Christianity

[Alexis Jacobi]

By all means continue! It seems the "pussy" factor (since you've mentioned it a few times) is as much a metaphysic as any you have to offer or sell.

[Note: I have read you as a virgin still.]

Still, you are very right: certainly those crazy Vedics see every element of our lives in strange but rather logically symbolic ways.

Note that I am contemplating a 15th chapter which will deal on sexual issues at the highest metaphysical level. And I hope to weave-in some pick-up tips, tricks and strategies.

Mr Phallus is a tricky operator!

[phyllo]

The Northern European peoples received Christianity, but modified those tendencies, and built a civilization. My understanding is that the N. European civilization compartmentalized religious world-negation and asceticism to the monks and the monasteries.

Christianity is considered to be nihilistic by some, in spite of these "modifications".

I am not sure if I understand what you are referring to. Nihilism and world-negation are not the same.

It's life-negating because it is obsessed with the afterlife, not life itself.

It's world-negating because it does not value this world, it values another world to come.

It's nihilistic because value and meaning come from the commands and will of a god. They don't come from this world and this life.

So without god, there is no value or meaning. This is expressed by IC and Iambiguous.

[Immanuel Can]

It's life-negating because it is obsessed with the afterlife, not life itself.

Rather, it's life affirming, because it does not make this life so absolute that it turns into a desperate struggle to get the most resources from the most people before death ends all. It offers a context in which a person can see value in not grasping and struggling madly against all others, and can endure some going-without himself, so that he can show some charity and kindness to others without fear of deprivation.

And that's exactly how it's worked out in history: look at the stats on who is doing charitable work, and who is not.

It's world-negating because it does not value this world, it values another world to come.

It's world-affirming because it recognizes this world for what it actually is: a contingent and temporal place, the real payoff of which is yet to come, when the whole of it is redeemed. It does not ask this world to be perfect NOW, but rather sees it as capable of being built toward a better future.

And again, that's exactly how it's worked out in history, you can see.

It's nihilistic because value and meaning come from the commands and will of a god. They don't come from this world and this life.

Yet nobody is every able to say from "this world and this life" what meaning and values would even be. Indeed, as Nietzsche pointed out, what follows from the death of God is the total destruction of all values and meaning.

And again...the great despots who destroyed 140 million people in the last century alone...not one of them was a Christian. If taking values from eternity is so bad, why weren't the great Atheist despots better people?

[Alexis Jacobi]

IC's Evangelical Protestantism is a modern invention, or re-interpretation if you will, a revisitation of Christianity from the vantage of modernity.

From that vantage, and through a sort of reinterpretation of Jesus Christ (his mission, his intention, and thus God's mission and intention) a new sort of Christian idealism comes into focus.

I would not say it is world-negating as former Christian expressions had been. It is rather a very specific attempt to impose a strict moralism on man and the way people live.

But this modern Christian, naturally, gets to do all the fun things too! He can bone his lovely wife in a hundred different positions, but he must keep his libido tightly corralled in his marriage; he can paraglide, motocross, ski, race, and all the rest; he can be a gourmet cook or a deep-sea diver; he can start a raucous rock band and play all the modern progressions as long as the message is Christian and *positive*, non-vulgar and non-Pagan; he can own corporations, be a soldier, indeed he could start and own an arms-manufacture corporation.

Once he has taken that really pretty easy step and is *freed from the consequences of sin* he is free to carry on as all tend to. The focus has become entirely this-world. Heaven has no particular special meaning that I have been able to discern.

[iambiguous]

I told you assholes: there’s more pussy than even Sinatra had in the life-renovation/deep psychic healing business.

On the other hand, look where Keith Raniere ended up.

[iambiguous]

Christianity is considered to be nihilistic by some, in spite of these "modifications".

That's true. Especially this guy: https://knowthyself.forumotion.net/t2330-abrahamism

Over and again, he accuses those who worship and adore the God of Abraham of being nihilists. Which from my own frame of mind makes absolutely no sense. Religions start with the assumption that if you are looking for meaning and purpose in life there is in fact One True Path to both of them. Then fill in the blank with one or another denomination.

But it has nothing to do with "modifications". Instead, it revolves around subsuming moral nihilism in such faiths as Christianity. And with denominations like Christianity, the righteous meaning and purpose that you embody on this side of the grave continues on through all of eternity on the other side of the grave as well.

That is nihilism?!!!

[Dubious]

By all means continue! It seems the "pussy" factor (since you've mentioned it a few times) is as much a metaphysic as any you have to offer or sell.

[Note: I have read you as a virgin still.]

Your metaphysical speculations are astounding! I wonder where do you get all these profound speculations from! I would never wish to deprive you of the sheer joy of visualizing it! Meanwhile, I keep myself pure for the life to come and simply employ my holodeck mind to make up for a temporary deficit!

Note that I am contemplating a 15th chapter which will deal on sexual issues at the highest metaphysical level. And I hope to weave-in some pick-up tips, tricks and strategies.

No doubt it will be the most extended and of utmost precision of all you have given us to ponder! At the highest metaphysical level I'm certain you will never think of letting anyone of your acolytes down!

Will there be pictures?

[Dubious]

The one you're desperately trying to sell.

But I need more information about what, exactly, you see me as *selling*. What exactly is being sold?

What better source for that than thou! To get a clue read some of your own posts. It's not as if I'm the only one who noticed.

[phyllo]

That is nihilism?!!!

It's nihilism because it says that there is no inherent meaning or purpose in the world.

A guy in a uniform or toga has to show up and give you meaning and purpose. But if you just imagine that guy or you are mistaken about him, then there really is no meaning and purpose.

That's what the regular nihilists say ... there is no meaning and purpose in the world and there is no guy.

[Gary Childress]

I think when Christianity becomes too watered down, it isn't really "Christianity" anymore. I think Christianity as rendered through Christ has an essence to be found somewhere among or near the accounts of Christs life, words and deeds that have been preserved, translated and reinterpreted many times in subtle and not so subtle ways. Christ was/is a force of peace to be reckoned with. Whether or not he created the planets, stars, galaxies and everything else in a literal sense is whatever it is. However, in ways, he, along with many others to varying degress, have made today possible, I think.

I think where we are today is better than where we would otherwise be without the peacemakers and tamers of humanity. And we continue to make peace and tame and be tamed as we go, if not to improve, then for no other reason than to maintain what is here now.

To me, the essence of Christianity is forever something that can only be understood in ways but never absolutely defined. And I think that is how it should be.

[iambiguous]

It's nihilistic because value and meaning come from the commands and will of a god. They don't come from this world and this life.

Simply unbelievable!

Well, if I do say so myself.

Nihilism: "the rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless"

Essentially meaningless.

Christianity not only provides mere mortals with a divine meaning and purpose on this side of the grave, this meaning and purpose then continues on for all of eternity on the other side of it.

Many nihilists start with the assumption that precisely because there is no God -- no One True Path to enlightenment, immortality and salvation -- mere mortals "down here" have for centuries sustained endless conflicts regarding possible secular equivalents of God and religion. Ideological, deontological and the like.

So without god, there is no value or meaning. This is expressed by IC and Iambiguous.

What never ceases to amaze me are those here who have engaged in exchanges with me for years and yet still manage to completely misconstrue my thinking regarding meaning and purpose and value given human interactions in a No God world.

I do not argue that there is no meaning or no morality or no value. I suggest instead that given my own rooted existentially in dasein grasp of human interactions in a No God, it seems reasonable to me "here and now" that neither scientists nor philosophers nor ethicists have come up with a moral agenda that all rational and virtuous men and women are obligated to subscribe to.

That, in other words, meaning and purpose and values are ever evolving historically and culturally out in particular worlds understood in ofttimes very different ways by particular people who may well be living very different lives.

And, yes, there may well be a God, the God. Or, if not, there may well be an objective scientific or philosophical morality.

But believing that is one thing, actually demonstrating that this is the case given particular contexts, another thing altogether.

So, the only way his reaction to me makes sense is that above all, he doesn't want to ever believe that my own "fractured and fragmented" moral philosophy might one day become his own. So, for that crucial reason alone I must be wrong!!!

On the other hand, IC does share my own belief that in the absence of God, all things are permitted. That, in other words, the only true antidote to nihilism is God and religion.

On the other other hand, IC claims that beyond a leap of faith or a wager, he has proof that the Christian God does in fact exist. But he refuses to post and to react to those YouTube videos [one by one] here in order to save the souls of those who do not accept Jesus Christ as their own personal savior.

Leading me to suggest that he doesn't even believe this himself.

[iambiguous]

Christianity is considered to be nihilistic by some, in spite of these "modifications".

That's true. Especially this guy: https://knowthyself.forumotion.net/t2330-abrahamism

Over and again, he accuses those who worship and adore the God of Abraham of being nihilists. Which from my own frame of mind makes absolutely no sense. Religions start with the assumption that if you are looking for meaning and purpose in life there is in fact One True Path to both of them. Then fill in the blank with one or another denomination.

But it has nothing to do with "modifications". Instead, it revolves around subsuming moral nihilism in such faiths as Christianity. And with denominations like Christianity, the righteous meaning and purpose that you embody on this side of the grave continues on through all of eternity on the other side of the grave as well.

That is nihilism?!!!

It's nihilism because it says that there is no inherent meaning or purpose in the world.

Yes, that is how I construe moral nihilism myself. No God and no inherent or necessary meaning or purpose in the world. And thus, the ofttimes quoted refrain here: "In the absence of God, all things are permitted".

A guy in a uniform or toga has to show up and give you meaning and purpose. But if you just imagine that guy or you are mistaken about him, then there really is no meaning and purpose.

Okay, but for literally millions and millions of impassioned Christians, the guy in the toga is the real deal. He does provide them with meaning and purpose. And such that not only do they ask themselves "what would Jesus do?" on this side of the grave, they truly do believe that if they do the same their very soul is then granted immortality and salvation for all of eternity after they die.

That's what the regular nihilists say ... there is no meaning and purpose in the world and there is no guy.

Yesh, that's what many nihilists believe. There is no essential meaning. But tons and tons of rooted subjectively in dasein existential meaning. And in the absence of God, why on Earth would they believe otherwise?

That's their whole point!!!

[Dontaskme]

I had 7 new sign-ups today ($10,493.00) and 5-6 drippingly sensuous PMs from girl fans world-wide. I told you assholes: there’s more pussy

I hope you were bold and brave enough to pre-warn those 7 new sign-up's that you were actually conning and scamming them out of their hard earned money, and that without their stupid gullibilty to be willing to pay you for the swindle, you would be nothing and no body just like everyone else, and that your gold plated rolls-royces were just the shiny trinket extras that comes with being a super sized trickster able to get away with stealing money from gullible vulnerable people, who are easily snared into your own self-made web of deception and manipulation, and lies. Poor pussies. If only those pussies had been lionesses, a lionheart would have eaten you alive. A lioness has no agenda except to chew you up and spit you back out, and charge you nothing for the privilege.


.

[phyllo]

Simply unbelievable!

Well, if I do say so myself.

Nihilism: "the rejection of all religious and moral principles, in the belief that life is meaningless"

Essentially meaningless.

You're fractured and fragmented but you respond as if you have the one objective definition and understanding of nihilism.

What never ceases to amaze me are those here who have engaged in exchanges with me for years and yet still manage to completely misconstrue my thinking regarding meaning and purpose and value given human interactions in a No God world.

What's amazing is how little slack you give people.

So, the only way his reaction to me makes sense is that above all, he doesn't want to ever believe that my own "fractured and fragmented" moral philosophy might one day become his own. So, for that crucial reason alone I must be wrong!!!

Nobody is attacking you. Nobody is saying you're wrong. You can safely drop your gloves.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Note: Today 30 June 2023 I have undertaken the writing of my memoirs.

The Epigraph:

Be the flame, not the moth.