Philosophy Now Forum

godelian wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 5:48 am Nowadays, in the West, the divorce judge will routinely rule that she can stop providing you with anything at all but you must still continue to provide financial-tension relief.

From there on, it effectively becomes something for nothing.

In the West, this practice has led to a pretty much complete distrust of not just marriage but of all the laws in the West.

A common myth. Alimony is awarded in only about 10% of divorces, is typically temporary and usually is only awarded after long term marriages.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 2:49 pm Well, there's no question the law favours the woman over the man in divorce proceedings, to an absurd excess.
...
I find those Western men who are attracted to Islam are overreacting.

Well, yeah. overreacting is part of the struggle against the absurd.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 2:49 pm understandable for an angry, frustrated man who feels weakened and humiliated by a Western system that is corrupted and biased against him.

There are dozens of millions of men in the West with an axe to grind. Unfortunately, they are pretty much useless to me because they won't unite and do what it takes to solve the problem.

Muslims are much more useful in that regard. There is a common understanding in Islam that the ruling mafia has no authority to overrule the laws of God. That allows me to select them as the preferred power structure that will enforce sanity in a world of absurdity. Someone has to do something about the problem, and you cannot make an omelet without breaking eggs

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 2:49 pm The man gains an angry cadre of supporters (the Islamists), but he loses his own soul to a death-cult driven by hatred -- a bad bargain, to be sure.

Their seething anger and deep hatred of injustice is eminently useful. It has the potential to solve a lot of problems, such as the problem of bringing back some justice. It is a fantastic bargain. The Islamic scriptures promise paradise to whomever dies head up high as a martyr for the cause of divine justice.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 2:49 pm I've always thought that the truly strong man is not the aggressive one, but the one who has so much power he always knows he does not need to overreact and become militant or hateful.

I am not particularly hateful. I was rather talking about a strategy of harnessing and repurposing other people's hatred for an otherwise good cause. Energy is precious. It would be silly to let it go to waste.

You see, the adversary has lost the mandate of heaven. This means that he has no longer a monopoly on the use of violence. That is why the road is now wide open for decisive countervailing measures. There is no appeasing the ruling mafia in the West. The solution is to deport them again from Kabul airport.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 2:49 pm They've let the injustices perpetrated against them turn them into bad, resentful, vicious men.

The laws of God and nature will always end up regaining the upper hand. It is no longer about any woman. We are long past that stage.

It is about geopolitics. It is about encouraging the Russian federation to do what it should have done a long time ago already, which is to attack and destroy NATO.

It is about eradicating the dollar.

It is about turning BRICS into an anti-western military alliance. It is about getting Iran to destroy the American naval carrier groups in the eastern Mediterranean. It is about China restoring its sovereignty over their rebellious province of Taiwan.

These are all geopolitical goals that need to be achieved. There are a lot of people who want this. Together and as a united front we can make it happen.

godelian wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 4:51 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 2:49 pm Well, there's no question the law favours the woman over the man in divorce proceedings, to an absurd excess.
...
I find those Western men who are attracted to Islam are overreacting.

Well, yeah. overreacting is part of the struggle against the absurd.

It's a bad reaction. It's makes everybody absurd.

There is a common understanding in Islam that the ruling mafia has no authority to overrule the laws of God.

But what they call Allah's "law" permits the raping of children, and the beating of women, the killing of Jews and Christians, terrorism, hatred, conquest, racism, slavery... You're joining the wrong team. These are not the people who are going to make anything better. You won't find a single place in the world where Islam is making things good. It doesn't do that. It just foments hatred.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Tue Jul 16, 2024 2:49 pm The man gains an angry cadre of supporters (the Islamists), but he loses his own soul to a death-cult driven by hatred -- a bad bargain, to be sure.

Their seething anger and deep hatred of injustice is eminently useful. It has the potential to solve a lot of problems, such as the problem of bringing back some justice.

I don't see a single Islamic state where this has happened.

The Islamic scriptures promise paradise to whomever dies head up high as a martyr for the cause of divine justice.

Seventy two "virgins" in an eternal seraglio? You really believe that's how it works? And you think that's a 'god' you want to follow?

You see, the adversary has lost the mandate of heaven. This means that he has no longer a monopoly on the use of violence.

But most people have done no "violence" to you or to Islam. What this makes you, then, is as bad as anybody who's done "violence" to you. Like them, you've become an angry, vicious person bent on hurting those who have done you no harm. Calling it "submitting" them doesn't make it not murder, rape and extortion.

Ironically, anybody who turns to that kind of solution is just proving to their abusers that the abuse was warranted. They can point at the now-vicious respondent, and say, "You see? I told you he was the kind of person you couldn't trust. Look how vicious and vindictive he is...we were right to abuse him."

Violence only begets more violence. Don't adopt the methods of evil people. That's never a way to win. The only way to really win is to play a very different game than they want to play, one with much better rules, with much higher moral standards. Islam's not it.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am But most people have done no "violence" to you or to Islam.

It is about the ruling mafia in the West. They are very violent. That is why they urgently need a taste of their own medicine. You see, if the men in the West do not rein them in, someone else will.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am Violence only begets more violence.

If that were the case, then why does the ruling mafia want a monopoly on violence?

Public law and order simply require the use of violence. Reining in a ruling mafia in the West requires it too. The only question left is, who is going to do it?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am Don't adopt the methods of evil people.

So, the ruler and his monopoly on violence are always evil? Unfortunately, human society needs a ruler. You are advocating anarchy here. I don't believe that anarchy will ever work.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am That's never a way to win.

And how did they defeat Nazi Germany in that case? By sending them flowers?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am The only way to really win is to play a very different game than they want to play, one with much better rules, with much higher moral standards. Islam's not it.

There is no more legitimate way of getting rid of a ruling mafia than by confronting it in battle. Islam is eminently suitable as a doctrine in that context. Even the Nazis admitted that Islam is a superior religion when it comes to motivating soldiers:

https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/arts ... with-islam

Both Hitler and Himmler had a soft spot for Islam. Hitler several times fantasized that, if the Saracens had not been stopped at the Battle of Tours, Islam would have spread through the European continent—and that would have been a good thing, since “Jewish Christianity” wouldn’t have gone on to poison Europe. Christianity doted on weakness and suffering, while Islam extolled strength, Hitler believed. Himmler in a January 1944 speech called Islam “a practical and attractive religion for soldiers,” with its promise of paradise and beautiful women for brave martyrs after their death. “This is the kind of language a soldier understands,” Himmler gushed.

Islam is a tool that is very suitable for its purpose. The hammer is Islam while the nail is the arrogance of the ruling mafia in the West.

The men in the West won't solve the problem, because otherwise they would have done so already. But then again, they won't fight for their ruling mafia either, which is a good thing.

As I have mentioned already, it makes sense to let the Russian Federation and China weaken the enemy during the preliminary game, i e. the prelude. I can also see a useful role for second-tier players such as Iran and North Korea.

The ruling mafia in the West want to enforce their bullshit onto others. So, let them prove that they are willing to risk their lives and die for what they believe in.

There are two main problems with your attempts at moralizing.

First of all, there is no morality in geopolitics. There are not even friends. There are only interests.

Secondly, at the individual level, which is the only level where morality is actually relevant, as far as I am concerned, all morality emanates from the laws of the Almighty.

Therefore, if you manage to argue that a particular statement necessarily follows from the Islamic scriptures and that there is consensus amongst the scholars on such ruling, only then I will acknowledge it as valid.

It is exactly the same as what Martin Luther argued at his trial in front of his highness, Charles V, emperor of the holy Roman empire:

If you can show me through scripture and reason that I am mistaken, I will retract what I have written.

However, since I also accept the answer that the Holy Apostolic Church gave to Luther in this regard, you cannot argue on the basis of the Christian scriptures:

The Bible itself is the arsenal whence every evil heresiarch from the past has drawn his deceptive arguments.

Moralizing in absence of system-wide premises, such as scriptures, does not work on me. I consider morality to be an axiomatic discipline. Without moral axioms no moral theory. Without moral theory no moral theorems, i.e. moral rulings.

Therefore, I must reject your moral arguments on grounds of being baseless and substantiated. They are simply in violation of the axiomatic nature of morality.

godelian wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 2:53 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am But most people have done no "violence" to you or to Islam.

It is about the ruling mafia in the West. They are very violent. That is why they urgently need a taste of their own medicine. You see, if the men in the West do not rein them in, someone else will.

It's not "the ruling mafia" that the Islamists are killing. They're killing civilians, people like you who are struggling under their cruelty. And you'll never get at those elites by violence, deception and cruelty; that's their game, and nobody else plays it as well as they do.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am Violence only begets more violence.

If that were the case, then why does the ruling mafia want a monopoly on violence?

It gets them what they want: power.

Public law and order simply require the use of violence.

No. What it requires is the presence of authority. Legitimate authority uses justice, not violence, to preserve order.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am Don't adopt the methods of evil people.

So, the ruler and his monopoly on violence are always evil?

"The ruler"? Who's that?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am That's never a way to win.

And how did they defeat Nazi Germany in that case? By sending them flowers?

The jury's still out on who "won" that war. I'd say that ultimately, any victories on any side have proved temporary. And the residual problem has always been the same: how to create order and peace instead of perpetual conflict. Mankind's not good at making any durable peace. All the arrangements after the war failed...the division of Germany, attempts at "world policing," the ensuing Cold War power structure, the arms race, nuclear brinkmanship, Vietnam, the rise of China, postcolonialism, the United Nations, NATO, globalism and the Middle East...it's an awful mess and getting worse.

It's very easy to create violence. It's much more demanding to build a civilization. How are we doing?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:37 am The only way to really win is to play a very different game than they want to play, one with much better rules, with much higher moral standards. Islam's not it.

There is no more legitimate way of getting rid of a ruling mafia than by confronting it in battle.

No, all you create then is the same tyranny with a new "boss."

Both Hitler and Himmler had a soft spot for Islam.

Wow. Is that ever a bad endorsement for Islam.

But I see what they have in common: authoritarianism, dogmatism, cruelty, murder, conquest...

The hammer is Islam while the nail is the arrogance of the ruling mafia in the West.

Islam's a doomed desert-dogma. The violence it wants to do, it clearly cannot do. Grinding its teeth in impotent rage is its default mode. But we're not going back to being 6th century Arab tribesmen. That's never going to happen. Wherever Islam achieves dominance, it instantly becomes corrupt, autocratic and cruel. There are no exceptional cases to that.

The men in the West won't solve the problem,

No, they won't. But Islam will only make things immeasurably worse.

First of all, there is no morality in geopolitics. There are not even friends. There are only interests.

Have you considered that this is exactly why geopolitics are such utter failures? They are not governed by any morality. The solution is not to counterpoise against them another immoral system. That just makes the immorality worse...and conflictual, as well.

You fight immorality by becoming moral. You don't fight it by getting down in the dirt with it and rolling around.

...all morality emanates from the laws of the Almighty.

That is true. So why has Islam failed so miserably at being moral? Because it worships the wrong god, a god of desert conquest, murder, repression, submission, fatalism and cruelty.

Therefore, if you manage to argue that a particular statement necessarily follows from the Islamic scriptures and that there is consensus amongst the scholars on such ruling, only then I will acknowledge it as valid.

I've read the Koran. I know how it was compiled. I know somewhat of the Haddiths, too. And I know Islamic scholarship somewhat. And I understand the attraction to disenfranchised males; it offers them an excuse for violence, and tells them they're heroes for acting on their desire for revenge. It decorates murder and repression with golden lights. But what it's really doing is just playing to the very worst instincts men have.

And you can see exactly what Islam is. It is exactly the same as what Martin Luther...

Actually, Islam is the Catholic Church, in that story. Islam is the autocratic, sclerotic and morally-bankrupt establishment, and Luther is in the role of an accused "infidel," with his head on the line. Islam is the agency that tells you that you can't understand the Koran, and you have to obey your imams instead, just as the Catholic Church enforced the authority of the priesthood. Islam is the agency that is using violence against anybody who resists it, just as the Catholic Church had been doing. They are of-a-piece in those respects.

Actually, I do wish everybody would read the Koran, and read it by themselves, with an open mind. Because I think then that nobody would be a Muslim. They'd see what it is, and they'd realize they were being had. But if they doubt, all they have to do is look at what Islam does. Look at all the countries where it rules, without exception: they are pits of misery and oppression, ruled by luxuriating fat-cats who trumpet Islamic dogma but gorge themselves on victims. Look at what Iran is doing, and what Hamas did in southern Israel. Murder, kidnapping, torture, rape, children in ovens...How can that be the way forward? Seriously????

Use your own moral sense, if you can: if the problem with the West is its violence, then how is Islamic violence not exactly morally faulty in the same way? If Christians employed violence, as, for example, the Catholic Church did, would they be morally right or wrong?

But there's a difference: only disobedient "Christian" can use violence, because the Carpenter of Galilee explicitly and repeatedly forbade his followers from doing so, and laid down for them a personal example of mercy and self-sacrifice. But Islamists, when they kill, rape, extort, conquest, force conversion, take slaves, and so on, are doing what Mohammed himself did, and what he commanded them to do.

That's quite a difference.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm It's not "the ruling mafia" that the Islamists are killing.

It depends on which ones we are talking about. I admire the ones who unceremoniously deported NATO from Kabul airport. They did something much better than killing them. They masterfully humiliated them.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm "The ruler"? Who's that?

Elephants have a matriarch. Wolves have an alpha male and female. Bees have a queen. Humans have a mafia boss.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm And the residual problem has always been the same: how to create order and peace instead of perpetual conflict. Mankind's not good at making any durable peace. All the arrangements after the war failed

War is fundamentally part of human nature. It is a continuation of the mating season. Animals fight each other individually every year during the mating season. Humans form groups to do essentially the same thing. The original goal was to confiscate territory and females. It is impossible to get rid of war for the same reason why it is impossible to stop bulls from fighting over mating rights during the mating season.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Wow. Is that ever a bad endorsement for Islam.

Someone may have led an upright life for decades until the five minutes in which he murders someone. Now he is a murderer. This person was fine for 99% of the time. The same holds true for the Nazis. You only need to get it wrong for 1% of the time to go into history as great evil. I am fine with the 99% of the time that they were not doing something really bad. There are no people who are 99% evil. That does not exist because they would not survive.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But I see what they have in common: authoritarianism, dogmatism, cruelty, murder, conquest...

Moses arguably did that too. So?
Again, there is no morality in geopolitics. It only applies at the individual level.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Grinding its teeth in impotent rage is its default mode. But we're not going back to being 6th century Arab tribesmen. That's never going to happen.

Calling Islam 6th-century tribesmen would be the same as calling Christianity 2000-year old Jewish fishermen and beggars.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm You fight immorality by becoming moral. You don't fight it by getting down in the dirt with it and rolling around.

Any examples in geopolitics in which your approach has yielded favorable results?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm So why has Islam failed so miserably at being moral?

Islam is a definition for morality. You can accept or reject that definition. What you are doing, is to call something like the ten commandments moral or immoral. In reference to what other morality are you doing that?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm I've read the Koran. I know how it was compiled. I know somewhat of the Haddiths, too. And I know Islamic scholarship somewhat.

That is irrelevant. I have explained what kind of moral rulings I deem to be receivable. That is not up for negotiation. I will never change these requirements. You sound a bit like women who complain about male preferences on Tiktok. While men perfectly accept that women prefer tall men with lots of money, women feel offended and argue over the fact that men prefer women to be young and with a low body count. These things are not up for negotiation. I only accept moral rulings of a particular type. I reject all other moral rulings. Take it or leave it.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm you have to obey your imams

It is a religion. It is not a ruling mafia. There is absolutely no enforcement at play. If a Muslim does not want to listen to any imam, who exactly is going to stop him from doing that?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm just as the Catholic Church enforced the authority of the priesthood. Islam is the agency that is using violence against anybody who resists it, just as the Catholic Church had been doing.

It is not the Catholic Church who did that. They would not have been able to do that. It is the ruling mafia who did it:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_the_Silent

According to the Apology, William's letter of justification, which was published and read to the States General in December 1580, his resolve to expel the Spaniards from the Netherlands had originated when, in the summer of 1559, he and the Duke of Alba had been sent to France as hostages for the proper fulfilment of the Treaty of Cateau-Cambrésis following the Hispano-French war. During his stay in Paris, on a hunting trip to the Bois de Vincennes, King Henry II of France started to discuss with William a secret understanding between Philip II and himself aimed at the violent extermination of Protestantism in France, the Netherlands "and the entire Christian world".[11] The understanding was being negotiated by Alba, and Henry had assumed, incorrectly, that William was aware of it. At the time, William did not contradict the king's assumption, but he had decided for himself that he would not allow the slaughter of "so many honourable people", especially in the Netherlands, for which he felt a strong compassion.[12]

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm They are of-a-piece in those respects.

No ruler in Islam has ever been in the situation of William the Silent.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Look at all the countries where it rules, without exception: they are pits of misery and oppression

It takes less than a generation to change the economic conditions of a country from poor to rich. The other way around takes a week. In the greater light of things, the economy does not matter. Furthermore, there are wealthy Arab Gulf countries. Lots of people around the world love Dubai. They dream of living there.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Use your own moral sense, if you can

I have already explained how morality works for me. It is non-negotiable. You keep sounding like women on Tiktok who cannot accept that men also have preferences.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But there's a difference: only disobedient "Christian" can use violence, because the Carpenter of Galilee explicitly and repeatedly forbade his followers from doing so, and laid down for them a personal example of mercy and self-sacrifice.

He didn't forbid the use of violence. He could himself not use violence because the place was governed by the Roman empire which would not have tolerated it. Moses used violence because he could. Christ did not use violence because he couldn't.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But Islamists, when they kill, rape, extort, conquest, force conversion, take slaves, and so on, are doing what Mohammed himself did, and what he commanded them to do.

There are no forced conversions in Islam.

If as a bull, you defeat another bull in battle, you can mate with his cows. According to the rules of the human mating season, i.e. war, having sexual intercourse with captive females is equally permissible. In fact, if you don't, you will find that the females themselves will disagree. If you defeat their men in battle, they end up without protection. The only way for them to reestablish protection, is to submit to the winners. Women typically do not even want to go back to their defeated men, if they are still alive. A man who has been defeated in front of his woman, typically doesn't want to take her back either.

godelian wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 4:35 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm It's not "the ruling mafia" that the Islamists are killing.

It depends on which ones we are talking about. I admire the ones who unceremoniously deported NATO from Kabul airport. They did something much better than killing them. They masterfully humiliated them.

You've missed the point, really. America was already leaving Afghanistan. The disorder that ensued was a result of the Biden administration grossly mismanaging the end of the pull-out.

And the reason they did it the way they did it was to dump all their military equipment, I think. For that military equipment will now be replaced by newer, more expensive military equipment, which will be done at the cost of the ordinary American taxpayer, and will also then be burned up in Ukraine, which is their new money-laundering and kick back operation. The Dems are done with Afghanistan. Having achieved their military-dump, they had no further care for the people of Afghanistan, but turned them back over to their oppressors.

Remember the hapless Afghanis falling off the wheels and wings of airplanes? If the Taliban is so wonderful, why did they so desperately want to leave? And who died as a result?

So what you witnessed is the most corrupt among the Western corrupt winning again. And once again, the losers were both the Afghanis and the ordinary American people.

Don't mistake the superficial for the deep truth. If the Americans had wanted to stay, they had the means to do it. If they wanted to pull their equipment out, they could have done it -- easily. What they did was exactly what they wanted to do.

So why are you praising something in which the most corrupt in the West won?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm

"The ruler"? Who's that?

Elephants have a matriarch.

That's primitive. It's tribal. It's a completely non-functional way to imagine the international situation for the globe. Elephants don't have republics, or democracies, or even libertarian anarchies. They have herds.

I understand why that would appeal to Islam. But Islam's still living in the tribal desert in the 6th Century, ideologically-speaking.

War is fundamentally part of human nature.

So is prostitution. So is exploitation. So is theft. There's no light in this observation, therefore.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But I see what they have in common: authoritarianism, dogmatism, cruelty, murder, conquest...

Moses arguably did that too. So?

When?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Grinding its teeth in impotent rage is its default mode. But we're not going back to being 6th century Arab tribesmen. That's never going to happen.

Calling Islam 6th-century tribesmen would be the same as calling Christianity 2000-year old Jewish fishermen and beggars.

No, because Christianity has already proved the utility of its ethics for two thousand years of applications, and throughout the modernization of the world. Islam's still stuck in tribal-think from the 6th Century: it's totally unequipped to apply to the modern world.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm You fight immorality by becoming moral. You don't fight it by getting down in the dirt with it and rolling around.

Any examples in geopolitics in which your approach has yielded favorable results?

"In geopolitics"? Well, geopolitics is a corrupt game. I quote the famous philospher "Sting," who once wrote, "There is no political solution / To our troubled evolution / Have no faith in constitution / There is no bloody revolution / We are spirits in the material world."

Not bad, that.

Christianity has had excellent effects, though, at the national political level, and at the institutional level. It's allowed such things as "natural rights" to be incorporated into political thinking, and the belief in the value-equality of persons, the creation of social-support networks, the promotion of the vulnerable, particularly in the rights of women and children, and in the moral structure of the judicial system -- although as Christianity has been rejected at the political level, all these things have begun to decay in the West.

Where morality pays off increases as we move toward the personal. In terms of communities, it has proved capable of both stabilizing them and of still allowing progress. In personal terms, well, that's really where it's paid off: it's generated the most charity in the history of the world, by far. It's renovated billions of lives, including such feats a recovering people from addiction and criminality. It's sponsored more educational initiatives than anything else in history....

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm So why has Islam failed so miserably at being moral?

Islam is a definition for morality.

How is slitting throats, raping civilians, driving planes into towers, beating women and molesting children...how are these things "moral"?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm I've read the Koran. I know how it was compiled. I know somewhat of the Haddiths, too. And I know Islamic scholarship somewhat.

That is irrelevant.

Not at all.

I will never change these requirements.

Stubbornness is not loyalty. It's not a virtue. If Allah were great, he would not need you to close your mind in order to be able to continue to believe. But Allah seems to need the violence of cowards, like those who gunned down helpless civilians in the Bataclan, in order to keep up his reputation. I cannot admire that. It's truly awful.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm you have to obey your imams

It is a religion.

Religions are not all autocratic. It's not part of the definition.

There is absolutely no enforcement at play.

That's taqqiya. We have all seen Islamists kill people who disagree with them.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm ...just as the Catholic Church enforced the authority of the priesthood. Islam is the agency that is using violence against anybody who resists it, just as the Catholic Church had been doing.

It is not the Catholic Church who did that. [/quote]
It certainly was.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Look at all the countries where it rules, without exception: they are pits of misery and oppression

It takes less than a generation to change the economic conditions of a country from poor to rich.

Islam has never done it. They have made their leaders rich, to be sure...but everybody else miserable. And women, children and dissenters...miserable beyond all belief.

You keep sounding like women on Tiktok who cannot accept that men also have preferences.

I'm not contesting your right to have a preference. I'm just pointing out that your preference will not lead to peace, happiness, prosperity, human rights...

And that's true. A man faces the facts. So I'm hoping you'll face them, instead of just saying, "Well, I've made my choice, so now I'm not going to think anymore." As I said earlier, I don't find such fearful retrenchment to be a mark of manliness. A man can handle the truth. So I'm hoping you can.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But there's a difference: only disobedient "Christian" can use violence, because the Carpenter of Galilee explicitly and repeatedly forbade his followers from doing so, and laid down for them a personal example of mercy and self-sacrifice.

He didn't forbid the use of violence.

He did more. He said, "You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love those who love you, what reward will you get? Are not even the tax collectors doing that? And if you greet only your own people, what are you doing more than others? Do not even pagans do that?" (Matt. 5)

Now, keep in mind: this is the One whom Mohammed himself is said to have declared a true prophet. For the Koran says,

"And when the angels said: 'O Mary! Allah gives you the glad tidings of a word from Him: his name shall be Messiah, Jesus, the son of Mary. He shall be highly honoured in this world and in the Next, and shall be one of those near to Allah. And he shall speak to men in the cradle and also later when he grows to maturity and shall indeed be among the righteous.

She said: 'O my Lord! How shall I have a son when no man has ever touched me?'

The angel answered: Thus shall it be. Allah creates whatever He wills. When He decides something, He merely says: "Be" and it is. And He will teach him the Book, the Wisdom, the Torah, the Gospel, and he will be a Messenger to the Children of Israel.' (Quran 3:45-49)

So how can it be anything less than an Islamic duty to hear Him?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But Islamists, when they kill, rape, extort, conquest, force conversion, take slaves, and so on, are doing what Mohammed himself did, and what he commanded them to do.

There are no forced conversions in Islam.

Sorry...that's taqqiya again. That's practically all Islam has ever done. Right now, in fact, in Pakistan, at least 1,000 girls are year are "converted" by force to Islam. We all watched ISIS line up people on the beach and slit their throats. There's nobody who knows anything about Islam who's going to believe that claim. Sorry.

If as a bull, you defeat another bull in battle, you can mate with his cows.

You're not a bull. God made you more. Bulls are violent and amoral. They kill everything that comes within their range, and have no self-control at all. God made you morally responsible. Bulls never are.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:19 pm You've missed the point, really. America was already leaving Afghanistan.

Because the Taliban made them leave.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:19 pm Remember the hapless Afghanis falling off the wheels and wings of airplanes? If the Taliban is so wonderful, why did they so desperately want to leave? And who died as a result?

If you remove the security perimeter around a plane, when surrounded by a crowd, some people would hang off from its wheels. Who was supposed to maintain security around their planes? They didn't because they wanted to show images to the world of desperate Afghans falling off wheels.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:19 pm If the Americans had wanted to stay, they had the means to do it.

They could have stayed for another ten years but the final outcome will still have been the same: getting deported from Kabul airport by the Taliban.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:19 pm So why are you praising something in which the most corrupt in the West won?

The Taliban did something much better and much more effective than killing their enemies. They skillfully humiliated them.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But I see what they have in common: authoritarianism, dogmatism, cruelty, murder, conquest...
Moses arguably did that too. So?
When?

Read the books of Moses. You will find lots of passages in which Moses uses violence or authorizes it, which I think is absolutely fine. Christ did not do that because the Roman empire would not have tolerated it.

Numbers 31

13 Moses, Eleazar the priest and all the leaders of the community went to meet them outside the camp. 14 Moses was angry with the officers of the army—the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds—who returned from the battle.

15 “Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them. 16 “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice and enticed the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident, so that a plague struck the Lord’s people. 17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.

I don't have a problem with Moses but I am quite confident that you do. And again, don't say that Christ would not have done that because he was simply not in a position to do that. The Roman empire would have brutally cracked down on him.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm No, because Christianity has already proved the utility of its ethics for two thousand years of applications

There is no religious law in Christianity and therefore no moral theory. Paul has written that the law is a curse. So, the law of God is a curse but the laws invented by the ruling mafia, are not. What a joke.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm and throughout the modernization of the world.

Atheists call Christianity as old-fashioned as Islam, or probably even more so.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Islam's still stuck in tribal-think from the 6th Century: it's totally unequipped to apply to the modern world.

Again, in that case, Christianity is stuck in the minds of 2000-year old fishermen and beggars; and totally unequipped for the modern world.
Don't you see that this kind of arguments is ridiculous?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm "In geopolitics"? Well, geopolitics is a corrupt game.

Geopolitics exist whether you like it or not.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Christianity has had excellent effects, though, at the national political level, and at the institutional level. It's allowed such things as "natural rights" to be incorporated into political thinking, and the belief in the value-equality of persons, the creation of social-support networks, the promotion of the vulnerable, particularly in the rights of women and children, and in the moral structure of the judicial system -- although as Christianity has been rejected at the political level, all these things have begun to decay in the West.

If Christianity were so fantastic, why did the French revolutionaries insist on getting rid of it? It was as much an insurgency against Christianity as one against their king. Furthermore, the Russian revolutionaries also stamped out Christianity, because it was deemed detrimental to the working class. If Christianity was such an excellent religion, why all these insurgencies that want to get rid of it? Have you ever seen an insurgency that wants to get rid of Islam or even Judaism?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm How is slitting throats, raping civilians, driving planes into towers, beating women and molesting children...how are these things "moral"?

It is not because you are naive that everybody else is.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Stubbornness is not loyalty. It's not a virtue. If Allah were great, he would not need you to close your mind in order to be able to continue to believe.

I do not close my mind. I just indicated what method you need to follow in order to make a moral claim that is receivable. You can call a C++ compiler close-minded because it does not accept programs that are not written according to the C++ grammar. There are, however, good reasons why these rules exist. You must axiomatically deduce your moral conclusions from system-wide premises. Otherwise, no such conclusion is receivable in morality.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But Allah seems to need the violence of cowards, like those who gunned down helpless civilians in the Bataclan, in order to keep up his reputation. I cannot admire that. It's truly awful.

It's like about the Israeli army bombing Palestinian civilians in Gaza. Does that mean that Judaism is "truly awful"? Muslims would never make that argument about Judaism because the argument is truly stupid. Westerners would, however, certainly make that kind of argument about Islam because stupid arguments are the mainstay of western thinking.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Islam has never done it. They have made their leaders rich, to be sure...but everybody else miserable.

Emirati are not miserable. Dubai is fantastically wealthy city which is admired all across the world.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm I'm just pointing out that your preference will not lead to peace, happiness, prosperity, human rights...

You would need omniscience to make that argument.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you

What else could he say with all those Romans running the show? Moses could make real decisions. Muhammad too. Christ couldn't because he was not in authority of his society. He did what he could given the limitations and obstacles in his situation. If you do not face the same limitations, then it would be ridiculous to adopt the same strategies.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm So how can it be anything less than an Islamic duty to hear Him?

Yes, if the Romans with their guns and cannons are running the show around you, and you don't stand a chance fighting them, then you'd better give them your left cheek if they hit your right one. Isn't that common sense? There is nothing wrong with Christ. There is only something wrong with your understanding of why he did the things he did. He wasn't a pacifist. He just couldn't use violence because that would have triggered bad reprisals from the Romans. That does not mean that using violence is wrong per se.

godelian wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 6:06 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:19 pm You've missed the point, really. America was already leaving Afghanistan.

Because the Taliban made them leave.

Don't kid yourself. The Taliban were what the Taliban has always been...just a bunch of pests. They came when they wanted to, and left when they wanted to.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:19 pm Remember the hapless Afghanis falling off the wheels and wings of airplanes? If the Taliban is so wonderful, why did they so desperately want to leave? And who died as a result?

If you remove the security perimeter around a plane, when surrounded by a crowd, some people would hang off from its wheels.

You should visit an airport. You won't see that.

Again, why were so many Afghanis so desperate to get away from your lovely Taliban? One would think they'd turn around and hug them for joy, if they were the "liberators" they style themselves to be...

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 5:19 pm So why are you praising something in which the most corrupt in the West won?

The Taliban did something much better and much more effective than killing their enemies. They skillfully humiliated them.

They got played again, by a corrupt American administration. And once again, the people who paid the price were the Afghanis.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But I see what they have in common: authoritarianism, dogmatism, cruelty, murder, conquest...
Moses arguably did that too. So?
When?

Read the books of Moses.

Done. When?

Numbers 31

13 Moses, Eleazar the priest and all the leaders of the community went to meet them outside the camp. 14 Moses was angry with the officers of the army—the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds—who returned from the battle.

15 “Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them. 16 “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice and enticed the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident, so that a plague struck the Lord’s people. 17 Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, 18 but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.

A corrupt and idolatrous nation, who came between God and His people, and was judged for it. God has the right to give life...and to take it away.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm No, because Christianity has already proved the utility of its ethics for two thousand years of applications

There is no religious law in Christianity and therefore no moral theory.

You don't know Christianity, obviously. And you clearly don't know the Bible as a whole.

In fact, Mo borrowed liberally (and erroneously) from the Law of the Old Testament, and he also praised the New Testament. But Mo only knew the Nestorians, who were a heretical sect, and Mo could not read. So if you check the Koran, you'll find that Mo got nearly all the details wrong. And those few things he did get right praise the Torah as authoritative, and Jesus Christ as a true prophet. And since both disagree with Mo, and Mo approved of them...there's only one conclusion.

Mo got it wrong.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm and throughout the modernization of the world.

Atheists call Christianity as old-fashioned as Islam, or probably even more so.

Atheists say many exceedingly foolish things.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm "In geopolitics"? Well, geopolitics is a corrupt game.

Geopolitics exist whether you like it or not.

So do pornography, pedophilia, slavery and sex trafficking. I don't like any of them. And their existence doesn't at all mean I owe them a hearing. Geopolitics is the same: it doesn't deserve a hearing.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Christianity has had excellent effects, though, at the national political level, and at the institutional level. It's allowed such things as "natural rights" to be incorporated into political thinking, and the belief in the value-equality of persons, the creation of social-support networks, the promotion of the vulnerable, particularly in the rights of women and children, and in the moral structure of the judicial system -- although as Christianity has been rejected at the political level, all these things have begun to decay in the West.

If Christianity were so fantastic, why did the French revolutionaries insist on getting rid of it?

Because they were Atheists.

...the Russian revolutionaries also stamped out Christianity,

Well, they tried; but also because they were Atheists, and Marxists, too.

Have you ever seen an insurgency that wants to get rid of Islam or even Judaism?

Yes. So have you, I'm certain.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm How is slitting throats, raping civilians, driving planes into towers, beating women and molesting children...how are these things "moral"?

It is not because you are naive that everybody else is.

That's not an answer. It's a dodge.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But Allah seems to need the violence of cowards, like those who gunned down helpless civilians in the Bataclan, in order to keep up his reputation. I cannot admire that. It's truly awful.

It's like about the Israeli army bombing Palestinian civilians in Gaza.

Perhaps. But at least the Israeli's are being forced to do it by Hamas. The Bataclan murderers had no such cause. They just did it because they were spiteful and evil.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm Islam has never done it. They have made their leaders rich, to be sure...but everybody else miserable.

Emirati are not miserable. Dubai is fantastically wealthy city which is admired all across the world.

Still ruled by "big-little men." They're rich, but like every Islamic state, they're corrupt as heck.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm I'm just pointing out that your preference will not lead to peace, happiness, prosperity, human rights...

You would need omniscience to make that argument.

No. Just logic. Islam has no resources for such things.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 3:45 pm But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you

What else could he say with all those Romans running the show?

Plenty. There were many insurrectionists in the days of Jesus, and much resentment over Roman rule in Israel. It would not at all have been hard for Him to become one of them, had He had even the slightest inclination.

There is nothing wrong with Christ.

According to the Koran, He's a sacred prophet. So why is it that you don't listen to Him?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Wed Jul 17, 2024 8:56 pm According to the Koran, He's a sacred prophet. So why is it that you don't listen to Him?

If you look carefully at the instructions that Moses gave to his army officers concerning the Midianite captives:

“Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them. “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice and enticed the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident, so that a plague struck the Lord’s people. Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man, but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.

You can clearly see that Moses was not a Christian.

Moses had to run his society and his army. There was no scope for Christian gullibility or other unrealistic nonsense in that regard. Just like Himmler, Moses understood that you must give soldiers the prospect of future rewards, i.e. lots of gold and lots of captive girls, for them to be willing to risk their lives in battle.

Moses was clearly a Muslim and not a Christian.

That is one of the many reasons why a western army does not stand a snowball's chance in hell on the battlefield against any adversary. Not even against the Russians.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rape_du ... of_Germany

The majority of the assaults were committed in the Soviet occupation zone; estimates of the numbers of German women raped by Soviet soldiers have ranged up to 2 million.

Antony Beevor describes it as the "greatest phenomenon of mass rape in history" and concludes that at least 1.4 million women were raped in East Prussia, Pomerania and Silesia alone.

I completely agree with Stalin' on the matter because it is exactly what Moses and Muhammad would have said:

When the Yugoslav Partisan politician Milovan Djilas complained about rapes in Yugoslavia, Joseph Stalin reportedly stated that he should "understand it if a soldier who has crossed thousands of kilometres through blood and fire and death has fun with a woman or takes some trifle".[26] On another occasion, when told that Red Army soldiers sexually maltreated German refugees, he reportedly said: "We lecture our soldiers too much; let them have their initiative."

Concerning Christ, he was also not a Christian. He was a follower of Moses and a keeper of Mosaic law. Therefore, you cannot use his words to argue against Moses or his views on the matter.

A western army is a complete joke.

Not only there will never be any gold or girls for its soldiers, but adding insult to injury, if the soldier's wife back home cheats on him while he is on deployment, the no-fault-divorce judge will side with her, give her half his stuff, and force him to pay alimony and child support. What a joke!

That is why it is easy to wipe the floor with on the battlefield with any western army. What are they fighting for anyway? Are they really willing to risk their lives and die for a feminist regime? Wouldn't they themselves not be the first ones to benefit if they lost the war?

godelian wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 3:04 am You can clearly see that Moses was not a Christian.

He was a Hebrew leader, actually. At the time at which he lived, there was no such thing as "Christians."

That is one of the many reasons why a western army does not stand a snowball's chance in hell on the battlefield against any adversary.

"The Western army"? There's no such thing. There is an American army, a British force, some Canadians or Australians, perhaps...

But what does battle do? It merely shifts the balance of power to a different side, for a time, until that power too is defeated one day. It piles up the dead, but it fails to change the basic dynamic. The human situation is never really changed by war. Did the Islamic empire change anything? Look at where Islam is today...pushed back to a fraction of its former holdings, humiliated by the loss of its alleged third capital, besmirching Allah's reputation with repeated acts of terrorism and murder...how is this "winning"?

In that sense, it matters not at all whether we're under a Communist dictator, an Islamist dictator, or a dictator who loudly employs the language of "protecting democracy" in order to preserve his control through the mass media. They're all just another form of tyranny.

Concerning Christ, he was also not a Christian.

Well, it depends on what you mean by "a Christian." The term means "a follower of Christ," so He obviously couldn't be "following Himself."

However, there's no other source of legitimate leadership for Christians than Christ, so in that sense, it's untrue -- He was the first such. If what Christians are obligated to be is anything, then it's to replicate the character of Christ in themselves, however imperfect they may be. And if anybody does not follow Christ in this way, you have every right to question whether or not he is making any legitimate claim to be a "Christian."

There will be no winner by way of war, you'll find. For the problems with mankind are not political; they're matters of the soul. That mankind tends towards war indicates a deeper fault: namely, that men are violent, power-hungry, driven by pride and folly, and so will repeatedly cause violence, tyranny and misery, no matter who wins. The only true rebellion against this is goodness -- to refuse to become vengeful, violent, tyrannical and cruel oneself, and to become merciful, gracious and committed to goodness instead. And this is only possible if the nature of the human person is also changed. This, God can do; but no man can do for himself.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm He was a Hebrew leader, actually. At the time at which he lived, there was no such thing as "Christians."

In my opinion, the actions by Moses are not compatible with the Christian view on the matter.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm The human situation is never really changed by war.

That is not even the purpose of war. The mating season of the cattle does not change the "political situation" for the cattle either. It is just a way of assigning bulls to cows for reproduction. The original goal of war for humans is similar. War is just a derailed version of the mating season. Besides that, it means nothing.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm In that sense, it matters not at all whether we're under a Communist dictator, an Islamist dictator, or a dictator who loudly employs the language of "protecting democracy" in order to preserve his control through the mass media. They're all just another form of tyranny.

Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. The mafia boss at the head of a country was never meant to manage such a large population and so many resources.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm However, there's no other source of legitimate leadership for Christians than Christ, so in that sense, it's untrue -- He was the first such.

Christ was a keeper of Mosaic law. Christians are not. So, I do not agree that Christians follow the leadership of Christ. They deliberately don't.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm There will be no winner by way of war, you'll find.

You can get rid of a particular ruling mafia and replace it with another ruling mafia through war. Of course, the new mafia will be equally corrupt, if not more. That problem is essentially unsolvable. However, if the next ruling mafia no longer seeks to overrule the laws of God, then we will still have made progress. I concede that this is less important for Christians, because like Paul so beautifully wrote:

Galatians 3:10-14. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”).

With God's law being considered a curse in Pauline Christianity, it is obvious that Christians are not interested in removing a ruling mafia that overrules God's law. Seeing God's law overruled is probably want they actually wanted in the first place.

I also don't understand why Christians want to follow a leader whom they deem to be a curse.

godelian wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 4:45 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm He was a Hebrew leader, actually. At the time at which he lived, there was no such thing as "Christians."

In my opinion, the actions by Moses are not compatible with the Christian view on the matter.

That is so. And Jesus Christ Himself expanded on the Jewish Law in such a way as to show it to be more merciful...and also more demanding...than Moses may ever have imagined. But that's all in the famed "Sermon on the Mount," so you can see that for yourself, if you like.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm The human situation is never really changed by war.

That is not even the purpose of war.

War is just about violence and who ends up on top. It really doesn't have another "purpose."

It is just a way of assigning bulls to cows for reproduction.

I'm curious: why would you think that war is about giving angry men more "cows" to "reproduce with"? Sex is but one of the human drives, and by no means the predominant one. The need for companionship, or food, or security, or oxygen are all greater, and all can cause one to forego completely the desire for sex until they are satisified. So why would we go so far down the list of human motives in order to select such an odd motive, allegedly, for war?

I suggest the motives of war are simpler still: power. I think that to narrow down the motives to "cows and bulls" not only sounds unlikely, but also is a little...well, perverse. It's not at all clear how war would grant one anything in that regard. The line certainly isn't a straight one, there.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm In that sense, it matters not at all whether we're under a Communist dictator, an Islamist dictator, or a dictator who loudly employs the language of "protecting democracy" in order to preserve his control through the mass media. They're all just another form of tyranny.

Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

I think that's not true. I think that the truth is that people are already corrupt (potentially), and that potential is made manifest when they have power to act on it.

The mafia boss at the head of a country was never meant to manage such a large population and so many resources.

There's no "mafia boss" in the West, of course. Are you perhaps projecting something like a monarchy, dictatorship or sultanate onto the situation? The UK has a king, but he's certainly no "mafia boss." He's barely even a figurehead with no real power.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm However, there's no other source of legitimate leadership for Christians than Christ, so in that sense, it's untrue -- He was the first such.

Christ was a keeper of Mosaic law.

Only in the sense that he kept it much more faithfully than the Jewish authorities did. But He certainly kept it in ways they objected to, such as "violating the Sabbath," as they accused Him, and of "associating with sinners," as He did, not doing the demanded ritual washings, which He apparently dismissed, and of denying their association with Moses, as He so stridently did in Matthew 23, for example.

But one thing Jesus Christ certainly wasn't: a traditional Jew. What He was, was a radical departure from the ritualized, traditionalized, patterns of the Judaism of His day, which had become overgrown with human inventions rather than adhering to divine intention. And He certainly made that abundantly clear.

Have you read any of the gospels? If you do, you'll find that again and again.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm There will be no winner by way of war, you'll find.

You can get rid of a particular ruling mafia and replace it with another ruling mafia through war. Of course, the new mafia will be equally corrupt, if not more. That problem is essentially unsolvable.

Then what is the advantage of war? One gets piles of corpses, and ends up under the rule of another "mafia boss," as you call it -- though I really think that's an odd way to understand the situation. But maybe you'll explain.

I concede that this is less important for Christians, because like Paul so beautifully wrote:

Galatians 3:10-14. Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”).

With God's law being considered a curse in Pauline Christianity,

No, no...look again, carefully. Paul's not saying that the Law IS a curse; he is arguing that the Law brings a curse. There's all the difference in the world between the two.

Consider this: the law against theft is good. But if you steal, you are under the judgment of that law, and thus are "cursed" by the judgment that law comes with.

So Paul's not against the Law. He says it's "righteous and good and holy," (Rom. 7:7-13). But He points out that since EVERYBODY falls short of it (Rom. 3:23), the end of the good thing is that people end up being cursed (Gal. 3:10) unless redeemed from that curse by Christ Himself (Gal.3:13).

it is obvious that Christians are not interested in removing a ruling mafia that overrules God's law.

I'm sorry...you're going to have to explain this "mafia boss" thing to me. I don't get it.

I think you could fairly describe the power currently in control of some Western countries as a cabal, perhaps...but in democracies, the ruling cabal is occasionally replaced anyway...and it may not be by somebody better, or it may; but it's certainly not easy to find one ruling "mafia" that runs the show all the time, especially since "the West" is an abstraction, not a place or nation. "Being Western" varies with perspective.

A side issue: I would even suggest that Islam is more "Western" than most of its followers would like to imagine. For example, it's notoriously monotheistic, whereas "eastern" religions are almost all pantheistic or polytheistic in some form. But monotheism is a feature of "the West," and not "the East." And Islam, even by its own account, is a narrative derived from ancient Judaism and Christianity...though not according to Torah or the New Testament, in most regards. So how can something derived from Judaism and Christianity be "eastern" in the sense that, say, Hinduism or Buddhism are?

I also don't understand why Christians want to follow a leader whom they deem to be a curse.

Are you referring back to the passage you quoted? I'm assuming so.

No, that's a very good question, actually: but it has an answer. Are you interested?

In a way, the answer is given in the verse itself: "Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us..." To "become a curse" is an awkward way to translate the Greek, really...but we don't really have an English expression that captures it. It means "to be treated as if" or "to be imputed as." We have exactly the same Greek syntactic pattern in 1 John 1:10 "If we say we have not sinned, we make God a liar." What does this mean? How could God be a liar? But that's not what the Greek means. It means, "If we say we have not sinned, we make God out to be a liar..." Not that God IS a liar, of course. You and I both acknowledge that it is impossible for God to lie, as the Bible declares; but the meaning of the phrase is clearly that we treat Him as if He were a liar. And that's what makes saying "I have not sinned" such a wrong thing to do: it's an insult against God, who has declared, "All have sinned..." (Rom. 3:23 again) We treat God as if we were telling the truth, thereby, and that He were lying.

That's an insult to God, obviously, a blasphemy. We can't say that.

So what is the verse you quoted really saying? It's saying that you and I have sinned. And as sinners, we are under the curse that comes from disobeying and breaking God's Law. And we should be judged. And we should pay the penalty for our sins. That is what would be right. But instead, because God is merciful (Ephesians 2:3-5), so that instead of judging us personally, he exacted the penalty due to us on Himself, in the Person of His Son, Jesus Christ, so that God might do justice AND still show mercy to us. (Rom. 3:26):

You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly.

Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous person, though for a good person someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us.

Since we have now been justified by his blood, how much more shall we be saved from God’s wrath through him! For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were reconciled to him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been reconciled, shall we be saved through his life! (Romans 5:6-10, underline mine)

So Christ was treated as the curse we deserved, so that we might go free. And God is still righteous for that, because the curse has been fulfilled -- but not at your expense and mine, but by that enacted on Jesus Christ -- if only, by faith, we will accept the terms of what God is offering: our lives in exchange for His.

Who would not follow a God who would die for love of one? Can any love be greater, Romans asks, than if I man lays down his life for a friend? But God has done more; He laid down His life for His enemies...for you and me.

That is why I gladly follow a leader who was once treated as a curse by God. I know of no person, no sage, no priest or imam, no philosopher, no one on Earth or in Heaven who has done so much for me. His being cursed has become the whole basis of my blessing. And what kind of ingratitude would lead me to turn away from love like that?

J was just alright but I wouldn't call em great. Had a lotta decent ideas but got all mixed up when he developed his messianic complex and got into trouble with the Roman POleece.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 5:52 pm That is so. And Jesus Christ Himself expanded on the Jewish Law in such a way as to show it to be more merciful...and also more demanding...than Moses may ever have imagined.

Christ didn't, if only because he did not have the authority to change God's law.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 5:52 pm But that's all in the famed "Sermon on the Mount," so you can see that for yourself, if you like.

That is exactly where Christ says that no letter will ever be changed to God's law.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm War is just about violence and who ends up on top. It really doesn't have another "purpose."

Originally, war did have a purpose. There is a need to figure out which bull will mount which cow. The solution turns out to be simple. Let them fight over it

Humanity still uses some derailed version of the mating season.

If you want a female from your own tribe, you bribe her relatives into handing her over.

If you want one from an adversary tribe, you start shit talking them as to convince your own tribe to teach them a lesson. Next, you gang up, kill their men or make them flee, and then you can proceed to confiscating the women. Problem solved.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm I think that to narrow down the motives to "cows and bulls" not only sounds unlikely, but also is a little...well, perverse.

If you cannot face the truth about the dark side of human nature -- in fact about the nature of life itself -- you will keep spouting hopelessly naive statements that are not true about reality but that merely reveal that you don't live in the real world but rather in a comforting fantasy.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Thu Jul 18, 2024 1:34 pm So Paul's not against the Law ...

I believe the worst possible interpretation while you believe the most naive one.

Judaism and Islam do not try to embellish anything, while Christianity wants to turn you into an idiot who in the fantasy of his head lives in delululand.

"Everybody is your friend!"

Jews don't believe this, because they know better than that. Muslims don't believe it either. Only a Christian is naive enough to buy into the bullshit, hook, line, and sinker.

"The world is a place where everybody loves everybody else!"

That is Christian lalaland. They are delulu. I feel sorry for them. If an online scammer steals half of his money, then the Christian will give him the other half too, because Jesus loves the scammer too! The scammer's sins will be forgiven!