Re: [asa] D'Souza vs. Hitchens - Surrending the debate

Interesting! Since different beliefs provide different "species,"
Animists, Hindus, Buddhists, Parsees, Shintoists, Bahai, Jews,
Christians, Muslims, etc. must be different species. Since conversion is
possible, the transmutation of species is fairly common.

Consider that we've had millennia of philosophy, centuries of science,
and, if the Christian view is correct, millennia of revelation. This
gives opportunity to refine our views--or to bollix them thoroughly. The
Protestant view is clear that the new birth and the indwelling Spirit
provide something very different than was available to the worshipers of
the One claiming to be the only true God before the Incarnation. What
difference did that make in terms of preserving JHVH's worship? In spite
of the severest condemnation of those who deviated from that worship,
Israel followed idols apparently more than God. Was stoning and
extermination necessary under the conditions of the ancient world? Is the
situation that much different, though with different motivation, with
Hitler, Stalin, Mao, Pol Pot, the Muslims who hold that conversion is a
capital offense, etc.?
Dave (ASA)

On Thu, 01 Nov 2007 13:02:17 -0400 mlucid@aol.com writes:
Genetically the human of the Old Testament are virtually identical to the

humans of the New Testament. But their knowledge of God was a world
apart, just like ours is different from those alive when Jesus lived.
Most
dramatically those alive five thousand years ago did not know Jesus did
they?
That alone makes a world of difference with respect to their knowledge of

God. But more to my point, the intuitive outlook of Old Testament men on
the nature of God was what I imagine to be fairly idiotic in terms of
anthropomorphizing God.

The Old Testament Gods of Israel are all over the map of lower order
human
emotions like vengeful, demanding, jealous etc. That men of that time
needed
a God that was thus disposed is fairly certain in my mind. But that
modern
humans need to see God as the Old Testament God is not at all certain.
By the time Jesus began to set things a little straighter God was seen in

terms of much higher order emotions like forgiving and merciful etc.
While
God does not change, we do. We evolve. We grow ever smarter and ever
more intuitive of the miracle of creation and Creator and I am willfully
evolving
the character of my faith and the nature of my understanding of God away
from the Old Testament Gods in what I believe to be greater compliance
to
how Jesus depicted the New Testament God.

Taking it one more step, I see my own vision of God as something that
will be seen as laughably anthropomorphic to humans five thousand years
from now and I try to see God in THAT light. What is my responsibility
to elevate God in my own eyes? What is my responsibility to evolve
my appreciation for the transcendence of God beyond my current place
of inherent ignorance?

However I rationalize God will be wanting no matter what I do. But how I

feel about God in my life is not so wanting. So I let my feelings, my
faith, my instinct for God take a greater hand in my life. I think a
humble
man or woman who holds in their mind the notion that we can never
rationally envision God in adequate terms, can, in further pursuit of
their
faith, feel God in our hearts in a way that shows to us our blindness. I
am
a big believer in the feelings, intuition, heart, and the Holy Spirit
over the
context restricted "certainties" of the rational mind.

As for worshiping a goat? I don't know, but I'm pretty sure no one
worships the actual animal. Maybe some kind of transcendent symbol that
is in the form of a goat, perhaps, or like the cows of the Hindus,
worshiping
life in the form of the stable system of animal husbandry that sustained
them
for centuries, but I don't think anyone actually worships the actual
animals.
Maybe they hold them in reverence, but, heck, I hold all of God's
creation
in a real and constant reverence, particularly animals because they're
kinda like us before the Fall.

But, as an imperfect sinner I am very reluctant to condemn anyone or
anything that is trying to worship. Anyone who places an external deity
over their own volition is acknowledging God. And God is God. And
anyone
who worships the God of Abraham is unambiguously worshiping the same
God I do. Do I condemn them? Not me.

When books have been written in the name of God and people condemn
each other for believing in different books about the same God, I become
very leery of those who condemn the other book. How can a human being
know the difference when they are raised to believe the Koran and with
love in their hearts and humility in their minds do everything they can
to adhere to its tenets?

I don't dare condemn anybody for false worship. I'll condemn them for
corrupting worship or corrupting the belief of others in pursuit of
their own
designs, especially if they become physically coercive, but not for being

different from my own. Not me.

If someone has the same faith as I do, however, I will feel much better
about trying to judge the relative merits of our rational translation
(words)
of our faith because we are both much safer from corrupting each other in

the process because we are so close to the same belief to begin with.
But I will not judge Wiccans among Christians, much less condemn them.

-Mike (Friend of ASA)

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Received on Thu Nov 1 14:53:03 2007