Christian God theme debunked.

What is it you think Jesus did?

 

I'm not Jesus and would not presume to speak for him. What do you think God required of Jesus, and do you think it had something to do with him hainging on a cross?

 

Doesn't answer my question or can't you chew on someone your own size, (metaphorically of course)?

 

State your question now.

And what makes you think you're bigger than Happily'? A bit presumptuous on your part.

 

You said

I'm asking you what he did. What did he do?

 

He taught some wise lessons and went against the prevailing religious authorities. Why do you ask?

 

What makes you think he is under the impression he's bigger than me? He might believe he's smaller!

 

Why don't you ask him to explain his comment? I'm sure he'd be happy to.

 

But back to the topic. Was a crucifixion necessary in order for God to lighten up?

 

It's supper time right now. I'll be back to respond to your answer later

 

I think the only degree of perfection we require is mercy and mercy makes no accounting responding only to request. Give to him who asks of you.

The offended become very offensive in taking offense.

Rude smude don't be a prude.

 

I'll refer back to your question:

NoxiousGas eluded to an answer for this question earlier. He pointed to the Old Testament where the following info can be found:

First you have to bear in mind the Trinity. God existing in 3 ways: The Father, Son and Holy Spirit.


Please please please read previous posts within this thread because we've answered this question numerous times.

I love this discussion, but you need to stay focused and pay attention in order to take something from this.

 

Stop judging me. You have a tendency to become very preachy and controlling of the way people speak. You seem to think you are the definitive answerer for most things. Let me remind you, that is your perception. If you want to have a conversation with me, you're going to need to tone it down.

 

What makes you think you are?
Evidently eating dinner is the extent of your chewing proportions at the moment but the question/s was/were,
Shall we debunk the necessity of human sacrifice altogether? What is the same is the same and what is different is different. When is sacrificing life for a cause ever meaningful?
Seems when a fireman dies in the performance of his duty he is idolized for his supreme sacrifice. Is a buddhist monk immolating himself for the cause of peace a noble act?

 

I think there is a bigger problem with the crucifixion that would make one question the validity behind it. I have brought that up before, so I won't do that here.

There were some ingenious changes that the crucifixion brought about for man. Changes that certainly played a role in the advancement of where we are today as a species. The Hebraic God, like many similar gods could only be approached through the blood sacrifice. This is because there is a clear separation of man from the divine in that man is of the physical while god exists in the more powerful non-physical. This concept evolved as many cultures worked their way through new understandings of the world as a planter culture. As they began to understand the world in more dualistic and in-group/out-group terms, they became more alienated from nature and felt this separation. They also began to see the world in secular vs non-secular terms.

The blood sacrifice goes way back into the paleolithic, if not earlier. It is intricately connected to the world-tree/world-mountain/world-cave motif---the axis mundi, or the portal to the divine. In the earliest times it was simply a matter of returning life's essence to nature, so that the game animals would be reborn again, or to the grave (the earth's womb) so that the dead may continue life.

As the zeitgeist changed in the planter cultures, and became more alienated from nature and the divine, they placed more emphasis on death, rather than rebirth or life on the other side. The blood sacrifice and its connection to death became the only way to open the doorway of the axis mundi, so that one could make requests from the divine. For example, it was only through the death of the blood sacrifice that the Hebrews could approach God within the tabernacle.

There were exceptions--the World Mountain, for example, and the World Cave, but they too involved dangers, such as lightning and steep cliffs to break free into the divine. There were also the Baethyls---sacred stones that served as a portal---but even there it involved a break from the physical world (such as falling asleep and entering the dream world in the case of Jacob).

But for immediate access to the divine, or access at will----it required the blood sacrifice. What was ingenious about the crucifixion is, first of all, that it did away with the blood sacrifice. It did away with the voodoo as you would say---replacing it with the communion. The implication of this is that it allowed everyone access to the divine via the axis mundi, the cross, at will. This modernized religion, and made it easier for expansion. Could you imagine life today if everyone who needed to make important requests at the temple, or wish for luck, had to supply a goat for a sacrifice? No longer did man have to approach god through death.

The second thing it did was to tear down the significance of the Goddess. There were many gods (and kings) that died (either to bring back the crops, or for our sins, or both, depending on the case) and were reborn (literally in the case of the gods, metaphorically or symbolically in the case of the Kings) long before Jesus. Even communion was already old by this time, with very similar traditions to Osiris and Mithra and others. (In the older traditions, this death and rebirth was directly tied into the vegetation cycle (birth in the spring, harvest in the fall, and death in the winter, not to mention how high the sun rose in the sky in connection to the seasons, so it was conceived as more of an ongoing annual thing---which again was modernized by the crucifixion as a one time deal.) But the rebirth through out the Middle East was all by the grace of the Goddess---the eternal immortal (often viewed as the earth, which was understood as eternal and unchanging. This was opposed to the god as sky father, who changes with the seasons, just as it circles the sky above, and is therefore not eternal in the same manner). The crucifixion did away with the goddess, as God sacrificed himself (son) to himself (father) to be with himself (holy spirit) and then was reborn to show the power (of son. father, holy spirit).

This too was a modernizing aspect of religion. By emphasizing the masculine side of the psyche we focus more on rationalism and objectivism. Unfortunately this also leads to our alienation from the subconscious and the further repression of women.

You refer to this as torture and get hung up on the barbaric nature of it. But one of the implications is that God did this to himself so that we would not have to. (This was also implied in the older sacrifice and rebirth of the kings in early planter cultures of the Middle East.)

But there are two things to consider in this regard. First is the fact that violence is a part of our nature. The more we repress that, and become alienated from that aspect of our psyche, the more violent we become. Take the horrible barbarity of World War I and World War II after the long relative peace of the Victorian Era. The cold and seemingly heartless rationalism of Ancient Rome understood this and used the gladiators to appease it. The Hunger Game movies and books play this theme out today. The Goddess cults tended to use sex to defuse the violence, as there is a deep subconscious connection between creating life and destroying it. For early Christians the crucifixion with all of its bloody barbarity provided an outlet to ritualize and express the violence of the sacrifice, even in an ecstatic manner (for example, the passion plays). But it places this on God and himself as his son rather than on man against beast, and man against man. It also presents the problem of man against himself, as opposed to man against man (Jesus was after all a Jew, and it was the Jews and Romans that played the human parts in this play of barbarity---in other words, it was the very people themselves who were converting to Christianity at that time that were to blame, not enemy peoples, that committed these acts of violence. It was later that Europeans turned this into a play of antisemitism).

The problem here is that the crucifixion, as it resolved the issue of barbarism and sacrifice, while projecting it onto god, also started the shift towards an alienated repression of violence within the individual. As protestantism moved away from the blatant depiction of violence and barbarity, it only furthered the alienation from this aspect of our own humanity. It repressed it without any ritual expression of it--meaning that it became a true shadow element---something we consciously deny as being a part of ourselves, leaving it to lurk in our shadows to express itself when it can in more violent and dangerous ways. For example, we all consider ourselves peaceful and non-violent, but enjoy The Hunger Games, and all kinds of violent movies, and demand more. All we want is for good to win over evil so we can justify our beliefs. Mel Gibson's Passion Play movie is another good example. But these do not quite defuse the situation because they lack the ritual aspect of it, which was at one time experienced in the ecstatic sense. Therefore we live in a very violent society, a very violent Nation, and a very violent world, but yet we all believe ourselves to be good. Yes, it is ok to kill and maim as long as it is for freedom and democracy and to protect the world--or so we try to justify such evil. (Personally I think defusing it with sex, including ritualized sex, is probably a more enjoyable means)

The second thing to regard is that you are basing your arguments on man-made ethics (yes, even if they reflect Christian ethics). We all have to die, that is a fact. The world has pain and suffering, and there are many kinds of tortures other than the physical. These are all things that teach us. Such man-made ethics try to alleviate the suffering and injustices we feel while we are here living amongst each other. But does that mean that they would be viewed the same way from the other side?

If you were on the other side, and saw that death was only a passage to a different existence----possibly a better existence----or even a coming home existence----would you see death as evil? If you saw that suffering and torture where only temporary states, by which you experienced life and learned its lessons, would you perceive them in the same way from the other side of existence?

 

Mountain Valley Wolf to the rescue!

 

According to some they are rescued by the crucifixion.

Mountain Valley Wolf for savior!

 

Thank you Happilyinlove!!!

By the way, I had to correct this part: "Yes, it is ok to kill and maim as long as it is for freedom and democracy and to protect the world."

to this: "Yes, it is ok to kill and maim as long as it is for freedom and democracy and to protect the world--or so we try to justify such evil."

 

Yes! Yes!

That is what I have hoped that Noxious Gas would one day understand!

Never mind the 666 birthmark that is hidden under my hairline---that doesn't mean anything!

 

My mother's first degree is in theology. She never imposed her beliefs on me, and always explained religion comprehensively like a story from history that occurred before, during and after biblical times.

You spoke from a scholarly, objective point of view - which I appreciate and I hope starch will as well.