The Real Cost Of Religious Faith - Atheist Experience

[Thorum]

I have watched these guys for years. They are really good!! This spot is just perfect...

DAuFJKQh83Y

[Joe McCarthy]

http://static.technorati.com/10/12/02/22851/cambodia-killing-fields-01.jpg

http://www.columbia.edu/itc/hs/pubhealth/boothby/forced_migration/images/CambodiaReds.gif

[Jägerstaffel]

Actual cost of atheism:

http://www.edrugsearch.com/edsblog/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/free-prescription-drugs.gif

And it relieves one of a substantial encumbrance.
Something for nothing!

[Agrippa]

I have watched these guys for years. They are really good!! This spot is just perfect...

DAuFJKQh83Y

The bald guy is great, really perfect in his argumentation. The other one is more annoying and far away from his level.

Yet what they primarily prove to me is, that the classic understanding of and faith into the traditional religions is ridiculous, especially if the scriptures being taken literally in a serious way. But it is impossible to state that atheism is closer to the truth than theism, this is just an opinion, since we can't know - which is why I'm rather an agnostic.

What we do know however is, that many very important, even fundamental aspects of the religious dogmas are false, can be disproven by the facts and reality.

And again, I can agree with this bald guys position point for point, perfect argumentation indeed.

[Debaser11]

Actual cost of atheism:

http://www.edrugsearch.com/edsblog/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/free-prescription-drugs.gif

And it relieves one of a substantial encumbrance.
Something for nothing!

I think Europe is experiencing the cost of atheism right now.

[Agrippa]

I think Europe is experiencing the cost of atheism right now.

That's Liberalism and Cultural Marxism rather and those which are still Christian are usually the most Liberal of all IN THE IMPORTANT MATTERS for our people, the leftwing Christians.

So this has nothing to do with religion, but a lot with ideology - and in the end, religion is nothing but an ideology which tries to be backed up by transcendental experience.

Better "better prophets" and founders of religions knew that, they made more or less useful rules, and just legitimated it with the religious pathos, so that even the immoral and stupid might follow them.

Yet, this works, like in Islam, always best for the time in which the prophets live, once he is dead and the world changes, the rules stay the same, whether they are still good or not, especially if the religion being based on scriptures, there can be only interpretation, but the sayings stay the same, which make a people backwarded in mind and culture, as one can see in the US South as well.

Religion or not is from a political stance not the question, the question is which rules and values a people have. This might be religiously legitimated or not, that is unimportant.

Just go for the "anti-abortionists" fighting for "the life of every black crack baby" serving as an example.

[Joe McCarthy]

I'm not a Southerner but with the possible exception of Mormons, they are probably the healthiest major white demographic in terms of overal spiritual, political, and racial health. They also tend to have children - which seems to be something severely lacking in their white critics.

[Debaser11]

Right. You can't just compartmentalize things.

[Agrippa]

I'm not a Southerner but with the possible exception of Mormons, they are probably the healthiest major white demographic in terms of overal spiritual, political, and racial health. They also tend to have children - which seems to be something severely lacking in their white critics.

Problem is, that alone doesn't make everything alright you know and still many other groups have even more children than them, they only have more children in comparison to other Euros...

[Thorum]

@ Joe and Debase: What were your thoughts of the video? What did they mean by "the real cost of religious faith?" Did you agree with the caller?

[Eldritch]

http://static.technorati.com/10/12/02/22851/cambodia-killing-fields-01.jpg

http://www.columbia.edu/itc/hs/pubhealth/boothby/forced_migration/images/CambodiaReds.gif

And how much death and suffering have religious conflicts caused over the centuries? I'd say it's almost certainly quite a bit more. What happened in Cambodia was essentially a result of a self-destructive mass psychosis.

[lei.talk]

http://wiki.ironchariots.org/images/1/1b/Button_commonobjections.png (http://wiki.ironchariots.org/index.php?title=Common_objections_to_atheism_and_c ounter-apologetics#Appeals_to_emotion)

[Debaser11]

Thorum, I need to finish watching the video but I'm running late right now. So I'll respond more thoroughly later.

I'll just say that much of the violence and injustice that has been done in the name of Christianity has been done due to a misunderstanding or a misappropriation of Christian doctine as far as I can tell. Keep in mind I'm not a Christian. However, the same cannot be said about Islam in its defense. Islam is an inherently barbarous tradition. I don't believe this to be true of Christianity. Christian society has produced the most humane civilization to this date. That's not incidental.

There is a tendency to lump all religion together in the West today which I find to be absolutely absurd. Religions entail a whole belief system. A whole worldview. Why not have a dialogue about the cost of philosophical ideas (in their totality)? It would be absurd. So I find the shoehorning of all the faiths for the sake of a creating an "us vs. them" duality between atheists and the faithful to be a bit lazy, simplistic, and even a tad narcissistic on the part of atheists much in the same manner that the faithful can sometimes be lazy for shoehorning all non-believers.

If Christian doctrine is abused and misunderstood by dolts, bigots, and psychopaths, it is no more the fault of Christian canon than it is the fault of Karl Marx for Stalin and Mao.

[Joe McCarthy]

I think it is fair to say that the primary role of Christianity has been as a builder of civilization, despite its violence. Atheism though can make no such claim, especially given its Communist taint.

[Thorum]

@ Joe and Debase: What were your thoughts of the video? What did they mean by "the real cost of religious faith?" Did you agree with the caller?

Neither of you watched the video...

So Joe and Debase flame the thread, make negative comments and spew their thoughts without even knowing what the thread is about!! Can I ask one thing from you two and another person I have ran across this week that did the same thing on another thread: if you want to comment, show the courtesy of reading, viewing and understanding the topic first...

Otherwise, save your propaganda, dogma and self-serving spewage for its own thread...

[Thorum]

@ Debaser: Thanks for the rep!!

"I don't think you know what "flame" means. It doesn't mean writing shit you disagree with."

Ah, ok...

[Debaser11]

Neither of you watched the video...

So Joe and Debase flame the thread, make negative comments and spew their thoughts without even knowing what the thread is about!! Can I ask one thing from you two and another person I have ran across this week that did the same thing on another thread: if you want to comment, show the courtesy of reading, viewing and understanding the topic first...

Otherwise, save your propaganda, dogma and self-serving spewage for its own thread...

How does me defending Christianity in the manner I did (to which you apparently have no intelligent response) self-serving? I'm not a Christian or an atheist. I just don't think religion is science like Chrome Dome and Squint-eyed man who you think are really "great." Thus I don't think of science and religion as being interchangable when addressing matters like Truth. This modern debate doesn't stem from Christians misunderstanding science. It largely comes from atheists misunderstanding science.

The two men are not even as good as Hitchens who is embarassingly out of his league when discussing ontological matters even if he makes himself look good by debating morons like Dinesh D'Souza and the like.

Concerning the "cost" of faith: we all know what they mean. The men go on about how faith costs a believer because it compels one to say and think all kinds of terrrible things about non-believers. That is not necessarily true. Had the hosts any real interest in the subject they base their show around and even bothered to achieve an understanding of scripture (even on a recreational level) they very likely would know better. All they are doing is strawmaning EVERYONE with faith by describing certain negative characteristics that are present within certain fundamentalist movements. Their arguments would be appropriate for attacking Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell, not Christianity. lol

The atheists are tantamount to a couple emo wet blankets I'd be likely to see in Austin (a city I'm very familiar with) whining about their predicament and making something as deep as an ontological belief or a communal expression of the divine about their own thickness. It's the height of ideological vanity to have a radio show ranting about other people for not sharing your lack of faith.

Furthermore, please explain to me how anything I said was propaganda while posting such a video like this is not?

And now that I've watched the video, I still stand by everything I wrote and everything I wrote that you didn't address in my initial response is still completely pertinent to the content in the video. Would you rather just have people post who agree with you so you can take turns blowing sunshine up each other's asses?

There is nothing Earth shattering or revelatory about the things these men are saying and frankly, it's laughable that these men present themselves as the ones cloaked in reason and evidence. But that's easy to do when arguing with some layman instead of a theologian or deeper thinker or something. They are basically making Bertrand Russell's argument only in a more proletariat sort of manner against vulnerable people. Needless to say, despite the great thinker that Russell is credited as being, he's a pretty big lightweight in terms of grappling with the big questions.

How would these two "rational" men explain something like a genetic mutation? Would they say it's random like scientists? Well, where does "random" come from? Such questions whose answers seem to venture past the realm of the material and toward a more nebulous strand of being are completely beyond these two Socrates's heads.

How is this view on a scientific observation like genetic mutation by Julius Evola any less reasonable than just putting one's faith in science like Moe and Curly have done?

"Geneticists, Evola argued, failed to provide a compelling account of how mutations occur. He maintained, as a consequence, that 'the cause is to be found elsewhere, in the actions of a superbiological element not reducible to the determinism of the physical transmission of genetic materials.' The true cause of hereditary variation was to be found 'rather by starting from another point of view that affords one an entirely different set of laws' than those of empirical science."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Evola


In closing, the hosts totally miss the point of faith and it's likely that one caller did as well. On the other hand, it's quite possible he feels all the things smarter men like Evola are getting at but is just not articulate. But the video is one big strawman against the faithful, particularly Christians.

[Joe McCarthy]

Originally Posted by Thorum
Otherwise, save your propaganda, dogma and self-serving spewage for its own thread...


No offense, but I have little time for atheist boilerplate even in my better moods, and my point from the outset was to illustrate the fact that whatever foibles have been created by religion, or specifically Christianity, the historical record is still better than that of atheism. In fact, even Islam created an entire civilization and carried culture far and wide. Atheism's primary contribution, if you'd call it that, has been to try and destroy what religion created.

[Austin]

I don't think atheism is really a good thing for humanity at present, although I am not very religious personally.

Religion is too good a tool to use to achieve what still needs to be done. Just think if all the masses of consumer-imbeciles were atheists and secular.....they'd be unmanageable and we'd have to actually deal with them and their idiotic notions of personal justice... Religion simplifies the masses desires into cohesive, manageable interests that can be heavily influenced.

[anonymaus]

Atheism though can make no such claim, especially given its Communist taint.

You wanna see my atheist capitalist taint, creampuff?

[Osweo]

Islam built nothing, but plundered everything.

Christianity's civilisation was a reworking of the pre-existent Roman, infused with a new barbarian spirit that would doubtless have expressed itself in another, but equally impressive, way, had Christianity not happened to have won out in the late Empire. :shrug:

As for the video, I find it embarrassing to watch clever atheists arguing against the stupider sort of Christian. Why don't they ask some proper theologian to come on the show? Might be worthwhile then.

[Jägerstaffel]

As for the video, I find it embarrassing to watch clever atheists arguing against the stupider sort of Christian. Why don't they ask some proper theologian to come on the show? Might be worthwhile then.

I don't get the point of debate, really. All the information is out there already. Anyone has enough to make an educated decision. What a monumental waste of time.

[Osweo]

I don't get the point of debate, really. All the information is out there already. Anyone has enough to make an educated decision. What a monumental waste of time.

Nah, there's always new people popping up who need to be introduced to things. :p

[Magister Eckhart]

And how much death and suffering have religious conflicts caused over the centuries? I'd say it's almost certainly quite a bit more. What happened in Cambodia was essentially a result of a self-destructive mass psychosis.

The point is that, despite the claims from atheists and their ilk, there is no necessary relationship between religious faith and human brutality. This is proven by the terrible brutality and massive acts of genocide committed by areligious, atheistic governments like the Khmer Rouge and Stalinist USSR. The only thing atheism serves to do is completely demolish what little preventative morality remains (thanks solely to religion) between human beings and their most animalistic and violent inclinations.


Islam built nothing, but plundered everything.

Is that religion, or just Arabs?


As for the video, I find it embarrassing to watch clever atheists arguing against the stupider sort of Christian. Why don't they ask some proper theologian to come on the show? Might be worthwhile then.

Because atheism cannot actually triumph against anything but straw-men. No truly intelligent person can accept atheism, especially not on such weak grounds as "religion causes violence".

[Thorum]

@ Wagner: What were your thoughts of the video? What did they mean by "the real cost of religious faith?" Did you agree with the caller?

[Magister Eckhart]

@ Wagner: What were your thoughts of the video? What did they mean by "the real cost of religious faith?" Did you agree with the caller?

I remember having a discussion with a close friend of mine in undergrad about how it was possible for both John Henry Cardinal Newman and Pat Robertson to technically be the same religion. We drew the conclusion that Christians, and religious people in general, fall into two categories: unthinking, unintelligent, uneducated plebeians who are afraid of reason and education because it can damage their faith and thinking, intelligent, rational scholars who crave reason and education because it strengthens their faith. We continued this discussion until she proposed to me a line of thinking that I had never thought of before and that I came to adopt whole-heartedly after our discussion.

There is in fact a hierarchy in terms of religious development and religious faith. There are three levels of this development, and therefore three kinds of people:

1. Less Intelligent and Uneducated Persons who take religion at face value and believe based entirely on the authority of mythos. They are blind believers and by and large might be called mystics.
2. Less or More Intelligent and Educated Persons who realise that there is no rational basis for blind belief in the authority of the mythos and therefore become atheists. They are also blind believers, but are entirely exoteric.
3. Intelligent and Educated Persons who realise that the real basis of religion is not manifested in the authority of the mythos but in the relationship between the mortal and the divine, and examine their faith through rational means to conclude that the existence of the divine and its relationship to man is confirmed by human reason but most richly expressed through faith. These are the only truly religious people, whose faith is a balance among three axes: mystic faith, authoritative tradition, and human philosophy.

Ultimately, all intelligent people go through a phase of major doubt that can either lead them temporarily toward atheism or toward agnosticism, depending on the person. Many of these people actually end up as deists, just one step away from embracing a religious tradition. The people, however, who get stuck in the rut of atheism, though they have stepped further than the born slaves and peasant-believers, are still inferior to those who can see the connection between human reason and divine revelation, and is not dependent on one or the other singularly.

The caller, therefore, falls into category 1, and is the most common person for any given atheist to argue with publicly because, frankly, they are not intelligent enough to use reason to support their faith. They are truly born slaves, whose only purpose is to serve.

The hosts, however, fall into category 2, and as said above display their own lack of wisdom as well as their dishonesty by choosing a medium that purposely attracts Cat. 1 believers like moths to a flame, thus exploiting the public forum to create their own cult of personality in challenge to religion. One might compare these to the wily merchant, the man who is educated enough to exploit weakness and achieve worldly success, but lacks the ability to enrich himself spiritually.

One rarely encounters anyone of the 3rd category anywhere, especially in this medium. Most often they are either too wise to involve themselves in such a vulgar arena or engaged as theologians who do not have the time to involve themselves in the same. These, I believe, are in fact synonymous with the highest naturally-born caste of man, the scholar-priest or priest-king.

Of course my own belief in the natural castes of man influence the above description, but I find upon omitting all reference to hierarchy and caste, it still holds true that there are these three basic approaches to religion, and everything is merely a variation on those rules. In a world without religion, there will still be natural-born slaves who cling to authority and a minority of truly intelligent people who cannot help but be naturally moral and rational, and in between them will be, for lack of a better term, the Machiavellians: smart enough to exploit, but not intelligent enough to build.

The "real cost of religion" is defined by these hosts only in reference to blind believers, and as such what it actually is for them is irrelevant: it is an argument that cannot stand unless applied against the lowest and most inferior sort of mind. The only reason it, along with most atheist doctrine, has become broadly accepted is because recognition of inferiority has itself become taboo (which leftists and atheists, greatly aided by the levelling of society and the reign of mediocrity, actively exploit). Nietzsche accurately says that the drive of these men is a Will to Overpower that is embodied in a Will to Equality because their natural inferiority does not give them the ability to truly overpower without first bringing the naturally superior down to their own level.

[Agrippa]

@Wagnerian: This is not related to religion specifically, it is true for all kinds of beliefs. Even science.

I mean you can tell someone something about the complexity of evolution or the human organism and all he gets might be some "sound" in which he believes or not, while he doesn't even grasp the most basic aspects of this truths.

There is always a difference in niveau, in all aspects and respects.

But the problem is, with religion, religion gives even the dumbest individuals "authority", if they just preach what is "written" in the mind of the morons. So they can destroy higher humans and people than they are, by just having the legitimation based on old scriptures they probably even don't understand.

This is the huge difference between European Christianity and what Calvinist sects made out of it. Look at the Catholics, they at least have their structures and niveau, some obviously superiour people - even if many of them fail this or that way - can rule out the most absurd and destructive ideas of a religion bound to the scriptures.

Yet what do you see in the USA and among sects? The most stupid ideas, made up by morons and fanatics for morons and fanatics being believed LITERALLY and being spread, making up pressure on better and finally higher standing people.

While I don't like what Christianity made out of certain aspects of European culture and moral in general, what Calvinists did, especially those sects with their "lay preachers" is just horrible.

Christianity was ruined from the moment the bible was translated, yet that was a good step and at least the Counter Reformation, Anglicans and Lutherans made something out of it which became, on the longer, acceptable for further higher development.

But this sects which still believe in the literal meaning of the bible are just moronic fanatics, worse than many Catholic and Lutheran preachers living more than 100 years ago.

And I think, in the end, this video and comments are PRIMARILY directed against this sect like fanatics which really see other people as "godless" and "Satanic", just because they might be more enlightened, being on a higher intellectual and psychological level than they are. They are like the peasants with nothing in their head which would even burn a writer or scientist like Kopernikus, just to keep up their delusion.

They are the ones truly tearing down higher values with their uneducated beliefs, which are a disgrace even for most of European Christianity.

As you cannot let the lowest elements judge about anything, the least they can judge is science, higher moral and religion. But that is what this sects transferred to some of the lowest elements in the European descended world.

Especially some of the Evangelicals and charismatic groups foster psychotic beliefs and behaviour. Some of those force their own children to experience "god" by bringing them under tremendous pressure to have "epiphanies".

[Osweo]

They are truly born slaves, whose only purpose is to serve.
You're disgusting. The most objectionable thing an ideology can do, is to establish rigid categories to impede the personal development of those who happen to fall under its sway. If you label people as 'born slaves', you run a high chance of misidentifying many who would otherwise have progressed into a more aware human being and been of use to his group in furthering its material circumstances or sense of itself.

More importantly, you damage the chance of those with potential who happen to be born into a family of what had appeared to be mere 'born slaves'. How many of your very own ancestors would have fallen under this term? Had the category been forceful in legal or social terms, how less likely would it have been that you would have emerged from them, to enjoy the liberty of thinking of yourself in such absurdly vain ways as you do? If you had been in charge a hundred years ago, chances are that you would have damned your own ancestors to lower caste servitude.

I was reading this today in that Baker book I recommended to you;
On Africa;

A remarkable feature of slavery was its acceptance, in certain cases by those who were subjected to it. Du Chaillu records that some of the Ovaherero (Damara) 'court slavery. You engage one of them as a servant, and you find that he considers himself your property. . . . They have no independence about them. . . . They seem to be made for slavery, and naturally fall into its ways.' There is strong contrast here with certain other ethnic taxa of man, such as the Sanids, whom it has been found almost impossible to enslave.


Can you honestly apply that sort of thing to those members of your own ethnic group that you have just so easily dismissed as 'born slaves'? Would they not rather have rebelled and struggled for their freedom, despite their lack of spiritual giftedness that you have chosen to take as the means of defining their total being?

Your spiritually simple were not 'born to serve'. They were born to live, to perpetuate the system they were born in, to defend it and on occasion to produce chance offspring that MAY be objectively regarded as 'superior' to them in some ways, but who nevertheless owe them their very existence.

[Adalwolf]

As for the video, I find it embarrassing to watch clever atheists arguing against the stupider sort of Christian.

That's the whole point of their show. Debate an unintelligent Christian to make atheism look better. I recommend people watch serious discussions between creationists and evolutionist scholars. And you will see how the enlightened Christian side prevails every time.

[Debaser11]

That's the whole point of their show. Debate an unintelligent Christian to make atheism look better. I recommend people watch serious discussions between creationists and evolutionist scholars. And you will see how the enlightened Christian side prevails every time.

This is what an intelligent debate on the subject sounds like.
It is the most intelligent argument an atheist (Russell) has from what I've seen and while Copleston is by far a wiser man than I could probably hope to be, his decision to get hung up on the language of casuality makes his side seem more discredited than it actually is.

-BWFpBTqSN0

r7kJOOENaNo

What Russell (a man whom I also respect to some degree) does here is basically deny the legitmacy of questions that religion seeks to address by its nature. He claims there is no legitmacy concerning questions about God only by refusing to acknowledge the nature and character most religious people ascribe to such a God. He comes out looking like the winner. And indeed, he does make some good points. He seems to think truth only lies in the material.

But he only comes out looking like the winner by refusing to have the discussion. It would be like if I were scheduled to play a tennis match with someone and the person said that having a match is an illegitimate indicator for knowing who was truly the better player and thus refused to play.

[Magister Eckhart]

This is what an intelligent debate on the subject sounds like.
It is the most intelligent argument an atheist (Russell) has from what I've seen and while Copleston is by far a wiser man than I could probably hope to be, his decision to get hung up on the language of casuality makes his side seem more discredited than it actually is.

-BWFpBTqSN0

r7kJOOENaNo

What Russell (a man whom I also respect to some degree) does here is basically deny the legitmacy of questions that religion seeks to address by its nature. He claims there is no legitmacy concerning questions about God only by refusing to acknowledge the nature and character most religious people ascribe to such a God. He comes out looking like the winner. And indeed, he does make some good points. He seems to think truth only lies in the material.

But he only comes out looking like the winner by refusing to have the discussion. It would be like if I were scheduled to play a tennis match with someone and the person said that having a match is an illegitimate indicator for knowing who was truly the better player and thus refused to play.

Interesting. Typically, this is how people in Russell's position come out as victors-- a similar event happened when Habermas debated Derrida (I have to say I'm not sure which I like better - I consider them both quite brilliant for all their faults).

Speaking of Habermas, he happens to contribute to the only really compelling debate between a scholarly Christian and a scholarly atheist I've ever encountered:

http://images.betterworldbooks.com/158/The-Dialectic-of-Secularism-9781586171667.jpg


The most objectionable thing an ideology can do, is to establish rigid categories to impede the personal development of those who happen to fall under its sway.

One cannot impede something that is not naturally developing. That's as if one were to say I was preventing a gorilla from becoming human by calling it a gorilla.


@Wagnerian: This is not related to religion specifically, it is true for all kinds of beliefs. Even science.

I mean you can tell someone something about the complexity of evolution or the human organism and all he gets might be some "sound" in which he believes or not, while he doesn't even grasp the most basic aspects of this truths.

There is always a difference in niveau, in all aspects and respects.

But the problem is, with religion, religion gives even the dumbest individuals "authority", if they just preach what is "written" in the mind of the morons. So they can destroy higher humans and people than they are, by just having the legitimation based on old scriptures they probably even don't understand.

This is the huge difference between European Christianity and what Calvinist sects made out of it. Look at the Catholics, they at least have their structures and niveau, some obviously superiour people - even if many of them fail this or that way - can rule out the most absurd and destructive ideas of a religion bound to the scriptures.

Yet what do you see in the USA and among sects? The most stupid ideas, made up by morons and fanatics for morons and fanatics being believed LITERALLY and being spread, making up pressure on better and finally higher standing people.

While I don't like what Christianity made out of certain aspects of European culture and moral in general, what Calvinists did, especially those sects with their "lay preachers" is just horrible.

Christianity was ruined from the moment the bible was translated, yet that was a good step and at least the Counter Reformation, Anglicans and Lutherans made something out of it which became, on the longer, acceptable for further higher development.

But this sects which still believe in the literal meaning of the bible are just moronic fanatics, worse than many Catholic and Lutheran preachers living more than 100 years ago.

And I think, in the end, this video and comments are PRIMARILY directed against this sect like fanatics which really see other people as "godless" and "Satanic", just because they might be more enlightened, being on a higher intellectual and psychological level than they are. They are like the peasants with nothing in their head which would even burn a writer or scientist like Kopernikus, just to keep up their delusion.

They are the ones truly tearing down higher values with their uneducated beliefs, which are a disgrace even for most of European Christianity.

As you cannot let the lowest elements judge about anything, the least they can judge is science, higher moral and religion. But that is what this sects transferred to some of the lowest elements in the European descended world.

Especially some of the Evangelicals and charismatic groups foster psychotic beliefs and behaviour. Some of those force their own children to experience "god" by bringing them under tremendous pressure to have "epiphanies".

I agree with this in general, especially as regards the Calvinists. I do not believe, however, that translation of the Bible necessarily is the root of our troubles, since, after all, the Vulgate itself began as a translation of scripture into a vernacular language. Rather, it seems to me the root of the problem isn't the accessibility of the text but an increase in literacy caused by widespread printing of the text. Even then, however, without the Calvinist heresy even this would not likely have developed into any serious threat to Western Civilization. Ultimately, it is the Calvinist heresy's implicit and explicit roles in modernisation and, therefore, the proliferation of the slave-minded population, that are chiefly to blame, as you rightly point out. I think Weber stopped short when he drew the line from Calvinism to capitalism-- he was thinking far too small. Calvinism contains in it the germ of all of modernity and modernism, which is, as Pius X declared (and I tend to agree) "the culmination of all heresies".

[anonymaus]

the root of the problem isn't the accessibility of the text but an increase in literacy caused by widespread printing of the text.

The rumors of widespread literacy in the West are greatly exaggerated. :coffee:

[Magister Eckhart]

The rumors of widespread literacy in the West are greatly exaggerated. :coffee:

Well, one has to admit that literacy rates have increased, even if intelligence has not.

[Adalwolf]

And 4 years later, Russel would ultimately see all of his views regarding abiogenesis - disproved!

[Eldritch]

The point is that, despite the claims from atheists and their ilk, there is no necessary relationship between religious faith and human brutality. This is proven by the terrible brutality and massive acts of genocide committed by areligious, atheistic governments like the Khmer Rouge and Stalinist USSR. The only thing atheism serves to do is completely demolish what little preventative morality remains (thanks solely to religion) between human beings and their most animalistic and violent inclinations.


So the relationship between religion and brutality does not (necessarily) exist, but the interdependence between religion and morality definitely does. Well, I disagree on that one.

There is also the tiny problem of religions being false. The fact of the matter is that Allah or the God of the Christian Bible do not exist. Do human beings really need fictional stories as a barrier between themselves and their lowest impulses?

[Debaser11]

Interesting. Typically, this is how people in Russell's position come out as victors-- a similar event happened when Habermas debated Derrida (I have to say I'm not sure which I like better - I consider them both quite brilliant for all their faults).

I'm only vaguely familiar with Derrida's ideas from a basic university course. From my experience with Derrida's ideas, I have to say that is not at all surprising to me that a debate with him on such a subject would turn out in a such a way despite the friction he had with analytical thinkers in his time. Word play, Jedi-mind tricks, the text of the text where no prior structure of true origin can be known, but rather a default origin of complexity exists instead, so everything is simply understood to be a text.

But maybe he's just over my head. But a lot of Derrida diagrams which showed me how to deconstruct "text" came off as intellectual masturbation to me. But hey, I'm not the brightest bulb in the drawer when it comes to understanding post-structuralist ideas.


Speaking of Habermas, he happens to contribute to the only really compelling debate between a scholarly Christian and a scholarly atheist I've ever encountered:

http://images.betterworldbooks.com/158/The-Dialectic-of-Secularism-9781586171667.jpg

Interesting.

[Magister Eckhart]

So the relationship between religion and brutality does not (necessarily) exist, but the interdependence between religion and morality definitely does. Well, I disagree on that one.

There is also the tiny problem of religions being false. The fact of the matter is that Allah or the God of the Christian Bible do not exist. Do human beings really need fictional stories as a barrier between themselves and their lowest impulses?

The answer to this has already been phrased better than I can phrase it. It requires one who is able to separate the superficial from the significant, however, and differentiate between universal logic and Christian appeal to authority.


Article 1. Whether the existence of God is self-evident?

Objection 1. It seems that the existence of God is self-evident. Now those things are said to be self-evident to us the knowledge of which is naturally implanted in us, as we can see in regard to first principles. But as Damascene says (De Fide Orth. i, 1,3), "the knowledge of God is naturally implanted in all." Therefore the existence of God is self-evident.

Objection 2. Further, those things are said to be self-evident which are known as soon as the terms are known, which the Philosopher (1 Poster. iii) says is true of the first principles of demonstration. Thus, when the nature of a whole and of a part is known, it is at once recognized that every whole is greater than its part. But as soon as the signification of the word "God" is understood, it is at once seen that God exists. For by this word is signified that thing than which nothing greater can be conceived. But that which exists actually and mentally is greater than that which exists only mentally. Therefore, since as soon as the word "God" is understood it exists mentally, it also follows that it exists actually. Therefore the proposition "God exists" is self-evident.

Objection 3. Further, the existence of truth is self-evident. For whoever denies the existence of truth grants that truth does not exist: and, if truth does not exist, then the proposition "Truth does not exist" is true: and if there is anything true, there must be truth. But God is truth itself: "I am the way, the truth, and the life" (John 14:6) Therefore "God exists" is self-evident.

On the contrary, No one can mentally admit the opposite of what is self-evident; as the Philosopher (Metaph. iv, lect. vi) states concerning the first principles of demonstration. But the opposite of the proposition "God is" can be mentally admitted: "The fool said in his heart, There is no God" (Psalm 52:1). Therefore, that God exists is not self-evident.

I answer that, A thing can be self-evident in either of two ways: on the one hand, self-evident in itself, though not to us; on the other, self-evident in itself, and to us. A proposition is self-evident because the predicate is included in the essence of the subject, as "Man is an animal," for animal is contained in the essence of man. If, therefore the essence of the predicate and subject be known to all, the proposition will be self-evident to all; as is clear with regard to the first principles of demonstration, the terms of which are common things that no one is ignorant of, such as being and non-being, whole and part, and such like. If, however, there are some to whom the essence of the predicate and subject is unknown, the proposition will be self-evident in itself, but not to those who do not know the meaning of the predicate and subject of the proposition. Therefore, it happens, as Boethius says (Hebdom., the title of which is: "Whether all that is, is good"), "that there are some mental concepts self-evident only to the learned, as that incorporeal substances are not in space." Therefore I say that this proposition, "God exists," of itself is self-evident, for the predicate is the same as the subject, because God is His own existence as will be hereafter shown (3, 4). Now because we do not know the essence of God, the proposition is not self-evident to us; but needs to be demonstrated by things that are more known to us, though less known in their nature — namely, by effects.

Reply to Objection 1. To know that God exists in a general and confused way is implanted in us by nature, inasmuch as God is man's beatitude. For man naturally desires happiness, and what is naturally desired by man must be naturally known to him. This, however, is not to know absolutely that God exists; just as to know that someone is approaching is not the same as to know that Peter is approaching, even though it is Peter who is approaching; for many there are who imagine that man's perfect good which is happiness, consists in riches, and others in pleasures, and others in something else.

Reply to Objection 2. Perhaps not everyone who hears this word "God" understands it to signify something than which nothing greater can be thought, seeing that some have believed God to be a body. Yet, granted that everyone understands that by this word "God" is signified something than which nothing greater can be thought, nevertheless, it does not therefore follow that he understands that what the word signifies exists actually, but only that it exists mentally. Nor can it be argued that it actually exists, unless it be admitted that there actually exists something than which nothing greater can be thought; and this precisely is not admitted by those who hold that God does not exist.

Reply to Objection 3. The existence of truth in general is self-evident but the existence of a Primal Truth is not self-evident to us.

Article 2. Whether it can be demonstrated that God exists?

Objection 1. It seems that the existence of God cannot be demonstrated. For it is an article of faith that God exists. But what is of faith cannot be demonstrated, because a demonstration produces scientific knowledge; whereas faith is of the unseen (Hebrews 11:1). Therefore it cannot be demonstrated that God exists.

Objection 2. Further, the essence is the middle term of demonstration. But we cannot know in what God's essence consists, but solely in what it does not consist; as Damascene says (De Fide Orth. i, 4). Therefore we cannot demonstrate that God exists.

Objection 3. Further, if the existence of God were demonstrated, this could only be from His effects. But His effects are not proportionate to Him, since He is infinite and His effects are finite; and between the finite and infinite there is no proportion. Therefore, since a cause cannot be demonstrated by an effect not proportionate to it, it seems that the existence of God cannot be demonstrated.

On the contrary, The Apostle says: "The invisible things of Him are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made" (Romans 1:20). But this would not be unless the existence of God could be demonstrated through the things that are made; for the first thing we must know of anything is whether it exists.

I answer that, Demonstration can be made in two ways: One is through the cause, and is called "a priori," and this is to argue from what is prior absolutely. The other is through the effect, and is called a demonstration "a posteriori"; this is to argue from what is prior relatively only to us. When an effect is better known to us than its cause, from the effect we proceed to the knowledge of the cause. And from every effect the existence of its proper cause can be demonstrated, so long as its effects are better known to us; because since every effect depends upon its cause, if the effect exists, the cause must pre-exist. Hence the existence of God, in so far as it is not self-evident to us, can be demonstrated from those of His effects which are known to us.

Reply to Objection 1. The existence of God and other like truths about God, which can be known by natural reason, are not articles of faith, but are preambles to the articles; for faith presupposes natural knowledge, even as grace presupposes nature, and perfection supposes something that can be perfected. Nevertheless, there is nothing to prevent a man, who cannot grasp a proof, accepting, as a matter of faith, something which in itself is capable of being scientifically known and demonstrated.

Reply to Objection 2. When the existence of a cause is demonstrated from an effect, this effect takes the place of the definition of the cause in proof of the cause's existence. This is especially the case in regard to God, because, in order to prove the existence of anything, it is necessary to accept as a middle term the meaning of the word, and not its essence, for the question of its essence follows on the question of its existence. Now the names given to God are derived from His effects; consequently, in demonstrating the existence of God from His effects, we may take for the middle term the meaning of the word "God".

Reply to Objection 3. From effects not proportionate to the cause no perfect knowledge of that cause can be obtained. Yet from every effect the existence of the cause can be clearly demonstrated, and so we can demonstrate the existence of God from His effects; though from them we cannot perfectly know God as He is in His essence.

Article 3. Whether God exists?

Objection 1. It seems that God does not exist; because if one of two contraries be infinite, the other would be altogether destroyed. But the word "God" means that He is infinite goodness. If, therefore, God existed, there would be no evil discoverable; but there is evil in the world. Therefore God does not exist.

Objection 2. Further, it is superfluous to suppose that what can be accounted for by a few principles has been produced by many. But it seems that everything we see in the world can be accounted for by other principles, supposing God did not exist. For all natural things can be reduced to one principle which is nature; and all voluntary things can be reduced to one principle which is human reason, or will. Therefore there is no need to suppose God's existence.

On the contrary, It is said in the person of God: "I am Who am." (Exodus 3:14)

I answer that, The existence of God can be proved in five ways.

The first and more manifest way is the argument from motion. It is certain, and evident to our senses, that in the world some things are in motion. Now whatever is in motion is put in motion by another, for nothing can be in motion except it is in potentiality to that towards which it is in motion; whereas a thing moves inasmuch as it is in act. For motion is nothing else than the reduction of something from potentiality to actuality. But nothing can be reduced from potentiality to actuality, except by something in a state of actuality. Thus that which is actually hot, as fire, makes wood, which is potentially hot, to be actually hot, and thereby moves and changes it. Now it is not possible that the same thing should be at once in actuality and potentiality in the same respect, but only in different respects. For what is actually hot cannot simultaneously be potentially hot; but it is simultaneously potentially cold. It is therefore impossible that in the same respect and in the same way a thing should be both mover and moved, i.e. that it should move itself. Therefore, whatever is in motion must be put in motion by another. If that by which it is put in motion be itself put in motion, then this also must needs be put in motion by another, and that by another again. But this cannot go on to infinity, because then there would be no first mover, and, consequently, no other mover; seeing that subsequent movers move only inasmuch as they are put in motion by the first mover; as the staff moves only because it is put in motion by the hand. Therefore it is necessary to arrive at a first mover, put in motion by no other; and this everyone understands to be God.

The second way is from the nature of the efficient cause. In the world of sense we find there is an order of efficient causes. There is no case known (neither is it, indeed, possible) in which a thing is found to be the efficient cause of itself; for so it would be prior to itself, which is impossible. Now in efficient causes it is not possible to go on to infinity, because in all efficient causes following in order, the first is the cause of the intermediate cause, and the intermediate is the cause of the ultimate cause, whether the intermediate cause be several, or only one. Now to take away the cause is to take away the effect. Therefore, if there be no first cause among efficient causes, there will be no ultimate, nor any intermediate cause. But if in efficient causes it is possible to go on to infinity, there will be no first efficient cause, neither will there be an ultimate effect, nor any intermediate efficient causes; all of which is plainly false. Therefore it is necessary to admit a first efficient cause, to which everyone gives the name of God.

The third way is taken from possibility and necessity, and runs thus. We find in nature things that are possible to be and not to be, since they are found to be generated, and to corrupt, and consequently, they are possible to be and not to be. But it is impossible for these always to exist, for that which is possible not to be at some time is not. Therefore, if everything is possible not to be, then at one time there could have been nothing in existence. Now if this were true, even now there would be nothing in existence, because that which does not exist only begins to exist by something already existing. Therefore, if at one time nothing was in existence, it would have been impossible for anything to have begun to exist; and thus even now nothing would be in existence — which is absurd. Therefore, not all beings are merely possible, but there must exist something the existence of which is necessary. But every necessary thing either has its necessity caused by another, or not. Now it is impossible to go on to infinity in necessary things which have their necessity caused by another, as has been already proved in regard to efficient causes. Therefore we cannot but postulate the existence of some being having of itself its own necessity, and not receiving it from another, but rather causing in others their necessity. This all men speak of as God.

The fourth way is taken from the gradation to be found in things. Among beings there are some more and some less good, true, noble and the like. But "more" and "less" are predicated of different things, according as they resemble in their different ways something which is the maximum, as a thing is said to be hotter according as it more nearly resembles that which is hottest; so that there is something which is truest, something best, something noblest and, consequently, something which is uttermost being; for those things that are greatest in truth are greatest in being, as it is written in Metaph. ii. Now the maximum in any genus is the cause of all in that genus; as fire, which is the maximum heat, is the cause of all hot things. Therefore there must also be something which is to all beings the cause of their being, goodness, and every other perfection; and this we call God.

The fifth way is taken from the governance of the world. We see that things which lack intelligence, such as natural bodies, act for an end, and this is evident from their acting always, or nearly always, in the same way, so as to obtain the best result. Hence it is plain that not fortuitously, but designedly, do they achieve their end. Now whatever lacks intelligence cannot move towards an end, unless it be directed by some being endowed with knowledge and intelligence; as the arrow is shot to its mark by the archer. Therefore some intelligent being exists by whom all natural things are directed to their end; and this being we call God.

Reply to Objection 1. As Augustine says (Enchiridion xi): "Since God is the highest good, He would not allow any evil to exist in His works, unless His omnipotence and goodness were such as to bring good even out of evil." This is part of the infinite goodness of God, that He should allow evil to exist, and out of it produce good.

Reply to Objection 2. Since nature works for a determinate end under the direction of a higher agent, whatever is done by nature must needs be traced back to God, as to its first cause. So also whatever is done voluntarily must also be traced back to some higher cause other than human reason or will, since these can change or fail; for all things that are changeable and capable of defect must be traced back to an immovable and self-necessary first principle, as was shown in the body of the Article.



CHAPTER II.
Truly there is a God, although the fool has said in his heart, There is no God.


AND so, Lord, do you, who do give understanding to faith, give me, so far as you knowest it to be profitable, to understand that you are as we believe; and that you are that which we believe. And indeed, we believe that you are a being than which nothing greater can be conceived. Or is there no such nature, since the fool has said in his heart, there is no God? (Psalms xiv. 1). But, at any rate, this very fool, when he hears of this being of which I speak --a being than which nothing greater can be conceived --understands what be hears, and what he understands is in his understanding; although he does not understand it to exist.
For, it is one thing for an object to be in the understanding, and another to understand that the object exists. When a painter first conceives of what he will afterwards perform, he has it in his understanding, but be does not yet understand it to be, because he has not yet performed it. But after he has made the painting, be both has it in his understanding, and he understands that it exists, because he has made it.


Hence, even the fool is convinced that something exists in the understanding, at least, than which nothing greater can be conceived. For, when he hears of this, he understands it. And whatever is understood, exists in the understanding. And assuredly that, than which nothing greater can be conceived, cannot exist in the understanding alone. For, suppose it exists in the understanding alone: then it can be conceived to exist in reality; which is greater.


Therefore, if that, than which nothing greater can be conceived, exists in the understanding alone, the very being, than which nothing greater can be conceived, is one, than which a greater can be conceived. But obviously this is impossible. Hence, there is doubt that there exists a being, than which nothing greater can be conceived, and it exists both in the understanding and in reality.

CHAPTER III.
God cannot be conceived not to exist. --God is that, than which nothing greater can be conceived. --That which can be conceived not to exist is not God.


AND it assuredly exists so truly, that it cannot be conceived not to exist. For, it is possible to conceive of a being which cannot be conceived not to exist; and this is greater than one which can be conceived not to exist. Hence, if that, than which nothing greater can be conceived, can be conceived not to exist, it is not that, than which nothing greater can be conceived. But this is an irreconcilable contradiction. There is, then, so truly a being than which nothing greater can be conceived to exist, that it cannot even be conceived not to exist;. and this being you are, O Lord, our God.


So truly, therefore, do you exist, O Lord, my God, that you can not be conceived not to exist; and rightly. For, if a mind could conceive of a being better than you, the creature would rise above the Creator; and this is most absurd. And, indeed, whatever else there is, except you alone, can be conceived not to exist. To you alone, therefore, it belongs to exist more truly than all other beings, and hence in a higher degree than all others. For, whatever else exists does not exist so truly, and hence in a less degree it belongs to it to exist. Why, then, has the fool said in his heart, there is no God (Psalms xiv. 1), since it is so evident, to a rational mind, that you do exist in the highest degree of all? Why, except that he is dull and a fool?



1. SEVERAL other questions remain for consideration respecting the attributes of God and my own nature or mind. I will, however, on some other occasion perhaps resume the investigation of these. Meanwhile, as I have discovered what must be done and what avoided to arrive at the knowledge of truth, what I have chiefly to do is to essay to emerge from the state of doubt in which I have for some time been, and to discover whether anything can be known with certainty regarding material objects.

2. But before considering whether such objects as I conceive exist without me, I must examine their ideas in so far as these are to be found in my consciousness, and discover which of them are distinct and which confused.

3. In the first place, I distinctly imagine that quantity which the philosophers commonly call continuous, or the extension in length, breadth, and depth that is in this quantity, or rather in the object to which it is attributed. Further, I can enumerate in it many diverse parts, and attribute to each of these all sorts of sizes, figures, situations, and local motions; and, in fine, I can assign to each of these motions all degrees of duration.

4. And I not only distinctly know these things when I thus consider them in general; but besides, by a little attention, I discover innumerable particulars respecting figures, numbers, motion, and the like, which are so evidently true, and so accordant with my nature, that when I now discover them I do not so much appear to learn anything new, as to call to remembrance what I before knew, or for the first time to remark what was before in my mind, but to which I had not hitherto directed my attention.

5. And what I here find of most importance is, that I discover in my mind innumerable ideas of certain objects, which cannot be esteemed pure negations, although perhaps they possess no reality beyond my thought, and which are not framed by me though it may be in my power to think, or not to think them, but possess true and immutable natures of their own. As, for example, when I imagine a triangle, although there is not perhaps and never was in any place in the universe apart from my thought one such figure, it remains true nevertheless that this figure possesses a certain determinate nature, form, or essence, which is immutable and eternal, and not framed by me, nor in any degree dependent on my thought; as appears from the circumstance, that diverse properties of the triangle may be demonstrated, viz., that its three angles are equal to two right, that its greatest side is subtended by its greatest angle, and the like, which, whether I will or not, I now clearly discern to belong to it, although before I did not at all think of them, when, for the first time, I imagined a triangle, and which accordingly cannot be said to have been invented by me.

6. Nor is it a valid objection to allege, that perhaps this idea of a triangle came into my mind by the medium of the senses, through my having. seen bodies of a triangular figure; for I am able to form in thought an innumerable variety of figures with regard to which it cannot be supposed that they were ever objects of sense, and I can nevertheless demonstrate diverse properties of their nature no less than of the triangle, all of which are assuredly true since I clearly conceive them: and they are therefore something, and not mere negations; for it is highly evident that all that is true is something, [truth being identical with existence]; and I have already fully shown the truth of the principle, that whatever is clearly and distinctly known is true. And although this had not been demonstrated, yet the nature of my mind is such as to compel me to assert to what I clearly conceive while I so conceive it; and I recollect that even when I still strongly adhered to the objects of sense, I reckoned among the number of the most certain truths those I clearly conceived relating to figures, numbers, and other matters that pertain to arithmetic and geometry, and in general to the pure mathematics.

7. But now if because I can draw from my thought the idea of an object, it follows that all I clearly and distinctly apprehend to pertain to this object, does in truth belong to it, may I not from this derive an argument for the existence of God? It is certain that I no less find the idea of a God in my consciousness, that is the idea of a being supremely perfect, than that of any figure or number whatever: and I know with not less clearness and distinctness that an [actual and] eternal existence pertains to his nature than that all which is demonstrable of any figure or number really belongs to the nature of that figure or number; and, therefore, although all the conclusions of the preceding Meditations were false, the existence of God would pass with me for a truth at least as certain as I ever judged any truth of mathematics to be.

8. Indeed such a doctrine may at first sight appear to contain more sophistry than truth. For, as I have been accustomed in every other matter to distinguish between existence and essence, I easily believe that the existence can be separated from the essence of God, and that thus God may be conceived as not actually existing. But, nevertheless, when I think of it more attentively, it appears that the existence can no more be separated from the essence of God, than the idea of a mountain from that of a valley, or the equality of its three angles to two right angles, from the essence of a [rectilinear] triangle; so that it is not less impossible to conceive a God, that is, a being supremely perfect, to whom existence is awanting, or who is devoid of a certain perfection, than to conceive a mountain without a valley.

9. But though, in truth, I cannot conceive a God unless as existing, any more than I can a mountain without a valley, yet, just as it does not follow that there is any mountain in the world merely because I conceive a mountain with a valley, so likewise, though I conceive God as existing, it does not seem to follow on that account that God exists; for my thought imposes no necessity on things; and as I may imagine a winged horse, though there be none such, so I could perhaps attribute existence to God, though no God existed.

10. But the cases are not analogous, and a fallacy lurks under the semblance of this objection: for because I cannot conceive a mountain without a valley, it does not follow that there is any mountain or valley in existence, but simply that the mountain or valley, whether they do or do not exist, are inseparable from each other; whereas, on the other hand, because I cannot conceive God unless as existing, it follows that existence is inseparable from him, and therefore that he really exists: not that this is brought about by my thought, or that it imposes any necessity on things, but, on the contrary, the necessity which lies in the thing itself, that is, the necessity of the existence of God, determines me to think in this way: for it is not in my power to conceive a God without existence, that is, a being supremely perfect, and yet devoid of an absolute perfection, as I am free to imagine a horse with or without wings.

11. Nor must it be alleged here as an objection, that it is in truth necessary to admit that God exists, after having supposed him to possess all perfections, since existence is one of them, but that my original supposition was not necessary; just as it is not necessary to think that all quadrilateral figures can be inscribed in the circle, since, if I supposed this, I should be constrained to admit that the rhombus, being a figure of four sides, can be therein inscribed, which, however, is manifestly false. This objection is, I say, incompetent; for although it may not be necessary that I shall at any time entertain the notion of Deity, yet each time I happen to think of a first and sovereign being, and to draw, so to speak, the idea of him from the storehouse of the mind, I am necessitated to attribute to him all kinds of perfections, though I may not then enumerate them all, nor think of each of them in particular. And this necessity is sufficient, as soon as I discover that existence is a perfection, to cause me to infer the existence of this first and sovereign being; just as it is not necessary that I should ever imagine any triangle, but whenever I am desirous of considering a rectilinear figure composed of only three angles, it is absolutely necessary to attribute those properties to it from which it is correctly inferred that its three angles are not greater than two right angles, although perhaps I may not then advert to this relation in particular. But when I consider what figures are capable of being inscribed in the circle, it is by no means necessary to hold that all quadrilateral figures are of this number; on the contrary, I cannot even imagine such to be the case, so long as I shall be unwilling to accept in thought aught that I do not clearly and distinctly conceive; and consequently there is a vast difference between false suppositions, as is the one in question, and the true ideas that were born with me, the first and chief of which is the idea of God. For indeed I discern on many grounds that this idea is not factitious depending simply on my thought, but that it is the representation of a true and immutable nature: in the first place because I can conceive no other being, except God, to whose essence existence [necessarily] pertains; in the second, because it is impossible to conceive two or more gods of this kind; and it being supposed that one such God exists, I clearly see that he must have existed from all eternity, and will exist to all eternity; and finally, because I apprehend many other properties in God, none of which I can either diminish or change.

12. But, indeed, whatever mode of probation I in the end adopt, it always returns to this, that it is only the things I clearly and distinctly conceive which have the power of completely persuading me. And although, of the objects I conceive in this manner, some, indeed, are obvious to every one, while others are only discovered after close and careful investigation; nevertheless after they are once discovered, the latter are not esteemed less certain than the former. Thus, for example, to take the case of a right-angled triangle, although it is not so manifest at first that the square of the base is equal to the squares of the other two sides, as that the base is opposite to the greatest angle; nevertheless, after it is once apprehended. we are as firmly persuaded of the truth of the former as of the latter. And, with respect to God if I were not pre-occupied by prejudices, and my thought beset on all sides by the continual presence of the images of sensible objects, I should know nothing sooner or more easily then the fact of his being. For is there any truth more clear than the existence of a Supreme Being, or of God, seeing it is to his essence alone that [necessary and eternal] existence pertains?

13. And although the right conception of this truth has cost me much close thinking, nevertheless at present I feel not only as assured of it as of what I deem most certain, but I remark further that the certitude of all other truths is so absolutely dependent on it that without this knowledge it is impossible ever to know anything perfectly.

14. For although I am of such a nature as to be unable, while I possess a very clear and distinct apprehension of a matter, to resist the conviction of its truth, yet because my constitution is also such as to incapacitate me from keeping my mind continually fixed on the same object and as I frequently recollect a past judgment without at the same time being able to recall the grounds of it, it may happen meanwhile that other reasons are presented to me which would readily cause me to change my opinion, if I did not know that God existed; and thus I should possess no true and certain knowledge, but merely vague and vacillating opinions. Thus, for example, when r consider the nature of the [rectilinear] triangle, it most clearly appears to me, who have been instructed in the principles of geometry, that its three angles are equal to two right angles, and I find it impossible to believe otherwise, while I apply my mind to the demonstration; but as soon as I cease from attending to the process of proof, although I still remember that I had a clear comprehension of it, yet I may readily come to doubt of the truth demonstrated, if I do not know that there is a God: for I may persuade myself that I have been so constituted by nature as to be sometimes deceived, even in matters which I think I apprehend with the greatest evidence and certitude, especially when I recollect that I frequently considered many things to be true and certain which other reasons afterward constrained me to reckon as wholly false.

15. But after I have discovered that God exists, seeing I also at the same time observed that all things depend on him, and that he is no deceiver, and thence inferred that all which I clearly and distinctly perceive is of necessity true: although I no longer attend to the grounds of a judgment, no opposite reason can be alleged sufficient to lead me to doubt of its truth, provided only I remember that 1 once possessed a clear and distinct comprehension of it. My knowledge of it thus becomes true and certain. And this same knowledge extends likewise to whatever I remember to have formerly demonstrated, as the truths of geometry and the like: for what can be alleged against them to lead me to doubt of them ? Will it be that my nature is such that I may be frequently deceived? But I already know that I cannot be deceived in judgments of the grounds of which I possess a clear knowledge. Will it be that I formerly deemed things to be true and certain which I afterward discovered to be false ? But I had no clear and distinct knowledge of any of those things, and, being as yet ignorant of the rule by which I am assured of the truth of a judgment, I was led to give my assent to them on grounds which I afterward discovered were less strong than at the time I imagined them to be. What further objection, then, is there ? Will it be said that perhaps I am dreaming (an objection I lately myself raised), or that all the thoughts of which I am now conscious have no more truth than the reveries of my dreams ? But although, in truth, I should be dreaming, the rule still holds that all which is clearly presented to my intellect is indisputably true.

16. And thus I very clearly see that the certitude and truth of all sciencedepends on the knowledge alone of the true God, insomuch that, before I knew him, I could have no perfect knowledge of any other thing. And now that I know him, I possess the means of acquiring a perfect knowledge respecting innumerable matters, as well relative to God himself and other intellectual objects as to corporeal nature, in so far as it is the object of pure mathematics [which do not consider whether it exists or not].


Unfortunately I can't find a full copy of Kant's The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God, but I encourage you to procure it.There are more that I can quote if necessary. Most of what can be said on this point already has been, and atheists have not been able to answer all of these rational arguments.

[Amapola]

Islam built nothing, but plundered everything.
Indeed. :thumbs up. Although Islam is becoming vigorously a major figure because of our own ideological crisis. :(


Christianity's civilisation was a reworking of the pre-existent Roman, infused with a new barbarian spirit
That is oversimplifying; Christianism, as a culture type, is the result of the fusion of two values orders of old tradition, of which he made use like a starting point for its own development: Judaism, which states the absolute Trascendence with a Single God, and that valuable mixed cultures that we embrace under tje term of romanitas and which had already discovered the need of admitting a single Divine Cause for the Universe.

Cultural anthropology has managed to prove and inform that the faith in a single God appears in primitive peoples; it is about a starting point and not an arrival point. Let's remember that the Greeks said "the gods were later".


that would doubtless have expressed itself in another, but equally impressive, way,

It was not so fast or impresive: the Christian community was made up of a encysted minority for 4 centuries in the mass of population and, it would take centuries for Christians to be Christian.


had Christianity not happened to have won out in the late Empire. :shrug:
Even before the late empire, since Aureliano, the militar soldiers already stated the Empire needed an ethic sustratum. Anyway it was just a matter of time because the pax romana was based on technique with little thinking, great buildings and libraries with not many maestros (like the kind of Plato or Aristotle), pgragmatism with little philosophy looking for material solutions as in our days. A dead end.

History seems to be cyclic: materialism, immanecense, individualism and massification detroy and destroyed patriotism and lead, led to the need of immigrants (it happened before and it's hapenning now again) and mercenaries. Philantropy brought and is bringing selfishness, education didn't and doesn't correct strong moral deviations. Woman got and gets certain independence at family's expenses, which broke up, like now. All this phenomenon got reversed after the victory of Christianism and only because of this the Eatern Roman empire lasted so many centuries longer.

It is not strange that historians like Tarn and Griffith write about the amazing similarity with our materialist modern world.

[Psychonaut]

The answer to this has already been phrased better than I can phrase it. It requires one who is able to separate the superficial from the significant, however, and differentiate between universal logic and Christian appeal to authority.

If you're into ontological arguments for the existence of God—and I've honestly never been convinced by any of these, finding it far too easy to enter into a reductio ad absurdum by applying the underlying principles of the arguments broadly—Gödel's use of modal logic (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/ontological-arguments/#GodOntArg) to formulate his version far outshines those of the Church Fathers in terms of logical persuasiveness.

[Eldritch]

The answer to this has already been phrased better than I can phrase it. It requires one who is able to separate the superficial from the significant, however, and differentiate between universal logic and Christian appeal to authority.

...

Unfortunately I can't find a full copy of Kant's The Only Possible Argument in Support of a Demonstration of the Existence of God, but I encourage you to procure it.There are more that I can quote if necessary. Most of what can be said on this point already has been, and atheists have not been able to answer all of these rational arguments.

Well, I could start copypasting articles that refute Aquinas and co. here, and then we can butt heads over whose article is more bestest. :shrug:

Btw I never said I'm an atheist. I have no interest in religious matters, least of all in organised religions, and it's pointless to wonder whether or not something we refer to as "god" exists or not, because if it does, we cannot understand its true nature anyway at this moment in time.

[Amapola]

And how much death and suffering have religious conflicts caused over the centuries? I'd say it's almost certainly quite a bit more. What happened in Cambodia was essentially a result of a self-destructive mass psychosis.

Faith in technology, secular humanism, consumerism, football fanaticism, and a host of other worldviews can be counted as religions, too.

here is no coherent way to isolate "religious" ideologies with a peculiar tendency toward violence from their tamer "secular" counterparts. So-called secular ideologies and institutions like nationalism and liberalism can be just as absolutist, divisive, and irrational as so-called religion. People kill for all sorts of things. An adequate approach to the problem would be resolutely empirical: under what conditions do certain beliefs and practices—jihad, the "invisible hand" of the market, the sacrificial atonement of Christ, the role of the United States as worldwide liberator—turn violent?

The point is not simply that "secular" violence should be given equal attention to "religious" violence. The point is that the distinction between "secular" and "religious" violence is unhelpful, misleading, and mystifying, and should be avoided altogether.

[Amapola]

ll just say that much of the violence and injustice that has been done in the name of Christianity has been done due to a misunderstanding or a misappropriation of Christian doctine as far as I can tell.
I don't think that either of these arguments works. In the first place, it is impossible to separate out religious from economic and political motives in such a way that religious motives are innocent of violence. How could one, for example, separate religion from politics in Islam, when Muslims themselves make no such separation?

Christianity is not primarily a set of doctrines, but a lived historical experience embodied and shaped by the empirically observable actions of Christians. So given certain conditions, Christianity, Islam, and other faiths can and do contribute to violence.

However, I agree, religion is not more prone to violence than secular institutions.

First, the division of ideologies and institutions into the categories "religious" and "secular" is an arbitrary and incoherent division. When we examine academic arguments that religion causes violence, we find that what does or does not count as religion is based on subjective and indefensible assumptions. As a result certain kinds of violence are condemned, and others are ignored. The myth of religious violence helps create a blind spot about the violence of the putatively secular nation-state. We like to believe that the liberal state arose to make peace between warring religious factions. Today, the Western liberal state is charged with the burden of creating peace in the face of the cruel religious fanaticism.

[Debaser11]

I don't think that either of these arguments works. In the first place, it is impossible to separate out religious from economic and political motives in such a way that religious motives are innocent of violence. How could one, for example, separate religion from politics in Islam, when Muslims themselves make no such separation?

That's rather the point. The fact that Christianity arguably does (give to Caesar what's Caesar's) and Islam does not supports my point. The bottom line is that Christians and Muslims made very different societies. Their religion tells us about their value systems and how they viewed an ordered society. It is not at all a stretch to say that the nature of Europe and the Middle East's politics and economics were affected by the nature of their faith.

Compartmentalizing things into "politics" and "economics" and "religion" really does not give one a clear picture of how organic societies emerge. But that's how they teach people to think at universities these days as if the areas had no overlap and each respective sphere existed in a vacuum.


Christianity is not primarily a set of doctrines, but a lived historical experience embodied and shaped by the empirically observable actions of Christians. So given certain conditions, Christianity, Islam, and other faiths can and do contribute to violence.

Of course Christianity can contribute to violence. But I find your relativism to be unwarranted. It's a great deal harder to justify violence by skimming through the New Testament than it is the Koran. That's not incidental. The doctrines reflect the "historical experience" at the very least. And those doctrines reinforce and help give rise to a new historical experience in the future. Drawing parallels between Christianity's violence and Islam's violence (which is the common line of argument today) is pretty asinine. Islam's whole Empire spread by the sword. It's becoming vogue to cite the brutal Inquisition and the Crusades (which were largely defensive) to somehow show how they are "equally" violent.


However, I agree, religion is not more prone to violence than secular institutions.

:thumb001:


First, the division of ideologies and institutions into the categories "religious" and "secular" is an arbitrary and incoherent division.

Indeed. Secular types today are the ones running around with the religious convictions that all races are equal, that men and women are the same, that it is selfish and bad to be rich, that the white man destroyed the environment, that the Indians were "here first," that having a large family is selfish, that being against Obama is "racist," that diversity is good, that being against immigration and open borders is "racist," that all religions are the same, etc.

If you cross any urban liberal types on these issues, you will be mentally branded by them with a Scarlet Letter.


When we examine academic arguments that religion causes violence, we find that what does or does not count as religion is based on subjective and indefensible assumptions. As a result certain kinds of violence are condemned, and others are ignored. The myth of religious violence helps create a blind spot about the violence of the putatively secular nation-state. We like to believe that the liberal state arose to make peace between warring religious factions. Today, the Western liberal state is charged with the burden of creating peace in the face of the cruel religious fanaticism.

Yes. I agree with what you have written here. The secularist types of today are missionary and religious in their own right. Part of their crusade is to save religious types from themselves by introducing them to "humanism" and other "humanitarian" ideals.

[Psychonaut]

Part of their crusade is to save religious types from themselves by introducing them to "humanism" and other "humanitarian" ideals.

It's so funny to see humanism contrasted with religion (I know that's the common usage, so this isn't a stab at you, Debaser), when so many of the very things that distinguish humanism from naturalism are religious—if not specifically Christian—in nature.

[Debaser11]

^Oh positively.

You wouldn't have "humanism" without Christianity.

[Osweo]

That is oversimplifying; Christianism, as a culture type, is the result of the fusion of two values orders of old tradition, of which he made use like a starting point for its own development: Judaism, which states the absolute Trascendence with a Single God, and that valuable mixed cultures that we embrace under tje term of romanitas and which had already discovered the need of admitting a single Divine Cause for the Universe.
That is oversimplifying. :D

There are many Christianities. None of them are made exclusively of only Judaism and Romanitas, when we are looking for the value systems behind them.

To omit the cold wind from the north when looking at Latin Christianity is to miss a lot. This was the Christianity of Goths, Franks and Langobards. For a while, there was a strong Celtic current up in the north-west, which did impact the continent too, though it was later overlaid by other influences.

Judaism and Romanitas don't adequately take into account the Hellenism of the east, which didn't quite catch on so much in the Latin west. The Christianity of the Eastern Empire had its Anatolian influence too. It's impossible to look at Ikonoclasts and Ikonodules without some attempt to get into the cultural mindset of the Hellenised Anatolians and Caucasians that were playing considerable roles in the Byzantine state. It was far from a purely Greek matter. 'Hellene' even came to mean 'ancient pagan' in official discourse there.

Later Orthodoxy up to the present naturally has its Slavonic input. The Nestorians and so on in the Middle East are from many aborted little might-have-been worlds too.


Cultural anthropology has managed to prove and inform that the faith in a single God appears in primitive peoples;
Who told you that? It's a simple lie. Cultural anthropology proves that, as in your secular/religious comments, it is impossible to define a category of 'primitive peoples' by reference to such religious conditions. See Baker on the Negrids of the 'secluded area' of inner Africa in the Nineteenth Century;

The various tribes entertained very different ideas as to the existence of a God. Schweinfurth tells us that the Bongo certainly had no idea of a creator, or any kind of ruling power 'above'. Livingstone records the opinion of a Portuguese official at Tete that the Banyai...., Barotse ..., and Balunda ... 'have a clear idea of a Supreme Being, the maker and governor of all things'.

It is impossible to generalise. Arguably most primitive of all, the Australids seem on the whole even less amenable to monotheistic ideas.

It was not so fast or impresive:
The Northern Tradition? You would simply have to read a lot more about it to have any authority to discuss its impressiveness or not.


the Christian community was made up of a encysted minority for 4 centuries in the mass of population and, it would take centuries for Christians to be Christian.
I don't understand your point.

All this phenomenon got reversed after the victory of Christianism and only because of this the Eatern Roman empire lasted so many centuries longer.
The phenomena were reversed when the Western Empire fell. The smashing of a state system that had lost its sense of purpose and grown too unwieldy to function removed the opportunities for the vices you name by destroying URBANISM. The peasants had not been subject to the same vices at all. THIS is the 'Empire' that you are thinking of. The East was a rather different world with very different ethnic undercurrents shaping its emergence from Romanitas. Though they still called themselves Romaioi, they were not of the same cultural trajectory at all.

[Thorum]

Perhaps this will help some here:

http://www.project-reason.org/images/gallery1/religionFlowchart.jpeg

[Magister Eckhart]

Well, I could start copypasting articles that refute Aquinas and co. here, and then we can butt heads over whose article is more bestest. :shrug:

Btw I never said I'm an atheist. I have no interest in religious matters, least of all in organised religions, and it's pointless to wonder whether or not something we refer to as "god" exists or not, because if it does, we cannot understand its true nature anyway at this moment in time.

It's really too bad I didn't post Kant. That's essentially his stance on the epistemological approach to God. :D

[Psychonaut]

It's really too bad I didn't post Kant. That's essentially his stance on the epistemological approach to God. :D

Which is then echoed in Wittgenstein's famous: "Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen." ;)

[Magister Eckhart]

Which is then echoed in Wittgenstein's famous: "Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen." ;)

And you'll find it's the root of my distaste for both of them. Real philosophy died at the hands of Descartes.

[Psychonaut]

Real philosophy died at the hands of Descartes.

:eek:

In the immortal words of Gary Coleman, "whachoo talkin' bout, Willis?"

[Amapola]

That is oversimplifying. :D

There are many Christianities. None of them are made exclusively of only Judaism and Romanitas, when we are looking for the value systems behind them.

To omit the cold wind from the north when looking at Latin Christianity is to miss a lot. This was the Christianity of Goths, Franks and Langobards. For a while, there was a strong Celtic current up in the north-west, which did impact the continent too, though it was later overlaid by other influences.

Judaism and Romanitas don't adequately take into account the Hellenism of the east, which didn't quite catch on so much in the Latin west. The Christianity of the Eastern Empire had its Anatolian influence too. It's impossible to look at Ikonoclasts and Ikonodules without some attempt to get into the cultural mindset of the Hellenised Anatolians and Caucasians that were playing considerable roles in the Byzantine state. It was far from a purely Greek matter. 'Hellene' even came to mean 'ancient pagan' in official discourse there.

Later Orthodoxy up to the present naturally has its Slavonic input. The Nestorians and so on in the Middle East are from many aborted little might-have-been worlds too.

Who told you that? It's a simple lie. Cultural anthropology proves that, as in your secular/religious comments, it is impossible to define a category of 'primitive peoples' by reference to such religious conditions. See Baker on the Negrids of the 'secluded area' of inner Africa in the Nineteenth Century;

The various tribes entertained very different ideas as to the existence of a God. Schweinfurth tells us that the Bongo certainly had no idea of a creator, or any kind of ruling power 'above'. Livingstone records the opinion of a Portuguese official at Tete that the Banyai...., Barotse ..., and Balunda ... 'have a clear idea of a Supreme Being, the maker and governor of all things'.

It is impossible to generalise. Arguably most primitive of all, the Australids seem on the whole even less amenable to monotheistic ideas.

The Northern Tradition? You would simply have to read a lot more about it to have any authority to discuss its impressiveness or not.

I don't understand your point.

The phenomena were reversed when the Western Empire fell. The smashing of a state system that had lost its sense of purpose and grown too unwieldy to function removed the opportunities for the vices you name by destroying URBANISM. The peasants had not been subject to the same vices at all. THIS is the 'Empire' that you are thinking of. The East was a rather different world with very different ethnic undercurrents shaping its emergence from Romanitas. Though they still called themselves Romaioi, they were not of the same cultural trajectory at all.

LoL!
Too early to reply such a long post. I will later.


The Northern Tradition? You would simply have to read a lot more about it to have any authority to discuss its impressiveness or not.

Hmm? what Northern Tradition? you must have misunderstood my post. I didn't refer to it and didn't even think of it.

Being impressed or not is a subjective thing though.

[Amapola]

That is oversimplifying. :D There are many Christianities. None of them are made exclusively of only Judaism and Romanitas, when we are looking for the value systems behind them.

To omit the cold wind from the north when looking at Latin Christianity is to miss a lot. This was the Christianity of Goths, Franks and Langobards. For a while, there was a strong Celtic current up in the north-west, which did impact the continent too, though it was later overlaid by other influences.
This is far beyond the point as it doesn't apply to the primitive sources of Christianism (which were Judaism, helenism and romanitas) I was talking about. Goths* (who were a king of Romanitas continuation), Franks etc... sure contributed to Christianity centuries after the forces I am talking about. To all said I can add more influences ( that I understand even more significative than what you said) not altering the Judeo-Latin base:

-Benito, Gregorio, Isidoro, Bonifacio, Cirilio and Metodio.
-Holy Roman empire
-Reform
-Intellection and sentiment
-General studies
-Avignon
-Catherine
-Spanish Catholic Reform
-Devotio moderna
-Schism and
-Conciliarism.

Actually Judaism flowed into Christianism which at the same time presented itself like the definitive Israel in which all promises have already been fulfilled. For decades, until the decade of the 70's, Chritianism was a continuation in the old Abraham's path. Rome might be the colums of the faith but the nostalgy of Jerusalem can never be erased.

... to be continued

[Cato]

Actually Judaism flowed into Christianism which at the same time presented itself like the definitive Israel in which all promises have already been fulfilled. For decades, until the decade of the 70's, Chritianism was a continuation in the old Abraham's path. Rome might be the colums of the faith but the nostalgy of Jerusalem can never be erased.

And nevermind the fact that it is Christianity that is largely responsible for the creation of Europe and its countries, unless battling paganized tribesmen established the various baronies, duchies, principalities, etc. that came to form the modern European nations. :confused:

Or, for my own sake, I can bring up the obvious influence of the Bible, Judeo-Christianity, Greco-Romanism, the Enlightenment, etc. upon the foundation of America:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights..."

And who, perhaps, is this Creator? The deity of Robespierre's "Cult of the Supreme Being?" This was largely an attempt to de-Christianize/de-Catholicize the worship of God, and is a form of deism that is completely at odds with Anglo-American deism, which still held to its Biblical roots (i.e. Jefferson's The Life and Morals of Jesus of Nazareth; Tindal's Christianity as Old as the Creation; Paine's The Age of Reason, where Paine scathingly attacks "priestcraft," sees Jesus as a gifted human teach [as did Jefferson] but never wavers from the belief that the God he worships is the God of the Bible: Yahweh).

[Cato]

Addendum:

And this more addresses the stupid trend of trying to resuscitate defunct pagan superstitions, which, to me, is a form of crypto-atheism than anything else.

The typical "heathen" positions amounts to:

"Boohoo, evil Christians used force and deception to convert our heroic and noble heathen ancestors to a Judaized alien faith. Now that we, their equally heroic and noble, progeny know this, we year for the days of the blood eagle and being able to hang a horse's head from the nid-pole! Woe is us!"

And then mate this idiocy with an equally idiotic form of nationalism or pan-nationalism (when nationalism is a product of Christianity; i.e. the Spanish nationality is a product of its Christianity, the English nationality is a product of its Christianity) and an equally idiotic form of anti-Jewishness ("Jews control the world") and lolz result.

Again, America, America is a product of Christian men who were equally well-versed in the classics of Greece and Rome and the Bible. So, it took a few renegade Englishmen, schooled in the lore of Romans, Jews, and Greeks, to create what has, thus far, been the greatest nation in human history.

Why is this?

Don't look to the Constitution. Atheists love to pull the Constitution out and say that it doesn't mention God, yet they also never seem to mention the Declaration, where the Creator is mentioned in the opening sentence. :lol:

[anonymaus]

Addendum:

And this more addresses the stupid trend of trying to resuscitate defunct pagan superstitions, which, to me, is a form of crypto-atheism than anything else.

The typical "heathen" positions amounts to:

"Boohoo, evil Christians used force and deception to convert our heroic and noble heathen ancestors to a Judaized alien faith. Now that we, their equally heroic and noble, progeny know this, we year for the days of the blood eagle and being able to hang a horse's head from the nid-pole! Woe is us!"

And then mate this idiocy with an equally idiotic form of nationalism or pan-nationalism (when nationalism is a product of Christianity; i.e. the Spanish nationality is a product of its Christianity, the English nationality is a product of its Christianity) and an equally idiotic form of anti-Jewishness ("Jews control the world") and lolz result.

Again, America, America is a product of Christian men who were equally well-versed in the classics of Greece and Rome and the Bible. So, it took a few renegade Englishmen, schooled in the lore of Romans, Jews, and Greeks, to create what has, thus far, been the greatest nation in human history.

Why is this?

Don't look to the Constitution. Atheists love to pull the Constitution out and say that it doesn't mention God, yet they also never seem to mention the Declaration, where the Creator is mentioned in the opening sentence. :lol:


http://i.imgur.com/XhKY6.jpg

[Cato]

http://i.imgur.com/XhKY6.jpg

Duke would've been more appropriate.

[Amapola]

That is oversimplifying. :D There are many Christianities. None of them are made exclusively of only Judaism and Romanitas, when we are looking for the value systems behind them.

As I have said before, the sources, core and genesis are the trascendence inherited from Israel, the ius which is Roman heritage and the value of the human person which Helenism had defended. The rest, what you mention is part of the long history and avatars of the above-mentioned


Judaism and Romanitas don't adequately take into account the Hellenism of the east, which didn't quite catch on so much in the Latin west.

Helenism was a big influence...there's absolutely no doubt that the Church of the early days assumed the symbolic world of the helenist world in a process of reception, transformation and synthesis.

While in Jesus' scatological preaching, man remains radically linked to God and the obedience towards Him goes hand in hand with love for the others, the formation of the different communities gave rise to an increasing objetivation of moral rules, which fulfillmentd frequently appears like criterion of what's Christian. This process belong to the environment conditioned by Greek thought, which usually used to classify virtues and vices. Already whithin the NT, tendencies of this sort are observed, ex, in domestic prescriptions; besides, helenistic categories made throug or anthropological perceptions although with a new interpretation. This is very boring but to quote a few more: Gospel was completed with Helenistic ethics, as in the stoic natural right; not to forget the germinal logos or Origenes, but this is getting boring :rolleyes:

[Cato]

as in the stoic natural right

Hooray, Stoics. :thumb001:

[Psychonaut]

The typical "heathen" positions amounts to:

"Boohoo, evil Christians used force and deception to convert our heroic and noble heathen ancestors to a Judaized alien faith. Now that we, their equally heroic and noble, progeny know this, we year for the days of the blood eagle and being able to hang a horse's head from the nid-pole! Woe is us!"

And then mate this idiocy with an equally idiotic form of nationalism or pan-nationalism (when nationalism is a product of Christianity; i.e. the Spanish nationality is a product of its Christianity, the English nationality is a product of its Christianity) and an equally idiotic form of anti-Jewishness ("Jews control the world") and lolz result.

Umm...straw man much? If you've seen this kind of position elucidated in Heathen books outside of those by fringe whackos like Varg or Ron McVann, please post them as examples of this kind of "idiocy" being "typical" of Heathen thought.

[Magister Eckhart]

Addendum:

And this more addresses the stupid trend of trying to resuscitate defunct pagan superstitions, which, to me, is a form of crypto-atheism than anything else.

The typical "heathen" positions amounts to:

"Boohoo, evil Christians used force and deception to convert our heroic and noble heathen ancestors to a Judaized alien faith. Now that we, their equally heroic and noble, progeny know this, we year for the days of the blood eagle and being able to hang a horse's head from the nid-pole! Woe is us!"

And then mate this idiocy with an equally idiotic form of nationalism or pan-nationalism (when nationalism is a product of Christianity; i.e. the Spanish nationality is a product of its Christianity, the English nationality is a product of its Christianity) and an equally idiotic form of anti-Jewishness ("Jews control the world") and lolz result.

Where did you get the idea that nationalism is a product of Christianity? Civic nationalism existed fully within the Roman republic (see Anthony D. Smith The Antiquity of Nations), well before Christianity ever existed. Furthermore, while the means of nationalism during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries was the bible, the core of the nationalism had little to nothing to do with God, focusing instead on language, forming the roots of what would later become the romantic nationalism you are referencing when you speak of "anti-Jewishness" that arises in nationalistic movements in the 19th century.

Before the French Revolution, in fact, nationalistic movements (such as the English nationalism of the Civil War) were very friendly to the Jews. It was only with the emergence of the mythology of the Aryan race that there is a sort of necessary tie between 19th century racial nationalism and anti-Semitism.

In the case of Germany, nationalism was rooted (like nationalism elsewhere in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries) in the notion of political liberty and political self-determination, albeit for the princes and nobility, but nevertheless it is driven by a humanistic sense of liberty. In the most extreme case of Italy, Nicolo Machiavelli writes that a man's nation must take precedence over his soul-- for true loyalty means the sacrifice of the entire self pro patria.

At any rate, I really just want to dispel any illusions you might have about nationalism. In any nationalistic movement (including Spain), religion is ultimately superficial, because the nation must necessarily, especially after the nineteenth century, replace the Body of Christ as the primary sensed community.

As for the heathen movement, yes these children do exist and they exist in large numbers, but they are not the defining feature of the revivalist movement. Indeed, you could just as easily be speaking of Wiccans or of Skinheads-- there is in fact nothing truly heathen in what you post as representative of "typical heathen".

[Adalwolf]

Umm...straw man much? If you've seen this kind of position elucidated in Heathen books outside of those by fringe whackos like Varg or Ron McVann, please post them as examples of this kind of "idiocy" being "typical" of Heathen thought.

You have to admit that many of the Heathen nationalists on forums such as these, will make that argument from the start. Claiming that life was in perfect tranquility and progression before Christianity and the crusades came barging in. A laughable proposition, actually. However, these are likely just people who subscribe to the Pagan lifestyle as more of a non-conformist social cult than any genuine understanding or interest...

[Psychonaut]

You have to admit that many of the Heathen nationalists on forums such as these, will make that argument from the start. Claiming that life was in perfect tranquility and progression before Christianity and the crusades came barging in. A laughable proposition, actually. However, these are likely just people who subscribe to the Pagan lifestyle as more of a non-conformist social cult than any genuine understanding or interest...

Who on this forum claims that? All of us? Any of us? Examples are more helpful than generalizations.

[Adalwolf]

Who on this forum claims that? All of us? Any of us? Examples are more helpful than generalizations.

Maybe read my post again where I said many do on forums such as these. Those types are much more abundant at Skadi for example, but can be found everywhere on the net. For instance: I have seen Brynhild make that argument here a few times.

[Cato]

You have to admit that many of the Heathen nationalists on forums such as these, will make that argument from the start. Claiming that life was in perfect tranquility and progression before Christianity and the crusades came barging in. A laughable proposition, actually. However, these are likely just people who subscribe to the Pagan lifestyle as more of a non-conformist social cult than any genuine understanding or interest...

Or perhaps they just have an immature kneejerk dislike of Christianity to begin with, and THEN lactch onto the heathen bandwagon/

[Joe McCarthy]

The typical neo-pagan is probably best described as an atheist with a horn helmet; what Hitler aptly described as 'folkish comedians'.

[Egbert]

You have to admit that many of the Heathen nationalists on forums such as these, will make that argument from the start. Claiming that life was in perfect tranquility and progression before Christianity and the crusades came barging in. A laughable proposition, actually. However, these are likely just people who subscribe to the Pagan lifestyle as more of a non-conformist social cult than any genuine understanding or interest...

The operative word being "tranquility". This relates not only to spirituality, the lack thereof and of trendy tattoo themes, but a geopolitical issue as well. Christianity had ambition and exercised strength, modern neo-pagans tend to subscribe to this idea that if they simply hide and leave the globe alone, the globe will leave them alone...a self-determined position of weakness. Unfortunately for them, others have ambition and exercise their strength...and in the case of Islam this comes directly from their religion.

[Psychonaut]

I have seen Brynhild make that argument here a few times.

ORLY? I don't recall her describing pre-Christian Europe as existing in "perfect tranquility" before. Would you mind citing a specific example of this? If it's as commonplace and typical as you guys are making it out to be, pulling up such an example from a forum like this, which has a preponderance of Heathens, should take only a moment.

[Adalwolf]

Yeah Ok, I will just waste 2 hours going through all 1800+ posts of hers to prove a point to you, which will serve no real purpose either way. This sounds like a very efficient use of time! It is just juvenile if you disregard the pagans we both know, who have used that reasoning.

[Psychonaut]

Yeah Ok, I will just waste 2 hours going through all 1800+ posts of hers to prove a point to you, which will serve no real purpose either way. This sounds like a very efficient use of time! It is just juvenile if you disregard the pagans we both know, who have used that reasoning.

If you're not willing to back up a claim you make about members of the forum, then don't make it. If you insult people's alleged opinions as "laughable," expect to be asked to provide examples of those views being opined.

[Debaser11]

In fairness, there is a lot of over the top hostility toward Christianity on this forum at times. The fact that so much discussion involved attacking Christianity wholesale in that "Jesus Camp" thread speaks volumes about people's attitudes. While I wouldn't lump any heathen in particular into the aforementioned camp, I do not think it's a stretch to say that many likely have a childish attitude about what Christianity is to European culture.

[Cato]

The typical neo-pagan is probably best described as an atheist with a horn helmet; what Hitler aptly described as 'folkish comedians'.

What's the source?

[Wyn]

What's the source?

Mein Kampf (http://www.roadtopeace.org/research.php?itemid=167&catid=46), apparently (source found via Google).


The characteristic thing about these people is that they rave about old Germanic heroism, about dim prehistory, stone axes spear and shield, but in reality are the greatest cowards that can be imagined. For the same people who brandish scholarly imitations of old German tin swords, and wear a dressed bearskin with bull's horns over their bearded heads, preach for the present nothing but struggle with spiritual weapons, and run away as fast as they can from every Communist blackjack. Posterity will have little occasion to glorify their own heroic existence in a new epic.

I came to know these people too well not to feel the profoundest disgust at their miserable play-acting. But they make a ridiculous impression on the broad masses, and the Jew has every reason to spare these folkish comedians, even to prefer them to the true fighters for a coming German state. With all this, these people are boundlessly conceited; despite all the proofs of their complete incompetence, they claim to know everything better and become a real plague for all straightforward and honest fighters to whom heroism seems worth honoring, not only in the past, but who also endeavor to give posterity a similar picture by their own actions.

[Magister Eckhart]

The operative word being "tranquility". This relates not only to spirituality, the lack thereof and of trendy tattoo themes, but a geopolitical issue as well. Christianity had ambition and exercised strength, modern neo-pagans tend to subscribe to this idea that if they simply hide and leave the globe alone, the globe will leave them alone...a self-determined position of weakness. Unfortunately for them, others have ambition and exercise their strength...and in the case of Islam this comes directly from their religion.

This is certainly true of the new-agers, the pacificist gnostics, the "eclectic" pagans, Wiccans, and, actually, a good number of so-called "heathens", but I would shrink from applying it to Folkish heathens on the whole. Many, many folkish heathens are childish and anti-intellectual (we've seen it displayed here, as Psychonaut will inevitably recall; I forget who outright attacked my efforts to intellectualise the religion, but it proves that we have plenty of idiots running around with hammers around their necks). However, I do not think that these are representative of the core of Asatru, only the commoner outlying followers. The core of heathen leadership, especially people like Steve McNallen and others like him, are in fact quite intelligent and willing to reach deeper than what you describe.


The typical neo-pagan is probably best described as an atheist with a horn helmet; what Hitler aptly described as 'folkish comedians'.

Indeed, neo-pagans, but again that's the reason Ásatrú leaders and thinkers make efforts to distance themselves from that very word.


Or perhaps they just have an immature kneejerk dislike of Christianity to begin with, and THEN lactch onto the heathen bandwagon/

I have seen this happen-- it is especially true of those brought to heathenry through the OR's prison ministry and is prevalent in "kindred"-heathenry. Almost all the people I've met that are drawn to kindred heathenry are of two categories: childish drones looking for a loud, similarly childish leader to latch onto and the loud-mouth anti-intellectual ideologues who want to be the leader. Very few of them are genuinely intelligent and genuinely academic, and this is our principal weakness: unlike Christianity, whose earliest theologians were all Bishops or priests or other leaders, contemporary "leaders" of the heathen community charge their followers with the task of driving out all the intellectuals and theologians to preserve the demagoguery of stupidity that typifies our entire society.


In fairness, there is a lot of over the top hostility toward Christianity on this forum at times. The fact that so much discussion involved attacking Christianity wholesale in that "Jesus Camp" thread speaks volumes about people's attitudes. While I wouldn't lump any heathen in particular into the aforementioned camp, I do not think it's a stretch to say that many likely have a childish attitude about what Christianity is to European culture.

Well, I can't say I blame people. Unfortunately, since John Calvin the larger part of Christian sects do everything they can to shun knowledge and reason in favour of blind faith (category 1 believers, if you remember my post elsewhere). Only Lutheranism, Catholicism, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Coptic Orthodoxy still have a sizeable group of believers dedicated to intellectual undertakings, and even in these places their numbers are shrinking as some of them make efforts to proletarianise the faith (as we saw with Vatican II, the council that turned the Church Calvinist or turned the Church adolescent, depending on how hostile one is to it). Really, it pains me to say it because it means I'm voluntarily jumping in leagues with our resident Serbian chauvinists, but the Orthodox branches of the faith remain the most intellectual and the most conservative, which is ironic considering that their approach to the figure of Christ is much more Platonic and mystic than the Roman Church. The Catholics have Aquinas, to be sure, but the greatest Christian theologians lived before the schism: Jerome, Gregory I, Gregory Nazianzen, Tertullian, Augustine, Ambrose, Athanasius, Basil, et. al., and their inheritors in the East are still honoured as a majority, unlike the Thomists who have fallen into a minority, albeit a large one, in Catholic circles.

Considering the amount of contact most Westerners have with Eastern Christianity or the early Church fathers, it is no surprise we have so much hostility to Christianity.

[Osweo]

Or perhaps they just have an immature kneejerk dislike of Christianity to begin with, and THEN lactch onto the heathen bandwagon/
Why are dislikes, knee-jerk or not, necessarily 'immature'? Christianity is the residual faith in our lands, so obviously, anyone who finds another will have to make his peace with the established religion in some way. I can't quantify it, but for every church-hater you can find another heathen who would say that Christianity simply didn't 'ring true' to him, or suchlike. :shrug:


The typical neo-pagan is probably best described as an atheist with a horn helmet; what Hitler aptly described as 'folkish comedians'.
What do you want? Folkish comedians or deadly serious cosmopolite one-worlder activists?

Which is best? Richard Dawkins and the hordes of militant atheism, or more or less atheists who still recognise the value of a religion beyond what it can tell you in literalist terms about the cosmos? There is a sense of reverence for tradition and humanity in the latter, after all.

Interesting that you should bring up Onkel Dolfi, as the next post can be applied interestingly to his regime;

The operative word being "tranquility". This relates not only to spirituality, the lack thereof and of trendy tattoo themes, but a geopolitical issue as well. Christianity had ambition and exercised strength, modern neo-pagans tend to subscribe to this idea that if they simply hide and leave the globe alone, the globe will leave them alone...a self-determined position of weakness. Unfortunately for them, others have ambition and exercise their strength...and in the case of Islam this comes directly from their religion.
Let's assume that your generalisation is correct, i.e. Heathens are largely in favour of a less interventionist foreign policy. You seem to be saying that the more interventionist you are the better, as though it were a virtue in itself. In Schiklgrueber's case, the results were horrific for his people, and to some extent Europeans as a whole. Did he simply fuck up a situation in which he COULD have succeeded? Or is interventionism on an extreme scale necessarily about the riskiest thing a state can engage in?

You seem fairly pro-establishment, too. You want America to be proactive on the world stage. Can you honestly demonstrate that this improves the life of Americans and the White Man as a whole? Might it not be more realistic to view interventionism as always at risk of transforming into meddling and miscalculation? Might not this application of Will zu Macht in foreign policy be the very LAST thing the West needs at this particular low moment in its history? Could Germany have done rather better with a few more 'folkish comedians' at the helm in the Forties, and few less mad imperialists?

A Christian remarked a good few decades ago that Islam is only a problem when Europe/Christendom is in crisis. Now, considering our internal problems, might our 'proactive' foreign policy in these times be more comparable to the frantic lashings out of a desperate wounded civilisation on the decline, than the measured and skillful actions of a confident and strong Culture with a Vision? You want the latter, but fail to see how it is impossible without domestic rebirth, and I don't see you suggesting anything to help that come about. :rolleyes:

That was all assuming you were correct. Yet Psychonaut as a concrete example from this very forum differs considerably from your caricature, if you'd bother to look into his posting record. :shrug:

[Magister Eckhart]

What do you want? Folkish comedians or deadly serious cosmopolite one-worlder activists?

Which is best? Richard Dawkins and the hordes of militant atheism, or more or less atheists who still recognise the value of a religion beyond what it can tell you in literalist terms about the cosmos? There is a sense of reverence for tradition and humanity in the latter, after all.

I agree with everything else you said (although I have reservations about your comments regarding knee-jerk and immature; most of the time knee-jerk reactions, i.e. reactions that are not thought out, are immature by their nature-- I have learned that from reflecting on my own knee-jerk reactions). However, I do want to highlight the above. The lesser of two evils is still an evil, really, if you're going to use that argument.

But even more, having idiots play-acting as vikings is not better than a militant atheist - both of these kinds of people are doing the same thing to religion, and neither of them are representative of an especially elevated kind of human being. Really, if you want to talk about their value to society and their relationship to religion, they're about equal, so even if you want to use the "lesser of two evils" approach, it doesn't apply here.

[Cato]

Well, as much as I think he was a vile man, Hitler was right in his views of the folkish comedians (yet his band of fools, the national socialists, was even worse in the end).

Christianity provided the unity in the west after the state power of Rome collapsed. This power too on the guise of a sacred faith, and the overlord was the Pope of Rome rather than the Emperor, but the identity of western man was, for a millenium, as a follower of the Church (or at least someone who has the sense to, while privately doubting, pay lip service to Christianity).

Nowadays, people are vocal in the destruction of Christianity when, before, even sensible skeptics like Thomas Jefferson could keep their true feelings about Christianity to themselves.

[Osweo]

Sceptics held their tongue when society was full of Christians. One percent gave way to the wishes of ninety-nine. It's the other way round now, though. What is the point of a farce where 99% pretend to conform to 1?!

[Magister Eckhart]

Well, as much as I think he was a vile man, Hitler was right in his views of the folkish comedians (yet his band of fools, the national socialists, was even worse in the end).

Christianity provided the unity in the west after the state power of Rome collapsed. This power too on the guise of a sacred faith, and the overlord was the Pope of Rome rather than the Emperor, but the identity of western man was, for a millenium, as a follower of the Church (or at least someone who has the sense to, while privately doubting, pay lip service to Christianity).

Nowadays, people are vocal in the destruction of Christianity when, before, even sensible skeptics like Thomas Jefferson could keep their true feelings about Christianity to themselves.

There's one major problem with what you're saying here, and that is the assumption that Christianity still has any moral force anywhere in the world, or, provided it does, that it has enough moral force to provide unity to the West. Christianity ceased to be a major uniting and even morally driving force in Western civilization right around the time Jefferson was born. Paying lip-service to Christianity so one doesn't get lynched isn't preservation of unity or of moral order - it's the preservation of the appearance of those things, which actually is more dangerous to the survival of an orderly, unified society than outright defiance of order because it goes by unnoticed.

Christianity provided a means by which a thriving, young culture could unite and come into itself as a dying, decrepit civilization fell away. Rome became the seat of power not for a continuation of the Empire, but a new birth of a different order. All civilizations eventually become decrepit, and their moral order falls away. Ours, however, is the first that seems unwilling or unable to provide a new moral order to replace the old that upholds similar values to the early stages of the old-- we alone in the West seem to be caving in without anyone significant rising up to restore a new order. This has much to do with the fact that we specifically turn to a lack of order -- represented by hedonistic, selfish, amoral atheism -- to replace the weakened and ever-weakening Christian moral edifice. The Romans, whose civilization had become decrepit, could look to a future in which a new order existed. We have no such good fortune, and when the Palantine Hill is overrun we will have no hope of bequeathing anything of ourselves, not even our empty shell, to the conquering barbarians.

This last bit is just idle musing: Orthodox Christianity is the only form of Christianity that still has any vigour, but unfortunately it's really completely foreign to the Western ethos, and does not seem to be defined by the same necessary Westward motion that the barbarians of the sand are.

[Cato]

Christianity was never about the world if you care to look at what Jesus himself went on about (and not, say, Paul or the doctors of the church):

"Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence." John 18:36, KJV.

I'm just putting this in its inspirational context y'know. Of course I know that it's largely a non-sequitur these days.. This my major issue with the Christian religion: most of them "goats," for those familiar with the table of the sheep and the goats. It makes me scornful, which I guess can't be helped.

One honest Christian who is true to his or her beliefs is worth 99 atheists who see fit only to pathetically nitpick, trust me.

[Cato]

This last bit is just idle musing: Orthodox Christianity is the only form of Christianity that still has any vigour, but unfortunately it's really completely foreign to the Western ethos, and does not seem to be defined by the same necessary Westward motion that the barbarians of the sand are.

Authentic Catholicism does as well, but this sort of Catholicism is in the minority in the post-Vatican II era. In the little bit of investigating that I've done about it (traditional Catholicism), it stands in stark contrast to the sort of Catholicism that, say, embraces illegal immgrants with open arms.

[Magister Eckhart]

Christianity was never about the world if you care to look at what Jesus himself went on about (and not, say, Paul or the doctors of the church):

"Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence." John 18:36, KJV.

I'm just putting this in its inspirational context y'know. Of course I know that it's largely a non-sequitur these days.. This my major issue with the Christian religion: most of them "goats," for those familiar with the table of the sheep and the goats. It makes me scornful, which I guess can't be helped.

One honest Christian who is true to his or her beliefs is worth 99 atheists who see fit only to pathetically nitpick, trust me.

I won't challenge you on that last point, since anyone true to a real religion is worth far more than anyone who believes in nothing, (atheism is the ultimate nihilism), but you simply cannot think of Christianity without thinking of its effect on the real world.

Christian morality was a major source of order in the West from the days of Charlemagne forward, and that's historically significant. You may say that true Christianity wasn't at play here, indeed, taking the "two kingdoms" route (which seems to be what you believe-- an idea borrowed from the Doctors of the Church at whom you seem to sneer), but you still cannot deny the importance of Christian morality to the West and the direct relation of the collapse of Christian morals and the collapse of all moral order in the West. A new moral order is necessary now that Christian morality is now clearly broken. The material point here isn't the sustainability of the Christian's soul (go to the Pro Traditio (http://www.protraditio.net/forum.php?) forum for that sort of discussion), it's the sustainability of the West.

Furthermore, Christian morality is informed by an intelligentsia and elite who understand and find new ways to express that morality through theological and philosophical inquiry, something we've not seen done by major thinkers in more than two centuries. You cannot sustain Christianity by simply jumping to the "Good Book" - as history has shown, radical reformers like Zwingli (and actually, to an extent, Calvin) contributed to the destruction of Christianity through this notion. Even Luther felt you needed theology, you couldn't just work from the base text; he was a dedicated student of the early Fathers.


Authentic Catholicism does as well, but this sort of Catholicism is in the minority in the post-Vatican II era. In the little bit of investigating that I've done about it (traditional Catholicism), it stands in stark contrast to the sort of Catholicism that, say, embraces illegal immgrants with open arms.

I actually believe I said the very same thing:


Only Lutheranism, Catholicism, Anglicanism, Eastern Orthodoxy, and Coptic Orthodoxy still have a sizeable group of believers dedicated to intellectual undertakings, and even in these places their numbers are shrinking as some of them make efforts to proletarianise the faith (as we saw with Vatican II, the council that turned the Church Calvinist or turned the Church adolescent, depending on how hostile one is to it).


unlike the Thomists who have fallen into a minority, albeit a large one, in Catholic circles.

[Cato]

I won't challenge you on that last point, since anyone true to a real religion is worth far more than anyone who believes in nothing, (atheism is the ultimate nihilism), but you simply cannot think of Christianity without thinking of its effect on the real world.

Christian morality was a major source of order in the West from the days of Charlemagne forward, and that's historically significant. You may say that true Christianity wasn't at play here, indeed, taking the "two kingdoms" route (which seems to be what you believe-- are you Lutheran?), but you still cannot deny the importance of Christian morality to the West and the direct relation of the collapse of Christian morals and the collapse of all moral order in the West. A new moral order is necessary now that Christian morality is now clearly broken. The material point here isn't the sustainability of the Christian's soul (go to the Pro Traditio (http://www.protraditio.net/forum.php?) forum for that sort of discussion), it's the sustainability of the West.

And from whence will this new moral order come? It's looking like it might come from one of two possible directions insofar as I'm concerned: Islam or the sort of view of the world expressed by Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins. In lieu of this, rather than embrace old fairy tales (as I was of a mind to do), I'd rather try to prop up what made America great. This isn't Christianity per se, I suppose, but if I have to become a vocal instigator on behalf of a moral order that most of the world considers to be collapses... so be it. Christianity and what it did, not entirely mind you, in the minds of the one thing I hold dear in this world (the United States of America, its Constitution, etc.)... Well, you might get my recent positioning.

No, not a Lutheran, but been to Lutheran services years ago. Lapsed Methodist, really, lapsed because, in the words of my late grandfather, they're a bunch of "white-washers."

As to Protradition, I'm familiar with the forum. :)

[Magister Eckhart]

And from whence will this new moral order come? It's looking like it might come from one of two possible directions insofar as I'm concerned: Islam or the sort of view of the world expressed by Sam Harris and Richard Dawkins. In lieu of this, rather than embrace old fairy tales (as I was of a mind to do), I'd rather try to prop up what made America great. This isn't Christianity per se, I suppose, but if I have to become a vocal instigator on behalf of a moral order that most of the world considers to be collapses... so be it. Christianity and what it did, not entirely mind you, in the minds of the one thing I hold dear in this world (the United States of America)... Well, you might get my recent positioning.

As to Protradition, I'm familiar with the forum. :)

No moral order can come from atheism-- atheism itself is a lack not a substance. Much like evil represents the absence of good (at least according to Augustine), atheism represents the absence of moral order. So either the new moral order must come from some creative force that is still left here in ourselves, preparing the way for the future, or it must come from some outside source. The only outside source that has designs on conquering us is Mohammedanism, so I must admit with some distaste that of the two you list, only Mohammedanism offers a new moral order, but I can guarantee there will be nothing left of the West when they conquer us, unlike the shell of Classical civilisation preserved in the new Western culture.

What made us great cannot still make us great. Christianity as a real moral and cultural force is confined to the past tense, however one feels about it as a religion--and unless Jesus comes back and does it very soon, I doubt it will even be sustainable as that. Our task in preserving the West is indeed to combat atheism, but resorting to simple-minded Calvinist protestantism won't successfully do that, it will only speed up the process of collapse. The one thing more dangerous than godless apostasy is heresy, as Ambrose, Tertullian, and Augustine (and later, Aquinas) rightly observe, and, unlike Luther, who remained confirmed in a doctrine steeped in early (and, more importantly, catholicly sanctioned) Christianity his entire life, Calvin and the other "reformers" were truly heretics.

What's your username on Pro Traditio?

[Cato]

No moral order can come from atheism-- atheism itself is a lack not a substance. Much like evil represents the absence of good (at least according to Augustine), atheism represents the absence of moral order. So either the new moral order must come from some creative force that is still left here in ourselves, preparing the way for the future, or it must come from some outside source. The only outside source that has designs on conquering us is Mohammedanism, so I must admit with some distaste that of the two you list, only Mohammedanism offers a new moral order, but I can guarantee there will be nothing left of the West when they conquer us, unlike the shell of Classical civilisation preserved in the new Western culture.

What made us great cannot still make us great. Christianity as a real moral and cultural force is confined to the past tense, however one feels about it as a religion--and unless Jesus comes back and does it very soon, I doubt it will even be sustainable as that. Our task in preserving the West is indeed to combat atheism, but resorting to simple-minded Calvinist protestantism won't successfully do that, it will only speed up the process of collapse. The one thing more dangerous than godless apostasy is heresy, as Ambrose, Tertullian, and Augustine (and later, Aquinas) rightly observe, and, unlike Luther, who remained confirmed in a doctrine steeped in early (and, more importantly, catholicly sanctioned) Christianity his entire life, Calvin and the other "reformers" were truly heretics.

What's your username on Pro Traditio?

Man's potential is man's potential, and man can make his own way in the world, sure. That much I don't dispute, but man is to be directed by, hm, the power cosmic for lack of a better term.

I don't view Jesus as some sandaled sissy like I used to; it's easy to fall into the mental trap that Jesus was a pacifistic beatnik who came to teach toleration and peace and "social justice" when he often said and did things contrary to this rather shallow view (whipping the moneychangers out of the temple, telling his followers to sell their coats and buy swords, etc.).

It's easy to get caught up in Tolstoy's view of Jesus, which is largely a product of, well.. Wishful thinking. :)

[Magister Eckhart]

Man's potential is man's potential, and man can make his own way in the world, sure. That much I don't dispute, but man is to be directed by, hm, the power cosmic for lack of a better term.

I don't view Jesus as some sandaled sissy like I used to; it's easy to fall into the mental trap that Jesus was a pacifistic beatnik who came to teach toleration and peace and "social justice" when he often said and did things contrary to this rather shallow view (whipping the moneychangers out of the temple, telling his followers to sell their coats and buy swords, etc.).

It's easy to get caught up in Tolstoy's view of Jesus, which is largely a product of, well.. Wishful thinking. :)

Agreed, agreed with reservations, and disagreed.

1. Well I agreed so I won't go into it.

2. While this is true, and the hippie-Christ most Christians worship today is an invention of the liberal, pacifistic, senile West, I do not recall the passage where Jesus tells any of his apostles to "buy swords". He claims to bring a sword and not peace (Mt. 10:34, Lk. 12:51), and he does drive the money changers from the temple in a rage (Mk. 11:15, Mt. 21:12, Lk. 19:45, Jn. 2:14-15), he even kills a fig tree for not having any figs on it (and it wasn't even in season!) (Mt. 21:19, Mk. 11:12-14, 20-21) but I do not recall seeing him encouraging the acquisition of arms-- indeed he speaks against that sort of thing (Mt. 26:52).

Furthermore, don't misunderstand me: I certainly don't suggest the figure of the Nazarene is somehow weak, merely that Christian morality is no longer strong enough to sustain moral order.

3. I don't find it easy at all to get caught up in Tolstoy. Dostoevsky is far superior.

[Cato]

Then said he unto them, But now, he that hath a purse, let him take it, and likewise his scrip: and he that hath no sword, let him sell his garment, and buy one.

http://bible.cc/luke/22-36.htm

The figure of Jesus as portrayed these days is largely powerless in my view. It's commonly said that he taught "do not judge," when, in fact Jesus taught people to judge sensibly. As to violence, I've always been under the impression that Jesus, despite being seemingly rather bland about violence himself, might very well approve of its use under appropriate circumstances (self-defense, "just" warfare, saving the life of an innocent, and so forth).

[Egbert]

Let's assume that your generalisation is correct, i.e. Heathens are largely in favour of a less interventionist foreign policy. You seem to be saying that the more interventionist you are the better, as though it were a virtue in itself. In Schiklgrueber's case, the results were horrific for his people, and to some extent Europeans as a whole. Did he simply fuck up a situation in which he COULD have succeeded? Or is interventionism on an extreme scale necessarily about the riskiest thing a state can engage in?

Being "better" is being safer and the safest position is determined by power. Whatever secures more power, in turn secures more safety, this might be engagement or it might not, depending upon circumstances. But one thing is certain, avoiding the game entirely doesn't keep one from being considered by those actually playing it. The world has become too small to simply fly under radar indefinitely.


You seem fairly pro-establishment, too. You want America to be proactive on the world stage. Can you honestly demonstrate that this improves the life of Americans and the White Man as a whole? Might it not be more realistic to view interventionism as always at risk of transforming into meddling and miscalculation? Might not this application of Will zu Macht in foreign policy be the very LAST thing the West needs at this particular low moment in its history? Could Germany have done rather better with a few more 'folkish comedians' at the helm in the Forties, and few less mad imperialists?

America is a Western, white-dominated nation with an Anglo foundation, in spite of immigration, degenerative pop culture and a darkie president. As long as it remains such, American domination is Western domination and clearly this improves the lot of Western white men, as opposed to their lot under non-Western civilizations. As nature abhors a vacuum, where the West shrinks, other civilizations gain, whether Latin America or Islam.

I'm a firm believer in being realistic, not living in the past or allowing oneself to be paralyzed by idealism...the West isn't ideal, but it is *far* superior to anything else at present.


A Christian remarked a good few decades ago that Islam is only a problem when Europe/Christendom is in crisis. Now, considering our internal problems, might our 'proactive' foreign policy in these times be more comparable to the frantic lashings out of a desperate wounded civilisation on the decline, than the measured and skillful actions of a confident and strong Culture with a Vision? You want the latter, but fail to see how it is impossible without domestic rebirth, and I don't see you suggesting anything to help that come about. :rolleyes:

I disagree entirely that Islam is only a problem because of Western intervention. Islam is at war along the whole of it's borders, with everyone, not just Westerners.

We are wounded and in decline and our enemies are strengthening...frantic or not, it is better to hit them while we still have the ability to do so. You are right in that I haven't suggested some kind of internal cultural revival, whether I want one or not, largely because I don't see it as realistic in a time frame that would help defend against current foreign threats. Nor do I assume it necessary in securing Western dominance, at least in the short term.

There is a very real problem regarding birthrates that desperately needs to be solved and it is an issue that could relate to a kind of cultural and/or spiritual revival. At the risk of being kinda silly, my suggestion here would be the obvious...to breed and learn from those who are breeding.