by Craig A. James.
Brent
You can safely assume you've created God in your own image when it turns
out that God hates all the same people you do.
- Anne Lamott
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