The problem I have is with your third point. Sure, power-hungry folks can, and have, used religion to control other people; they have also used many other levers - including democracy, politics itself, science, egalitarianism, philosophy, etc. It does not thereby follow that “egalitarianism” is ipso facto a bad thing, because the Jacobins used it as reason for taking control of the French Revolution.
To my mind at least, “religion” is simply part and parcel of the human condition at a certain stage of its evolution. Like “tribalism”. There is no doubt that tribalism has been the cause of much misery, and many power-hungry folks have used it as a lever to gain power. Yet without tribalism, could people have evolved beyond the level of hunter-gatherer bands?
It is a “misuse” of the English language is what it is. Substitute cheese, octopuses or carpet fluff and it makes just as much sense, i.e. none.
Oh but it really is. Once you introduce god into the argument you are forced to define him. If he is a god in any meaningful sense then he has properties.
Is the golden rule the only thing he did? What does he do? what else does he say? etc. etc. etc.
It is an unnecessary and potentially harmful complication.
When the Soviet leaders in Lenin’s time ordered the extermination of the clergy and other Christians, they targeted those people for being Christians, not for any specific act of direct resistance to the regime. When the Nazis exterminated the Catholic clergy across much of Poland, it was because they were the Catholic clergy, not for anyone individual resistance on the part of the individuals who were killed. And the same for other like instances. Your argument depends on drawing a line between those “singled out because they were Christian” and those “singled out if he resisted orders or policy enforcement”. But if a totalitarian dictator knows from the start that his type of authority will always be at odds with the Christian understanding of universal love and freedom, what’s the difference. In either case the result is that the dictator employs violence to crush Christianity. For instance, if the Nazis issued decrees saying things like this:
then how would there be any distinction between those persecuted for being a Christian and those Christians persecuted for resisting Nazi rule?
Why does it not make sense for a person to make such a statement?
Why does the complicated details of theology matter a tinker’s damn for whether or not following the Golden Rule is harmful?
Oddly, in Judaism most of the “complicated” details of theology which are of such interest to Christians are, basically, not important. Indeed, Jews tend to disagree or be unclear on such matters as what God is actually like, whether there is or is not an afterlife, what it is like, etc.
Without the tribalism and subsequent social skills we would still be cowering in caves.
There is a clear evolutionary benefit from accepted ways of behaviour.
Thing is, we were good enough at it for 250,000 years without having to evoke an Abrahamic god.
It seems like 10,000 years ago we were smart enough to start asking elaborate questions about nature and society but not yet smart enough to come up with equally elaborate answers.
Lo and behold, religion filled that gap. It served a purpose but we are only now shaking it off.
Because you make the mistake of thinking of atheism is a movement or an ideology, it isn’t. Just as octopuses and cheeses aren’t (though the French may disagree).
There is nothing in the concept of atheism that could lead a person to kill in the name of it. Nothing. Remember that one line explanation of it?
Following the Golden rule itself is a good thing. But that has nothing to do with religion.
The minute you invent a theology to explain where it came from you are thinking above your pay grade as a hairless ape.
Your quote an even your hyperbolic site confirm the distinction.
Persecution was not because the Nazi regime was atheist but because the churches held power. Power the Nazi state wanted for itself.
The Polish situation, while an exeption, exemplifies this. Poland was to become part of Germany anything Polish had to go. Among all things Polish is also the Polish clergy.
You would not be arrested in Nazi Germany just for being a Christian, the majority of Germans were Christians. You could get arrested for being an uppity Christian though.
As soon as I said the word “all”, I knew someone was shooting first and asking questions later. But…I really don’t know where my post (#5) fits in the scheme of things, being religious yet not a total apologist. Currently, I really would like to see abuses by priests to acknowledge their wrong doings and go on trial. Why? Again, it comes down to people using people regardless if religion was a tool or not.
Oh…and jinty? I already called out everyone (both sides) including the OP for this soon to be Pit thread back in #71. Still waiting for the thread to get back on track.
Religious beliefs pre-writing (and indeed, pre-civilization) can only be guessed at through analogy with exusting hunter-gatherers - but those tend to be very religious indeed, in a shamanistic way.
Each level of society has a type of religion appropriate to it. The notion of god (or gods) plus an established priest-hood is clearly a creation of a reasonably advanced level of civilization - say, late chiefdom or early state-level.
In our own type of society, that form of religion is a bit of an anacronism. But that’s a very different issue than saying that religion, as an institution, requires foregiveness for past atrocities - that is like saying that tribal chiefdoms need foregiveness.
What you are doing, is falling into the “no true Scotsman” fallacy. Sure, no-one can truly kill another person and actually benefit “atheism”. That doesn’t mean that evil-minded and power-hungry people cannot kill people and claim (or even believe) that they are doing so. That’s why it is a “misuse”.
The ironic thing is that a similar “no true scotsman” is usually trotted out in favour of Christianity. There is nothing in the concept of Christianity - religion of redemption that it is, and one expressly disclaims murder - that could lead a person to kill in the name of it …
That’s your assertion, but it is not, historically speaking, true. The Golden Rule was originally articulated by religious folks, in a religious setting, as far as we know - in all cultures. Naturally, you and I would both agree that an actual, existing god had nothing to do with it - god being mythological - but religion, a creation of hairless apes and not god(s), certainly did.
But then they are doing so out of a craving for power and as a result of their evil tendencies. Atheism has no properties on which such a claim could be made.
It isn’t the “no true scotsman” argument as I don’t doubt that they are truly atheist but it can’t have any relevance to their actions.
The “concept” of Christianity relies on the record of a holy book. All of it, unless you know better. You think there is nothing in the whole of that book that could be taken to mean one should cause harm to another?
The golden rule is seen at work in the higher primates, no religion needed.
How not? If someone claims to be killing priests to make the world safe for atheism, why not take them at their word?
Remember, I’m agreeing with you that atheism cannot, by its nature, actually be “helped” in this manner, as it is not a movement unto itself. This is a misuse of the concept of atheism.
Heh, I’m saying that Christians use a “no true scotsman” argument, not that I agree with them!
Really? How do you know either part of that - either that they self-conciously know of the Golden Rule, or that they are not themselves religious?
What I’m saying is that, of the available evidence, the Golden Rule has historically been articulated in a religious context.
That takes care of the origins of the Golden Rule, but is neither here nor there when we question the need to keep religion around because of the Golden Rule, or any other such moral goodness religion supposedly brings to the table.
Moral systems and ethical constructs don’t specifically need divine backing to exist or be valid - they just need a consensus. Since the Rule is not only more pleasant to the individuals involved, but empirically proven to be better and more profitable for societies in general, “god says it’s cool, too” doesn’t carry much additional weight.
IOW, behaviours which we consider “good” are innately and demonstrably good, and don’t particularly need to be inculcated through juju, gris-gris, sacred books or threats of supernatural retribution. Reason works just as well, and leads to less woolly thinking as a fringe benefit.
Or, to put it the opposite way, what do religions bring that couldn’t conceivably be achieved without them ?
Which I think is relevant when religious apologists try to argue that without religion we’d all naturally become heartless psychopaths always on the threshold of a killing spree. Because HITLER !
Well, yeah. I’m certainly not of the opinion that religion is necessary to act morally. I’d be kind of fucked if I was, given that I don’t follow any religion.
My point goes back to the OP’s question: should we forgive religion’s past atrocities?
I’m of the opinion that the question is, basically, a meaningless one. Religion is part-and-parcel of our social evolution. A good argument can be made we don’t “need” it anymore, that in our form of society organized religion as we know it is an anacronism. But religion, as an institution, needs no foregiveness, any mire than other social forms presumably necessary at the time, but which are an anacronism today - like chieftainship, or tribalism.
I suppose it is possible to imagine a world of civilized humans who got that way without the typical "band-tribe-chiefdom-state’ evolution, or religion; but they would be very different from us.
Yes, I’d agree that forgiveness is probably not the right word, and does not make much sense. I interpreted the OP to roughly mean “could we please stop throwing the Crusades in the Christians’ collective faces ?”, which can in turn be more or less equated with “is religion on balance a positive or even neutral phenomenon **today **?”
Which I don’t believe it is, all things considered.
Yeah, sorry. But I stand by my point about the hijack, this thread started out promisingly - ITR mentions posts 5, 9 and 12, and true enough for early posts like those - but quickly got re-routed so that by now almost none of the posts are on-topic.
You & me both :D, but I’m enjoying reading the discussion between Malthus, Kobal2 and Novelty Bobble.
And yet, you have no hesitation in answering it for Hitler…
Can you provide any evidence to back this up? E.g. a passage from Mein Kampf, or one of his speeches, or gossip from Goebbels’ diaries, or… well, anything?
