Christianity

[Dubious]

Our Present is not just somewhat absurd . . . it has become totally infused with absurdity.

...a fact already bewailed humorously and ironically by Kierkegaard in 1846. I'm certain he wouldn't be so humorous about it now though the irony would be much more intense.

[Alexis Jacobi]

I just had the strangest epiphany! I saw Jesus. He said in clear and direct tone:

"I am a cage, in search of a bird.”

How was I to know it'd turn out like this?!

No no! This cannot be! I was right! Jesus had to have become an equivalent of Hamlet!

God, what a terrifying thought: If the Sermon of the Mount were rehearsed today and Jesus-Hamlet spoke truth.

“Last night I dreamed about you. What happened in detail I can hardly remember, all I know is that we kept merging into one another. I was you, you were me. Finally you somehow caught fire.”

“You can choose to be free, but it's the last decision you'll ever make.”

“You are the knife I turn inside myself; that is love! That, my child, is love!”

[Phil8659]

Alexis Jacobi

Wow! that can be paraphrased as "". Very impressive.

Are you the one they call the Master of NOP?

[Alexis Jacobi]

Are you the one they call the Master of NOP?

Uptown or Downtown?

[Phil8659]

Are you the one they call the Master of NOP?

Uptown or Downtown?

Damn, It will take research time I ain't got.

I avoid YouTube when I can. Do some research on YouTube and Google, the part about censorship to manage the opinions of their mass audience. Do you remember a time when it was free, before Google bought it out? I am one of those banned from posting on YouTube, I do not fit their pc profile. When Google took over, their poster's were forced into what YouTube claimed would always be free, so Google bought your freedom. I do not respect that in the least.

[Alexis Jacobi]

It will take research time I ain't got.

In that case let it drop.

[Phil8659]

It will take research time I ain't got.

In that case let it drop.

I added to the above, I hope that when I dropped it you didn't get hurt.

[Nick_A]

You can't run. The logic of Christianity will remain hidden from secular eyes. The darkness within society remains dominant.

It is possible (i.e. likely) I am not making myself clear. I do not find the last series of posts to do anything at all to further 'productive conversation'. "Ah but!" I would then say "We do not in any sense agree on what productivity is!"

So it all begins to look like what it in fact really is: absurd. The absurd manifests when it is not so much 'important ideas' that are the concern of participants but something else. What is that? When people are consumed by their own subjectivity (and cannot see around it).

I have often reduced it to the word 'bickering'. I have come to see that, for some, bickering is actually the object! To bicker inanely is (I gather) a satisfying pastime. Maybe it is the reason (some) people stick around? (Speaking generally of these forums).

The term 'absurd' is a postmodern one. And this conversation takes place within postmodern intellectual circumstances. There is no way around that! And no escape from that. From that one cannot run. And no matter where one runs one will run into the quagmires of confused ideas. Literally so much upheaval within those structures (in the mind and in perception) through which a view and understanding of the world is formed, and these views and understanding do not coincide! that the result is a postmodern pastiche of the absurd. A recent arrival offers just such a picture of the absurdism I refer to.

The thing is this might be taken *personally* by some who write here. It is not meant that way! Bickering-style critiques -- bicker-jabbing it might be called -- serve no constructive function (though it certainly has a function).

Our Present is not just somewhat absurd . . . it has become totally infused with absurdity.

Now how shall I take 'the logic of Christianity' if I understand, as I do understand, that the field of surrounding life, and the life and ideas that enter here on this thread, are infused with absurdity? I do not think my position, originally articulated, has in any sense changed: Every person only has their own personal realm, their 'within', their personal conscious field, as the area that they have ultimately to work with when it pertains to what you, Nick, often put emphasis in. I do not deny exterior relationships, duties, actions, etc. but my point is clear: If anything is *done* it is done internally. And what is done can hardly be communicated even between people who are very close in orientation and where confidence exists.

Unlike you (to all appearances) I take "the darkness within society" (that is within persons) to be the norm. In this sense I am not very amenable to utopian idealism. I could sort of go along with The Beast abstraction, but all abstractions are faulty and no abstraction should ever be taken as a sufficient picture. What is 'dominant' in life is, essentially, what life is.

And what shall I do? start crying? Hide away? Bewail that it is so?

I agree. This long thread has not really been productive and with no idea how it could become productive. If this is true, the same problems exist in the world in which people do not understand each other.

I'm going to initiate another thread over the weekend: "Is World Peace Possible"? I do hope you participate as would those like IC as well. Naturally I will assert that it is impossible for collective life in Plato's Cave. But why is it so? It is obvious that world peace is impossible for the world as it is. Can it change? Why is what so many want obviously impossible as we are? You may have another perspective. Those with faith in education for example may believe that will lead to world peace.

It could be an interesting thread if it doesn't get ruined. Even now there are those preaching a one world government which I believe is absurd invariably leading to slavery. It is worth discussing why collectively we are as we are with war as the absurd but logical outcome.

[Belinda]

It's the social world that provides you with the mental tools to choose whether or not you consent.

Of course not. My Ma gave me the words to describe natural rights, but my right to myself and my capacity to self-direct, these aren't learned or bestowed, they're recognized, and most folks, I think, recognize this early on, before language.

Good on your mother for teaching you.

Yeah, she's a good egg.

However she was not reared apart from others, and probably had other children to play with. Young children learn how to get on with each other and cooperate through play.

I reckon folks exercise their natural skills at interactin' thru, for example, play. Doesn't seem to me anyone learns how to cooperate.

Skills such as self -direction and cooperation are potential only unless they are nurtured especially during childhood when most learning takes place. When inborn ('natural') potential is nurtured by the way young children play and learn then the skills such as language, self-direction, and cooperation become actual skills.

[henry quirk]

Skills such as self -direction and cooperation are potential only unless they are nurtured especially during childhood when most learning takes place. When inborn ('natural') potential is nurtured by the way young children play and learn then the skills such as language, self-direction, and cooperation become actual skills.

Self-direction requires nuthin' but gettin' out of the way of the self-director. By 7 months, Junior is scootin' around, explorin', choosin', for his own inscrutable baby reasons, to go here instead of there. He self-directs cuz it's natural for him. No one teaches him diddly.

Now, sure, instruction can refine his reasons, help him discern between wise self-direction and not-so-wise self-direction, but time and experience will offer the same instruction, in an admittedly haphazard way.

It's no different with cooperation.

Language, though, that depends modelin'. The capacity has to be awakened and the language transmitted.

[Harry Baird]

Hello again, denizens of the Philosophy Now forums, after nearly a decade's absence.

I was directed to this thread in late April, and finally finished reading it today, in full, other than that, on rare occasion, I skimmed or skipped posts to which it didn't seem worth paying attention.

It was quite the mammoth undertaking. Biblical, even.

I had thought that, after all that reading, I would contribute meaningfully to the discussion/debate. When it came time to log in though, I thought to myself, "Well, why don't you have a little look back on your past - now ancient! - involvement on this forum before making any putatively meaningful contribution to this thread?"

"Good idea", I responded to myself. And so I did, and, in reading through some of my past contributions, I realised that there was nothing particularly new for me to contribute, and that, to a very large extent, it had all been said before (with respect to all contributors from back then, not just myself).

However, my early reading of the thread had inspired me to some creative writing. I thus propose to contribute to this thread - rather than repeating myself - a play of three acts of three scenes each, scene by scene, each separated (for purposes of increasing anticipation, haha) by a day or a few days.

I am keenly aware that the response from moderators might be: "This content is inappropriate. This is a forum for philosophers, not wannabe playwrights". I will respect any such moderation decision or sentiment. If it is decided that the content is inappropriate, I hope though that I might be allowed to post it elsewhere in full and simply link to it as a whole.

With that said, my next post will be the first scene of nine. Note that as the play was composed early in my reading of the thread, the characters prominent in the thread at that time are not all the same as at the current time. No offence is intended to those left out (nor left in) from two or so hundred posts ago.

[Harry Baird]

The Church of No One Truth (NOT): A Cautionary Tale

A Play of Three Acts of Three Scenes Each

Act one, scene two >>

Act one, scene one

Characters:

Bjorn aGus: the parishioner born again - on his own terms - as AJ.

Pastor Wiola: the clergywoman with wings of lace; rhymes with "viola".

Setting:

Inside the Church of No One Truth (NOT)

Bjorn aGus: Pastor Wiola, might I trouble you?

Pastor Wiola: Why, certainly, parishioner Bjorn aGus. What seems to be the problem?

Bjorn aGus: I think we need to sit down together somewhere, Pastor. This is serious.

Pastor Wiola: Please, parishioner Bjorn aGus, step into my office.

(She opens the door and motions him in, following after him.)

Pastor Wiola: Take a seat.

Bjorn aGus: Oh, I couldn't possibly. They're all so delicately crocheted. I'd ruin them.

Pastor Wiola: Why don't you perch yourself on the corner of my desk then?

Bjorn aGus: I'd be glad to. Usually, it's me who's providing the hard wood, so I always appreciate it when a pastor provides it instead.

(He sits on the corner of her desk, and she sits on her chair behind her desk.)

Pastor Wiola: Now, parishioner Bjorn aGus, please: unburden yourself.

Bjorn aGus: Well, it's about our Commandments.

Pastor Wiola: You mean "Commandment", I presume? In the singular.

Bjorn aGus: That's part of the problem, Pastor Wiola. Doesn't a singular Commandment seem a little... insufficient?

Pastor Wiola: "Thou shalt have no One Truth before thee but the One Truth that there is no One Truth." What could possibly be deficient about that?

Bjorn aGus: The thing is, Pastor Wiola, and I don't want to be heretical like that guy outside wearing the billboard, but... don't you think our Commandment is a little... well... and this is hard to say, but... isn't it possibly, uh, just a little... well, self-contradictory?

Pastor Wiola: Why, parishioner Bjorn aGus, whatever do you mean?

Bjorn aGus: I... uh... well... I... oh, nevermind.

Pastor Wiola: Spit it out, parishioner Bjorn aGus.

Bjorn aGus: Well, I mean, it seems to be saying at once that there is and that there isn't One Truth. I just can't make sense of it. It's really testing my faith.

Pastor Wiola: This is very pleasing to hear, parishioner Bjorn aGus. This represents good progress. You have reached the threshold of the next step on your journey: to recognise the paradoxical nature of reality. You seem ready, then, to recognise that our Commandment is, in fact, a koan.

Bjorn aGus: (Taken aback a little) It is? I thought it might have just been a little badly worded.

Pastor Wiola: Heavens above! We have never had somebody solve the koan so quickly!

Bjorn aGus: (Even more surprised) I solved it?

Pastor Wiola: That's correct, and in record speed.

Bjorn aGus: The solution is that it's badly worded?

Pastor Wiola: Correct, parishioner Bjorn aGus.

Bjorn aGus: Huh. Well, there you go.

Pastor Wiola: You understand the next step in your journey, I presume?

Bjorn aGus: I, uh... I mean... (trailing off)

Pastor Wiola: (A little impatiently) To discern the correct wording, of course!

Bjorn aGus: Oh. I was, uh - I was kind of hoping that we might make some... well, more specific ADDITIONS.

Pastor Wiola: (Laughing) Oh, goodness me, parishioner Bjorn aGus, you are quite the joker. Of course, the aim is not to add but to subtract.

Bjorn aGus: And the paradox?

Pastor Wiola: Yes, yes, that can be done away with too.

Bjorn aGus: It can?

Pastor Wiola: Yes. You will soon discover as much for yourself. Now, unless there's anything else, parishioner Bjorn aGus, I wish you godspeed in your rewarding rewording adventures. Please return when you have achieved success.

(She stands and opens the door for him, and he walks out.)

Act one, scene two >>

[uwot]

Pastor Wiola: (Laughing) Oh, goodness me, parishioner Bjorn aGus, you are quite the joker. Of course, the aim is not to add but to subtract.

Well indeed, keeping all those different gods in ancient Greece and Rome in check, and more urgently their followers, was like herding cats. How much simpler if everyone worshipped the same god?

Bjorn aGus: And the paradox?

Yawn.

[Age]

The Church of No One Truth (NOT): A Cautionary Tale

A Play of Three Acts of Three Scenes Each

Act one, scene one

Characters:

Bjorn aGus: the parishioner born again - on his own terms - as AJ.

Pastor Wiola: the clergywoman with wings of lace; rhymes with "viola".

Setting:

Inside the Church of No One Truth (NOT)

Bjorn aGus: Pastor Wiola, might I trouble you?

Pastor Wiola: Why, certainly, parishioner Bjorn aGus. What seems to be the problem?

Bjorn aGus: I think we need to sit down together somewhere, Pastor. This is serious.

Pastor Wiola: Please, parishioner Bjorn aGus, step into my office.

(She opens the door and motions him in, following after him.)

Pastor Wiola: Take a seat.

Bjorn aGus: Oh, I couldn't possibly. They're all so delicately crocheted. I'd ruin them.

Pastor Wiola: Why don't you perch yourself on the corner of my desk then?

Bjorn aGus: I'd be glad to. Usually, it's me who's providing the hard wood, so I always appreciate it when a pastor provides it instead.

(He sits on the corner of her desk, and she sits on her chair behind her desk.)

Pastor Wiola: Now, parishioner Bjorn aGus, please: unburden yourself.

Bjorn aGus: Well, it's about our Commandments.

Pastor Wiola: You mean "Commandment", I presume? In the singular.

Bjorn aGus: That's part of the problem, Pastor Wiola. Doesn't a singular Commandment seem a little... insufficient?

Pastor Wiola: "Thou shalt have no One Truth before thee but the One Truth that there is no One Truth." What could possibly be deficient about that?

Bjorn aGus: The thing is, Pastor Wiola, and I don't want to be heretical like that guy outside wearing the billboard, but... don't you think our Commandment is a little... well... and this is hard to say, but... isn't it possibly, uh, just a little... well, self-contradictory?

Pastor Wiola: Why, parishioner Bjorn aGus, whatever do you mean?

Bjorn aGus: I... uh... well... I... oh, nevermind.

Pastor Wiola: Spit it out, parishioner Bjorn aGus.

Bjorn aGus: Well, I mean, it seems to be saying at once that there is and that there isn't One Truth. I just can't make sense of it. It's really testing my faith.

Pastor Wiola: This is very pleasing to hear, parishioner Bjorn aGus. This represents good progress. You have reached the threshold of the next step on your journey: to recognise the paradoxical nature of reality. You seem ready, then, to recognise that our Commandment is, in fact, a koan.

Bjorn aGus: (Taken aback a little) It is? I thought it might have just been a little badly worded.

Pastor Wiola: Heavens above! We have never had somebody solve the koan so quickly!

Bjorn aGus: (Even more surprised) I solved it?

Pastor Wiola: That's correct, and in record speed.

Bjorn aGus: The solution is that it's badly worded?

Pastor Wiola: Correct, parishioner Bjorn aGus.

Bjorn aGus: Huh. Well, there you go.

Pastor Wiola: You understand the next step in your journey, I presume?

Bjorn aGus: I, uh... I mean... (trailing off)

Pastor Wiola: (A little impatiently) To discern the correct wording, of course!

Bjorn aGus: Oh. I was, uh - I was kind of hoping that we might make some... well, more specific ADDITIONS.

Pastor Wiola: (Laughing) Oh, goodness me, parishioner Bjorn aGus, you are quite the joker. Of course, the aim is not to add but to subtract.

Bjorn aGus: And the paradox?

Pastor Wiola: Yes, yes, that can be done away with too.

Bjorn aGus: It can?

Pastor Wiola: Yes. You will soon discover as much for yourself. Now, unless there's anything else, parishioner Bjorn aGus, I wish you godspeed in your rewarding rewording adventures. Please return when you have achieved success.

(She stands and opens the door for him, and he walks out.)

Just out of curiosity how would you propose when we have ascertained thee One Truth?

Or, what would you say would be the deciding factor in KNOWING that we have finally obtained thee One Truth?

[Belinda]

Skills such as self -direction and cooperation are potential only unless they are nurtured especially during childhood when most learning takes place. When inborn ('natural') potential is nurtured by the way young children play and learn then the skills such as language, self-direction, and cooperation become actual skills.

Self-direction requires nuthin' but gettin' out of the way of the self-director. By 7 months, Junior is scootin' around, explorin', choosin', for his own inscrutable baby reasons, to go here instead of there. He self-directs cuz it's natural for him. No one teaches him diddly.

Now, sure, instruction can refine his reasons, help him discern between wise self-direction and not-so-wise self-direction, but time and experience will offer the same instruction, in an admittedly haphazard way.

It's no different with cooperation.

Language, though, that depends modelin'. The capacity has to be awakened and the language transmitted.

Some skills are inborn just as you describe. Chomsky claimed that a very basic knowledge of language is inborn. However Junior aged seven months will not scoot around so very much unless his parents give him the space and safety to do so,** and the encouragement of the parents' examples. Junior at age eighteen months will not learn a specific language unless his parents are constantly talking to him in a friendly manner. I wouldn't argue aganst Chomsky! I agree with you about language development.

Junior will breathe, digest his food and adjust his blood pressure without any others around but skills are potentials only, until and unless they are nurtured.

** There's an interesting experiment with a baby at the crawling stage who is set down on a flat floor (no furniture) which has been painted in black and white quadrilateral tile pattern. Except the painted tiles are not all squares but look as if the floor is falling down a precipice. The baby stops short as the 'edge' and will not proceed. So your assumption about Junior age seven months seems largely correct.

What all this has to do with Christianity is that the need for other intelligible beings or Being, is inborn, but which particular satisfaction (religion) of that need is a matter of nurture. Have you seen the film 'Castaway' ? It's a lively illustration of man's basic need for The Other.