My recent post A Cowboy Buryin’ drew a Reader’s Pick and some wonderful comments. Thank you all. Among the comments was one from Koshersalami, who offered what could be called bullet points on Judaism. What follows is drawn from his comment and my reply.
• • •
I consider myself a Christian, and I remain a Christian for the simple reason that's how I was raised. In that, I'm with Jesus – who most Christians seem to forget was not a Christian, but a Jew – and Gandhi. Both men remained in the faith of their fathers, and I can't imagine two better role models.
Yes, the Christian faith has its foibles and its faults, its foolishness and its fantasies, but so do all other faiths. To my mind, some Bible stories are typical tribal glorifications of deeds of derring-do (see Samson, Jericho, et al), while others are superstitious nonsense (burning bushes, rods turned into snakes).
Clearly, other stories are fanciful tales not unlike the Brothers Grimm, meant to entertain and teach children moral lessons. But alas, too many of these children never grew up, which is why I sometimes refer to them as Kindergarten Kristians.
But again, those indictments can be lodged against all faiths. And as I once told my cousin Jack, a Mormon, I see no point in trading one set of fairy tales for another.
• • •
Perhaps more to the point, I see no reason to reject my faith simply because I – like most Christians – fail to put it into practice. As Jesus warned, putting faith into practice is usually difficult, often arduous, and sometimes dangerous – as it obviously was in his case. Indeed, Jesus likened following him to taking up a cross.
Sad to say, too many people who call themselves Christians don’t seem to comprehend that the prime directive of the faith is self-sacrifice, suppressing one's selfish desires for the good of the commonweal. Too many Christians seem to be in it to reap rewards in the hereafter. Indeed, many – if not most – don’t even bother to try to put their faith into practice – as our elections bear stark testimony.
From my reading of the text, the twin pillars of the faith – at least as espoused by Jesus – are pacifism and communism. But advocating either pillar in this self-professed "most Christian nation" can get you ostracized or even killed.
So much for claiming to follow the Prophet of Peace and Love.
• • •
As for Kosher's bullet points on Judaism, I’ve taken the liberty of bolding and enumerating them. From his description, it sounds as though I may be Jewish without having converted.
(1) No original sin
Agreed. From a theological perspective, it’s absurd on its face that any just God would mete out eternal punishment simply due to the accident of birth. Yes, Church thinkers have applied countless theological band-aids to heal that logical chasm; but drop the premise of original sin, and those machinations are no longer necessary.
As a practical matter, nothing I know of is more destructive to the developing mind and the fragile ego of the young than the notion that one is worse than worthless, that one is inherently evil. What's inherently evil is that notion.
How awful – how truly sinful – to teach self-debasement, to teach that one can do nothing of merit on one's own, to teach that one is worthless save by the grace and good offices of some celestial Benevolent Dictator.
(2) Satan is a minor figure
I don't believe in Satan, and I see no need for any such entity, since humans are capable of all manner of evil all on their own. If God exists and is omniscient and omnipotent, as is the claim, the whole scenario of "Battlefield Heaven" and "fallen angels" is also logically absurd.
Fear, not love, is too often the prime motivator for Christians. They not only fear Satan, but fear God. That sort of thing was incomprehensible to at least one Native American who said:
"What sort of men are these Europeans that they must fear their God in order to do good?"
(3) Emphasis on how you treat others is theologically paramount. Not an emphasis on what to believe. Conduct trumps faith.
That’s certainly what I take from Jesus' words. Unfortunately, the heretic Saul of Tarsus argued otherwise, argued that grace trumped works. Thus he opened a rift in the faith that has never completely healed.
To me, Saul/Paul doesn't quite get it. Yes, he argues love is paramount, but he can never seem to completely escape the legalistic way of thinking. Try as he might, Saul/Paul remained a prisoner of the pharisaic tradition.
So, I reject Pauline heresy. Instead, I hold with the view that "You will know them by their fruits" and with Jesus’ admonition "As you have done to the least of these, so also have you done unto me."
We see the trap of legalism in our own time with a decision like Citizens United that treats a legal construct called a corporation – which in reality is nothing more than a contract that can be created or destroyed at the stroke of a pen – as having the same divinely-given, inalienable rights as human beings.The Creator shudders; Jesus weeps.
Indeed, we see this fallacy at work every time a court holds legal a law whose consequences are clearly immoral. That is not what Jesus would do. “Man," he said, "was not made for the Law, but the Law for Man.”
(4) Afterlife is believed in but mostly ignored and not really used as a motivator. Life is the main event, not death prep. Virtue mainly is its own reward.
Agreed again; and here I take my cue from that great 20th Century theologian Peggy Lee:
“Is that all there is?
If that’s all there is, then let’s keep dancing
Let’s break out the booze and have a ball”
While you catch your breath at that, I’ll remove my tongue from my cheek. But I'll also make mention of the fact that Jesus' first miracle was turning water into wine at a wedding reception. I should also make mention of Matthew 11:19:
"The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they said, ‘Behold, the man is a glutton and a wine-bibber, a friend of tax collectors and sinners’. But wisdom is justified by its works."
Contrary to the bleating from certain pulpits and other conservative quarters, the realization that this may be “all there is” is no excuse to hedonistically “break out the booze and have a ball”. Instead, it is an argument to enjoy our days and leave something of value behind; in short, to make the most of the three-score and ten – if we are lucky – we are given on this Earth.
An old gospel song says “we’ll understand it all bye and bye”. Maybe. Or maybe we go in a hole in the ground and become food for worms and never do find out the answers to the questions that so vex us here in this earthly realm. But if that's the case, at least those questions will no longer vex us.
Personally, I’m fond of the Hindu notion that you come back in the next life as what you persecuted in this life. That notion seems inspired by a divine sense of justice. Racists, homophobes and xenophobes, beware!
If there is a Heaven – and frankly, I rather doubt there is – it certainly won't be as it's sold to Kindergarten Kristians. I like to trouble them with questions such as these:
If our earthly bodies are restored in the afterlife, how so? Will it be in the form of a helpless baby that can't fend for itself? Will it be as a gawky, obstinate, pimply teenager? Will it be in the full physical glory of one’s thirties? Or will I be forced to spend eternity in the body of a decrepit old man with twisted painful joints, a bald head and a weak heart? These questions are no more absurd than the usual "answers".
(5) Questioning scripture is a tradition; in fact, it's our most sacred tradition - that's mainly what Torah study is. "Israel" (well, really "Yisra el" if pronounced in Hebrew) translates into English as "wrestles with God." There's a reason for that.
When I was young and questioned the faith I was handed, my father would say "When you talk like that, the Devil has entered the room." Sorry, Dad, but either God gave me this mind and expects me to use it, or there is no God and my humanity demands that I question what does not comport with reason and experience.
(6) Sex is not a bad thing. Infidelity is, because it hurts people.
I'm afraid I learned that lesson not from my faith, but from my own painful experience. Indeed, among the wisest things I ever learned was from a Catholic priest, who helped me through a very troubled time in my life. I don't recall who he quoted, but I certainly remember the quote: "A man's only authority is his own experience."
I've come to understand that the measure of a man is not his mistakes, but what he learns from them.
(7) The big mission is to Repair The World.
One could certainly take Jesus’ declaration that “the Kingdom of Heaven is at hand” to mean that Heaven is in the Hereandnow and not in the Hereafter. Thus if we are ever to reach Heaven or achieve Nirvana, it will be by undoing the damage we have done to the world.
To me, that is the idea embodied in the injunction to have “dominion over the Earth”. But at the moment, we seem to have given the word dominion a very different – and perverted – meaning. One might say it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a climate-change denier to enter the Kingdom of God.
Much is made in conservative Christian circles of "the purpose driven life". I haven't read Rick Warren's book, but it seems to me that purpose is not to discriminate or legislate against people because of their race, religion, gender or sexual orientation. That is not what Jesus would do.
Nor is that purpose to be constantly at war. The old hymn says "Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war"; that as is critically important, but too many Christians ignore it, in their hubris believing the God they hold to be omniscient and omnipotent is paradoxically so weak as to need defense by mere humans.
For the record, Jesus said, in essence, "Make love, not war."
Seems to me our purpose as sentient beings supposedly created in God's image is simply to love in the truest sense of that word. Seems to me that was the essence of Jesus' message, and it seems to me that is a difficult enough challenge without getting lost in the weeds of pharisaic legalisms.
Seems to me our purpose should be to love as much and as hard and as long as humanly possible so that each of us leaves this world – in whatever small way – better than we found it.
©2012 Tom Cordle
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The door to love is open wherever the heart is open to love
Ok,
Pt by pt…….
“ Bible stories are typical tribal glorifications of deeds of derring-do (see Samson, Jericho, et al),
while others are superstitious nonsense
(burning bushes, rods turned into snakes). “
THEY SEEM SO. BUT REMEMBER. PEOPLE WERE NOT RATIONAL THEN.
THEY THOUGHT IN METAPHOR.
SOME OF THE METAPHORS ARE COOL:
“ fanciful tales not unlike the Brothers Grimm,
meant to entertain “
RE ORIGINAL SIN..W/O THE METAPHORICAL SPIN, WITH THIS AWFUL IDIOT LITERALISM..MAKING AN ANALOGY INTO A FACT, YOU ARE DEAD ON:”How awful – how truly sinful – to teach self-debasement, to teach that one can do nothing of merit on one's own, to teach that one is worthless save by the grace and good offices of some celestial Benevolent Dictator. “
SATAN TOO is but a metaphor, for the self inclosed persona/ego who grabs and reaches and cares not whom he hurts in his narcissistic sociopathic solipsistic activity.
Ah, SATAN IS the Freudian death wish.
The Pauline heresy was an expediency.To grow the faith. He is the true Judas.
Afterlife to me is gonna happen. Or not. I don’t care. Now. I see it as eternity, which is forever here/now.
"questioning faith :” the mission of the Christ?
Yes by god, a man’s only authority=his experience.
(7) The big mission is to Repair The World.
Damn straight. Call off the “evacuation to heaven”.
The kingdom of God is within.
Where, is that?
Interior. Motivation. To grasp and destroy and ruin, or to: make it better.
Thanks
Jesus was a radical. He believed the poor would always be with us and that doing good by them was important, but not the overriding drive in one's life. He lived, he loved and he preached that we should do both, in equal measure, with compassion and empathy in our hearts.
The only time we ever see Jesus get angry in scripture is when he invaded the Temple of the Money Changers and drove out the bankers and financiers of ancient Jerusalem. He wasn't anti-government or even for no taxes.
He told someone asking about paying Ceasar's taxes:
Render unto Ceasar that which belongs to Ceasar.
Someone asked him if it was a sin to be rich, in and of itself:
He said, "Verily I say unto you that it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of the needle than for a rich man to enter through the gates of heaven."
The Eye of the Needle was a real place. It was a part of the Silk Road where, if only you could get a camel to crawl on it's knees to enter the city that grew behind it, you could shave off weeks of travel. As it was, the city that grew up at the head of this pass, was wealthy beyond measure in its day, charging for the unloading of goods at one side, and the loading of goods on the other side, to keep trade flowing. When viewed in this light, it makes the statement less allegorical than metaphorical.
It also references the idea that unloading all your goods is the only way to enter heaven, no less so than passing through "the Eye of the Needle," in his day and age. It would have been easy to understand and poignant to any traveler or merchant of the time.
Jesus knew that he was going to be persecuted for his radical views by the establishment. Hell, it was an obvious 'no brainer' based on the evidence of everyday life. Yet, he went with the courage of his convictions and took the harder, more difficult task, hoping that somehow, he might come out of it alive -- slim though that chance might be.
That's the Jesus I admire and respect. Nothing to do with Faith in God to save me, but in faith that people can do some amazing things who act faithfully to their beliefs. Jesus stopped one of the Apostles from killing a Roman soldier during his capture at the Gardens of Gethsemane with the admonition, "No! He who lives by the sword shall die by the sword," and proceeded, according to scripture, to heal his enemy, who'd lost an ear.
He who has ears, let him hear. He who has eyes, let him see.
That's a very secular way of telling people to observe the world around them and think for themselves. An admonition I take seriously.
Great piece, Tom.
--r--
As a devotee of Joseph Campbell, I certainly understand the necessity and value of myth, especially as a way of teaching children. My complaint -- worry? -- is when putative adults continue to accept these myths as factual rather than metaphorical.
To cite one grievous example, there's the myth of the rugged individualist -- aka the Paul Bunyan myth -- that continues to resonate and permeate and denigrate our culture and our politics. There's the related myth of American Exceptionalism that renders a vast majority of Americans xenophobes. And the myth of the Sacred Founders -- akin to Papal Infallibility -- that cripples 21st Century problems and politics with 18th Century solutions. And perhaps worst of all, the myth of White Supremacy.
Sad to say, much of that mythology has its roots in the pathetic, paternalistic, pharisaic traditions of the Bible.
And as for love:
“I tell you this
to break your heart,
by which I mean only
that it break open and never close again
to the rest of the world.”
― Mary Oliver, New and Selected Poems, Vol. 2
Thanks
Matt
Someone here, Sandra Stephens, labeled me a pragmatic romantic -- I'll gladly accept that. On the other hand, I'm often accused of being a cynic because of my political diatribes, but I don't see it that way. The idea is to resist and speak out -- I Will Not Go Quietly -- against those who see this world as a jungle in which the only law is the Law of the Tooth and the Claw. That's certainly What Jesus Would Do.
Sad and painful as it is to witness that sort of jungle ethic in the dark world of corporate crapitalism, it is even more sad and more painful to see it rear its ugly head with religion. It is revolting to see the reputedly religious claim America is "the most Christian nation", while simultaneously decrying social welfare.
That millions of Christians have accepted the perverted heresy of the Prosperity Gospel is reason enough for me to long for The Second Coming. Should that day arrive, there are going to be a lot of very surprised putative Christians.
No doubt Jesus was a radical, but the truth is there were many radicals in that day, including the aforementioned sicarii. There were also many other prophets in that day, and many of them claimed to be the Messiah -- just as there are many in our day claiming they can save us from the wretched excesses of craptialism by giving free rein to wretched crapitaliists. Like the poor, liars and false prophets will always be with us.
Thanks
Pandora
I'm not familiar with the Ramayana or the poem, but I certainly agree with the sentiment
Beautifully conceived, it expresses compassionate Christian thought over the denying, saddening sort of thinking too often found today.
Gorgeous work, Tom.
Rated
It sort of depends on which "Old Man" you're talking about. The God of the Old Testament strikes me as xenophobic, capricious and vengeful; the God of the New Testament is, for the most part, someone(?) I can accept.
Born in another time and place, I suspect I might well have been Jewish. Who knows -- maybe I was in a past life.
Thanks for the kind words. I don't mean to be poor-mouthing or falsely modest, but it strikes there's nothing special about what I said -- seems like all of that ought to be pretty obvious to anyone who's not ignorant or willfully blind. Unfortunately, lots of those who claim to be Christians are -- or should I say aren't?
I figured a good one-line comment to your post would be "Sure you do when you pull down your pants and face forward".
Lezlie
Good guess, but that didn't happen until I was 21 -- now there's a story
I suspect you and I are from the Lost Tribes -- I know my Native American ancestors were very Jewish in their outlook
Pragmatic romantic.. not a bad way to be..
And ;
"What sort of men are these Europeans that they must fear their God in order to do good?"
Indeed.
Rated for hence why a pagan appreciates a Jew :).
A fascinating and grossly under-reported (for obvious reasons) part of our history is that religious conversions among Native Americans in colonial times frequently didn't last because the NA were appalled at the gross hypocrisy of those who preached one thing and did quite the opposite.
What's even less well-known was NA captives were often exchanged for settlers captured by their tribes. This became a serious problem, tho, because many whites refused to return to their white families. Anyone who doubts that can look it up -- Ben Franklin wondered why these people willingly chose to remain with a tribe when it was clear they would be materially deprived. My answer? They preferred honesty to hypocrisy.
Social constructs and ideals may vary, but on my reading of the Bible in chronological order 9I'm up to Exodus 20 right now), I keep running across passages that sound downright Native American in tone. I find this a fascinating cultural heads-up.
Bravo M. Cordle! Thanks, as always
It's the best of OS when two minds meet and reflect, rather than impetuously respond, especially when there's this much meat on the bone.
I'm going to share and savour this with my dormant-jew partner.
Great post ; thanks again.
Joakim.
Always this ... I have believed.
Thank you, Tom, for sharing this.
It is so easy to understand and yet..why is it so hard?
All faiths have a version of the golden rule. It just boils down to decency.
I have finally come to be content with not knowing the answers and contented myself as well with knowing its the journey not the destination that matters.
Anne Cameron Cutri
Well, we'd all like to hope for a Great Beyond, but in the meantime, I think it wise to try and make the best of the present circumstances
Rob
Thanks. I come from a long line of preachers; but as for being one myself, I'm afraid I have to borrow Groucho's retort about country clubs: I'm not sure I'd want to belong to a church that would have me for a preacher.
Yes, tribes have similarities the world over. In my concert/seminars about Native Americans, I like to point out that it would be impossible to convince a "savage" that something can be legal and immoral -- and yet our laws make that claim frequently.
For instance, it's still legal to sell derivatives even though they brought our economy crashing down -- and may well do so again. And it's still legal to use suspect practices to sell people homes they can't afford. Caveat Emptor may be the rule of the corporation, but it ought not be the rule in a supposedly Christian nation.
I'm afraid that all too often "conduct humps faith".
Kim
This is one bone that can be chewed on infinitely -- or at least as long as we're on this side of the sod
Yes, love is the answer. I'm always amazed wheb those who advocate love are dismissed as wimps. Loving is hard; hating is easy. Real men learn how to love -- or they remain boys.
Ande
I blush. Yes, it really does boil down to decency. But common decency, like common sense, seems to be in short supply.
"A man's only authority is his own experience." Does this mean we are doomed to repeat, never learning from others?
Seems to me our purpose as sentient beings supposedly created in God's image is simply to love in the truest sense of that word. Seems to me that was the essence of Jesus' message, and it seems to me that is a difficult enough challenge without getting lost in the weeds of pharisaic legalisms.
Seems to me our purpose should be to love as much and as hard and as long as humanly possible so that each of us leaves this world – in whatever small way – better than we found it."
You know Tom you and I do not disagree as much as you might think. I think where we disagree is the implementation
of this wisdom. I once said to you I didn't feel I had a right to tell by brother to help my other brother. I was serious about that.
I think God wants my brother to see the light and do the right thing. I am not sure God wants me to use the human creation of government to make him perform the act that he resents.
He has never seen he light. And the love is not in his heart.
Let take two goals in life.
1. Take care of your brother in all the ways Christ taught us.
2. Learn to fully love your brother.
If 2 happens then 1 will certainly follow.
If we force 1 to happen, by law, it is not clear anyone of the forced have learned to love anyone.
Would it not be much more glorious to achieve what I know your are saying, by our own choice? Is that not the only real way for 6 billion souls to become one (God)?
Regarding "a man's only authority is his own experience", that sort of ties in with psychiatrist /philosopher R D Laing's observation that "you can't experience the experience of my experience." That actually makes sense once you get past the awkwardness of it.
You asked if this means we can't learn from the experience of others.
Not necessarily. You can tell a child that putting his hand on a hot burner will hurt, and that child will have been given the knowledge that that is something he probably ought not do (depending of course on how much credibility that child gives your experience and your authority). That may be enough to keep him from getting burned; but until he does get burned, he won't experience the experience.
Problem is that in life things are seldom so simple. Take love. We speak of getting burned in a relationship, too, and sometimes we are warned that we may get burned in a certain relationship. But it's far more often the case that we have to get burned before we take the lesson.
What's worse is that we often get burned again because we fail to draw the lesson from that experience. So it can be said that despite the fact we experienced the experience, we didn't experience the learning that should have come from that experience.
Thanks. As for the EP, that's what I call the blind squirrel theory -- even a blind squirrel finds an acorn every now and then
Jonathan
You're welcome
In a perfect world -- or the Kingdom of Heaven -- you are correct. This is not a perfect world. Thus when selfishness keeps the greedy from doing what is morally correct, in a civilized society in which all citizens tacitly agree to "promote the general welfare", the govt not only has the right but the duty to see that greedy citizens give back a portion of their wealth to the society that made that wealth possible.
Conservatives have all manner of rationalizations to deny this, calling it theft and the like, but those are simply excuses for failing to live up to civic responsibility. In short, the failure to live up to the moral imperative forces govt to invoke the legal imperative.
As Jesus answered those who sought to trip him with sophistic snares, "render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's. Your money may say "In God We Trust", but the real author is the Federal Reserve, and it is backed by "the full faith and credit of the United States of America" -- that is to say, Caesar.
Now if I could just be a bit more circumspect in my behavior
Thank you. That was one of the most persuasive and simple compliments I've received in quite a while.
Yes I am speaking of a perfect spiritual world. You are speaking of a world with the perfect ends without the spiritual goals ever being realized. I take the duty preached by Christ to be charitable and the duty to see the light as equally important. Your solution guarantees end of suffering. But is provides no certainty that either person, the rich, or poor, has achieved anything toward the rewards promised in “Kingdom that is not of this world”.
The rich has not earned it if he as not gotten it. The poor has not gotten it either if he sees the gift as a requirement rather than a choice by the rich. And why would he. He is likely the one that voted to command the gift and must realize there is resentment. Do you see that while this solves the immediate problem of feeding poor, it solves nothing toward the spiritual growth of either.
But lets focus on the rich, because you will probably take exception to my thinking that the poor can be unenlightened. They can but we can discuss that at another time.
So the rich. How do we enlighten them? Well I submit you will never enlighten anyone by force. EVER. Not in a million years. The real crime of taking from the rich is not taking his money. It is taking away any incentive for him to ever see the light. In that way he is short changed. If one is born into the idea that he is rich and not very charitable, he challenge in life is to change that in is heart. That change can come from many experiences. All the things in life that awakens a person to this duty. Soul searching, reading, experiencing etc.
Unfortunately taxation is more likely to be a disincentive to spiritual growth. He may come to acceptance about paying his taxes. But he never really gets the true love of his brother thing. And , I thick the biblical people would say this man will not pass St. Peter just because he obeyed the law and paid the taxes. Because he did not get his learning. The Buddhist would say he will be reincarnated and do it again until he does get it.
It is hard for me to talk about and explain in limited words, but to me the goal is Not need the gov in the first place. And I firmly believe as long as it exercises its power many will not come to enlightenment.
You and I should talk I person Tom. My guess is that in a few hours we may find we are not that different. Just a thought.
Nearly 18 years ago my father in law died. Prior to that my husband was driving home from visiting him at St. Joe in Ann Arbor, MI. Driving late at night on the back roads, he missed a curve in the road and drove into the front of an abandoned house with his pick up truck. Initially he tried to re-start the engine, he heard a voice, "Stop, I smell gas", then the door flew open and he wandered out into the dark yard. A nurse had been following him and pulled over to check on him, he said, "where is the guy that opened my door?" She said, there is no one here but us.
His angel? Divine intervention? He had several brushes with death in his 52 years but didn't survive the last one. Wonder what he sees on the other side.
I also have stories of healings that make me take pause. We are not random.
Believe me, I have no illusions about the perfection of this world or the people in it. I'd settle for people of all faiths owning up to what I perceive as the essence of those faiths, which as you point out is no more than the Golden Rule. But alas, it seems those who appear most ardent about their faith to often seem the farthest from truly understanding it. Or as Jesus put it:
"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full."
Lefty
W couldn't hold a candle to Cheney. Indeed, guys like him are why I say there's no need for Satan
Sounds as tho you're making the argument that taxes keep the rich from becoming enlightened. I'd say that argument is at best putting the cart before the horse.
Taxes have nothing to do with enlightenment, other than enlightening the too bulging wallets and purses of the greedy and self-centered. Taxes are the price the rich pay for failing to be enlightened enough to do the right thing without coercion.
You are correct that the poor aren't doing so well at that moment, tho Mitt Romney seems to think otherwise: "The poor are doing just fine." But it's clear to anyone who wants to see that is a direct result of cutting taxes for guys like Romney from 92% under Eisenhower to the present 15% or less.
That gutting tax rates has actually increased poverty and decreased employment makes a mockery of trickle-down economics, and frankly doesn't do much for your argument either -- earnest tho it may be.
Yes, in a perfect world we wouldn't need govt. But this is not a perfect world, and therefore as even an arch-conservative like Thomas Hobbes pointed out five hundred years ago, we need govt to protect the rest of us from the worst of us.
Our Constitution reflects that imperative and demands that govt "provide for the common defense" AND "promote the general welfare". That conservatives fail to comprehend that the latter is equally important is either willful ignorance or willful blindness.
I'm not fool enough or logician enough to dismiss out of hand that there is more to this world out of hand -- or whatever other worlds there may be. We see, at least those of us who are at least a bit enlightened, with both our eyes and our hearts.
The eyes are of course limited by sensory perception, while the heart can sometimes avail itself of a sixth sense. But the heart has a problem all its own in that it has a tendency to see what it wants to see -- especially where love is concerned.
Thus the eyes and the heart are each blind in their own way, and thus each of us remains perpetually struggling to reconcile the two.
Go ahead Tom; tell us what you think of Islam and their beliefs.
You know the Truth, when it can stand the test of time. Jesus was persecuted and after 2000 years, He is still being persecuted.
John 15: 18-25 18 “If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. 19 If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you. 20 Remember what I told you: ‘A servant is not greater than his master.’[b] If they persecuted me, they will persecute you also. If they obeyed my teaching, they will obey yours also. 21 They will treat you this way because of my name, for they do not know the one who sent me. 22 If I had not come and spoken to them, they would not be guilty of sin; but now they have no excuse for their sin. 23 Whoever hates me hates my Father as well. 24 If I had not done among them the works no one else did, they would not be guilty of sin. As it is, they have seen, and yet they have hated both me and my Father. 25 But this is to fulfill what is written in their Law: ‘They hated me without reason”.
You say, “I consider myself a Christian, and I remain a Christian for the simple reason that's how I was raised. In that, I'm with Jesus – who most Christians seem to forget was not a Christian, but a Jew – and Gandhi. Both men remained in the faith of their fathers, and I can't imagine two better role models”.
To be called a Christian, you need to have become a follower of Jesus and have accepted Him into your heart as Lord and Savior. You are among the people playing Christian in order to give yourself the right to write trash such as this. All True Christians absolutely know that Jesus is Jewish and what God the Father says about standing with Israel. Hence, our UNBREAKABLE bond with Israel.
You say, “Yes, the Christian faith has its foibles and its faults, its foolishness and its fantasies, but so do all other faiths. To my mind, some Bible stories are typical tribal glorifications of deeds of derring-do (see Samson, Jericho, et al), while others are superstitious nonsense (burning bushes, rods turned into snakes)”.
It is beyond me, how with statements such as these, you could possibly call yourself a Christian, except for the fact of using the term Christian for your own benefit.
You say, “Sad to say, too many people who call themselves Christians don’t seem to comprehend that the prime directive of the faith is self-sacrifice, suppressing one's selfish desires for the good of the commonweal. Too many Christians seem to be in it to reap rewards in the hereafter”.
Hey Tom, you are right on this one, too many people think they can earn their way into heaven. The only thing getting you to heaven is acceptance of Jesus as Lord. It is all about God’s Grace.
You say, “From my reading of the text, the twin pillars of the faith – at least as espoused by Jesus – are pacifism and communism”. So much for claiming to follow the Prophet of Peace and Love.
Satan is manipulating you perfectly. Jesus was all about the Church, not about government. Jesus said give to Caesar what is Caesars and give to God what is God’s. Jesus had absolutely nothing to do with the government. Jesus actually spoke socialism, but within the church. The followers of Christ, the members of His church were to take care of each other, He did not say go give your money to the government so they could give it out to the people. Following the Prophet of Peace and Love is exactly why your types of haters attack Christianity and try to lead everyone to slaughter using that statement.
God says, His word will confound the wise, because without the Holy Spirit, you cannot understand it.
Well, the remaining parts of your post are pure rubbish and anti Jesus. It shows your ignorance about God’s Word. You truly are satanic to the core.
Now Tom, go get the Muslims and attack their Faith.
Where you been hidin'? Hope all is well in your world.
Talk about going from the sublime to the ridiculous. I get a note here from my dear friend Dharma, followed by yet another ranting diatribe from you. In case you didn't recognize yourself in this post, people like you are who I'm referring to when I speak of Kindergarten Kristians.
Yes, Islam has its problems, but so does Christianity -- have you forgotten The Crusades, The Inquistion, the witchhunts? These aren't ancient history, and the rise of the Religious Right in America gives a strong hint that we could experience some of that awful behavior again. Think not? Witness the fool Rick Santorum and his followers who would return the world s to the kind of rank paternalism that permeates the Old Testament.
For the record, the grounding of Christianity in pacifism - - at least as it was espoused by Jesus -- is an important difference between that faith and Islam. Mohammed insisted followers of Islam take up the sword, while Jesus insisted Followers of the Way put away the sword. Too bad his followers didn't follow.
Ignoring Jesus' teachings, over the centuries, millions of so-called Christians gladly took up the sword, somehow deluding themselves that the omniscient and omnipotent God needed defending by mere humans. Indeed, in spite of Jesus' teachings, even today millions of Christians would gladly follow the OT directive to put every Muslim -- every man, woman and child -- to the sword. I suspect you would be among them.
Again -- so much for the putative followers of the Prophet of Peace and Love.
And as a people we will always disagree and the gov will never achieve the goal of taking are of all in need.
The difference between you and I is that you chose to believe the people will eventually get it right through gov. I chose to believe there is NO chance to get it done through gov and maybe a snowballs chance in hell it can get done through personal awareness.
Thanks
Since you've taken a conciliatory tone this time out, I'll flog this dead horse one more time.
First of all, where did you get the idea I thought govt can be perfected? That's nonsense; I've never said any such thing. I leave the delusion of perfection to Utopians and Libertarians. As I said, I am a pragmatist.
Govt will always be far less than perfect because it is administered by imperfect people, voted into office by even more imperfect people, voters whose powers of discernment are highly questionable, since they keep returning deeply flawed legislators to Congress. Or as is their wont of late, replacing deeply flawed legislators with utterly incompetent Teapartian ideologues too ignorant or pig-headed to comprehend that politics IS the art of compromise.
Hence, you are quite correct that govt will never be able to meet all the needs of all the people all the time -- anyone who believes otherwise is living in a dream world. But the alternative can hardly be to simply get rid of govt -- it is as foolish to imagine govt can be eliminated as it is to imagine it can be perfected.
Speaking of foolish, that brings me to legislators who sold their soul to Grover Norquist. I say foolish because of their foolishly consistent promise to never, ever, never raise taxes under any circumstances – even while fighting two far-flung wars simultaneously. Foolish.
Grover, I’m sure you know, has said he doesn’t want to get rid of govt, he just wants to get it small enough to drown in a bathtub. Cute. What he and the masters of greed have done instead is drown the country in a sea of debt. This in the name of freedom. Not cute.
The ugly truth is that in far too many cases – Grover being the prime example -- those who advocate getting rid of government aren't interested in promoting freedom -- they're only interested in keeping others enslaved, as a way to maintain their prerogatives and wealth -- which in Grover's case is not earned, but inherited. In short, Grover is a parasite, an organism that sucks the very lifeblood from the host.
Grover is far from alone. Vampire/Vulture/Chainsaw capitalists do the same with many -- if not most -- of the companies they purport to "save". In short, rather than operating on Christian principles, they operate on the Law of the Tooth and the Claw.
Politics does indeed make strange bedfellows. The unholy marriage between wingnut Libertarians like Norquist and rightwing Christians is blatant hypocrisy, since Ayn Rand, the queen of Libertarians was an avowed atheist. So much for the promise never to compromise.
Perhaps a worse compromise will be seen come November, when millions of fundamentalist Christians will most likely cast their vote for a man they deem a heretic by virtue of his Mormon faith, a man who has demonstrated time and again he isn't the least interested in the cares and concerns of the common man, but only in feathering his own already opulent nest.
Romney and Norquist and their acolytes are living proof that after 2,000 years Christianity has failed to change the hearts and minds of a substantial portion of humankind, including most especially those who claim to be Christians.
Had Jesus' message of pacifism and communism -- communalism if you prefer that term -- carried the day, perhaps we would have -- as you wish -- no need of govt. But it didn't; and therefore, govt is forced to force those who will not otherwise do right by their fellow citizens to a least contribute some of their booty to the common good.
Why has Christianity failed to truly win the hearts and minds of most who claim it? First, because it is a hard faith, a faith that demands self-sacrifice. But it fails as well because many if not most Christians are in denial about this simple truth – the principles of Christianity and the principles of capitalism are irreconcilable.
No wonder Jesus wept.
Very interesting things here. I think you have done good service in terms of binding the wounds between different groups of heretics...because that's what we are.
There are 613 commandments in Judaism, 248 positive commandments...things you must do....and 365 negative commandments....things you're not supposed to do.
If you worked on one a day by either doing or not doing the thing you're supposed to do or not supposed to do, it would take almost two years to complete the list....but some of these commandments take a lifetime to master.
The reason I say that we're all heretics is that no one, not even the most devout Jew, is ever fully compliant with these goals. It's an impossible task. Therefore, all Jews fall short of perfect behavior....and it is the behavior that matters in Judaism, not belief.
I have known many rabbis - some of the quite prominent - who have privately confessed that they are actually atheists and that they don't believe in God at all....but they remain good Jews and good rabbis because their behavior - their adherence to the laws - is exceptional.
Even the attempt to abide by the commandments is itself a mitzvot, because it brings the adherent into the constant present tense in which one is constantly thinking about the laws. This creates a completely different mindset from the average person's....and these people are indeed exceptional, and exceptionally powerful.
Christianity somehow or other lost track of these commandments, and substituted catechisms for the conscious attempt to achieve perfection by adhering to the laws. Indeed, Christianity proclaims that the old commandments were no longer valid.
The point is that, when you take the commandments together, they give you a full representation of what it means to live a fully conscious life....and that's the goal of Judaism, not access to heaven or the avoidance of hell, neither of which we Jews believe in.
Indeed, most people don't realize that Judaism encompasses a belief in reincarnation as opposed to a one way trip to heaven, a concept that Christians share with Muslims, and no other faiths on earth.
Speaking as one heretic to another, the good we do here is all we need to do.
A thoughtful response from you, as always. I don't fully understand Judaism, but then I don't fully understand Christianity, either. As I pointed out to Tommy T, I don't favor the warlike aspects of Islam -- or for that matter, Judaism -- or for that matter, Christianity as it's practiced. And lord knows, Hinduism is far too complicated for my puny mind. What little I know of Buddhism I find appealing, since it shares with pure Christianity (as opposed to the sort practiced by most Christians) the rejection of materialism. I also find interesting the notion that when perfected we become one with the Nothing that is Everything. That strikes me as a sort of theological representation of the astronomical reality.
Where does that leave me? On the endless quest, but at least I've finally arrived at the point I understand and accept that the quest is endless. To my mind, that puts me far ahead of the True-Believers who claim to know what can't be known. It's all too obvious that those who claim to know, don't -- and that makes them dangerous. As the Buddhist koan warns:
"If you meet the Buddha on the road, kill him."
Figuratively, of course.
And that rant by Tommy was entertaining. I could almost feel the spray of spittle.
Sorry you got lost in the Comment Shuffle. As for "questioning believer", there was never a more questioning believer than Jesus -- with the possible exception of Socrates, and I'm not sure what he believed in besides the truth.
Noahide Christian, eh? I can always count on you to educate me to something I've never heard of before.
Thanks for visiting. Yes, there's much to admire about Judaism. But as Jesus pointed out too clearly for his own benefit, there is much to disparage about Judaism's rigid holding to the Law -- not to mention a xenophobic weltview still much in evidence today in some circles. I suppose the real evil is not a particular faith, but the fundanmentalist versions of all of them.
That, of course, brings me to Tommy T, who predictably can't see that he is the embodiment of every criticism I made about the faith.
Oh, and you're quite right about the mad-dog spittle and spray -- I don't think I'd wanna follow him on a microphone.
Thanks, what a nice gift on a birthday -- now, like Christianity, to try and live up to the mark.
As for welcoming me to your tribe, the words of another nominally Jewish songwriter named Robert Zimmerman would seem to apply -- slightly altered as is my wont:
Letchu be in my tribe if I can be in yorn.
Yes, it's easy to be judgmental, and I certainly stand guilty. The Good Book says "Judge not, lest ye be judged", but as with most of the advice contained therein, it's a road not taken.
Did you PM me when you wrote this? You might have. I am that f'drayt (Yiddish, literally "spun around").
I'm trying to figure out how on Earth I missed it.
No, I rarely PM my posts. Glad you found it -- can we attribute that to Divine Intervention? Probably not, but whatever the reason, you're welcome. And I may I say, I'm glad this caused your head to spin -- maybe that's because your tops in my book. Sorry for that last ...
Your friend,
Herman Punster
In the New Testament, Jesus appeared to me more than anything as perhaps the best physician ever. The rest of the New Testament appeared to focus on Saul/Paul -- a royal shit who turned into the most successful Bible salesman ever. Paul's ambition no doubt led to the Protestant work ethic operating in my family.
Unfortunately, the KK's seem to focus only on the Book of Revelations, a bad mushroom fantasy if there ever was one.
I love Jesus, especially when he stands up to self-righteous bullies throwing stones and tosses money changers out of the temple, but I've always had a big problem with his Old Man...there is nothing "just" or even "sane" about a deity that allows children to suffer or inflicts suffering on a bet. "Sacrifice" for justice in the face of evil and power is a worthy principle of any belief, but genocide and damnation to invoke fear of "holy" wrath and vengeance is just bad parenting... I have no desire to be the child of that kind of G_D.
Thanks for visiting even after working hours, and thanks as well for the kind words. I’m glad there are people like you here, else I’d have left a long time ago. I’m having a particularly difficult time of it of late, what with being attacked for daring to suggest throwing your vote away on a third-party candidate or staying home come November is a foolish thing to do at this critical juncture in our history.
Americans in general, and Kindergarten Kristian in particular, are woefully ignorant of our history and our predominant religion. Thus Michelle Bachmann is able to get away with saying the Founders ended slavery (or maybe she really is that ignorant). I suppose KK and others can be excused for not knowing John the Baptist was a Jew and not a Baptist, since most were never really taught much truth about their religion.
Their ignorance extends to other faiths as well. Thus the purported followers of the Jewish Prophet of Love and Peace would condemn to Hell and eternal punishment the one man who came closest to putting Jesus’ teachings into practice – Gandhi – because he was a Hindu.
It’s all too sad, and it’s getting worse – gotten much worse since religion and politics became entwined in the same dirty game of wealth and power. And thus, as I said, “feed the poor” has been corrupted into “fill my pockets”.
Thanks for awarding me a PhD – thank god it isn’t from Liberty University.
Yes, the God of the Christian Bible certainly exhibits a schizoid personality. Indeed, the OT god hardly appears in the New Testament until Revelation. Few KK are aware Revelation barely made the cut, when early in the Fourth Century the first “authorized” version of the Bible was concocted at the insistence of Constantine, a pagan.
Nor are most aware that up until Constantine, Christian practice was devoutly and decidedly pacifistic. It’s said the refusal to take up the sword is one reason Nero condemned Christians to the lions.
Not to put to fine a point on it, but one might say Constantine engaged in a sort of Droit du seigneur, deflowering the virgin Church and then enforcing an arranged marriage with the Sword. Any chance of Pacifism predominating in Christianity ended when that marriage of inconvenience was blessed a couple centuries later by Augustine.
KK are also mostly unaware that their much-beloved and overly-idolized King James Version of the Bible is also a bought and paid for political document, created at the behest and insistence of King James to counter the Geneva Bible and reinforce the notion of the Divine Right of kings.
So much for Divine Inspiration.
I’m suspicious more than labels, I’m suspicious of schemes that rob us of the possibility of living our lives here more fully in favor of the possibility of something beyond. It’s said everybody wants to go to Heaven, but nobody wants to die. And since you’ve mentioned Shakespeare, he certainly said it more eloquently:
“To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover'd country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?”
I think each of us invents our own God – tho most would never admit it. To my mind, Jesus certainly did – where does one find the loving Heavenly Father he invoked in the OT? We seem to ignore the fact Jesus had access only to the OT.
The OT God is a xenophobic, capricious, vindictive conniver who rewards atrocious behavior – Abraham, Jacob, David – and punishes the innocent with the guilty – surely not everyone in the time of Moses deserved to drown in a flood -- surely not everyone in Sodom and Gomorrah deserved the rain of fire -- surely every man, woman and child in the conquered cities of Canaan did not deserve to be put to the sword -- surely Job did not deserve to have his family destroyed and his life ruined because God and Satan made a sporting wager – and most surely, Jesus did not deserve to suffer such a horrible death,