Christianity and the West
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Lifecrafter
Member # 59
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written Monday, October 27 2003 09:06
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I think the role of the Christian church(es) in the development of European culture is overrated, or at least it was not a positive role. One should not be too focused on the barbarian tribes of the North, who indeed gained something from the fact that the Church preserved and spread parts of (southern) European civilization after the fall of Rome. Southern Europe already had a unique and highly developed culture long before that crazy shepherd cult came along. The Greeks adopted many achievements of the oldest developed societies (such as Egypt), and added an emphasis on freedom and science; Christian theology was a huge step backwards. Being proud of your heritage is OK, but it makes more sense for us to be proud of our much more characteristic secular and democratic heritage! The Romans were not that great, but they founded an empire that brought peace and prosperity. Judaism is better than its stepchildren Christianity and Islam in the sense that the Jews are not trying to convert (or destroy) the rest of mankind. That being said, it is, unfortunately, heavily influenced by the struggle for survival of a small and poor nation. "There is only this One God of ours, only these Commandments, only this Scripture!" There are desperate attempts to say "we're no sinful Egyptians, Babylonians or Persians, we're those unique crazy mountain savages who don't even like sex!". Men, at least, could have fun in most societies. The idea that sex is somehow evil is truly amazing and actually not as widespread as Arabs and Americans think it is. By the way, the roles are now reversed - Northern Europe has thrown off the yoke of the Church, and enjoys greater freedom and prosperity than Southern Europe, which was severely damaged not only by Christianity, but also by Islam. It is amazing how far you can get with "you'll get a pie in the sky when you die"... Posts: 950 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 2940
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written Monday, October 27 2003 09:31
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quote:...Uh...to the Romans maybe, I dont think the other one third of world population slaughtered by the Romans in their so called "Pax Romana" thinks of the Romans as the bringers of peace and prosperity. Pretty much like what is happenng to the US today. History is not without a sense of irony after all. -------------------- "I don't want to achieve immortality through my work, I want to achieve it through not dying." Posts: 469 | Registered: Thursday, May 1 2003 07:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 496
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written Monday, October 27 2003 10:08
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Islam, did a heck of a lot more to preserrve Greek knowledge than Christianity did. Conversely, powerwise at least, Christianity is the direct inheritor of the Roman Empire. What I would note--a dirty secret in the history of Western civilisation--is that Rome took its social model from Sparta and not from Athens, hence its militarisation and contempt for the plebians. I suspect this discussion will annoy a lot of people, so I hesitate to add that anti-semitism is more a creation of Christianity than Nazism, a demented mentality not reciprocated by Jews. It is hard to find any defence for this other than to claim the anti-semites aren't 'real' Christians despite anti-semitism being Christian practice for over a millenium. Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00 |
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Lifecrafter
Member # 59
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written Monday, October 27 2003 11:01
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The_Nazgul, I don't know how many millions would have died from starvation and constant tribal warfare without the Pax Romana. An example of "noble savages": Until recently, around 80% of Yanomani indian males died in inter-tribe raids. X, don't forget the Byzantines, either. And the Turks were not like the Arabs, mainly because they came later, when the rest of the world had already moved on. Of course it's annoying to many, but...Europe sucked for a thousand years because of religious fanaticism.  The Renaissance and the Enlightenment brought us back in the game, and the Church was mainly a nuisance all the time.  Posts: 950 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00 |
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Lifecrafter
Member # 3310
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 02:38
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I certainly haven't got as much knowledge as you (Alex) when it comes to history, but I would still like to try to defend Christianity a little. First of all, I don't really think it's wise to compare the Greek culture with the Christian theology, since they are two totally different things. Science and philosophy can't be compared to the beliefs of a community. I know that this is one of the easier ways to solve the problem (we know what is right because we belive it's so) and I know it's hard to argue about a persons beliefs, but well, that's what theology is all about. What more, Christianity has undoubtedly had a great impact on our present moral understanding. The Greek's and the Roman's moral sense was hugely different from ours. In those days, things like pity and humbleness were seen as weaknesses and it was not before Christ introduced them that they gained popularity. This is actually very interesting. From nowhere came a man and started to preach about helping those in need, and he actually gained followers! This is strange since such thoughts had never been popular (maybe except in some Asian religions). And even without these spiritual matters, Christianity has developed our society in many ways. The ability to read and write and the preservation of a great amount of knowledge, a few to mention. Although the church during the Middle Age opposed many scientifical discoveries, they only did what they thought was best (a fundamental approach as to the Bible), as anyone of us would do. If they really were to believe in God, they couldn't just state that He was wrong, could they? The beliefs of someone can never be said to be wrong, since they are just that, beliefs. And a religion in which the beliefs aren't worth anything and don't need to be obeyed, isn't a religion. Posts: 756 | Registered: Monday, August 4 2003 07:00 |
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Post Navel Trauma ^_^
Member # 67
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 06:20
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quote:I disagree. If two people have different beliefs, at least one of the is wrong. And then it's time to look for evidence. If there is no possible evidence for them, the beliefs are not worth much anyway. -------------------- Grammar wenches beware: This is the house that the malt that the rat that the cat that the dog that the cow that the maiden that the man that the priest that the cock that the farmer kept waked married kissed milked tossed worried killed ate lay in. My Website desperance.net - Leave your sanity at the door Posts: 1798 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 2940
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 06:55
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quote:Neither do I, but we do have a fair idea of how many people died under Roman Imperialistic slaughter and it is certainly more than tribal warfare, and I am not only considering Roman antagonists here but the Roman soldiers themselves. As for starvation, it was a common problem at that era, even in Roman ocupied territory, wich I must add, always favoured roman citizens when it came to any sort of social problem. Captured people were usualy used as slaves and considering they were treated as objects I doubt they would have had any priority when starvation was at hand. You are also not considering many other developed cultures you mentioned yourself in your first post. Greeks, Jews, Egyptians and many other stable cultures that were far better without the "Pax Romana". Casualties might have been dimished but at what cost. And here I will quote Galgacus, Caledonian chief, from Tacitus: Agricola, 30, refering to his and my idea of "Pax Romana". "Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant" "Where they make a desert, they call it peace." [ Tuesday, October 28, 2003 07:07: Message edited by: The_Nazgul ] -------------------- "I don't want to achieve immortality through my work, I want to achieve it through not dying." Posts: 469 | Registered: Thursday, May 1 2003 07:00 |
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Lifecrafter
Member # 3310
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 07:32
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quote:Well yes, that may be correct in more simple matters, where one actually can prove to be right. But, in spiritual matters I find it hard to think that one could be in the right where another couldn't. If I believe in God (or anything else, for what it matters), who are you to say that I shouldn't? You can't prove (or can you...hmm..  ) that my belief is wrong and thus it isn't something worth arguing about.I don't fully get why beliefs without evidence should be considered worthless. All religions (and of course all other unexplainable things) are based on (what I know) things that probably never can be explained. I guess that's why they are called beliefs. Anyway, religions don't appeal to the scientific part of the human mind, but rather to the emotional part. I have found, that people need something to believe in, in order to, in lack of better words, keep up their mental health. And I have sometimes wonder what the world would look like if each and every thing would have been perfectly explained and everything would have a rational reason. Nothing strange, nothing mysterious. Isn't it a horrible thought! Posts: 756 | Registered: Monday, August 4 2003 07:00 |
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Guardian
Member # 2476
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 07:47
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quote:This caught my eye. If Christ's message was one of understanding, love and sharing, then it was a message about qualities that you can strive to develop within yourself. Their acquisition cannot be ordered. If I order you to love your neighbour, you can of course come up with faked compliance. But that removes you even farther from honestly sharing with him than your natural impulses might have done. A quality is an inner potential. It can be expressed, but order and obedience have nothing to do with it. quote:Not necessarily, I think. If we discuss the time for harvesting apples, I agree they should not be harvested in spring. But if you believe in freedom and I believe in honesty, where's the problem? Religious systems have come up with all kinds of junk that their originators would probably never want to have anything to do with. If that is what you disagree with, I'm with you. If you wish to believe that matter and fact are all that is, alright. There might be more that you cannot see but I see. But if I saw more and you didn't, I couldn't show you. So we'd be at a standstill. Neither could prove his/her point to the other. -------------------- Polaris Posts: 1828 | Registered: Saturday, January 11 2003 08:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 496
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 08:57
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Ironweed, the medieval Church was an exclusive literate caste that mechanically reproduced classical knowledge (e.g. that of Augustine, a north African Roman, and more significantly, Aristotle) at best, and obscured it with scholastic Christian glosses at worst. It took an explicit appeal to classical sources in the Renaissance to animate any of this with the first inklings of experimental method. This was despite the Church, not because of it, and those that 'went too far' like heliocentrist Giovanno Bruno were burned by pious Churchmen. I am not arguing religious belief is bad here per se, just that the Church had a stultifying effect on European culture. Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00 |
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Post Navel Trauma ^_^
Member # 67
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 09:22
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quote:I'm not saying you are wrong. I'm saying someone is wrong. And since we don't know who, I'm not saying you shouldn't believe what you want. In fact, I don't mind you believing things that are definitely wrong. quote:Well, my opinion of the value of religion is not one that is found often (or at all) in religious people. quote:It might make you feel happier, but that doesn't make it any likelier to be true. Anyway, my mental health is fine. quote:It's not a horrible thought. The more we know, the more there is to be amazed by. And the explanations are normally much more wonderful than the mysteries. You can still be awed by the beauty of something if you know how it works (and then you can also be awed by that) quote:I meant contradictory beliefs. After all, if I believe I'm sitting at a desk, and you believe the sun is yellow, it's not the case that one is wrong. But if someone believes that there is a god, and someone else doesn't, someone is wrong, even if there is no way to tell who. quote:I do believe that matter and fact are there is, but if there really is something else, that is also matter and fact, just stuff we don't know about. -------------------- Grammar wenches beware: This is the house that the malt that the rat that the cat that the dog that the cow that the maiden that the man that the priest that the cock that the farmer kept waked married kissed milked tossed worried killed ate lay in. My Website desperance.net - Leave your sanity at the door Posts: 1798 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00 |
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Shock Trooper
Member # 136
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 10:17
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quote:So, the people who in Athenas (motherland to democracy) and at 399 b.C. condemned Socrates to death because he "perverted the youth" must have been christians...  Posts: 253 | Registered: Tuesday, October 9 2001 07:00 |
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Shock Trooper
Member # 18
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 15:07
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Words from staunch atheist (me): Beliefs do not require proof, in fact, they're not beliefs if they have proof - they're fact. And I'm covering all those words here, like faith, etc. Having faith in something is believing it to exist without the evidence of proof. To modern sensibilities, this seems like a sham. Faith is believed to be a term that came into common use in the dark ages as a way of controling and taxing the masses. Through the use of faith, so called "religious figures" could scare the population into submitting to their wills, in a very subversive and underhand way. It is the common belief of historians studying spirituality, that religions (particularly christianity) are the most advanced and long-surviving scams ever. They are also the most economical. They teach members to convert their friends, they cannot be proved wrong (as there is no logical basis in their beliefs), they have strong political ties and are socialy acceptable. That's what I think anyway, Md. EDIT: Sorry, forgot an 'ity' and an 'are'. [ Thursday, October 30, 2003 09:59: Message edited by: Majordomo ] Posts: 304 | Registered: Monday, October 1 2001 07:00 |
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Lifecrafter
Member # 521
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 23:21
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Ah, the bigotry is back. I drop in the boards for the second time in about two months and find this topic. Many of you are bigots with little understanding of the fall of Rome, rise the Eastern Empire and the massive depopulation in the sixth century that killed Europe's advancement. You use phases like medieval and neglect the term was created by Dutch Protestants as slander against Catholics. You refuse to believe it, and I will not play target for you. I have now decided I am going from here. These boards are focused on a lot of self indulgent crap that adds nothing to Jeff. I will be at animenewsnetwork.com from now on, where I am one of the oppressors And to really prove it, I am making my account unaccessible. I can't be back. I am gone for good from here. Stop the hate, stop the debates that serve no purpose other than rage, and your live a more full filled life. -------------------- I am not really here. Posts: 956 | Registered: Wednesday, January 16 2002 08:00 |
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Guardian
Member # 3521
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written Tuesday, October 28 2003 23:38
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While I do not condone bigotry or hate speech in any form, I have found very little of outright bigotry in this thread so far. Though I am religious as well, I find a civil discussion on religion to be quite all right, as long as it does not degenerate into a mudslinging fest. I know little of the bigotry you have faced on these boards in the past (I have only been here for less than a month), but it seems to me that, at least in this thread, no outright hate speech has been voiced against Catholicism or any other religion. Perhaps you have acted a bit rashly by terminating your account. Putting up your own opinion on the topic rather than accusing everyone else of being bigots probably would have been a better idea. I would hope and expect that no one here would belittle your beliefs or your religion if you did indeed bring them up here. But if you feel you must leave, then I have no power to force you to stay. I would have liked to know you, but I suppose it's too late. Remember that you can always come back, even if you need to re-register to do so. -------------------- "Let a man find himself, in distinction from others, on top of two wheels with a chain- at least in a poor country like Russia- and his vanity begins to swell out like his tires. In America it takes an automobile to produce this effect."- Leon Trotsky Posts: 1798 | Registered: Sunday, October 5 2003 07:00 |
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Lifecrafter
Member # 59
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written Wednesday, October 29 2003 05:45
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quote:He was framed for political reasons, since he had influential friends who were viewed as traitors. Kakashi tends to leave every now and then; I suppose he's a very emotional guy. I was only trying to be provocative and funny. If anyone cares, I'm formally Christian as well.[ Wednesday, October 29, 2003 05:48: Message edited by: Alex ] Posts: 950 | Registered: Thursday, October 4 2001 07:00 |
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Infiltrator
Member # 2940
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written Wednesday, October 29 2003 06:29
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I agree with both Stughalf and Alex, Kakashi took it too seriously. There was no bigotry in these post, just a discusion between people who wanted to share some thoughts on Christianity, Middle Ages, Rome, etc... True, they probably wont contribute anything to Jeff, but then again, there is very little on the General board that actualy does contribute anything at all. -------------------- "I don't want to achieve immortality through my work, I want to achieve it through not dying." Posts: 469 | Registered: Thursday, May 1 2003 07:00 |
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Shock Trooper
Member # 136
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written Wednesday, October 29 2003 08:17
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quote: Actually, it started as "We worship this only God, Who beats those pitiful gods of sinful Egyptians, Babylonians or Persians." quote: Southern Europe countries are acconfessional nowadays (safe the Vaticano Estate, of course ). The differences you note about Southern and Northern Europe are more related to the crags between Catholicism and Protestantism, as well as to certain political ways (i.e., the ballast of southern caciquism) that go back to pre-Roman times.Posts: 253 | Registered: Tuesday, October 9 2001 07:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 22
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written Wednesday, October 29 2003 08:53
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If Kakashi would be so kind as to say what he believes to be bigotry, maybe we could have a discussion about it and not just throw random insults at each other. But, since he's "left" he's set himself up at an unassailable position from which he cannot be attacked, because he seems unwilling to explain to everyone what his problem is. -------------------- KazeArctica: "Imagine...wangs everywhere...and tentacles. Nothing but wangs and tentacles! And no pants!" Posts: 2862 | Registered: Tuesday, October 2 2001 07:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 496
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written Wednesday, October 29 2003 09:19
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Kakashi is being ridiculous - 'Medieval' was a term coined during the Renaissance to disparage those insufficiently respectful of classicism. It was paired with 'Gothic', implying a crude, barbarian art and culture. Those coining this term were (pre-) Italian Catholics (well, Neoplatonists, but nominally Catholic) in a time before the Reformation, before "Protestantism" and the "Dutch" had ever been heard of. And I have no hesitation criticising the Catholic church where this is historically deserved. The Papacy acually did much to mitigate the effects of European expansion in the New World, but it is hard to excuse the excesses of both the Crusades and the Counter-Reformation, both specifically Papal innovations. In fact, doing so represents a form of historical revisionism that most would find unaccepable. I think the 'modern' worldview largely (if incompletely) attributed to Protestant rationalism also deserves much criticism and if saying this upsets them too - tough. Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00 |
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...b10010b...
Member # 869
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written Wednesday, October 29 2003 11:47
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Sometimes, X, I wonder what it is that you do believe. -------------------- I believe there are 15 747 724 136 275 002 577 105 653 961 181 555 468 044 717 914 527 116 709 366 231 425 076 185 631 031 296 protons in the universe, and the same number of electrons. -- Sir Arthur Eddington Posts: 9973 | Registered: Saturday, March 30 2002 08:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 496
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written Thursday, October 30 2003 09:18
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You don't want to know, Thuryl. It would bore everyone if I droned on about it here. Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00 |
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Guardian
Member # 3521
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written Thursday, October 30 2003 09:59
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I would be interested in knowing, as well. And I have a very long attention span .-------------------- "Let a man find himself, in distinction from others, on top of two wheels with a chain- at least in a poor country like Russia- and his vanity begins to swell out like his tires. In America it takes an automobile to produce this effect."- Leon Trotsky Posts: 1798 | Registered: Sunday, October 5 2003 07:00 |
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Bob's Big Date
Member # 3151
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written Thursday, October 30 2003 10:23
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The Catholic Church's biggest problem in the middle ages was that it tried to be a political entity. Being a political entity in medieval Europe implied committing a severe atrocity here and there. The only reason we hold this against them today is because there aren't any Rurikid tsars or Hohenzollern imperialists around nowadays. -------------------- In a word, gay. --Bob the Impaler Posts: 2367 | Registered: Friday, June 27 2003 07:00 |
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Shaper
Member # 496
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written Friday, October 31 2003 07:42
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I'm sort of inclined to agree, though I'd hold the bad behaviour of other political entities against those concerned too, rather than exhonorating the church as being 'as bad as the rest'. From his opening comments, I think Alex would also fault them for Pauline teachings on sexuality, though Roy Porter's 'Flesh in the Age of Reason' was pretty interesting in pointing out that the Church at least valued and acknowledged our physicality in a way other faiths (inc. 'heresies' like Manicheanism) did not. We had to wait for Descartes for a genuinely dualistic view of mind / body according to Poerter's schema. The Church had a healthy tolerance of the laity's 'sins of the flesh' - at least compared to later idealists who HATED such physical realities as a distraction from their 'pure life of mind' or thought the greater part of themselves an irrelevance, which seems terribly world-denying to me. You even get relatively sensible and otherwise free-thinking people like William Godwin coming up with this stuff. As to my own views more generally, I'm for the witches rather than those that burned them (of whichever sect), even if they were just silly old women. Posts: 2333 | Registered: Monday, January 7 2002 08:00 |