Religion general

The Great Deluge, when the gods flooded the planet because humans were being too loud but a cow goddess took pity on us and taught an immortal how to build a big boat.

Oklahoma has provided me a great example of why I am intensely skeptical of organized religion, particularly when it mixes with government.

A legislator there introduced a bill that would allow parents to sue teachers, and demand the removal and banning of any subject matter that ran counter to religious beliefs.

Now, I’ll not delve into the politics directly here as that is for the other thread.

Instead, let’s examine the religious side. This is 100% a problem of organized religion, as it wields far too much power when it is able to pull moves like this. Using religion to stamp out all opposing thought is asinine. And religion has no place in schools outside of comparative religion and humanities classes.

Science is science, based upon demonstrable results and testable evidence, self correcting and able to be scrutinized. Religion is not, and should not be brought into science classes in any way. The “teach the controversies” bullshit is the realm of small minded fools wanting to impose their beliefs where they do not belong.

We do not teach medical classes that show doctors how to use voodoo healing in addition to proper medicine, nor do we teach engineers to pray their machines into action. We teach what can be demonstrated.

@Zincy
One problem is that some religious types view science as something that you can choose to believe in or not.

Which is always funny when they post it from their cellphones, using their fingers attached to a body supported by modern medicine, to upload to the Internet.

They pick and choose what science to follow.

According to Hinduism, the best solution to despair is firstly to resolve the issue and seek treatment. And then, as you get help, focus on what duties you should do and complete your work, leave the problem to God and stop worrying, and meditate on Him.

Once a person continues to focus on God and concentrate, God will come closer to them and be more likely to help them.

@HorsesandMuchMOAR
Literally the same with Islam in that sense.
If you want a secular flavor, it’s basically do what you can and dont worry yourself over something you can’t control. It’s good advice in general, god or no god.

If god doesn’t want to know my true potential as a human being and all he wants from me is to fear him and live in “obedience”, then why did he “created” me in the first place?

The “Fear” part is a more ancient definition, not referring to “be scared shitless.” It’s more like “Look to while feeling ‘that’s awesome.’”

Hope you guys don’t mind, but there’s a goddess I pray to daily.

That is also what my boss told me, while I was working at his seafood restaurant today!

@Background Pony #D3EC
Is it Palutena?

Please give your serious thoughts on this topic: Can a German be a Shintoist? (I was a forced prisoner for a year, and I wanted to ask you this honest question) Of course there are no wrong answers. But your thoughts would interest me more than. ;-)

I don’t know if I am even qualified to answer such a question, but why COULDN’T you be a Shintoist? Anybody can be any religion, all one needs is genuine desire to follow its path.

Question for the Christians. How do you jive the parts of the bible that are demonstrably false?

Not the metaphysical parts, the physical and historical parts.

Take the flood, for example. We know through both historical records and genetic testing that there was 0 way that humanity was wiped out down to 2 people.

Several major civilizations thrived during the time of the “great flood”, with one in particular, China, still existing to this day. They have an unbroken historical record dating back to way before that time.

Then there’s the genetic record. Human diversity did indeed take a big hit with the Little Ice Age, where we dropped down to an estimated less than 15k humans extant at the time. But, we can fairly accurately model our genetic diversity pattern to conclusively show that our diversity never dropped to just two people. It is functionally impossible.

Knowing this, what is your defense?

I’m not defending it, because treating the Bible as literal is stupid. Only the hardcore “Jesus freaks” do that.

I’d be really curious as to how that one guy I sparred with earlier would respond. He doesn’t strike me as a literalist, but I think he might hew closer to it than you.

You and some of the other Christians are capable of debate without throwing a temper tantrum when confronted. I respect that. I like getting different perspectives, particularly on stuff like this.

I respect those willing to have spirited debate and explain their positions without going into a tizzy. I have little respect for those who will come into a debate, throw some punches because someone said something they dislike, and then play the victim/run away when they get confronted.

To be utterly frank with you, there are parts of the Bible that don’t translate well to modern words and context unless you spend time studying them from as much of a Hebraic perspective as is possible. I don’t know when exactly the flood is estimated to have taken place, and I don’t really know if it was worldwide or just in the local Israel (and nearby lands) area. I always think that English translations of Hebrew can miss details that should be considered. I do think there was a big flood, but when and where?

I’m not necessarily chalking this all up to both 1: translation error and 2: adding modern context to an ancient book, it’s just something else to be considered.

Minor detail: Noah might not have been in the boat with only his wife; his 3 sons and their wives might also have been on for the ride. That still only makes up to 8 people, as far as I can tell.

…

Lastly (not exactly in your question but since it’s on my mind as it’s closely related,) here’s an example for how translations might not always explain things in the most straight-forward way, how they might “hit the nail on the head” in a way, but it might not be driven down far enough for everyone to realize without studying:

When Noah got drunk on wine and “was seen by his son Ham,” why did Noah then curse Canaan who wasn’t even born yet? This is something that bothered me when I first read it, because in English, it sounds like Noah is angrily saying “damn you!” over something that shouldn’t even be a problem.

It occurred to me that Noah wasn’t cursing Canaan at all; he was saying something more akin to “Canaan? He’s deeply messed up for many reasons.” And why’s that? Canaan wasn’t even born yet, so how should Noah even know his name? The answer I found was Noah’s son, Ham, (R7 alert:) probably raped his own Mom who gave birth to Canaan. So, Canaan looks to be a result of incest.

The conclusion isn’t quite obvious in English translations, but if we refer to The Law (Torah) books, the term “seeing his/her nakedness” (R7) is an old term referring to having sex, and that’s what Ham saw; “he saw his father’s nakedness in the tent.“ But wouldn’t that refer to (R7) homosexual sex? If “Noah” refers to Noah and his wife, almost the same as how a surname refers to a family, and Noah’s saying “Cursed be Canaan” who isn’t even born yet, then the answer is “No.”

Today is Maha Shivaratri.

Normally, people would pray for the whole night to honour Shiva, while some people fast or chant prayers for the whole day. This day is believed by Hindus to be the day Shiva dances a cosmic dance, or marries the goddess Sati, representing cosmic union.

I still feel torn. On the one hand, I firmly believe in the old gods. On the other hand, I believe in Shintoism. Damn…

WHY did the Franks have to kill all our druids too!!!? And our herb women? Our bone readers!? Our seers!? Stupid Christianity!

As if a child-fucking church would be better.

Lots of reasons why I don’t believe in God, but only one particular reason is that God isn’t a he. It’s an it.

Interesting.

To be fair, the Christian God has no gender. He (or They) is an infinite being Who existed before gender.

So to some extent, God is nonbinary!

The reason why the Bible says “he” in reference to God YHWH is because there is no “it” within the ancient form of the Hebrew language. Literally everything - the trees, ground, river, rocks, a walking stick, the flowers, the sky - would be called “he” or “she” in the language.

That said, I still don’t think God is just male or female, but is both. It also appears as though “he” is more than one person, if we’re going specifically by bible verses here. I keep thinking of that part in Genesis when he sees the tower of Babel and then says “See, Man has become like us. ……. Lest he do anything he sets his heart to, let’s go confuse their language.”

Also, Any angel who shows up, well, the word “angel” is the Greek word for the Hebrew word “Malak,” which means “Messenger.” It doesn’t mean “winged being with a halo,” and I found multiple verses that counter that idea. Not explaining them here and now, though…

I may have explained a few things not in the best way here, hopefully they still come through alright… I’m writing at about 2 AM.

EDIT: Fixed my late-at-night error that could have confused modern Hebrew with Ancient Hebrew.

There’s actually multiple classes of “angel”. The classic “winged humanoid with halo” and the “Biblically correct angel” are both angels.