The Christian captivity of any notion of "heathenry"

[Lutiferre]

I wanted to open this thread simply as a point of criticism, not against the teachings as such of any of what you call heathenry, but against the very designation of there being such a thing as heathenry, and against the mandate for spending even a second on such a notion.

The thing I want to say is very simple. If you are not Christians, if you reject Christianity, then you also reject heathenry, and you also acknowledge that no is more heathen than another. Because to say that you are a heathen when you are not a Christian, is to miss the fact that with a real rejection of Christianity comes the cognition of the absolute worthlesness of any terms such as "heathenry"; which imply the division between those in ignorance and those in truth; those Christians and those unupdated; the absolute truth and the perverted and corrupted outsiders which are all deficient in their knowledge of truth. As long as you center the division in history between self and other when it comes to cult, indeed on Christianity, then you still posesses a Christian mindset, you still assign a primacy and uniqueness of Christianity, and possibly other religions as well, of your own arbitrary choice. This has no value whatsoever given that Christianity is itself heathen, itself pagan, for a true non-Christian appreciation of self and other, in cult; it is not something that hinges on Christian synthesis or sentiments, only so for those still breathing in the Christian selfawareness.

This notion, of course, reduces itself to nothing when you reject Christianity, because it is itself a condition of Christian selfawareness, which is utterly irrelevant to a non-Christian phronema which you haven't acquired. You are still living in captivity to the Christian phronema, to the Christian division between "everything that is not Christian" and that which is Christian.

In truth, if Christianity is rejected, or at least, if this Christian mindset, to the extent that it still occupies the minds of non-Christians, is purged out and taken up from it's roots to wither away, Christianity is itself no more and no less heathen than anything else. Indeed then, if you reject Christianity, then from your point of view Christians should be heathens and pagans just as much you (because nothing else exists), if not more than you, because you still live in captivity to notions you deem yourself unheathen, which is itself a notion that is utterly incoherent and irrelevant, and so too becomes the distinction of who is more or less so; all that remains then are you own private conceptions in all their modernity and detachment from all actuality of authentic non-Christian historical self-understanding into the Christian selfawareness that permeates your minds.

It becomes interesting to note that you are all, on that note, repeating a Christian historicism and selfawareness, defeating the creed who is somehow wrong, which can be reduced to falsehood (the Christian who imported semitic filth into the religious affirmation of the incompatible and right people; your own - or, alternatively, for the Christian, heathens, non-Christians), while you are somehow right, which translates to the absolute truth value (the untainted and noble heathens who will have no Semitic influence; or for Christians, Christianity itself and it's actual adherents).

A kind of absolute division between one and other in terms of cult, and spirit, which simply does not exist from a truly non-Christian standpoint, except as a cheap repetition of a really Christian awareness, exclusivism and mutual division, rather than the more historically authentic mass of indistinct pluralism and interexchange of the plurality of religious and spiritual circulation, of which it is completely indifferent to any exclusivistic viewpoints, that are only really reflections of a repetition of Christian historicism in a so-called heathen version. It is Christian selfawareness turned against Christianity.

[SuuT]

If you substitute your use of the term Christian with Heathen in your treatise, you come closer to actually saying something.

In other words, one could take the same axiomatic approach, invert your qualifiers, and it would appeal to Heathens as opposed to Christians and the notion that Christianity contains all Heathen attributes in the highest expression of their truth.

[Liffrea]

Sorry Lutiferre but if there is a point in that lot it’s way over my head….

[Lutiferre]

If you substitute your use of the term Christian with Heathen in your treatise, you come closer to actually saying something.

In other words, one could take the same axiomatic approach, invert your qualifiers, and it would appeal to Heathens as opposed to Christians and the notion that Christianity contains all Heathen attributes in the highest expression of their truth.
You exactly commit the error I was commenting on and blindly continue exactly the thing I was criticizing without even noticing it :rolleyes:

What I was criticizing is the very way in which you use the word "Heathen", which I believe is ultimately meaningless, self-refuting, not "heathen" teaching, which itself presupposes the very notion I was criticizing and begs the question to the point of reducing itself to a circular fallacy.

Sorry Lutiferre but if there is a point in that lot it’s way over my head….
Read it again. :thumbs up

[SuuT]

I apologise, Lutiferre. You are right. Your treatise is perfectly lucid, Heathenry is a sham, you have a godlike grasp on truth and I am off to wipe my ass with my Doctoral degrees in Philosophy and Education.

[Lutiferre]

I apologise, Lutiferre. You are right. Your treatise is perfectly lucid, Heathenry is a sham, you have a godlike grasp on truth and I am off to wipe my ass with my Doctoral degrees in Philosophy and Education.
If you had understood even the repeated keywords in all its chaotic confusion, you wouldn't have a need for lucidity.

[Electronic God-Man]

You said a lot of unnecessary crap, but...

I'd agree that the term "heathen" should be used in contrast to "Christian", as it has been throughout history. I wouldn't want to follow any path that defines itself through not being something else and "heathen" does seem to imply "not Christian".

I wish there was a better term. We won't find one. It wasn't a unified system. No one knows how the "heathens" referred to themselves collectively. Most likely they simply considered themselves "the people" and believed in "their Gods".

[Psychonaut]

Just as Heidegger spoke after reading Sartre, there is but one appropriate word: dreck.

[Lutiferre]

Writing in confusion and ambiguity is the best way to write for a (in any case) pessimistic scenario of oneness in mind with those it's addressed to.

[SuuT]

I'd agree that the term "heathen" should be used in contrast to "Christian", as it has been throughout history. I wouldn't want to follow any path that defines itself through not being something else and "heathen" does seem to imply "not Christian".

...:confused2:

All spiritual traditions have an internal and an external: Heathenry is no more defined in virtue of not being Christian than the Christian is by not being Heathen. And the fact remains that the one is not the other, although Lutiferre would have every Heathen truth sucked into the ravenous maw of Catholicism.


... It wasn't a unified system.

One of the substantive differences between Chritianity and Heathenry, then as well as now.


No one knows how the "heathens" referred to themselves collectively.

Sure we do: Mom, Dad, Brother, Sister, Son, Daughter, etc.


Most likely they simply considered themselves "the people" and believed in "their Gods".

Not so simple at all, though.

[Loddfafner]

Lutiferre would do well to translate whatever it was he wrote into English. He may know what he means but his words do not communicate it. There are several possible arguments he could be making but it is not clear which one it is. Perhaps it is a criticism that is better suited to satanism. Satanism only makes sense within a Christian framework, so it could, in a twisted way, be a form of Christianity. Satanism is an explicit rejection of Christ that continues to fetishize Him.

Heathenism is not, as I see it, the opposite of Christianity. They are not mutually exclusive categories, and they do not define each other. Folk Christianity preserves more than a few heathen themes from Santa and the Easter Bunny to the sacred springs by old churches to those old gods disguised as Catholic saints. I can celebrate Christmas with my family as a heathen without any dissonance. I simply focus on the tree rather than the crèche.

[Psychonaut]

Lutiferre would do well to translate whatever it was he wrote into English. There are several possible arguments he could be making but it is not clear which one it is. Perhaps it is a criticism that is better suited to satanism. Satanism only makes sense within a Christian framework, so it could, in a twisted way, be a form of Christianity. Satanism is an explicit rejection of Christ that continues to fetishize Him.

Heathenism is not, as I see it, the opposite of Christianity. They are not mutually exclusive categories, and they do not define each other. Folk Christianity preserves more than a few heathen themes from Santa and the Easter Bunny to the sacred springs by old churches to those old gods disguised as Catholic saints. I can celebrate Christmas with my family as a heathen without any dissonance. I simply focus on the tree rather than the crèche.

Exactly. So many of the Christians here seem unable to differentiate between something that is pre-Christian and that which is explicitly anti-Christian.

[SuuT]

[...] I can celebrate Christmas with my family as a heathen without any dissonance. I simply focus on the tree rather than the crèche.

I induce self-hypnosis by staring at my neon "HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MITHRAS!" sign that I drape with Baldur's mistletoe.

[Lutiferre]

Heathenism is not, as I see it, the opposite of Christianity. They are not mutually exclusive categories, and they do not define each other.
Actually, you are getting closer to my point there.

But you still don't fully grasp it, because you still pretend that there is A, heathenism, and B, Christianity.

The truth is that such a distinction is a product of a Christian selfawareness and awareness of others, and not of a non-Christian one.

For an actually non-Christian selfawareness, this distinction is non-existing and closes itself around itself. Most importantly, in the idea of seeing both as sort of unitary system or phenomena, while in reality only one refers to an at all unitary phenomenon, and the other (Heathenry) refers to nothing at all which doesn't include the former (Christianity) for such a perspective.

[Electronic God-Man]

...:confused2:

All spiritual traditions have an internal and an external: Heathenry is no more defined in virtue of not being Christian than the Christian is by not being Heathen.

Yeah, of course. But, pre-Christian Europeans didn't call themselves "heathen". Christians called people that practiced pre-Christian religion "heathens". So calling it "heathenry" does seem to be naming it from a Christian perspective and not a "heathen" one.

I can also see why in that sense some might hear the word "heathen" and think anti-Christian instead of what it really is.

:D Or maybe heathens can pull an African-American job on this and say they are reclaiming the word "heathen" from Christians like Blacks are trying to do with the word "nigger". :p

[Psychonaut]

I can also see why in that sense some might hear the word "heathen" and think anti-Christian instead of what it really is.

It is proving to be a tough job, but reclamation of the word is necessary since the other options are all stifling neologisms.

[SuuT]

[...]:D Or maybe heathens can pull an African-American job on this and say they are reclaiming the word "heathen" from Christians like Blacks are trying to do with the word "nigger". :p

Well, there are other names/particularisations: but when we need names for things, and 'correct' *cough* ways to speak of them, we go - by default - to existing words before we go the neologism route. And besides, we have Ulfilas to thank for the word, not Christainity. The pejorative connotations came later.

[Lutiferre]

I am not speaking of just "a slightly incovenient name" for something actually existing.

I am speaking of the idea that there is something, or even worse, one thing, to name to begin with ("Heathenry").

[Jamt]

Heathenism is not, as I see it, the opposite of Christianity. They are not mutually exclusive categories, and they do not define each other.

Would you not understand Nietzsche’s worldview as something based on opposition or at least disappointment with Christianity? As some Heathens are influenced by Nietzsche, might not some of them base there spirituality on opposition to Christianity just as Satanists and Atheists do? I am not saying that you do.

[Electronic God-Man]

Would you not understand Nietzsche’s worldview as something based on opposition or at least disappointment with Christianity? As some Heathens are influenced by Nietzsche, might not some Heathens base there spirituality on opposition to Christianity just as Satanists and Atheists do? I am not saying that you do.

Actually, I have seen a number of heathens (online, not here) that have used heathenism more as a vehicle for anti-Christianity than anything else.

[Loddfafner]

Would you not understand Nietzsche’s worldview as something based on opposition or at least disappointment with Christianity? As some Heathens are influenced by Nietzsche, might not some Heathens base there spirituality on opposition to Christianity just as Satanists and Atheists do? I am not saying that you do.

Certainly. But "heathenism" covers a wide range of positions and possibilities. It is only slightly more narrow a concept than "paganism", in that it excludes the worship of scented candles, rainbow-colored pyramids, and dolphin-shaped dildos. Unfortunately it does not seem to exclude those who dismiss Christianity as a Jewish conspiracy.

[SuuT]

It is important to note that one can be an 'antiChristian(ity)' as well as a Heathen and the two things can be entirely separate from one another. Moreover, that one can be against Christianity in a manner that has little to do with Christians, themselves.

Simply because a juxtaposition can be made between two things, does not mean that the side of the scale that goes up is somehow defining itself in relation to what went down: In many instances, one simply had more 'dead weight' than the other.

[Liffrea]

What system of belief is defined solely by a name?

I think we can become tediously pedantic with this, should we not be looking at content rather than label?

What makes one Heathen but not Christian? I have my ideas and I'm sure most here do as well.

[Óttar]

Certainly. But "heathenism" covers a wide range of positions and possibilities. It is only slightly more narrow a concept than "paganism", in that it excludes the worship of scented candles, rainbow-colored pyramids, and dolphin-shaped dildos.
The word "Heathen" like "pagan" was coined by Christians, this is true. Both have similar meanings. Paganus as we all know, refers to those who dwell in the countryside as Christianity was more prominent in urban centres, and the "pagans" were "unreached peoples" as it were. Heathen is related to the word "heath" meaning a tract of uncultivated open land i.e. countryside. "Pagan" is a Romance word related to compagna etc. Heathen is a Germanic word, in this way there is perhaps an ethnic, socio-cultural distinction, but the concept is the same. The fact that the word "pagan" has been hijacked by new age fluffery notwithstanding.

Pre-Christian indigenous religion or perhaps more appropriately, religions, shared many common characteristics from Ireland to India i.e. ancestor veneration, a belief in spirits, minor deities, natural forces, numinosity, major deities, and in some cases, a supreme divinity. When two cultures met, there was a large possibility that there would be tolerant cultural exchange i.e. a sharing of deities, identification between two foreign divinities etc. There was no "My way is the right way, your foreign gods are anathema, go to Hell etc."

The words "pagan" and "heathen" are merely used because "Pre-Christian indigenous religion(s)" is too much of a mouthful. I do see the difficulties in using the former terms however and recommend words like Hellenismos for ancient Greek religion, Religio Romana for ancient Roman, Forn Sed for ancient Norse. Alternatively one may use nomos "law, ancestral custom, principles" for Greek, mos maiorum "ancestral custom, way of life" for Roman, just as the word Dharma "custom, law, order, principle, religion" and Sanatana Dharma "eternal law, etc." is used for Hinduism.

In ancient times, practitioners of these customs, wouldn't have thought to so rigidly codify these beliefs by giving them a name, because that's how things had always been, practiced by everyone, and the intolerant, exclusivistic notions of Judaism and Christianity were alien and not relevant to their way of life. In this scenario, you have two different types of religion i.e. one that has been around since human beings even had religious beliefs, and another upstart religion which tells everyone they have a special club and if you dwell outside of this club you will go to Hell.

[Lutiferre]

The word "Heathen" like "pagan" was coined by Christians, this is true. Both have similar meanings. Paganus as we all know, refers to those who dwell in the countryside as Christianity was more prominent in urban centres, and the "pagans" were "unreached peoples" as it were. Heathen is related to the word "heath" meaning a tract of uncultivated open land i.e. countryside. "Pagan" is a Romance word related to compagna etc. Heathen is a Germanic word, in this way there is perhaps an ethnic, socio-cultural distinction, but the concept is the same. The fact that the word "pagan" has been hijacked by new age fluffery notwithstanding.

Pre-Christian indigenous religion or perhaps more appropriately, religions, shared many common characteristics from Ireland to India i.e. ancestor veneration, a belief in spirits, minor deities, natural forces, numinosity, major deities, and in some cases, a supreme divinity. When two cultures met, there was a large possibility that there would be tolerant cultural exchange i.e. a sharing of deities, identification between two foreign divinities etc. There was no "My way is the right way, your foreign gods are anathema, go to Hell etc."

The words "pagan" and "heathen" are merely used because "Pre-Christian indigenous religion(s)" is too much of a mouthful. I do see the difficulties in using the former terms however and recommend words like Hellenismos for ancient Greek religion, Religio Romana for ancient Roman, Forn Sed for ancient Norse. Alternatively one may use nomos "law, ancestral custom, principles" for Greek, mos maiorum "ancestral custom, way of life" for Roman, just as the word Dharma "custom, law, order, principle, religion" and Sanatana Dharma "eternal law, etc." is used for Hinduism.

In ancient times, practitioners of these customs, wouldn't have thought to so rigidly codify these beliefs by giving them a name, because that's how things had always been, practiced by everyone, and the intolerant, exclusivistic notions of Judaism and Christianity were alien and not relevant to their way of life. In this scenario, you have two different types of religion i.e. one that has been around since human beings even had religious beliefs, and another upstart religion which tells everyone they have a special club and if you dwell outside of this club you will go to Hell.
And yet again you reduce the issue to merely a matter of naming, after which you proceed to introduce and exposit your own presuppositions about "Heathenry".

I've said it already:

I am not speaking of just "a slightly incovenient name" for something actually existing.

I am speaking of the idea that there is something, or even worse, one thing, to name to begin with ("Heathenry").

[Óttar]

Pre-Christian indigenous religion was varied yes, and there were differences between the different systems, but they all shared commonalities. One thing which distinguishes them from Christianity is how they viewed and interacted with the world. These traditions don't need names. They have existed since the beginning of religion itself. It is only when Abrahamic religion arrives on the scene that they are forced to codify themselves. Before Abrahamism, it was simply the way things were. In this, they are united.

[Lutiferre]

Pre-Christian indigenous religion was varied yes, and there were differences between the different systems, but they all shared commonalities. One thing which distinguishes them from Christianity is how they viewed and interacted with the world. These traditions don't need names. They have existed since the beginning of religion itself. It is only when Abrahamic religion arrives on the scene that they are forced to codify themselves. Before Abrahamism, it was simply the way things were. In this, they are united.
I was not trying to start an argument about what they were, but pointing out that you are ignoring the issue goes beyond merely naming, and into a whole paradigm of presuppositions and confident ideas, even of a kind unitary phenomenon which is simply "non-Christian" or "Aryan" or whatever you want to call it.

As a matter of fact, I disagree with everything you said entirely.

That non-Christian religions have commonalities is no more significant than the fact that there are commonalities between Christianity and those non-Christian religons, which is yet the fact ignored by this Christian historicist captivity you wilfully remain in with your own alterations and private conceptions.

[Lutiferre]

Indeed, it is a point of significance that for a non-Christian, there is no kind of metaphysical differentiation between Christianity and what is confidently but errorneously called "Heathenry", as there would be for a Christian. That you remain dedicated to this idea, albeit under different forms, is what I mean with the Christian captivity of these notions.

[Psychonaut]

That non-Christian religions have commonalities is no more significant than the fact that there are commonalities between Christianity and those non-Christian religons, which is yet the fact ignored by this Christian historicist captivity you wilfully remain in with your own alterations and private conceptions.

That's entirely incorrect. The connections between European pre-Christian religions are genealogical in nature, whereas commonalities with Christianity that don't involve appropriation of pre-Christian ideas by the Church are simply morphological, and thus not nearly as important.

[Lutiferre]

That's entirely incorrect. The connections between European pre-Christian religions are genealogical in nature, whereas commonalities with Christianity that don't involve appropriation of pre-Christian ideas by the Church are simply morphological, and thus not nearly as important.
That was not my point. I was speaking far more fundamentally. My point was more metaphysical than genealogical.

[Óttar]

That non-Christian religions have commonalities is no more significant than the fact that there are commonalities between Christianity and those non-Christian religons, which is yet the fact ignored by this Christian historicist captivity you wilfully remain in with your own alterations and private conceptions.
Oh, so I should just up and call myself a Christian despite the fact that I do not believe "in One God, the Father Almighty... seen and unseen, His Son...descended into Hell...Resurrected..." and all that garbage.

If such a system was not devised and codified by a self-righteous, power hungry fraternity 1,604 - 2,000 years ago the world would be a better place.

In the mean time, I'll drink my wine, salute Dionysus, bang chicks, improve myself, live, love, and learn, while you go off and memorize the Council of Trent and 1,000 convoluted theological tracts. Which is fine. Such is your way. Live and let live. It's when you try to shove that shit down everyone else's throat that we have a problem.

:icon_cheers: :coffee:

[Lutiferre]

Oh, so I should just up and call myself a Christian despite the fact that I do not believe "in One God, the Father Almighty... seen and unseen, His Son...descended into Hell...Resurrected..." and all that garbage.
I never said that. But you may be right, considering your mindset is most likely not very much progressed from a sort of secularised Christianity in the Enlightenment heritage.


In the mean time, I'll drink my wine, salute Dionysus,
Right, because you are a Greek.

No.. wait. You are an Indian. Sorry, I forgot.

It's when you try to shove that shit down everyone else's throat that we have a problem.
What is the problem with that exactly?

[Óttar]

secularized Christianity
A belief in a Supreme Being or beings is not Christianity.

Right, because you are a Greek.
Dionysus was known to more peoples than the Greeks. Cults (this word in its antique sense) spread all over the place. There were Buddha statues carved in the Hellenistic style found as far afield as Gaul. Isis, an Egyptian deity with later Greek influence, was found in Britain. There are countless other examples of this.

[Lutiferre]

A belief in a Supreme Being or beings is not Christianity.
I never said it was. I was speaking about certain presuppositions which probably have more to do with the ethical realm.


Dionysus was known to more peoples than the Greeks. Cults (this word in its antique sense) spread all over the place. There were Buddha statues carved in the Hellenistic style found as far afield as Gaul. Isis, an Egyptian deity with later Greek influence, was found in Britain. There are countless other examples of this.
I never denied that religious beliefs travel and that this has always been the case and is completely natural, and even the ground for the religions of my ancestors. It seems you are the one who does that.

[Nodens]

This argument can only occur at cross-purposes. Any objective dialogue on the philosophical independence of Heathenry from Christianity would require us to treat both categories as historical events, whereas Lutiferre's position implicitly reduces Heathenry to a historical event while assigning to Christianity the status of Eternal Truth. This allows him to take Heathenry as an ill-defined category while viewing Christianity as a monolithic system. By reducing Christianity to a historical event, he would be forced to recognize Heterodox systems (Arianism, Gnosticism, Rastafarianism, etc.) as part of the category of Christianity, undermining a key point in his initial thesis, namely that Christianity can claim to avoid the 'error' he finds in Heathenry. In reality, the boundaries of what may be called 'Christian' are no narrower or less mutable than that which may be called 'Heathen', rendering the thesis as a whole invalid.

As to the oft used argument that Heathenry (or Nietzscheanism, or Objectivism, or any other system for that matter) is inherently invalid as it is based (at least in part) in a reaction against Christianity misses the Philosophical Systems 101 principal that all philosophy is a reaction to existing philosophy. If the fact that Nietzsche was reacting against Christianity reduces him to an effect of Christianity (as opposed to an independent system), then the fact that Christianity was a reaction to First Century Judaism (and also to Neoplatonism and Roman Ceasarianism) reduces it in a similar manner.

[Lutiferre]

This argument can only occur at cross-purposes. Any objective dialogue on the philosophical independence of Heathenry from Christianity would require us to treat both categories as historical events, whereas Lutiferre's position implicitly reduces Heathenry to a historical event while assigning to Christianity the status of Eternal Truth. This allows him to take Heathenry as an ill-defined category while viewing Christianity as a monolithic system.
No. My argument is not based on Christian presuppositions, but is an argument based on non-Christian ones, on what a non-Christian selfawareness and esteem of self and history would be. It is a refutation of the existence of anything called "heathenry" from a non-Christian viewpoint.


As to the oft used argument that Heathenry (or Nietzscheanism, or Objectivism, or any other system for that matter) is inherently invalid as it is based (at least in part) in a reaction against Christianity misses the Philosophical Systems 101 principal that all philosophy is a reaction to existing philosophy. If the fact that Nietzsche was reacting against Christianity reduces him to an effect of Christianity (as opposed to an independent system), then the fact that Christianity was a reaction to First Century Judaism (and also to Neoplatonism and Roman Ceasarianism) reduces it in a similar manner.
I agree, though I don't agree on the specific examples (Christianity was more than just a "reaction").

[Nodens]

No. My argument is not based on Christian presuppositions,

Of course it is, your perspective is simply too narrow for you to recognize this.


but is an argument based on non-Christian ones, on what a non-Christian selfawareness and esteem of self and history would be. It is a refutation of the existence of anything called "heathenry" from a non-Christian viewpoint.

You divide the world into Christian and non-Christian, placing all non-Christian (or at at least non-Abrahamic) religion into the 'Heathen' category, and then assume that all self-described Heathens do the same. You deny the validity of an Indo-European category of religion to argue that Heathenry is simply New Age eclecticism. You assume that the concept of 'us versus them' can only be based in the concept of 'right versus wrong'. You define your concept of religion as the only correct concept of religion, allowing you to deny the status of 'religion' to those systems that differ.


(Christianity was more than just a "reaction").

Only when interpreted through Christian axioms.

[Lutiferre]

You divide the world into Christian and non-Christian, placing all non-Christian (or at at least non-Abrahamic) religion into the 'Heathen' category, and then assume that all self-described Heathens do the same.
No. You have understood it completely opposite of the whole point with this thread. My expectation was that what I call heathens would not do the same, and the thread was exactly directed against any such "heathens" who do do the same to show the absurdness of doing so.


Only when interpreted through Christian axioms.
No. Just like Nietzsche, and anyone else, was more than a mere "reaction" (even if he/it was also a reaction), so was Jesus and Christianity.

[Nodens]

No. You have understood it completely opposite of the whole point with this thread. My expectation was that what I call heathens would not do the same, and the thread was exactly directed against any such "heathens" who do do the same to show the absurdness of doing so.

Then I must ask, just what are you railing against in this part of the forum?


No. Just like Nietzsche, and anyone else, was more than a mere "reaction" (even if he/it was also a reaction), so was Jesus and Christianity.

I'll grant that I may have misinterpreted the intentions of your statement.

[Lutiferre]

Then I must ask, just what are you railing against in this part of the forum?

Precisely the opposite of what you said.



You divide the world into Christian and non-Christian, placing all non-Christian (or at at least non-Abrahamic) religion into the 'Heathen' category, and then assume that all self-described Heathens do the same.
No. You have understood it completely opposite of the whole point with this thread. My expectation was that what I call heathens would not do the same, and the thread was exactly directed against any such "heathens" who do do the same to show the absurdness of doing so.

[Nodens]

Only an issue in this forum if


You deny the validity of an Indo-European category of religion to argue that Heathenry is simply New Age eclecticism.

[Óttar]

It seems you are the one who does that.
Where!? :rolleyes2:

[Lutiferre]

Where!? :rolleyes2:
That has, to the extent I've seen it, been your very reason for rejecting Christianity, whenever you didn't reject it because of it's supposed similarities with pagan religions, like the cult of Mithras.

[Loddfafner]

Writing in confusion and ambiguity is the best way to write for a (in any case) pessimistic scenario of oneness in mind with those it's addressed to.

Is that you, Csongi? Or is this a statement that perfectly captures the Christian mindset? If confusion and ambiguity is really your goal, you have succeeded. If productive debate between Christians and Heathens is your goal, then clear statements of your questions would help. If they are ambiguous, at least map out the contours of the ambiguity. Don't hide your goalposts in thick fog.

[Nodens]

Is that you, Csongi? Or is this a statement that perfectly captures the Christian mindset? If confusion and ambiguity is really your goal, you have succeeded. If productive debate between Christians and Heathens is your goal, then clear statements of your questions would help. If they are ambiguous, at least map out the contours of the ambiguity. Don't hide your goalposts in thick fog.

He's advancing a noncognitivist argument against Heathenry as he interprets it, and doing so in an intentionally insulting manner.

[Óttar]

That has, to the extent I've seen it, been your very reason for rejecting Christianity
No. How about I've rejected Christianity because I don't believe in it. :confused:

[Angantyr]

I am no more a non-Christian (or an anti-Christian) than I am an non-Buddhist, a non-Shintoist, a non-Democrat, a non-Santaclausist, or anything else. I do not define myself in negative terms, particularly with respect to something that has no relevance to me whatsoever.

A Christian who defines those who believe in the pre-Christian Gods as non-Christians is merely displaying his ignorance.

[Lutiferre]

Is that you, Csongi? Or is this a statement that perfectly captures the Christian mindset? If confusion and ambiguity is really your goal, you have succeeded. If productive debate between Christians and Heathens is your goal, then clear statements of your questions would help. If they are ambiguous, at least map out the contours of the ambiguity. Don't hide your goalposts in thick fog.
I never said it was my 'goal'. But quite simply, my thoughts on it did have an essential point which I managed to convey, but were no more lucid than what I presented.

I do not define myself in negative terms, particularly with respect to something that has no relevance to me whatsoever.
Angantyr's Religion: Heathen


A Christian who defines those who believe in the pre-Christian Gods as non-Christians is merely displaying his ignorance.
Of course they are non-Christians by virtue of not being Christians. It's only any non-Christians own selfawareness and awareness of Christianity, and especially the latter, which was the most essential point of this thread, if constituted by the Christian awareness for essentially non-Christian, which is absurd, since it hinges on the Christian selfawareness.

[Lutiferre]

No. How about I've rejected Christianity because I don't believe in it. :confused:
Your seeming surprise with my statement pretends that I should think your criticisms of Christianity in various posts were of absolutely no significance, merely absurd or meaningless, which is an absurdity you obviously don't admit to.

[Frigga]

I wanted to open this thread simply as a point of criticism, not against the teachings as such of any of what you call heathenry, but against the very designation of there being such a thing as heathenry, and against the mandate for spending even a second on such a notion.

Why are you against the designation of Heathenry for Heathens may I ask? I'm truly curious. Do you think that Heathenry sounds cooler than christianity, and you want us to abolish it?


The thing I want to say is very simple. If you are not Christians, if you reject Christianity, then you also reject heathenry, and you also acknowledge that no is more heathen than another. Because to say that you are a heathen when you are not a Christian, is to miss the fact that with a real rejection of Christianity comes the cognition of the absolute worthlesness of any terms such as "heathenry"; which imply the division between those in ignorance and those in truth; those Christians and those unupdated; the absolute truth and the perverted and corrupted outsiders which are all deficient in their knowledge of truth. As long as you center the division in history between self and other when it comes to cult, indeed on Christianity, then you still posesses a Christian mindset, you still assign a primacy and uniqueness of Christianity, and possibly other religions as well, of your own arbitrary choice. This has no value whatsoever given that Christianity is itself heathen, itself pagan, for a true non-Christian appreciation of self and other, in cult; it is not something that hinges on Christian synthesis or sentiments, only so for those still breathing in the Christian selfawareness.

Gah, your sentences are so circular, it's hard to know where to begin! I know that you spend a lot of time reading manscripts that are hundreds of years old, but please, if you wish to lecture us on our religion, please talk in the English language of the 21st century.

How pray tell is someone rejecting the religion of christianity automatically come to the realization that the term Heathenry is worthless? I'm truly curious as to how you got to that conclusion. How also are we dividing those who are christians into the camps of "us" vs "them" as regards to truth and ignorance? And what are your sources for this stance? How also do we possess a christian mindset when someone chooses to leave christianity for Heathenism? How indeed is christianity Pagan and Heathen? In my mind, Heathenry and Paganism is a religion that is quite insular with their followers, meaning that they concern themselves with those immediately around them, and their leaders are those that are within their immediate sphere of influence. How is christianity supposed to be different when for almost two thousand years there has been the Vatican, and other centers of christianity that influence their followers from thousands of miles away?


This notion, of course, reduces itself to nothing when you reject Christianity, because it is itself a condition of Christian selfawareness, which is utterly irrelevant to a non-Christian phronema which you haven't acquired. You are still living in captivity to the Christian phronema, to the Christian division between "everything that is not Christian" and that which is Christian.

How pray tell are we living in captivity to christianity's mindset when we decide to either reject it, or to not embrace it at all? Where are you digging up these conclusions from? Also, if there is a modern equivalent for phronema, which of course, there is, how about using that instead of dragging out hard to pronounce words that haven't been used in 100 years so that you can feel more educated. It makes the condesending tone that much more insulting when you do that. I'm sorry, but the implication that we are ignorant children that have not acquired the proper mindset is mildly insulting. I think that you are capable of acquiring the proper mindset when you realize that christianity is not the sole truth in the world, and that there are other paths that are truth for other people. To me, that seems like a mature mindset to have, instead of the one that you seem to be describing, which is "NO! Only my way is the correct way! You're all WRONG!!!"


In truth, if Christianity is rejected, or at least, if this Christian mindset, to the extent that it still occupies the minds of non-Christians, is purged out and taken up from it's roots to wither away, Christianity is itself no more and no less heathen than anything else. Indeed then, if you reject Christianity, then from your point of view Christians should be heathens and pagans just as much you (because nothing else exists), if not more than you, because you still live in captivity to notions you deem yourself unheathen, which is itself a notion that is utterly incoherent and irrelevant, and so too becomes the distinction of who is more or less so; all that remains then are you own private conceptions in all their modernity and detachment from all actuality of authentic non-Christian historical self-understanding into the Christian selfawareness that permeates your minds.

Hm, I think that you yourself are confused as to what the differences between what a christian and Heathen mindset really are. How are you so certain that christianity is "no more and no less" Heathen than anything else? You yourself proclaim that you are not Heathen, and never have been. I however was christian until I was 19, and have been a Heathen for almost ten years. I detect a very distinct difference between the two. If you cannot speak from personal experience, then don't spout the teachings of others or try to tell us that we are wrong, and that you are right.


It becomes interesting to note that you are all, on that note, repeating a Christian historicism and selfawareness, defeating the creed who is somehow wrong, which can be reduced to falsehood (the Christian who imported semitic filth into the religious affirmation of the incompatible and right people; your own - or, alternatively, for the Christian, heathens, non-Christians), while you are somehow right, which translates to the absolute truth value (the untainted and noble heathens who will have no Semitic influence; or for Christians, Christianity itself and it's actual adherents).

Where are you getting these notions from?? Gah! I for one have never thought that any race or religion was more noble than the other. Please stop jumping to conclusions. There are many people who believe that there is an absolute truth for every single person in the whole world, and who do not try to feel within their own hearts that they are superior to another because of their own insecurities. Why are you trying to tell us that we all are doing that? Just because some people in this world do that does not mean everyone does. I try to not project my own insecurities onto others. Others in my aquaintence do that though and it bugs me to no end. You seem to be doing this, why are you?


A kind of absolute division between one and other in terms of cult, and spirit, which simply does not exist from a truly non-Christian standpoint, except as a cheap repetition of a really Christian awareness, exclusivism and mutual division, rather than the more historically authentic mass of indistinct pluralism and interexchange of the plurality of religious and spiritual circulation, of which it is completely indifferent to any exclusivistic viewpoints, that are only really reflections of a repetition of Christian historicism in a so-called heathen version. It is Christian selfawareness turned against Christianity.

So, what is it precisely that you are trying to say? That Heathens are christians who are masochistically in denial? Pfft. Heathenism has its roots many thousands of years before christianity was even a wisp of a dream. Now, not bringing up Northern European Paganism here, but how about Hinduism? It is the single oldest continually praticised religion in the world. Christianity actually lifted many things directly from other religions like Hinduism and Buddism, and ancient Eygptian, religions that predated it. How is it that christianity is absolute truth when those truths came from other, older religions? How are peoples who are Heathens, have never been christian, and have no relatives who are christian supposed to think of your above arguments? You're making a blanket statement, and a false one that is full of your own inflated sense of self worth. Instead of trying to tell Heathens that we're masochistic christians in denial, work on improving yourself. I'll not try to tell you what you should do if you keep out of our business as well.

[Amapola]

Do heathens consider their religion an old or new thing? and why don't you like to be called pagans?

[Mrs Ulf]

Do heathens consider their religion an old or new thing? and why don't you like to be called pagans?

Its an old religion, older than yours.

I have absolutely no issue being called Pagan...who said that?!. Most of us don't mind being called pagan, we prefer Heathen only because it gives notion to which Gods we follow and allows everyone else around us a bigger picture of what we do. Other then them assuming were part of the wiccan group.

You do realize that Pagan is a broad term, and you need other words to separate the different groups.

::BTW thats it from me, goodluck with your endless pointless debate ;)::

[Amapola]

Its an old religion, older than yours.

I have absolutely no issue being called Pagan...who said that?!. Most of us don't mind being called pagan, we prefer Heathen only because it gives notion to which Gods we follow and allows everyone else around us a bigger picture of what we do. Other then them assuming were part of the wiccan group.

You do realize that Pagan is a broad term, and you need other words to separate the different groups.

::BTW thats it from me, goodluck with your endless pointless debate ;)::

Why do you get defensive? it's the first question I ask in the forum about this and I am by no means interested in making an endless pointless debate (although a forum is meant for debating) NOR that I had ever started one about this issue. The only reason I ask about this is because I really know nothing to really judge or speak about Paganism. So thanks for your answer, I would also be glad to get others' answers with a better spirit .

[Psychonaut]

Do heathens consider their religion an old or new thing?

Both/and

Religion is not a static thing that is either old or new. Speaking for myself, I see Heathenry as being an old stream-of-religion that we wandered from but are now getting back in touch with. We have grown as a people while we were away from Heathenry and thus cannot simply start right back where we left off just prior to the conversion. Much of the debate in contemporary Heathenry is our working out as a religion just how to re-integrate ourselves into this religious stream. So, I'd say that it's not as if we're resurrecting an old faith, nor that we've created a new one—rather it's that we've re-aligned ourselves with one that has been dormant for some time and are currently in the midst of figuring out how are to swim in its waters.


and why don't you like to be called pagans?

Theoretically, Pagan would be a fine name, had it not been co-opted by the Wiccans and their ilk. Heathen also has the benefit of being a native English term, rather than a Latin borrowing. However some authors who are essentially Heathens, like Alain de Benoist in his influential On Being a Pagan, do use the term Pagan as a descriptor.

[SuuT]

1.) It feels very good and is a breath of the freshest air to see some people actually asking questions about Heathenry as opposed to barking about what it is and isn't. Special thank you to Alana, in particular.


2.) Lutiferre: It is fairly rare to see such a backfire - the fundament of your thesis (near as I can tell at this point) is that "Heathen" is a nebulous term that only has meaning when couched within a Christian juxtaposition of Heathenry to itself; and, that Heathenry is contraindicated by Christianity as containing any and all truths that Heathenry may contain. But, what you have gone on to do - quite well I would add - is show that it is the devout Christian that has profound difficulty grasping and manipulating the Heathen 'alrgorithim' on its own terms: You are not going to succeed in opening a new line of thought experimentation for self-professed Heathens, as your approach is a fundamentally Christian one, containing all of the axiomatic presuppositions of Christian thought. It's quite ironic: You are telling Heathenry that it is amourphous because it is self-defined by that which it is not, proceed to describe what you consider to be a non-entity within the confines of Christain axioms, and then tell the Heathen that they are without an identity absent the Christian nexus...

...It's all a very tidy package of self-consistent illusions on behalf of the Christian axiomatic approach; but it makes me wonder who is it, really, that is experiencing the identity crisis.

[Lutiferre]

It's quite ironic: You are telling Heathenry that it is amourphous because it is self-defined by that which it is not, proceed to describe what you consider to be a non-entity within the confines of Christain axioms, and then tell the Heathen that they are without an identity absent the Christian nexus...

No, not "within Christian axioms". Exactly not, as I told Nodens, exactly the opposite.
Why are you against the designation of Heathenry for Heathens may I ask? I'm truly curious. Do you think that Heathenry sounds cooler than christianity, and you want us to abolish it?
In what you quoted I referred to what I was about to say, so please halt interpreting it too soon or you will make misinterpretations like this.



Gah, your sentences are so circular, it's hard to know where to begin! I know that you spend a lot of time reading manscripts that are hundreds of years old, but please, if you wish to lecture us on our religion, please talk in the English language of the 21st century.
Most things worth reading were written a hundred years ago - true.


How pray tell is someone rejecting the religion of christianity automatically come to the realization that the term Heathenry is worthless? I'm truly curious as to how you got to that conclusion. How also are we dividing those who are christians into the camps of "us" vs "them" as regards to truth and ignorance? And what are your sources for this stance? How also do we possess a christian mindset when someone chooses to leave christianity for Heathenism? How indeed is christianity Pagan and Heathen? In my mind, Heathenry and Paganism is a religion that is quite insular with their followers, meaning that they concern themselves with those immediately around them, and their leaders are those that are within their immediate sphere of influence. How is christianity supposed to be different when for almost two thousand years there has been the Vatican, and other centers of christianity that influence their followers from thousands of miles away?



How pray tell are we living in captivity to christianity's mindset when we decide to either reject it, or to not embrace it at all? Where are you digging up these conclusions from? Also, if there is a modern equivalent for phronema, which of course, there is, how about using that instead of dragging out hard to pronounce words that haven't been used in 100 years so that you can feel more educated. It makes the condesending tone that much more insulting when you do that. I'm sorry, but the implication that we are ignorant children that have not acquired the proper mindset is mildly insulting. I think that you are capable of acquiring the proper mindset when you realize that christianity is not the sole truth in the world, and that there are other paths that are truth for other people. To me, that seems like a mature mindset to have, instead of the one that you seem to be describing, which is "NO! Only my way is the correct way! You're all WRONG!!!"
You just keep asking questions too soon to a portion of text which doesn't explain itself, because it's explanation lies in the next few paragraphs. So instead of responding with a repetition of what I have already said, since that would be arrogant, I will just recommend you to try and read what I said without taking one paragraph out and isolating it.


Hm, I think that you yourself are confused as to what the differences between what a christian and Heathen mindset really are. How are you so certain that christianity is "no more and no less" Heathen than anything else?
Again.. if you had understood my point, you wouldn't ask this question! I am not saying Christianity actually is heathen from a Christian perspective.


So, what is it precisely that you are trying to say? That Heathens are christians who are masochistically in denial?
No, no, no, no, no, no...................

Heathenism has its roots many thousands of years before christianity was even a wisp of a dream.
And here we get the problem precisely again. "Heathenry" refers to everything and anything that is not Christian from a Christian point of view, so of course you can say it's much older, but in reality it isn't, because there is no "it", no unitary phenomenon, and Christianity becomes no less "heathen" than anything else as long as there is no implication of a Christian perspective that Christianity is the truth and everything else a lesser thing; heathenism and paganism becomes simply everything, except in a Christian point of view, in which it is everything excluding Christianity.

Christianity actually lifted many things directly from other religions like Hinduism and Buddism, and ancient Eygptian, religions that predated it. How is it that christianity is absolute truth when those truths came from other, older religions?
Thats the sort of question you could be asking, you are getting closer to my point, but imminently what you should ask is the more fundamental question of whether you reject that there is an absolute historicist metaphysical divide between Christians and non-Christians like the Christians would have it (e.g. absolute truth and non-absolute truth), then Christianity itself becomes a part of that everything that would otherwise be called pagan and "Heathenry" in the Christian selfawareness, in which that everything is divided between Christianity and non-Christianity - then it is all simply a part of that same everything, with no kind of divide in this Christian sense.

[SuuT]

No, not "within Christian axioms". Exactly not, as I told Nodens, exactly the opposite.



:confused2:

Then I'm asking that you be more plodding with your epistemology because there is no visible sunshine in the brainstorm you have given thus far. If you are developing your point as you go, it would help to tell your audience that as well: the 'you just don't get it/no no no/are you retarded?' retort gets no play in the House that the Æsir built.

[Lutiferre]

:confused2:

Then I'm asking that you be more plodding with your epistemology because there is no visible sunshine in the brainstorm you have given thus far. If you are developing your point as you go, it would help to tell your audience that as well: the 'you just don't get it/no no no/are you retarded?' retort gets no play in the House that the Æsir built.
Well, my whole point is really in my original post in a very concentrated form, which is why it may seem confusing and which is why I have kept explaining it.

[Liffrea]

Originally Posted by Alana
Do heathens consider their religion an old or new thing?

A question with more depth than at first apparent.


and why don't you like to be called pagans?

I don’t give a damn what people call me (I’m not being aggressive I genuinely don’t care).

[Óttar]

Thats the sort of question you could be asking, you are getting closer to my point, but imminently what you should ask is the more fundamental question of whether you reject that there is an absolute historicist metaphysical divide between Christians and non-Christians like the Christians would have it (e.g. absolute truth and non-absolute truth), then Christianity itself becomes a part of that everything that would otherwise be called pagan and "Heathenry" in the Christian selfawareness, in which that everything is divided between Christianity and non-Christianity - then it is all simply a part of that same everything, with no kind of divide in this Christian sense.
And I have explained Pre-Christian indigenous religion had no need to define itself until religions with exclusivist notions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) came on the scene. And let me repeat that this religion or group of religions was varied, but shared common elements. Compare to the distinction between the Greater Tradition (Vedic, Brahminical) and lesser tradition (tribal, popular, non-Vedic) within Hinduism (Itself an umbrella term.) Because it is in the nature of indigenous religion to tolerate other beliefs, there is no reason to suspect that Jesus would not have been respected as just another pagan god. The Jews and Christians became subject to suspicion and persecution because they did not tolerate other beliefs or show even a superficial common courtesy to the gods of Rome. If Christians had merely sprinkled some incense on the altar at state functions, they would've been left in peace.

It is this spirit of intolerance in normative Christianity and Islam that is the source of wars of religion, causes of needless bloodshed.

Just because Abrahamic religion and and non-Abrahamic religion are fundamentally different, does not make the non-Abrahamic way meaningless. Everyone here already understood your points without you having to make them. Your argument was unnecessary, and the fundamental conflict between paganism and Christianity has played itself out in this thread. We are fine identifying as Heathens or Pagans, and a host of other terms. We know what we mean, we do not need an outsider defining us.

Tao, Dharma, Mos Maiorum, Nomos, Forn Sed, all can be translated more or less as "The Way." What more needs to be said?

[Lutiferre]

And I have explained Pre-Christian indigenous religion had no need to define itself until religions with exclusivist notions (Judaism, Christianity, Islam) came on the scene. And let me repeat that this religion or group of religions was varied, but shared common elements. Compare to the distinction between the Greater Tradition (Vedic, Brahminical) and lesser tradition (tribal, popular, non-Vedic) within Hinduism (Itself an umbrella term.) Because it is in the nature of indigenous religion to tolerate other beliefs, there is no reason to suspect that Jesus would not have been respected as just another pagan god. The Jews and Christians became subject to suspicion and persecution because they did not tolerate other beliefs or show even a superficial common courtesy to the gods of Rome. If Christians had merely sprinkled some incense on the altar at state functions, they would've been left in peace.
Which is soemthing I touched in already in my original post, and was very implicit in the discussion, as regards pluralism and exclusivism.


Tao, Dharma, Mos Maiorum, Nomos, Forn Sed, all can be translated more or less as "The Way." What more needs to be said?
Which is also how Christianity and Mosaic religion before it saw and sees itself, as "The Law" and "The Way". To the last comment - without doubt, a lot more needs to be said though not in the scope of this thread.

[SuuT]

... To the last comment - without doubt, a lot more needs to be said though not in the scope of this thread.

Yeah, you wouldn't want to de-rail it or anything. :D;)

[Óttar]

Which is soemthing I touched in already in my original post, and was very implicit in the discussion, as regards pluralism and exclusivism.
We already understood this. We replied sufficiently.

[Lutiferre]

We already understood this. We replied sufficiently.
There is no meaning in talking of suffiency or replies in this context.

[Lutiferre]

Yeah, you wouldn't want to de-rail it or anything. :D;)
I would derail it sooner than set too high ambitions for it as a singular discussion ;)

[SuuT]

I would derail it sooner than set too high ambitions for it as a singular discussion ;)

That's what thread splits are for, bonehead. You've had no problem with going full-bore organic before:D. Tell us what you're thinking!:)

I'm the only one that bites. :evilb:

[Murphy]

GREATEST TROLL-THREAD EVER

Regards,
The Eunuch.

[Angantyr]

Let me just put this simply. It is the epitome of hubris to think that a Christian is the definer and determiner of what Heathens believe. What a Christian may think of me and my faith is not what defines me as a Heathen or Heathenism in general. It has no more relevance than the Buddhist definition of Heathenism. And, I am sure that a Christian does not rely on the Buddhist definition of Christianity to define himself.

Why are Christians so self absorbed? Why is it so difficult for Christians to understand the obvious?

[Jamt]

Why are Christians so self absorbed? Why is it so difficult for Christians to understand the obvious?


Because we are the best.

[Freomæg]

There's no clarity in this thread. Lutiferre, I find your stance incredibly arrogant - to refuse attempting to conduct yourself and re-explain what you're trying to say. Instead, you maintain that the dozen or so who are desperately trying to turn this into a fruitful debate are simply too ignorant to comprehend you. As a matter of fact, we'd like to give you the acceptable answers you seek - help us.

I, like the others, still don't quite get your point. But I suspect you're doing what you've done elsewhere also in defining everything outside of Christianity by the dogmatic limitations of your own Christian faith. I'd ask you: "Am I wrong?" but I know what your answer will be either way.

[Lutiferre]

There's no clarity in this thread. Lutiferre, I find your stance incredibly arrogant - to refuse attempting to conduct yourself and re-explain what you're trying to say.
I disagree. That's not what I did. I've tried re-explaining it many times, and that every time someone has mandated it.

Instead, you maintain that the dozen or so who are desperately trying to turn this into a fruitful debate are simply too ignorant to comprehend you. As a matter of fact, we'd like to give you the acceptable answers you seek - help us.
Not necessarily too ignorant, no.


I, like the others, still don't quite get your point. But I suspect you're doing what you've done elsewhere also in defining everything outside of Christianity by the dogmatic limitations of your own Christian faith. I'd ask you: "Am I wrong?" but I know what your answer will be either way.
Well, why do you ask "Am I wrong" when you are the one with suspicions? You can have your suspicions, but the fact is that suspecting me and this thread of the opposite of what it's basic point is, is simply a meaningless polemic which I could easily repeat with everything you say. You could disqualify anything by twisting it and turning it with such suspicion.

[Jamt]

I disagree. That's not what I did. I've tried re-explaining it many times, and that every time someone has mandated it.

Not necessarily too ignorant, no.

Well, why do you ask "Am I wrong" when you are the one with suspicions? You can have your suspicions, but the fact is that suspecting me and this thread of the opposite of what it's basic point is, is simply a meaningless polemic which I could easily repeat with everything you say. You could disqualify anything by twisting it and turning it with such suspicion.

You have the skull size. Strive at all times for clarity.

[Lutiferre]

You have the skull size. Strive at all times for clarity.
I don't have the skull size for clarity, no; there is simply too much inside my skull fighting against itself to avoid absolute chaos.

[Freomæg]

I'm sorry Lutiferre. I can't help. When it was thought that you were referring to 'Heathenism' as a Christian label for Germanic pagans, and that the label itself was innappropriate, I thought we were getting somewhere. But then you said it's not just in the labels and I again I had no idea what your point could possibly be. The practice of Heathenism (under that name or another) would still have existed, and possibly would still exist had Christianity never even been conceived of (or, to speak your language, had Jesus never existed). Thus only a fool would suggest that by rejecting Christianity you are also rejecting Heathenism.

[Loddfafner]

GREATEST TROLL-THREAD EVER

Regards,
The Eunuch.

For once, I agree with the Eunuch. The hypothesis that there was a core argument hidden in that prose has been refuted as the patient efforts of the respondents to find and answer that argument were met with increasingly cryptic comments instead of serious efforts at clarification.

Lutiferre's posts in this thread are much more consistent with a hypothesis of deliberate trolling (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaching_experiment) of the kind where one posts something willfully absurd and then sits back and derives entertainment from people's efforts to make sense out of it.

An alternate hypothesis of ordinary schizophrenia remains in the running though.

[Lutiferre]

For once, I agree with the Eunuch. The hypothesis that there was a core argument hidden in that prose has been refuted as the patient efforts of the respondents to find and answer that argument were met with increasingly cryptic comments instead of serious efforts at clarification.
It certainly hasn't been refuted. You have just stated that it has.

Oh well, quantum physics have been refuted, too. And your mom has been refuted. Why? Because I just said so, of course.


Lutiferre's posts in this thread are much more consistent with a hypothesis of deliberate trolling (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breaching_experiment) of the kind where one posts something willfully absurd and then sits back and derives entertainment from people's efforts to make sense out of it.

An alternate hypothesis of ordinary schizophrenia remains in the running though.
Admittedly I probably suffer from a mild degree of schizophrenia, that is, a division of my mindset. But not in the clinical sense which involves various other psychiatric phenomena.

[Lutiferre]

But then you said it's not just in the labels and I again I had no idea what your point could possibly be.
I was referring to, at the core, the distinctly Christian selfawareness which any such labels are preconditioned by; I was referring to the pretension of an actual reality behind the label; an actual historicist and metaphysical division implied, and an actual unitary phenomenon, a repetition of a distinctly Christian mindset and self-awareness in a heathen context.


The practice of Heathenism (under that name or another) would still have existed, and possibly would still exist had Christianity never even been conceived of (or, to speak your language, had Jesus never existed). Thus only a fool would suggest that by rejecting Christianity you are also rejecting Heathenism.
Again, then you miss my point, because I am not making claims about what actual reality would exist, but about certain pretensions of self-styled heathens about it.

[Freomæg]

I'm lost, and as such out of this thread for good. Enjoy!

[Lutiferre]

I'm lost, and as such out of this thread for good. Enjoy!
I think we've had about as much enjoyment we can take. Now is the time for no joy :p

[Fred]

Both you and SuuT transpose the values of identity in order to put down Christianity. It is the same as "yes means no and no means yes". There is nothing else to that, other than how arbitrary and unsubstantiated as to the actual values between them, in common or apart. I'm pretty sure this is about holding down one to raise another. It is Marxist supremacy and if Christianity is bad because of Judaism, then Marxism is plain bad all around.;) Marxism is secular Judaism.