Flann wrote:Atheists just say it's all coincidence when we say God answers prayer.
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Flann wrote:Atheists just say it's all coincidence when we say God answers prayer.
couldn't agree moreDB Roy wrote:The personalization done by the mystery cults becomes apparent: YOU are your own savior! You will be saved ONLY by your own efforts. YOU are Jesus, Attis, Osiris, Isis, Cybele, etc. It is YOU that undergo the trials of this world and YOU that will be buried unless YOU prevent it by perfecting yourself and THAT is the purpose of the mystery school. Modern Christians have completely discarded their religion’s higher teachings thinking that the baby milk they find in the bible can save them.
Yes, the claim of Christian uniqueness regarding resurrection is a typical example of the fallacious nature of dogmatic reasoning.DB Roy wrote:Interesting passage from Chapter 4:
"...I have seen recent attempts to claim that pagans had no notion of resurrection, ...by producing a hyper-specific definition of one particular kind of resurrection, proving they didn't have or accept it, then concluding they had no notion of resurrection at all. But such a specificity did not exist in ancient vocabulary. Many different Jewish and Christian sects believed in many different kinds of resurrection, and all were called 'resurrection'. And there were yet more kinds of resurrection imagined among pagans, and considerable overlap between their ideas and those of the Jews and Christians. I shall thus avoid any fallacy of anachronistic precision by using all words for 'resurrection' to mean just what they meant to everyone in antiquity, whether pagan, Jew, or Christian: rising from a state of death to be alive again. Nothing more."
Just to state the fact, this is not relevant to the whole HJ question, but only to the actuality of the resurrection. Depends on who you call Christian Fundamentalists, I guess, as to whether believing in the resurrection is fundamentalist.“…the origin of Christianity can be attributed to hallucinations (actual or pretended) of the risen Jesus. The prior probability of this conclusion is already extremely high, given the background evidence just surveyed; and the consequent probabilities strongly favor it as well, given the evidence we can find in the NT. Christian fundamentalists are really the only ones who do not accept this as basically an established fact by now.
Dr. Carrier should be more careful in using terms from psychiatry. "Schizotypal" refers to a personality disorder characterized by the inability to form and sustain relationships, suspicion of others, odd mannerisms, and other traits. It is not a psychotic disease.DB Roy wrote: "…the origin of Christianity can be attributed to hallucinations (actual or pretended) of the risen Jesus. The prior probability of this conclusion is already extremely high, given the background evidence just surveyed; and the consequent probabilities strongly favor it as well, given the evidence we can find in the NT. Christian fundamentalists are really the only ones who do not accept this as basically an established fact by now. But it is important to acknowledge the broader point as well, that Christianity leaders, and many congregants, were either schizotypal or normal trance-induced hallucinators (or pretended to be), and they routinely engaged in hearing voices and seeing visions from heaven (or pretended to), and moreover regarded anything their subconscious mind hit upon during an ecstatic state as an inspired communication through the holy spirit.”
It's interesting that Mark repeats this very closely. Did he know of Paul, or was there an orally-transmitted formula that the Mark writer used?23 For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 25 In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
I just pulled this off the internet:DWill wrote: Dr. Carrier should be more careful in using terms from psychiatry. "Schizotypal" refers to a personality disorder characterized by the inability to form and sustain relationships, suspicion of others, odd mannerisms, and other traits. It is not a psychotic disease.
Isn't that how any trend starts? And why do some things catch fire among the people and some don't? We don't know other than to chalk it up to "impersonal social dynamics."During this period when Jesus was exclusively a visionary concept, presumably the visions were coordinated somehow, since there did exist a community of believers. It seems more likely that, even if we accept the visionary thesis, the beliefs were spread by teaching from only a few who claimed to have had these visions.
It's interesting that Mark repeats this very closely. Did he know of Paul, or was there an orally-transmitted formula that the Mark writer used?[/quote]23 For I received from the Lord what I also delivered to you, that the Lord Jesus on the night when he was betrayed took bread, 24 and when he had given thanks, he broke it, and said, “This is my body which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 25 In the same way also he took the cup, after supper, saying, “This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.”
He and his fact-checkers still did err here. Schizotypal is used only in combination with Personality Disorder, as your source said. It's diagnosed when the symptoms most prominent place the person well out of the mainstream in social functioning. There are not commonly hallucinations or delusions with the disorder, but if there are, they are briefer, less frequent, and less intense than with the psychosis of Schizophrenia or Bipolar 1. Fixed ideas would be common, but they are not usually bizarre. Beau Bergdahl, the soldier held by the Taliban for five years, has been diagnosed with the disorder on the basis of being "unrealistically idealistic" and being certain of seeing traits in people that others did not.DB Roy wrote:I just pulled this off the internet:DWill wrote: Dr. Carrier should be more careful in using terms from psychiatry. "Schizotypal" refers to a personality disorder characterized by the inability to form and sustain relationships, suspicion of others, odd mannerisms, and other traits. It is not a psychotic disease.
Common signs of schizotypal personality disorder include:
- Discomfort in social situations.
Inappropriate displays of feelings.
No close friends.
Odd behavior or appearance.
Odd beliefs, fantasies, or preoccupations.
Odd speech.
The last two items are particularly pertinent--people seeing visions of the risen Christ and people speaking in tongues. I think schizotypal can explain it. Back then, people thought that people who were crazy were divine in some way, possessed of a spirit and not necessarily an evil one. Such people were often seen to have something special about them. The German/Yiddish word "selig" is used to mean both silly and blessed. So, as Carrier points out, some leaders may have even pretended to be this way to gain converts.
I'm just not too sure about the hallucinogen use, but otherwise what you say is pretty solid. Especially in social groups, people can work themselves into an ecstatic frenzy without the aid of substances. My thinking, though, is that it still isn't highly plausible that Jesus originated as a vision of a pure god. This would seem to read backwards what actually seemed to have happened, in the Gospels if not necessarily in Paul: Jesus first being viewed as anointed by God but not divine, and only later, with John's Gospel, being exalted as a god coeval with the creator. 'Man who was also, or became, a god' appears to fit the case better than 'god who never even started as a man.' I'm talking about how Jesus was viewed. Mark reflects a tradition that Jesus existed as a man. The claim that the writer of Mark was implanting the entire notion that Jesus was a man, runs into serious problems (not that you have said that yourself).DB Roy wrote:Isn't that how any trend starts? And why do some things catch fire among the people and some don't? We don't know other than to chalk it up to "impersonal social dynamics."DWill wrote:During this period when Jesus was exclusively a visionary concept, presumably the visions were coordinated somehow, since there did exist a community of believers. It seems more likely that, even if we accept the visionary thesis, the beliefs were spread by teaching from only a few who claimed to have had these visions.
Christianity was (and, in many ways, still is) a charismatic cult. That's why evangelism exists. Large numbers of people will follow one guy with a vision (pun intended). Many Christians still speak in tongues. Ancient people saw it as communing with God but today we call it glossolalia. And many preachers excel at doing this even though you know they're just bullshitting. They can mimic this trance-state because it convinces followers. And it is clear to the writers of the NT that this stuff was extremely common in the early churches:
-People seeing floating "tongues of flame."
-Stephen seeing Jesus floating in the sky even though no one else sees it.
-Paul seeing a bright light and hearing a voice and then suffering hysterical blindness.
-Ananias hallucinating a conversation with God.
-Cornelius and Paul hallucinating about talking with an angel in different incidents.
-Many in the early churches were prophesying.
And let us not forget the use of psychotropic drugs which were certainly being used as a sacrament just as marijuana is still a sacrament in the Ethiopian church. It's even possible a candidate was initially drugged without his knowledge which made him very suggestible and would explain the need for strict secrecy among the higher initiates.
James D. Tabor calls Mark "heavily Pauline in its theological content," obviously agreeing that he knew Paul well and didn't disagree with him on substance. I wouldn't argue about the matter of practice you raise.He read Paul. Probably most if not all Christian leaders of that time did. Paul wrote his beliefs down so there was no need for an oral transmission and the letters served as the basis for getting a church started. Mark didn't promote the writings of Paul because he was in disagreement with him on key points. Mark wanted a Jesus who could forgive sin at will and not one who had to die on the cross to achieve it. This was likely because their apostles remitted sin in just this fashion in public. Mark created a Jesus who did the kinds of things the apostles of their community did when they went among the people so it appeared as though they were carrying on in his tradition. The effects had to be something the people could see right away.
Don't worry D.B. When the anti-theists and freedom from religionists control everything you will create an harmonious and peaceful world.DB Roy wrote:The remnant of Christianity that remains today—the orthodoxy—is nothing more than the low-level teachings and hence it would be powerless to accomplish much beyond screwing things up without the mature ones to guide them but since they no longer exist, we’ve had to settle for watching the Christians botch everything up.