Implications of Original Sin

[SpuriusMaximus]

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Still is, in Iran.

Well, I was aiming to make a point about how the religion has been a political thing since the dawn of time, not that it is still so today. I mean, the latter ought to be obvious enough anyway.

Though, if you really want to talk about Iran, it's not really a good example of what that _whole_ paragraph was all about. Yes, the mullahs still have real power, but not by receiving messages from the Spirits (or God) like a shaman would. Muhammad was the last prophet in that religion, so, that's it, nobody else after him can claim divine messages.

Want something closer to that mark?

Well, the Pope receives messages from the Holy Spirit. Last I checked the largest christian sect, _far_ more populous than Iran or probably than all the islamic fundies combined, stil has it as an official doctrine that a Pope can make infallible pronouncements because the Holy Spirit tells him to.

In Tibet, the right to rule of the Dalai Lama was pretty much just that he's the head of the local theocracy. And the same supremely-enlightened dude that's been living for hundreds of years, and just reincarnating in different bodies. And he's so fit to rule because he's one with the unverse, achieved supreme enlightenment, and is therefore the dude to listen to. How's that for woo?

 

[Ethnikos]

So if you can think of any period where the churches weren't about politics (even local, if not at the level of a country), I'm very curious when was that.

Being free and independent is not easy or safe. Abraham journeyed across the wilderness and came to Canaan. He lived as a nomad and avoided politics when possible. Moses had to bring the people out of Egypt in order to practice their religion. These groups that were formed did not lack in volunteers to join up. It was not some cult where they had to keep the members from running away.
In more modern times, it is difficult to find these groups that you can point to as examples of independent believers because they were systematically murdered by the bigger institutional religion. One good example is the Waldenses, who were before the main Protestant Reformation but held similar views as the protestants. They were hunted down like animals.
The point I was trying to make was that there needs to be periodic break-outs from the old thinking, that you have to go to the witches for your medicine, to cure you from original sin. We can get spiritual medicine directly from God. The only final solution to sin is the making of everything new. I want everyone to be there, and not caught in the spell of the sellers of charms and incantations and candles and incense and holy water.

 

[I Ratant]

Being free and independent is not easy or safe. Abraham journeyed across the wilderness and came to Canaan. He lived as a nomad and avoided politics when possible. Moses had to bring the people out of Egypt in order to practice their religion.

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Fiction.
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I want everyone to be there, and not caught in the spell of the sellers of charms and incantations and candles and incense and holy water.

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All religions need to have the believers buy the charms, pay for the incantations, candles, incense and holy water.
That's all any of them have.
For a person educated in the histories of religions to accept any one of them as "The religion" is to emit a mind-fart of egregious odor!

 

[Ethnikos]

All religions need to have the believers buy the charms, pay for the incantations, candles, incense and holy water.
That's all any of them have.
For a person educated in the histories of religions to accept any one of them as "The religion" is to emit a mind-fart of egregious odor!

I meant that literally. Maybe you think that you can apply that to every religion, figuratively. In the wilderness, there is no cathedrals and men in fine robes and hats. God speaks to man and can walk together in the spirit.

 

[I Ratant]

"in the wilderness... god speaks to man.."
It helps if the man has submitted himself to physical and sensory deprivations, with say the aid of the local hallucinogens.. and takes some time to make the connection to god... 15 days for Mohammed, for instance, 40 for most every one else.
Then the ineffable truth is "revealed".
It is amazing that that effing "truth" is never the same, but totally dependent on the personality and culture of the revelant.
Were there truly one overarching mentality striving to connect to humanity, the "truth" really oughta be the same, no matter what the time or culture.
There is one truth which does permeate all cultures, and it's really the most basic, that too many people ignore.
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.
One can lead a full satisfying life following that precept.
All moral behavior comes from it.

 

[TimCallahan]

It would be a curse if you would consider being born into a family with a certain genetic mutation that causes everyone having it passed down to them to have some sort of negative affect from it.
You are right that everyone was born from people who had already sinned.

Ethnikos, what you're espousing here, that we are born into a state of estrangement from God, regardless of whether we have sinned or not, is essentially the idea put forth by Pelagius. This was opposed by Augustine, who said that we ourselves are specifically evil. Pelagius argued that, even in our estranged state, we have the free will to either accept or reject God's offer of salvation. Augustine argued that we are so corrupted by sin, passed down to us by the very act of sexual intercourse by which we are conceived, that we are unable to even choose good over evil. Thus, our salvation is entirely an act of grace on the part of God. Conversely, we would have to assume that those not saved are arbitrarily condemned by God, as per Paul's "vessels of wrath" rant in Romans 9.

While the Pelagian view makes a great deal more sense, it was judged heretical and remains so to this day. So, are you a Pelagian or an Augustinian?

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

You know, that's an interesting can of worms by itself. I noticed that IMHO most theists nowadays are really anywhere between Pellagianism and Arianism.

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

There is one truth which does permeate all cultures, and it's really the most basic, that too many people ignore.
Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

... and it's even biologically built in. You know, those mirror neurons. So we wouldn't actually need a religion, moral philosophy, or whatever, to do just that. Most of the human efforts related to it, mostly were or ended up, rationalizations as to when it's ok and indeed expected to go _against_ that basic instinct.

 

[Gaetan]

The forbidden fruit

New International Reader's Version, genesis, 3.2-4
2 The woman said to the serpent, "We can eat the fruit of the trees that are in the garden. 3 But God did say, 'You must not eat the fruit of the tree that is in the middle of the garden. Do not even touch it. If you do, you will die.' "

The tax are the monopoly of devil. This is the devil who told to Adam and Eve to not eat the fruit and this is the devil in the form of a serpent who told them to eat it. The Christ was right to say in the Gospel according to St. John in 8.44:

"From the beginning, the devil was a murderer. He has never obeyed the truth. There is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his natural language. He does this because he is a liar. He is the father of lies.”
The error of Adam and Eve was to blame themselves to eat it. When you face the devil the last thing to do is to acknowledge one’s faults because you open your doors to him.

More about Tax:

The satanic tax

I want to point out the ignorance of peoples facing the technique of devil, as for exemple, the satanic taxes as food restrictions. At the beginning of the creation, the devil was present. He didn’t want that Adam and Eve our parents eat apples in the garden. The devil wanted to stop humans to live as free beings. Luckily Eve free us of this tax by eating the apple.

Later the devil in his instructions to Moses prohibit peoples to eat food like pigs, since that time muslims and jewish follow this tax. The effect of this compulsive tax is the following: if you don’t eat pig, no problem. But if you eat it, the devil comes in you. He shift his own crimes on your fault. You see right away this criminal of Satan, the god of jewishs, muslins and christians. The Christ told them that what was impure was not what comes in the mouth but what comes out of it.

Gaétan

 

[SpuriusMaximus]

The tax are the monopoly of devil.

Really? Now that's an interesting thesis, but I'd like to see something more than a non-sequitur in its support.

The error of Adam and Eve was to blame themselves to eat it. When you face the devil the last thing to do is to acknowledge one’s faults because you open your doors to him.

So, basically they should have been complete psychopaths? If they do something right, it's their merit, but if they err, it's because of someone else?

I'm sorry, but that kind of person is a psychopath. I don't think that the whole population being psychopaths would be a viable society. Nor one that's fun to live in.

I'm sorry, but the world would be a much better place if people started taking credit and responsibility for what they did.

No, I'm not saying cower in shame for every little mistake. Sometimes you don't have all the data, sometimes you screw up the execution, etc. Acknowledge your limitations, or you'll never improve.

But if you did something evil, that's it. It's not the devil, it's not society, it's you. No god or devil made you do it. The mens rea (evil intent) is yours alone, if you had it.

More about Tax:

The satanic tax

I want to point out the ignorance of peoples facing the technique of devil, as for exemple, the satanic taxes as food restrictions. At the beginning of the creation, the devil was present. He didn’t want that Adam and Eve our parents eat apples in the garden. The devil wanted to stop humans to live as free beings. Luckily Eve free us of this tax by eating the apple.

Later the devil in his instructions to Moses prohibit peoples to eat food like pigs, since that time muslims and jewish follow this tax. The effect of this compulsive tax is the following: if you don’t eat pig, no problem. But if you eat it, the devil comes in you. He shift his own crimes on your fault. You see right away this criminal of Satan, the god of jewishs, muslins and christians. The Christ told them that what was impure was not what comes in the mouth but what comes out of it.

Gaétan

So, basically you don't know what "tax" means?

 

[TimCallahan]

The forbidden fruit


The tax are the monopoly of devil. This is the devil who told to Adam and Eve to not eat the fruit and this is the devil in the form of a serpent who told them to eat it.

QUOTE

Okay, did the devil - according to your view - tell them to eat the fruit or not to eat it?

QUOTE

I want to point out the ignorance of peoples facing the technique of devil, as for exemple, the satanic taxes as food restrictions. At the beginning of the creation, the devil was present. He didn’t want that Adam and Eve our parents eat apples in the garden. The devil wanted to stop humans to live as free beings. Luckily Eve free us of this tax by eating the apple.

Later the devil in his instructions to Moses prohibit peoples to eat food like pigs, since that time muslims and jewish follow this tax. The effect of this compulsive tax is the following: if you don’t eat pig, no problem. But if you eat it, the devil comes in you. He shift his own crimes on your fault. You see right away this criminal of Satan, the god of jewishs, muslins and christians. The Christ told them that what was impure was not what comes in the mouth but what comes out of it.

Gaétan

Not only can I not figure out what your talking about, your whole post is tortured by your indifference to grammer. Try using articles, proper tenses and making your subjects and verbs agree with respect to singular or plural endings.

 

[Ethnikos]

While the Pelagian view makes a great deal more sense, it was judged heretical and remains so to this day. So, are you a Pelagian or an Augustinian?

Though I recognize the brilliance of Augustine and find myself much of the time in agreement with him, I have to think he is worse than Calvin on this. It may be because he was being personally attacked, that he took an extreme stance on this question. Augustine does not even allow for us to refuse salvation.
Augustine may have thought he had to throw in the thing about sex because Jesus was born without that act being part of his birth. They may have been of a mindset back in Augustine's time where they put more importance into it than we would.

We are all determined to be fit for destruction. We are all predestined for salvation in Christ, meaning it was pre-planned for Jesus to be saved out of mankind and when we enter into Christ, through repentance, we can be saved no matter how bad we may have been previously.
Jesus inherited flesh that had been weakened by generations of people trapped into a cycle of sinful behavior. Jesus was perfect, even though he had imperfect flesh. He most likely had been born into the best version that would have been available at the time. That in itself would not have been sufficient to keep him from falling. He would have had a good hearted set of parents and helpful siblings, from Joseph's previous marriage, to watch out for him. Being a product of a mysterious transformation, of a preexisting spiritual entity into a human, would have given him advantages that we can not help but think was influential. As a result of the combination of several factors, Jesus was able to live without sinning and so was capable of saving us. Could we do that? I don't think so. Could we become equal to Jesus? No. We get on the path to being more like him when we believe because the Spirit shows us Jesus gradually more clearly as we turn out minds more away from the world.

 

[Ethnikos]

"in the wilderness... god speaks to man.."

I was not giving a formula on how to have an experience.
I was showing that we can have a connection to God in a spiritual way without a building and hierarchical vestments and figurative props.
The Waldenses had to go up into canyons to read the Bible. Their church was the natural mountainside.

 

[Marduk]

The concept of original sin, as I understand it, is that all humans are born sinners because they are descended from Adam and Eve, who sinned.

not neccesarily so, if original sin is true then I am definitely a child of Lilith and some demons

 

[Ethnikos]

The error of Adam and Eve was to blame themselves to eat it. When you face the devil the last thing to do is to acknowledge one’s faults because you open your doors to him.

True repentance is how you create a communion with Christ.
Satan tries to short circuit the process by presenting your errors in such a way as to have you react by you becoming defensive about it.

 

[Marduk]

what did the poor bastards who lived before Jesus was born have to do...dance a jig?

believe it or not they had to touch a goat in the temple on Yom Kippur. The goat was then kicked out to die in the wilderness along with their sins. This caused the famous first decree of Nebekiah in 500bce, who proclaimed the Arabs sinful purely because they had set up an entrepreneurial second hand goat dealership

 

[Marduk]

Satan tries to short circuit the process by presenting your errors in such a way as to have you react in a way that makes you defensive about it.

ah so thats why palaeontologists arent big on the bible, he's constantly rubbing their noses in it with fossils isn't he



Bless you dark lord

 

[TimCallahan]

He [Jesus] would have had a good hearted set of parents and helpful siblings, from Joseph's previous marriage, to watch out for him.

Here you seem to advocate the theology of the perpetual virginity of Mary. What, precisely, do you base this on? Mark 6:3 mentions the several siblings of Jesus, not step-brothers and step-sisters. Since there is really no biblical basis for the assumption that Mary remained a virgin all her life, what is the source of your assumtion that the siblings were from Joseph's previous marriage?

 

[Foster Zygote]

Here you seem to advocate the theology of the perpetual virginity of Mary. What, precisely, do you base this on? Mark 6:3 mentions the several siblings of Jesus, not step-brothers and step-sisters. Since there is really no biblical basis for the assumption that Mary remained a virgin all her life, what is the source of your assumtion that the siblings were from Joseph's previous marriage?

The author of Mark doesn't even mention virgin birth at all. The concept of the virgin birth was added later in order to spice up the story with a popular narrative element of the time.

 

[Marduk]

The author of Mark doesn't even mention virgin birth at all. The concept of the virgin birth was added later in order to spice up the story with a popular narrative element of the time.

Really I didn't know that, I thought it was invented by Mary when her pregnancy became obvious so that she could avoid being stoned to death as an adultress