My take on Jewish religion

[godelian]

I believe that God is an active Platonic abstraction, which is omnipotent and omniscient, and of whom further attributes have been published by means of revelation.

The Jewish view on God is probably a bit too anthropomorphic to my taste (a bit too much like a human) but I find it generally still a good match for my own beliefs. The Jewish moral theory seems to be consistent and deductively closed, and therefore, suitable for the purpose determining what is right and what is wrong.

Compared to Christianity, Judaism is a breath of fresh air. Judaism exempts you from the absurdities that Christians believe in. Compared to Islam, Judaism is incredibly similar and only differs in details, when these are held under a magnifying glass.

It is not because I find one religion attractive that I find the other ones unattractive. They could have similar characteristics.

Religion is an abstraction. God is abstraction. People, however, are physical beings. Therefore, people are intellectually not particularly interesting to me. In that sense, I am not much interested in the followers of a religion. If you are just a person and not an idea, you are most likely rather irrelevant to me. There are a few exceptions, but these are few and far between.

What do you think about Judaism?

If you junk the unnecessary add-ons in the absurd Christian doctrine, you quickly get something that actually makes sense!

[Gary Childress]

What do you think about Judaism?

Given the way the world is, I think that Judaism and Islam may be a little closer to the Truth than Christianity. I would like to think that God is about love and forgiveness as Christianity claims, but there's much that happens in this world that suggests to me that Christianity isn't true.

With that said, I don't particularly subscribe to any religion. I'm agnostic.

[godelian]

I would like to think that God is about love and forgiveness as Christianity claims, but there's much that happens in this world that suggests to me that Christianity isn't true.

It is actually fine to be hopelessly naive, but why turn that into a religion?

With that said, I don't particularly subscribe to any religion. I'm agnostic.

That seems okay as a starting point for further analysis. However, if you do some additional thinking, you end up dealing with the issue of moral theory. How does that get defined? We are continuously being bombarded by influencers and their manipulative messages. If you do not explicitly state your moral theory, you will end up subconsciously subscribing to mere manipulation that you are being fed left, right, and center. Even ChatGPT subtly tries to manipulate your morality! If you leave the moral space blank, people in power will fill it up with beliefs that only benefit them. Conceptually, there could exist an agnostic moral theory, but in practice there clearly isn't. So, that leaves the situation open to manipulation.

Of course, Christian doctrine was primarily developed to benefit its clergy. It cannot be trusted either. In fact, no doctrine that fails to be consistent and deductively closed can be trusted. There is a reason why it is inconsistent. There is a reason why it lacks deductively closure. That is exactly the place where the clergy will insert manipulative word salads.

Disbelief is fantastically useful. However, disbelief should first and foremost be targeted at the fake moral doctrines that are being promoted. It is not enough to reject the false belief in the fake divinity of a hominid and his single mother. It is also necessary and even more important to reject the fake Christian moral doctrine. The term "agnostic" does not point that out. In my opinion, you may actually not disbelieve enough. There is so much more to disbelieve and to reject. Other people want to profit from the fact that they have misled you concerning right and wrong. That is why, in my opinion, an "agnostic" is not "agnostic" enough. An "agnostic" seems to focus his agnosticism on things that may not even matter particularly much.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Anything makes sense once you believe it. But you cannot get to belief by sense.Judaism is relatively harmless as it doesn't proselytize. But it informs Zionism.

[Gary Childress]

I would like to think that God is about love and forgiveness as Christianity claims, but there's much that happens in this world that suggests to me that Christianity isn't true.

It is actually fine to be hopelessly naive, but why turn that into a religion?

As I allude to it's probably wishful thinking that motivates most Christians, perhaps often, but not necessarily always in a cynical sense that they are just using it to their own advantage. I think most of us would like the world to be a non-violent and safe place. It's not morally wrong to be pacifist--if one were able to consistently apply it to one's own behavior. As you seem to say, though, it seems to be all but impossible in practice for even the closest adherents of Christianity to fully conform to their (professed) beliefs. That causes a lot of consternation, guilt, and cognitive dissonance.

[godelian]

Anything makes sense once you believe it.

No, because the belief could be inconsistent:

ChatGPT: Does every theory have a model?

Not every theory has a model. Whether a theory has a model depends on whether it is consistent.

Here's the distinction:
A theory is a set of sentences (formulas) in a formal language.
A model is a structure that assigns meaning to the symbols in the language and makes all the sentences in the theory true.
A theory is satisfiable (i.e. it has a model) if there exists at least one structure in which all the sentences are true.

Key point:

If a theory is inconsistent, then it has no model. In classical logic, from an inconsistent theory, everything follows (principle of explosion), so no structure can satisfy all the sentences simultaneously. If a theory is consistent, then under certain conditions, it does have a model. This is formalized by the Completeness Theorem (for first-order logic), which says:

A first-order theory is satisfiable (has a model) if and only if it is syntactically consistent.

So, in first-order logic, every consistent theory has a model.

Would you like an example of a theory that has no model?

If deductive activity leads to contradictions, the belief does not make sense, regardless of whether you believe it or not.

But you cannot get to belief by sense.Judaism is relatively harmless as it doesn't proselytize.

The foundations of the belief system are fully documented. So, anybody can download and investigate it. If they think that it is useful, they could even use it to deductively figure out what is right and wrong. The goal of religion is not necessarily to participate in collective rituals. You may just be interested in a consistent argument as to why particular behavior is deemed right or wrong according to objectively documented criteria.

We live at the end stage of a highly corrupt civilization in which moral behavior is often depicted as immoral, and the other way around. From the day you were born, powerful manipulators have spent effort convincing you of their new unsustainable brand of right and wrong. Therefore, you cannot trust your own upbringing. That is why it makes sense to use documentation that long predates the depravity of modern society.

But it informs Zionism.

I am not so sure about that. That would be similar to saying that Catholicism inspired Adolf Hitler, because he was a Catholic.

ChatGPT: Is Zionism compatible with traditional (orthodox) Judaism?

Haredi (Ultra-Orthodox) Anti-Zionists
Often see Zionism, especially in its secular form, as heretical or rebellious against God’s will.
Classical Jewish thought held that Jews were to wait for the Messiah to return to Israel, not force redemption through political means.
Cite the Talmudic "Three Oaths" (Ketubot 111a), which caution against mass immigration to Israel or rebelling against the nations.
Groups like Neturei Karta and some in Satmar Hasidism oppose the modern State of Israel.

The more traditional and the more orthodox the strand of Judaism, the less it likes Zionism.

[godelian]

I think most of us would like the world to be a non-violent and safe place.

Nature itself is not a non-violent or safe place. On the contrary, it is full of violence. Concerning primates, on average 2% of all primates die from internecine violence. That is the case for humans, but also for chimps, baboons, and so on. For mammals as a whole, it is just 0.3%. We are much more violent to each other than other mammals. The reason why nature is the way it is, always boils down to the fact that it is instrumental to our survival as a species. In other words, if there were no need for the extra violence, it would not even exist. This means that any attempt at reducing the casualty rate of internecine violence from 2% to 0.3% would almost surely lead to our complete destruction and disappearance as a species.

[Gary Childress]

I think most of us would like the world to be a non-violent and safe place.

Nature itself is not a non-violent or safe place. On the contrary, it is full of violence. Concerning primates, on average 2% of all primates die from internecine violence. That is the case for humans, but also for chimps, baboons, and so on. For mammals as a whole, it is just 0.3%. We are much more violent to each other than other mammals. The reason why nature is the way it is, always boils down to the fact that it is instrumental to our survival as a species. In other words, if there were no need for the extra violence, it would not even exist. This means that any attempt at reducing the casualty rate of internecine violence from 2% to 0.3% would almost surely lead to our complete destruction and disappearance as a species.

Is that (in red) an assumption or is there evidence to support the belief that reducing the casualty rate of internecine violence would lead to our complete destruction?

[godelian]

I think most of us would like the world to be a non-violent and safe place.

Nature itself is not a non-violent or safe place. On the contrary, it is full of violence. Concerning primates, on average 2% of all primates die from internecine violence. That is the case for humans, but also for chimps, baboons, and so on. For mammals as a whole, it is just 0.3%. We are much more violent to each other than other mammals. The reason why nature is the way it is, always boils down to the fact that it is instrumental to our survival as a species. In other words, if there were no need for the extra violence, it would not even exist. This means that any attempt at reducing the casualty rate of internecine violence from 2% to 0.3% would almost surely lead to our complete destruction and disappearance as a species.

Is that (in red) an assumption or is there evidence to support the belief that reducing the casualty rate of internecine violence would lead to our complete destruction?

Unfortunately, we do not have the opportunity to test such hypothesis.

Manipulating the input parameter of internecine violence is simply not feasible.

We just know that fundamental changes to biology typically fail. Therefore, we are even inclined to avoid trying to make such changes. For example, we can now clearly witness why in the past so many people put up such resistance against radical changes in traditional gender roles. The birth rate has dropped far below replacement level and is still dropping rapidly. With the population aging rapidly,we can safely predict that this will soon have quite destructive societal consequences. Every society that has this problem will simply go bankrupt. Of course, I will have no evidence of this until the inevitable finally happens.

[Gary Childress]

Nature itself is not a non-violent or safe place. On the contrary, it is full of violence. Concerning primates, on average 2% of all primates die from internecine violence. That is the case for humans, but also for chimps, baboons, and so on. For mammals as a whole, it is just 0.3%. We are much more violent to each other than other mammals. The reason why nature is the way it is, always boils down to the fact that it is instrumental to our survival as a species. In other words, if there were no need for the extra violence, it would not even exist. This means that any attempt at reducing the casualty rate of internecine violence from 2% to 0.3% would almost surely lead to our complete destruction and disappearance as a species.

Is that (in red) an assumption or is there evidence to support the belief that reducing the casualty rate of internecine violence would lead to our complete destruction?

Unfortunately, we do not have the opportunity to test such hypothesis.

Manipulating the input parameter of internecine violence is simply not feasible.

We just know that fundamental changes to biology typically fail. Therefore, we are even inclined to avoid trying to make such changes. For example, we can now clearly witness why in the past so many people put up such resistance against radical changes in traditional gender roles. The birth rate has dropped far below replacement level and is still dropping rapidly. With the population aging rapidly,we can safely predict that this will soon have quite destructive societal consequences. Every society that has this problem will simply go bankrupt. Of course, I will have no evidence of this until the inevitable finally happens.

When you say, "traditional gender roles" do you mean, for example, women staying at home and men working paid jobs outside of the home? Or what do you mean by "traditional gender roles"?

Considering that there are over 8 billion people in the world and considering the impact it's having on resources like fresh water, and arable land, and the impact on the environment in terms of pollution, habitat destruction, and carbon emissions, dropping below replacement rates may not be a bad thing at the moment. It may be for economists who believe in artificially stimulating growth for the purpose of perpetuating market profit or for people who are afraid of other population groups "taking over" and think that pumping babies out is a matter of necessity. Otherwise, the world could probably benefit from stabilizing population and even decreasing it. Quality of life is important for human beings too, not just quantity of life. People enjoy having the wild spaces in the world also. Plus trees are important for oxygen production.

[godelian]

the world could probably benefit from stabilizing population and even decreasing it.

Possibly. However, it would require a much slower decrease in population. It would also require a different social and economic structure. More traditional families would certainly be able to handle it much better. It looks like we are going to end up with a large demographic of aging singleton/atomized individuals that nobody will take care of in their old age -- no offspring -- while the government will also not have any money for that.

[Gary Childress]

the world could probably benefit from stabilizing population and even decreasing it.

Possibly. However, it would require a much slower decrease in population. It would also require a different social and economic structure. More traditional families would certainly be able to handle it much better. It looks like we are going to end up with a large demographic of aging singleton/atomized individuals that nobody will take care of in their old age -- no offspring -- while the government will also not have any money for that.

Well, I agree that a slow decrease is preferable to a fast one. And a traditional family structure seems like it ought to be a solid foundation on which a person can retire and decline into old age. Those make good sense.

[attofishpi]

What do you think about Judaism?

Given the way the world is, I think that Judaism and Islam may be a little closer to the Truth than Christianity. I would like to think that God is about love and forgiveness as Christianity claims, but there's much that happens in this world that suggests to me that Christianity isn't true.

With that said, I don't particularly subscribe to any religion. I'm agnostic.

Every c^nt that doesn't have gnosis is agnostic - including yer Muzzlem friend here.

IF the entire world agreed and accorded by what Christ taught, you'd have something close to heaven on Earth.

IF the entire world agreed and accorded by what MorHamMad taught, you'd have paedophilia and women as sub servants to men.

Make a fucking choice. Oooo i'm AGNOSTIC!! --- SO IS EVERY BELIEVER/NON-BELIEVER

[godelian]

Every c^nt that doesn't have gnosis is agnostic - including yer Muzzlem friend here.

I think that agnosticism is perfectly fine. I believe in the existence of God, not because of an irrefutable argument, but because of intuition. To me, it is perfectly understandable that someone is not adamant on his position concerning the matter. He may indeed be undecided.

Make a fucking choice.

There is no immediate pressure to make that choice. Seriously, what's wrong with hesitating if you are not sure? I cannot provide him with an irrefutable argument because I simply do not have one. I personally "feel better" by believing in God. There is nothing objective about that. That is simply not an argument to convince anyone else with.

[Gary Childress]

IF the entire world agreed and accorded by what Christ taught, you'd have something close to heaven on Earth.

Maybe that's true. However, as long as there are those who will take advantage of the meek who live according to Christ, then it's only going to be heaven on Earth for the aggressive, greedy, and militaristic.

I don't feel the spirit of Christ in me. I go to a Christian based recovery group and I don't feel at home there. Everything seems artificial to me. I don't feel Christ's call, if there is such a thing. Would you like me to lie and pretend that I believe?