The Hubris of Man

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April 9, 2023 at 5:32 pm #297437
Vknid
Moderator
Obviously, today (Easter) conjures religious thoughts, feelings and sentiments.

But even given the day it is I read a YouTube comment posted today on a random video where a non-believer was excoriating a believer in Christ for even mentioning Jesus. The claim was God/Jesus was a make believe deity.

To some degree that is a person trying to convince themselves (in my opinion) because whether you believe Jesus was the Son of God or not, we know he existed.

But this is not my point. My point here is a general one not even aimed at religion.

Humans, are so overfilled with hubris that they tend to think that if they cannot conceive of it or prove it through their devised means that it cannot be. I don’t think that was always the case but in the last hundred years it seems to be the case. But if that were true where would science be today? If we always assumed we were right and could never be wrong NOTHING we understood would evolve.

To refuse to take in new data and or refuse to consider your our conclusions is a point in which you are stunted.

We don’t have to believe God exists. But he does regardless. This is no different than the dwarf planet Pluto. You cannot see it with your own eye. You cannot on your own prove it exists. But you have faith in those that proclaim it’s existence and as such believe in it. And even if no one has ever mentioned Pluto to you and you have no idea it’s there because you cannot see, touch or taste it, there it is anyways hanging in the solar system despite you lack of belief.
April 12, 2023 at 6:10 am #297606
Wisdom
” because whether you believe Jesus was the Son of God or not, we know he existed.”

Based on what exactly? There is not one historian or chronicler who lived during his supposed lifetime who mentions him. Neither Roman, Hebrew or Greek. Pontius Pilate never mentions him in his correspondences to Rome. According to John 18:3, Pontius Pilate used a 500 men strong cohort to arrest Jesus.
Chances are Philo of Alexandria, who chronicled much of Pilate’s troubles with the Jewish population (such as beating protestors to death who protested after he had emptied the temple treasury to pay for a new aqueduct), would have mentioned that. Chances are Jewish sources would have mentioned it, if a major breakaway cult had risen and their leader been executed. There were dozens if not hundreds of breakaway cults around that time. The Romans didn’t care about Jewish religious sensibilities, as is evident by someone as low ranking as Pilate, who was merely a military governor, being able to ransack the temple treasury for an infrastructure project without being reprimanded. The idea that the Romans would have been willing executioners for the Jews totally unrealstic. Unless the followers of Jesus were rioting or harming people, the Romans would not have sentenced their leader to death. If such riots had taken place however, they would have been chronicled. No such riots are ever mentioned by Romans, Christians, Jews or anyone else.

The earliest mentions of Jesus are in St. Pauls epistles, which were written some 40 years after all this supposedly took place, and by his own admission are not based on eyewitness accounts, but divine inspiration. However, there are several anachronisms to be found in the biblical accounts, i.e. King Herod’s supposed slaughter of the first born sons, an event which Herod’s own chronicler never mentioned (who mentions all kinds of other atrocities) and made further implausible by the fact that Herod died in 4BCE. Further indication that the gospels are just a remix of various old testament stories (slaughter of the first borns by the Egyptians, Jesus sharing several attributes with Joshua, even down to the same Hebrew name Yehoshua).

So please specify, how exactly do we confirm Jesus existed again?

The example of pluto is silly. You’re saying we should believe any outlandish claim because it could be true? Then I hereby proclaim I am a trillionaire, who very certainly has a big stash of gold, and if you do as I say, then after you die, I will guarantee to gift enough to your family so that they will never have want of anything again. Also, if you question me having that stash of gold, you’re a heretic and I’m gonna send goons who believe my story after you. Meanwhile, gimme your money.

Religion in a nutshell.
April 12, 2023 at 8:01 am #297610
Audie
April 12, 2023 at 8:35 am #297612
Vknid
Moderator
@wisdom

Look, you are free to hate whatever you want. If you want to give God the finger you go right ahead. I am not trying to force you to believe in anything I simply tossed out a talking point. But your conflation of organized religion equating to faith or a belief in God is incorrect. Those are not at all the same things.

.

“Based on what exactly? There is not one historian or chronicler who lived during his supposed lifetime who mentions him”

There are more points of reference for the historical existence of Christ than many things we historically assume today is fact. For that I refer you to a work called “The Case for Christ”. Written by a devout atheist who literally set out to prove exactly what you are claiming and in doing so became a Christian. Now historically speaking the closest known historical reference to Jesus I am aware of was by Tacitus a Roman Historian in 116AD. That’s if you want to toss out the Bible entirely. But there are other works such as the Dead Sea Scrolls.

“The example of pluto is silly. You’re saying we should believe any outlandish claim because it could be true?”

No, I am saying the opposite. I am saying that people believe in many things they have personally seen no or little proof of. And also that to a great degree all people have faith. Again taking Pluto. Most people have never seen it with their own eyes or really put any research into it but they believe it exists because they place faith in books and what others people such as scientists say.

Now you want to scoff at faith and belief you go right ahead. In a equal sense I scoff at the thought that everything came from nothing all by itself and somehow directed itself to become life. I find it silly that people think we are all here because of billions of years of countless happy accidents. Atheism, in a nutshell.

EDIT – Also, you are making my point about the hubris of man which was the actual point of the post. You think that because you cannot conceive of it or explain it, it simply must not be and there is no possible way you could be incorrect.
- This reply was modified 1 year ago by Vknid.
April 12, 2023 at 9:11 am #297617
Wisdom
None of the sources mentioned in that video are from the supposed lifetime of Jesus, which would have been between ca the years 3BCE to 33CE. Josphus is probably the best source, but his account was written in 93 to 94AD. So over 60 years after the supposed crucifixion.

Thallus’s writings don’t exist (anymore) and were merely referred to by Iulius Africanus in the early 200s. Not a historical source. Neither is Nero.

The mentions of Jesus in the Talmud are disputed, and the Talmud has been destroyed, censored and rewritten so many times, that it’s impossible to determine how much of it is original. ”

Numerous times between 1239 and 1775 all copies of the Talmud were destroyed. In 1280 following the Disputation of Barcelona the Talmud was censored.[54] Following the invention of the printing press, the Talmud was banned by the Pope. All printed editions of the Talmud, including the Basel Talmud and the Vilna Edition Shas, were censored. In 1559 the Talmud was placed on the Roman Index and banned. In 1564 under the Tridentine Index an expunged version of the Talmud was allowed. In 1592 the pope ordered all copies of the Talmud and other heretical writing destroyed expunged or not. The total prohibition would stay in place until 1775. Even then the censorship system would remain in force.[42] As a result of these disputations many manuscript editions had references to Jesus removed or changed, and subsequent manuscripts sometimes omitted the passages entirely. ”

The Talmud, written several centuries after the destruction of Judea and after the onset of Jewish persecution, would obviously have had to mention Jesus and provide some kind of alternative narrative. It’s entirely useless as an account or proof of a hisotorical Jesus, especially since no original version survived.

Unless something is uncovered in the future, there is no actual historical source from 0-33CE, Roman, Jewish or Greek that confirms the Gospel. If the Romans really had gone after Jesus’s cult with 500 soldiers, it would have been a big deal, and would have most certainly been documented. Either by Jews as a warning against anyone trying to lead people to idolatry or by the Romans to document unrest and argue for a larger military presence, or by Greeks who generally observed and documented the lunacy of the world around them. Yet nothing was written down until decades later.

This is why it’s a religion. There’s no proof. If there was proof, it wouldn’t require belief or faith.
April 12, 2023 at 9:56 am #297632
Vknid
Moderator
“There’s no proof.”

No there is, you just choose to discount it. If you held all history to that same standard there would be much less of it.

But “disbelief” can be applied to anything if we are going to play that game. The moon landing, the roundness of the Earth etc.

I could even expand the Pluto thing to that. You say it exists, I say prove it. You show me books and scientific interviews and I say I don’t care what you bibles or your priests say.

Again, end of the day, you have as much faith as anyone else. Yours is placed in humans (a place I put almost no faith) and mine in God.
April 12, 2023 at 12:19 pm #297636
comicsgate
I’m not even that religious, but the Talmud-thumpers ruined most music and entertainment, so these days, I find myself listening to other kinds of music and watching faith films. The cool thing about being a fan of faith films, is that usually, you have the theater to yourself. There are so many religions and people believe in all kinds of things.

I just finished reading a few books by Mitch Horowitz about the occult and I had no idea that so much of that stuff came over from the old world because the USA offered freedom of religion. Those Mitch Horowitz books helped me understand why religious people want to get away from some groups that get caught up in emotions because a lot of that New Thought is an occult infiltration that merges and borrows elements from religion but introduces prosperity preaching. It is a bit unfortunate that the author says the top 10 mega churches are all prosperity preachers.
April 12, 2023 at 4:23 pm #297652
Wisdom
@Vknid Unlike for the events of the gospel, we have actual evidence for the roundness of the Earth. I can most certainly prove that. As for Pluto’s existence, I can’t prove it, but I’m not basing public policy on Pluto either. That’s the significant difference. If there was a cult of Pluto which demanded humanity follow its rules, claims of its existence would be more relevant.

The debate about Jesus historicity is not about Jesus. It’s about policy.

Personally, I don’t believe in a historical Jesus, but I can’t prove that belief either. Belief is just that: personal. It shouldn’t matter either way. Only hard facts should matter when it comes to policy.
April 12, 2023 at 7:29 pm #297671
Vknid
Moderator
“If there was a cult of Pluto which demanded humanity follow its rules”

This is a fundamental misunderstanding of Christianity. It never demands anything. God gives us free will, it would be anti-God or anti-Christian to try to take that away. The entire Bible is an offer. You are free to turn it down.

“Only hard facts should matter when it comes to policy.”

I agree with this in part but much of policy is also about what is illegal. And that ultimately is about what is moral and that intersects with belief.

“we have actual evidence for the roundness of the Earth. I can most certainly prove that.”

Ha I can show you many people and channels that would disagree.

“. Belief is just that: personal”

agreed
- This reply was modified 1 year ago by Vknid.
- This reply was modified 1 year ago by Vknid.
April 12, 2023 at 8:37 pm #297676
Wisdom
“This is a fundamental misunderstanding of Christianity. It never demands anything. ”

The hundreds of thousands tortured, burned, drowned etc as witches might disagree with that statement. But yes, historical villainy aside, I get what you mean. In fact, Christianity (and morality as a concept for that matter) would be meaningless without individual free will and the possibility of moral choice.

“I agree with this in part but much of policy is also about what is illegal. And that ultimately is about what is moral and that intersects with belief.”

Indeed. This is why policy would ideally be based entirely on an objective, universal morality, and not one based upon belief. What that is, is likely impossible to get people to agree upon. I think a good compromise would be people just splitting apart and having different rules in different areas based on the will of the majority.

“Ha I can show you many people and channels that would disagree.”
Hehe, no doubt you could, but you can probably guess my opinion of them :D

I did forget to mention one more point I wanted to make earlier in regards to your pluto example. I think there’s a fundamental difference between believing and not believing. Many people equate atheism with being a belief or even a religion. I don’t necessarily agree, since belief is active, whereas disbelief is passive.
Let’s say I knock on your door, tell you I’m a superb investor, have a great play for this post covid economy and will triple your investment in 2 years. Great deal, right? All you gotta do is invest 100k of your savings with my company, and you’ll be good to go in 2025. Naturally, you won’t pass on such a deal, and hand me cash. I bid you good day and promise you won’t regret this decision. That is, until your wife comes home that evening and you get an earful.
Now the thing is, at that point, neither you nor your wife know if I’m a crook or not. Could be I take your 100k and run. Could be I keep my word. You don’t have proof for either, right? However, if you believed me, you will have to justify your faith in my tale to your wife. You will have to lay out what evidence and what concept I presented that ultimately convincend you. If, however, you slammed the door in my face and told me to get lost, you would not have to justify yourself – regardless of whether I objectively told the truth or not. This is because not believing is the default. Every day you are confronted with schemes which promise you a path to get rich or save big. More often than not you don’t believe it. But do you actually believe they are lying? Do you actively have to believe that I’m lying in order to not lend me the 100k? Or are you simply not convinced I am telling the truth or know what I’m doing? There is a difference here.
The same goes for theology. To not believe in the existence of a god is not an active act that requires faith. On the contrary, it means you not to have faith (unless you believe in some other replacement deity or entity instead).

Similarly with Pluto, we believe in the existence of Pluto, because there is no risk involved with that belief, and there is nothing to gain for the scientists who claim to have found Pluto. If however, there was a cost associated with the existence of Pluto, people would demand proof. If proof of Pluto’s existence was as elusive as proof of Jesus’s existence… then you’d have a lot of Aplutoism :)
April 12, 2023 at 10:46 pm #297684
Audie
What you choose to believe has nothing to with whether what you believe is true or not.

Why is Christianity true? Jesus lived, Jesus died, Jesus rose, and we have the record of those events by eyewitnesses recorded in the Bible.

You want to dismiss the Bible? Tough. Many have tried before. They have failed.

Why is Christianity true? To use an parallel from Chesterton, it’s because Christianity fits the world and its problems like a key fits a lock.

Evolution offers man nothing. It can’t offer man anything. All evolution says is, ‘Things that stay live can procreate”. It can’t offer any real progress, because there is nothing to progress toward. A man who tries to read progress into evolution is simply reading his own preferences into evolution.

What can other religions offer? Only a never-ending stream of “Do more try harder”. How can you know when you’ve done enough and tried hard enough? Who can say. What do we pile up more of after, for example, a thousand reincarnations: sins, or good works? Look around you, or honestly look inside yourself, and you’ll see the answer.

What does Christianity offer? Forgiveness of sins, eternal life, and salvation from the just wrath of a holy God, and all of it offered as a gift, no great works required to earn it, no money called for to pay for it, only repentance of sins and faith in Christ who sacrificed Himself to save us.

No other key could fit the world’s great trouble. All of our best works, all of our works of charity and self-sacrifice, all of them are filthy in our pride, our hubris, our selfishness, our desire to manipulate God or the gods or whatever spiritual powers any person may claim to believe in. If God does not offer salvation freely as a gift, then all mankind would end up in Hell, because none of us can live up to even our own weak and pathetic standards, let alone the high and holy standards of God.

Christian is true, because it tells us the truth.
April 13, 2023 at 6:53 am #297700
Vknid
Moderator
First off, great conversation @Wisdom. I am enjoying the banter.

“This is why policy would ideally be based entirely on an objective, universal morality, and not one based upon belief.”

There is no such thing as universal morality, it does not exist although you can have a common morality but that is predicated on a common root. All morality at it’s root is based on a belief. Once a people are separated from that root that common morality will fall apart, hence what we see today.

“I think a good compromise would be people just splitting apart and having different rules in different areas based on the will of the majority.”

I agree, hence states. I see that as the perfect solution. Let each area/state customize it’s laws/rules for the people that inhabit it. There should be very little federal intervention. In fact I think much of the friction we see in the USA politically is because power is rapidly being centralized at the Federal level forcing different peoples in different states to all adhere to the same laws whereas that was never the design.

“since belief is active, whereas disbelief is passive.”

I have interacted with many an Atheist that had a VERY active hatred for God. That is not at all passive and and ironically to hate something is to lend credence its existence. But I know there are some that are passive and simply do not believe. I think both types exist.

“On the contrary, it means you not to have faith (unless you believe in some other replacement deity or entity instead”

As I have mentioned EVERYONE has faith. EVERYONE. And everyone worships something. The only difference is where faith is placed and what is worshipped. So my personal choice is to have faith in God and worship him instead of secular faith in humans and worshipping the same or myself.

“If proof of Pluto’s existence was as elusive as proof of Jesus’s existence… then you’d have a lot of Aplutoism :)”

You are conflating a few things. There is much “historical” proof of the existence of Jesus. Now what we might consider more elusive is whether we believe he is the son of God and of course God’s existence in general. That is where faith comes in as you eluded to earlier and that is just the way that works, that’s the entire deal. If we were all certain God existed because we saw him that would not give us the chance to love him because we would just be scared like hell and be obedient simply out of fear. If God wanted robots he would have made them. But instead he gave is the chance to love him in return because he loves us.

My point with the Pluto thing is this. The exact same burdens of proof you demand to prove Jesus or God if placed on something else would draw you to the same point of disbelief. You yourself cannot prove Pluto exists. You rely solely on a small group of people who “claim” they can prove it and the texts they create. So to believe Pluto is out there you must have faith in these people and what they say. If believing in God did not mean you needed to live a certain way and or that you will be judged I think many more people would find the proof out there more than enough. It’s not from lack of evidence that many disbelieve its the fear of what it would mean so they place the burden of proof so high intentionally so that it can never be attained. I am not saying that is everyone or that it applies to you I am saying I think that thought mechanism/process is fairly common. And again this circles back to the hubris of man thinking that if he cannot understand something or explain it himself then it could not be.
April 13, 2023 at 5:58 pm #297723
Wisdom
Likewise. I appreciate that you’re not dogmatic in your approach, unlike the ramblings above. Your mind operates rationally (for the most part, but that’s all any of us can ever hope for), which is a good and rare quality.

“All morality at it’s root is based on a belief.” Or observation. I’d still make an argument for a morality based on natural law, with religious or cultural morality added on top on a voluntary and individual basis (i.e. observing the sabbath, not eating pork, not being gay, whatever else there is) .

“I have interacted with many an Atheist that had a VERY active hatred for God”

Quite true. It’s a bit perplexing, though some may instead simply hate Christians or hate Christian morality, and use god as a placeholder, since it’s less offensive. In some countries in Europe (UK, Germany, Austria), people have been arrested for making anti-Christian remarks, but not for anti-god remarks (but they have been arrested and convicted for equating Mohammed’s marriage to Aisha at 6 years old to pedophilia). In the US, too, I presume there are less consequences for saying “I hate god” than “I hate Christians”. In the end, it means the same thing.

“As I have mentioned EVERYONE has faith. EVERYONE. And everyone worships something. ”

I don’t. I legit never accepted any dogma.

“There is much “historical” proof of the existence of Jesus. ”
Can you name this proof? I mean for the historical Jesus, not the faith aspect of his divinity. Proof dating back to his lifetime, not something written 50 years later.

“If believing in God did not mean you needed to live a certain way and or that you will be judged I think many more people would find the proof out there more than enough.” Certainly that would lower the threshold for many.

“And again this circles back to the hubris of man thinking that if he cannot understand something or explain it himself then it could not be.”
Or perhaps we simply evolved to trust our senses. It is, after all, the only way we can experience the world around us. We see, we hear, we smell, we feel. Relying on our senses is not hubris in my opinion. On the contrary, there is a certain ascetic discipline to it.

@Audie: To all that I simply say: no, you’re entirely wrong. Christianity is a lie, prove me wrong.
April 13, 2023 at 8:35 pm #297730
comicsgate
Did Talmud-thumpers push the lie of transgenderism?
Did Talmud-thumpers push the lie of genetic modification therapy and call it a “vaccine” and did that affect the lives of members of the GeeksandGamers community?

Have the Talmud-thumpers in the media told you the truth? Would you ever think Talmud-thumpers would be truthful with you about anything?
April 14, 2023 at 2:06 am #297740
Wisdom
I dunno, you go and find the passage in the Talmud that mentions genetics. Or transgenderism. The laws governing the age of consent / marriage in ancient Judaism are in the Bible, not the Talmud, and were the same as in ancient Rome, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Carthage and most of Europe. Today it’s 16.
As for the Pfizer Vaccine, what of Earth does that have to do with Jews? It was developed by German company Biontech, which is owned by Turks: Özlem Türeci and Uğur Şahin, both muslim, with the latter being the actual inventor of the vaccine.

As for the media, American media is run by the CIA. As the recent Pentagon leaks showed, the CIA is no friend of the Jews and is instigating a coup against the democratically elected president of Israel. Who was a big supporter of Trump and other right wing presidents in Europe like Viktor Orban (and secretly Putin as well).

Epstein was a Democrat. All democrats are pedophiles. That’s the whole idea behind that ideology.
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