The two texts and their perspectives are fundamentally incompatible.
That's sort of what I'm getting at. There's an obvious schism between old testament and new testament. That's a terrible decision for established dogmatic texts. There should be a more unified vision.
Relatedly, it's been my view that the most successful way to read this mishmash bible is to rely heavily on personal interpretation. But this gets into other matters, like whether a religion should be taking the place of philosophical learning, or what the true purpose of a religious text should be.
People such as yourself (and younger me) foolishly believe that you can teach most people philosophy. Most people do not have the intellect, inclination, or patience to understand philosophy, whereas we think nothing of it and find it fascinating. We're blinded by our high intelligence.
I can't really refute that, but I wanted to share the shorthand I started using: that such people that have no capacity for self-improvement or a desire to question the world aren't really on the level of "human", they are merely "people".
I have already conceded that many people desire the authority and guidance present in religion. Others simply don't give a damn about anything greater than the present moment. I'm not convinced they're all hopeless, but I do try to rearrange my expectations in understanding the difference.
I think that the intelligent have been irresponsible and petulant in their pursuit of destroying religion merely for the triumph of reason over dogma.
They should have stood up an alternate religion. But they wanted to keep their hands clean, and so the progressives and post modernists got there instead and planted new seeds in the field the gnostics had just finished burning.
I have spent twenty five years looking for a religion that has the spine stand up to these people. Only one I've seen is Islam, and I refuse to walk that way, it's a cure that's worse than the cancer.
We need someone willing to do what Joseph Smith did, but in a Kekistani way.
It's not me. I'm not a prophet. I could say the words but I don't have the qualities of leadership, the force of personality, to make the words stick.
That's a fair assessment. The destruction/weakening or religion was a sort of gleeful pursuit for a while. Most participants may have truly meant well.
It reminds me of some of the summaries I've read of Nietzsche's work. From what I understand, he tried to address how a man (if not society altogether) could move on in life after religion is no longer an option. I'm a little embarassed that I have yet to actually read the related work, because I keep finding opportunities to use it in discussion here.
And yeah, totally agree on leadership. Would make things so much smoother. But I think about it sometimes and wonder what it'd take for us to accept some dude as a leader - not so much that he may lack qualities, as that we're all perhaps very jaded about opportunists, scammers, and controlled opposition. Would a new leader need to overcome that himself, or would the leader actually require that we're ready to accept him? I'd hope for the former, and that excludes me from the running because it's far beyond my ability.
That's sort of what I'm getting at. There's an obvious schism between old testament and new testament. That's a terrible decision for established dogmatic texts. There should be a more unified vision.
Relatedly, it's been my view that the most successful way to read this mishmash bible is to rely heavily on personal interpretation. But this gets into other matters, like whether a religion should be taking the place of philosophical learning, or what the true purpose of a religious text should be.
Religion is philosophy for dummies.
People such as yourself (and younger me) foolishly believe that you can teach most people philosophy. Most people do not have the intellect, inclination, or patience to understand philosophy, whereas we think nothing of it and find it fascinating. We're blinded by our high intelligence.
I can't really refute that, but I wanted to share the shorthand I started using: that such people that have no capacity for self-improvement or a desire to question the world aren't really on the level of "human", they are merely "people".
I have already conceded that many people desire the authority and guidance present in religion. Others simply don't give a damn about anything greater than the present moment. I'm not convinced they're all hopeless, but I do try to rearrange my expectations in understanding the difference.
See, I'm a little more cynical than that.
I think that the intelligent have been irresponsible and petulant in their pursuit of destroying religion merely for the triumph of reason over dogma.
They should have stood up an alternate religion. But they wanted to keep their hands clean, and so the progressives and post modernists got there instead and planted new seeds in the field the gnostics had just finished burning.
I have spent twenty five years looking for a religion that has the spine stand up to these people. Only one I've seen is Islam, and I refuse to walk that way, it's a cure that's worse than the cancer.
We need someone willing to do what Joseph Smith did, but in a Kekistani way.
It's not me. I'm not a prophet. I could say the words but I don't have the qualities of leadership, the force of personality, to make the words stick.
That's a fair assessment. The destruction/weakening or religion was a sort of gleeful pursuit for a while. Most participants may have truly meant well.
It reminds me of some of the summaries I've read of Nietzsche's work. From what I understand, he tried to address how a man (if not society altogether) could move on in life after religion is no longer an option. I'm a little embarassed that I have yet to actually read the related work, because I keep finding opportunities to use it in discussion here.
And yeah, totally agree on leadership. Would make things so much smoother. But I think about it sometimes and wonder what it'd take for us to accept some dude as a leader - not so much that he may lack qualities, as that we're all perhaps very jaded about opportunists, scammers, and controlled opposition. Would a new leader need to overcome that himself, or would the leader actually require that we're ready to accept him? I'd hope for the former, and that excludes me from the running because it's far beyond my ability.