Posted on 07/05/2005 7:07:57 PM PDT by balrog666
long on rudeness, short on sense or responsiveness. This gratuitous rudeness is not a response to my rather well documented contention that biblically inspired church doctrine has been responsible for repeated episodes of horrid genocide of groups in philosophical conflict with the Church.
Go talk to a shrink about your fear of God. Better yet, talk to Him about it. Maybe one day you'll figure it out.
I am on reasonably good terms with God and His Laws, and can give a reasonable answer to the question of what to do when the Golden Rule and the 10 commandments collide. Something you seem to have trouble with.
I'm not shelling my own troops, I'm calling out the MP on an AWOL renegade, who is fighting his own war with out sides.
Well, maybe that's your view. My view is that I am addressing questions about the fundamental source of morality to a blank wall.
I'm sorry, but if you're an atheist, and you think that the USA isn't the "highest claim", then you can get the hell out of my country.
I'm sorry if you're a completely inept spokesperson for God Law, which apparently, you think is of lesser priority than the laws of the United States.
I'm going to war by January most likely, and I will be damned if I'm going to have someone like you tell me that (in absence of God) the USA is NOT the top of the line!
Funny, I went to war for you and my country without shunning or insulting you or requiring you to take a loyalty test to my opinions about God. Apparently, civility and reciprocity is not a big priority at the recruiting station these days.
You missed the part where I talked about you coming from being an atheist.
Allow me to paraphrase "In the absence of (a) God, the USA should be any American's #1 thought."
This would mean that "in the presence of (a) God, the USA should only be #2, and no less."
Easy to do, since I'm not.
Short of calling me a mass-murderer, an idiot, and then speaking the same of all Christians for the actions of a few...
I believe if you will look back at what you've posted, you'll find that my responses are comparable to yours in stridency. I don't believe I have called you a mass murderer, in, fact, I consider your lack of comprehension as to who or what was the target of that barb to be the principle failing of modern christianity to acknowledge the roots of it's persistent misbehavior toward people it disagrees with. If this failure to acknowledge does not change, it won't take long before christianity resumes murdering those who disagree with it.
What service did you go into?
I intended to go into the Air Force as a radio intercept analyst, in those flying guppies that overflew the bombing flights gathering elint, but I spent most of my hitch working for the spooks at NSA.
I'm going Regular Army. I'm entering as a PFC.
Good for you. I realize you aren't soliciting advice, but it I were in your shoes, I'd go for specialist ratings as soon as I could. Oh, and one more thing that doesn't often get mentioned--you can get so caught up in how serious, scary, and immediate being a soldier is, that you can overlook that it's also a lot of strange and sometimes amazing fun--don't miss out. .
I guess this is the part whre I appologize for acting brashly.
Looking back, I see that I was more assuming than anything when I responded.
I would like to take the time, however, to point out the majority of such horrid acts made by Christians were "suppported" by the Old Testament. Jesus did away with the old laws (at least, that is my understanding) and thus there is no calling for eradication of opposing ideas.
Than why hasn't it been jews genociding christians, and kidnapping christian children to be brought up jewish, for the about the last 1400 years?
In point of fact, this isn't accurate. The principle of salvation isn't Old Testament, nor are the passages from the bible that have directly fueled the easter genocides, such as Matthew 27:25, where the connection between pulpit and riot is immediate.
Jesus did away with the old laws (at least, that is my understanding) and thus there is no calling for eradication of opposing ideas.
Not that this is such a very relevant defense, but You have offered no support that has much credence, that I am aware of, that The 10 Commandments are in, while the rest of God's word is out, and I think it is a difficult sell that that the 10 Commandments aren't a central part of christianity.
Thats cool about the NSA bit. Or at least, sounds cool.
Doing elint work really struck my fancy, and there was a lot that was interesting about it. Elint is so important on the battlefield now, that there couldn't be a better place to feel like your competence has a lot of leverage when you're in the shit.
Pick up another language (likely Arabic or Farcee)
I'd bet on Chinese. If you go this way, there will be an important tech school choice to make between about a year of electronics with a 12-16 week crash course at the language school at Monterey, and a year of language school, with 12-16 weeks of radio operations, electronics and decryption. You might want to think hard about what you really enjoy doing so much you could do it forever before making this choice.
Ya know, it never occured to me to post an entire book before!
Great post, though. I get frustrated with assertions from Creationists that "there is no evidence" when I know there is a lot. And yes, most Creationists really aren't qualified to discuss the issue since they don't know the underlying subject matter (nor will they, since the doctrine of Divine Fiat doesn't require it).
I am going to bookmark your post and just send peopl over for a look when I run into ignorance.
How could you have gotten to here without reading post #52, et seq?
The only documentation of lying is by Creationists.
My arguement for stating that Jesus did away with the old laws (while keeping the 10 Commandments) is due to the reasoning behind them.
The Old Laws were instructions for a group of people to follow to ensure favor with God. With the coming of Jesus, these laws were no longer required, only a following of Jesus. The focus of salvation went from being the responsibility of a nation, to a relationship with a person.
Jesus proclaimed the 10 Commandments, while denouncing the "eye for an eye" laws that were still being followed in his day.
And while the Catholic Church did a huge thing by keeping literacy a viable option in the Dark Ages, they also with held the majority of the texts' meanings from the people (opting to, instead, teach them only what THEY thought important)
This would lead to people only understanding a portion of the Bible at any given time, allowing the Pope to conduct political manuevers within such a guideline.
Then came Martin Luther.
Some people maintained their ignorance of the New Law, and thus slavery was permitted in "Christian" areas.
But also, as you pointed out, the more "organized" Christian groups (ie, Catholics and Eastern Orthodox) on some parts, permitted the Nazi takeover, and even paid for several "Holy Wars". Again though, politics.
Meanwhile, The Jewish faith has kept it's Torah (a little different from the OT) but more or less gave up on it's more theistic roots.
So the Jews have become more secular, and the Christians went through being "Jews" for the 1400 years you mentioned.
They followed the Old Law, in accordance to their teachers biddings. They suffered greatly under the pagan (and often secular) Roman Empire. They then went forth, and converted many nations to their beliefs, using methods the Jews had used for centuries before on (smaller) neighboring tribes... whom they often enslaved.
Which kind of writing? Translit. or pictogram? Lot's of good reasons for betting on Chinese. 1) they are presently spending more than we do on armaments. 2) in a replay of the conditions leading up to WWII, they will be growing increasingly needful of secured oil resources. 3) Clinton secured a great deal of the money he needed desperately to win the 96 elections from a company that's a front for Chinese Army intelligence: Cosco, in illegal contribution maneuvers that Dole was caught on tape supervising, and should have gone to jail for.
Consequent to that, a great deal of our defense-critical missile and computer technology was suddenly legally exportable to china, and blocks against chinese investments in the US were lifted, and opposition against establishing bases for Cosco operations in South and Central America was dropped.
See "Year of the Rat" if you want more details. The chinese are smart, subtle, ambitious, patient and dead serious, and what the Clinton episode shows is that they are making decades-deep maneuvers to prepare for a war they know is coming. And like WWII, this will be a war whose outcome will not be certain.
As I pointed out previously, if I accepted this argument, (which I don't), it only defends the church from the witchmania charges. It does not defend the church from jew-murdering charges, since the church relied on the doctrine of salvation and specific NT sources, such as Matthew 27:25, to enflame its parishoners into wholesale murder of their local jewish populations. And it was not "some renegade clerics" who where responsible for this. Calling the church "political" and trying to pretend that the persecution of the jews somehow goes against the grain for "true" christians is a laughable claim, on the historical record. The church fomented jewish hatred from the pulpit, in obedience to Papal Encyclicals, whose rhetorical basis was the Doctrine of Salvation, and numerous anti-jewish phrases in the NT, most especially Matthew 27:25. No matter how you try to twist around like a jesuit to try to see it otherwise, jewish hatred by christians was fueled persistently from fundamental christian doctrine and text--that's why it had the legs to persist for 1400 years, through myriad of "political" fashions.
I agree with you on all cases... but why shy away from a Middle Eastern language so quickly?
China is a very looming threat, but I still find that this WOT is not going to end anytime soon either.
Of course, this brings to face a very chilling thought: What if China were counting on us still being at war with terrorists when they DO rise?
For that matter... why hasn't China been reporting any terrorist attacks?
Team America may have been satire, but it draws a very realistic picture. (I've always felt that Kim Jong Il is a maggot compared to what else is out there.) What if it isn't North Korea... but China?
Oh, and pictogram. My spacing needs work.
Given the lack of jew-killing (at least on any scale of historical notice) in America, I would have to disagree with the "it's not political"/"it has survived many political fashions" bit.
I think it has almost everything to do with a people who were/are hell-bent on being the "pure race".
As racist as it sounds (and being of the same blood myself, I feel I can say this): The Aryan people have a history (breeding, if you will) for subjegation of other people. One would note that the Greeks and Romans did not do as say, the Germanic tribes did.
This pride of "purity" was passed down, and a fear of outsiders was established. Not saying they were the only ones capable of such actions... but it is interesting to see historically how the Normans (set in their ways so much, they would print a Cross AND Mjolnir at the same time) reacted to Christianity as opposed to the Greeks.
Id' say, more than anything, it's this tribal tension, coupled with bad times, that makes people do bad things. Not the Church (though the Church is made up of people, who also share those times).
Again, you didn't see such things occur in the USA, excepting people who took the OT at more value than the NT. Ignorance.
Making war on countries whose general population attains stone-age levels of technological understanding have endings that are foregone conclusions. N. Korea and Iran do not pose credible threats to US Sovereignty. China does.
There's another fairly historically important difference: The 1st Amendment of the US consitition was written to prevent religeous differences from turning into legal genocides. When the Pope ruled over states, the story was sadly different, as our Founders were painfully aware.
Tribal tension did not write the "Hammer of Witches", or the innumerable anti-jewish encyclicals, nor does tribal tension account the doctrine of salvation, or for Matthew 27:25, nor does tribal tension cause Easter Sunday sermons on these subjects from which the parishoners streamed out of church to murder their local jewish populations wholesale. It does not account for the crusades against a people half a world away, and it does not account for the burning of witches or scientists--being old and friendless, or in disagreement with the church, does not make you a member of a foreign tribe.
Everyone's does. That's why those who could actually do it properly were/are esteemed as artists. Ever seen a pictogram typewriter? It is really something to look at, its keyboard is so huge. If they had had a more atomic alphabet, like our indo-european, it would have been them, and not us, that dragged the world into the industrial age, maybe a few centuries sooner.
a) virtually no Moslems in china. b) No festering centuries-old religeous antagonism that resulted in bloody conflict that lasted for generations. c) No CIA setting up phony, a-historic, widely resented raghead monarchies on top of oil-bearing sand, and d) no unofficial 52nd state of the Union plopped down smack on top of the Muslim holy land, within this century.
Oh, I think that's probably wrong. I think wherever slavery has made economic sense, it has occured (and is occuring). Despite the press coverage given to abolitionist sentiments in the last two centuries, I think probably you can blame the rise of the industrial age, with it's startling increase in the economic leverage of the worker's output for the partial demise of slavery.
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