I am just wondering where the theocratic states that are examples of human justice and happiness are?
Religion, what's the point?
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One, where in any of my post have I posited it does? My entire point is that it doesn't.
Two, The Roman Empire spanned centuries. Two and a half, No shit.
The next time I'm discussing morality with a druid, a World-Tree believer or a Sumerian 'An' worshiper, I'll bring that up. When discussing it with Christians and Muslims, it's rather redundant.
Three, the same way countless parents, including mine achieved it without much difficulty.
Does he really? What a revolutionary!
Four, Mockney from the internet and some people he can quote to make himself sound like a patronising high school teacher argues that the benefit of co-operation to survival was an even earlier base incentive. Aligned with many other non-religious things, like the natural protective bond animals form with their off spring.
Essentially I agree, because what you're saying is "morality isn't religious, but religion helped some of it spread somewhat during an uncivilised time" This is obvious. It doesn't address why it's still relevant. Or why the religious in this thread can claim they've a higher level of morality, why that belief should be respected and not ridiculed, or any of the points we've been arguing really.
You're attempting to define morality but not addressing the efficacy of whether religion and morality are a positive combination. History suggests that they haven't been.
I know that Quran mentions polytheistic religions. The thing is, there is no trace of a main monotheistic religion before Abrahamic religions came along (leaving aside Zoroastrianism and some early form in Ancient Egypt). As you travel earlier in time, you will find people believing in many gods, in Animism, in Totemism,..etc. To suggest that all of these people were born with a predisposition to believe in one God is just nonsense. Also, your claim that all of these people were influenced in order to ignore the "Fitrah" is equally weak because :
1) Given the scale of time (thousands of years), it is very very unlikely that people with a natural predisposition for monotheism would not have developed monotheistic religions. Claiming that everyone was tempted to ignore this natural predisposition is just nonsense. You only have to see the variety of religions nowadays and even currents inside a religion to deduce that even under heavy brain-washing and influence, some people still develop different flavors of religions.
2) You can't find a reason why they would be tempted to ignore monotheism. You talked earlier about "evil desires". Care to expand on this ? (Please don't make me ask again !
)And your analogy was just nonsense. Clothes are objects whereas people are not. People act based on their nature, they express it. If all people were born with a natural tendency to believe in one God, the majority would still follow their nature and we would have overwhelming evidence of monotheistic rituals etc. This is even more applicable to prehistoric people who did no have our level of sophistication and who would surrender more easily to their nature. We have nothing of the sort, in fact we have quite the opposite : Animism, totemism, chamanism, polytheism,...
Now, tell us what made all these people (remember, generations and generations worldwide over thousands of years) ignore their nature and be converted to polytheism or other religions/cults.
Werewolf, Danny hasn't responded to my question, but what do you make of his assertion that Fitrah isn't it crucial aspect of Islam anyway?
As far as I'm concerned the only relatively viable interpretation of any religion with a holy text is that of the fundamentalist; for why would any god concern himself with trivialities when addressing his followers directly through the medium of holy scriptures?
Are we to believe that the almighty god is prone to inconsequential whimsy in the guidance of his people? It just doesn't make any sense for a god to be making gratuitous of haphazard insinuations in any holy text or through the words of any prophet for surely the only way this could lead is towards conflict and indecision.
Is god himself a conflicted, indecisive being? Is so then he cannot possibly be defined as being omnipotent. Could it be that this apparently rather contrary, fallible being is instead merely the construct of the demonstrably contrary and fallible minds of humans? Or could it be that the depicted god is indeed omnipotent but intends to cause conflict and indecision in his followers, in which case god couldn't be described as being fair, which again would be indicative of god as a construct of the fallible and routinely unfair minds of humans.
As far as I'm concerned the only relatively viable interpretation of any religion with a holy text is that of the fundamentalist; for why would any god concern himself with trivialities when addressing his followers directly through the medium of holy scriptures?
Are we to believe that the almighty god is prone to inconsequential whimsy in the guidance of his people? It just doesn't make any sense for a god to be making gratuitous of haphazard insinuations in any holy text or through the words of any prophet for surely the only way this could lead is towards conflict and indecision.
Is god himself a conflicted, indecisive being? Is so then he cannot possibly be defined as being omnipotent. Could it be that this apparently rather contrary, fallible being is instead merely the construct of the demonstrably contrary and fallible minds of humans? Or could it be that the depicted god is indeed omnipotent but intends to cause conflict and indecision in his followers, in which case god couldn't be described as being fair, which again would be indicative of god as a construct of the fallible and routinely unfair minds of humans.
I have never heard of the concept of Fitrah being disputed in Islam. It is not only described in a Hadith (which certainly Muslims might disagree on) but it is also mentioned in Quran. In Islam, every child is considered to be born a Muslim (in the sense of believing in one God) and that's a fact. I consider this to be pretty crucial as it is a very strong claim. This is not related to practices or rites but to human's nature and it is certainly a fundamental aspect, more so when it is supposedly coming from the creator. You will not find many Muslims (if not any) contesting this. And Danny didn't know about Fitrah until I mentioned it...
Out of all the hypotheses, that is the simplest and most coherent one. The scriptures are just products of their time. They are deeply influenced by previous religions from which they borrow the myths/legends and plagued with inconsistencies and contradictions of all kinds. The concept of a personal God is also laughable when we factor in what we know about the universe and how insignificant we are in comparison. Monotheistic religions were only one step in the development of humans, a very short time when you contrast it with how long humans have been living on Earth.
You still didn't give an answer..
Cider, no need to get philosophical about it. There is very little debate really about this issue. If you don't believe in it then you don't understand science itself, which is a bit disappointing.
It's by the way the exact same thing I said before that atheists believe in, and some denied.. Somebody even told me "Well, you've found only one out of dozens.....". I think we have comfortably more than one who believe in that, as we see..
Lack of evidence for existence does not equal an evidence for lack of existence.
Have you actually read the scientific theory wiki page I linked you to? Because you're still completely miscomprehending how science works. If Cider has misunderstood the science itself, then so have the vast majority of scientists.
Wondering if this conversation will spill over into this thread about a religious celebration?
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/ramadan-2013.373672/
Not saying it should, just wondering.
https://www.redcafe.net/threads/ramadan-2013.373672/
Not saying it should, just wondering.
I know that Quran mentions polytheistic religions. The thing is, there is no trace of a main monotheistic religion before Abrahamic religions came along (leaving aside Zoroastrianism and some early form in Ancient Egypt). As you travel earlier in time, you will find people believing in many gods, in Animism, in Totemism,..etc. To suggest that all of these people were born with a predisposition to believe in one God is just nonsense. Also, your claim that all of these people were influenced in order to ignore the "Fitrah" is equally weak because :
1) Given the scale of time (thousands of years), it is very very unlikely that people with a natural predisposition for monotheism would not have developed monotheistic religions. Claiming that everyone was tempted to ignore this natural predisposition is just nonsense. You only have to see the variety of religions nowadays and even currents inside a religion to deduce that even under heavy brain-washing and influence, some people still develop different flavors of religions.
2) You can't find a reason why they would be tempted to ignore monotheism. You talked earlier about "evil desires". Care to expand on this ? (Please don't make me ask again !
And your analogy was just nonsense. Clothes are objects whereas people are not. People act based on their nature, they express it. If all people were born with a natural tendency to believe in one God, the majority would still follow their nature and we would have overwhelming evidence of monotheistic rituals etc. This is even more applicable to prehistoric people who did no have our level of sophistication and who would surrender more easily to their nature. We have nothing of the sort, in fact we have quite the opposite : Animism, totemism, chamanism, polytheism,...
Now, tell us what made all these people (remember, generations and generations worldwide over thousands of years) ignore their nature and be converted to polytheism or other religions/cults.
Finding multiple Gods does not mean that nobody believed in one God.
The original state of somebody doesn't indicate that it will be the most important factor in how he turns out. Clothes are made clean, but most of them get dirty (the ones that are used).
The analogy is pretty logical. Souls being the clothes, and dirt being the evil on Earth.
Those (evil) desires, let's talk a little about them instead of repeating the same thing: One of them is stubbornness, and bias. When the same incident in football is watched by United and Chelsea fans (live or in 50/50 calls), most United fans will have a different opinion about it than the majority of the Chelsea fans. It's not because they were originally different type of people, or because they had (originally) different understanding about football. It's because they want their team to benefit.. That's one common example about how what you want affects the judgement or the action of people, in a big way, and makes them lose their objectivity, or neutrality in their thinking.. And this is not only among atheists, it's also among christians, Muslims, different sects of Muslims, ...etc.
The point is, that they believed in multiple gods, not just one god each. I already gave you a relatively recent example with the aborigines believing in spirits as a way of explaining things they didn't understand. It was the Abrahamic religions that came along and said "Nah, there's just one god for everything" Look at the Nordic gods, Thor and Odin were both assumed to be real, even if some people worshiped one over the other.
It spanned over a millennium, even.
Being "not important" doesn't necessarily mean it's disputed. The other example I gave "breastfeeding" is also pretty undisputed (that it's recommended to do).. But not important means it doesn't represent the basis of Islam, or the belief in God.. Also it means that if eventually somebody had a different interpretation about it, then it doesn't change what Islam is about, and it doesn't make him a non-Muslim.
Whose word are you taking on that?
I'm always surprised that it doesn't horrify religious people to know that as per their beliefs, the vast majority of the human race is or will be burning in the everlasting fires of hell.
And given the graphic descriptions of hell in most religious books, I wonder any religious folk are able to sleep at nights knowing that easily nine tenths of the people they run into on a daily basis are going to be for example "thrown into a bottomless pit" or "cast into a lake of fire and brimstone."
And given the graphic descriptions of hell in most religious books, I wonder any religious folk are able to sleep at nights knowing that easily nine tenths of the people they run into on a daily basis are going to be for example "thrown into a bottomless pit" or "cast into a lake of fire and brimstone."
The anthropologists.
Does Abraham exist according to them?
Nope.
Then why are you calling them "Abrahamic religions"?
Because they're based on the made up story of Abraham.
That's wrong. Islam believe that Adam was the first prophet. Abraham is just as much a prophet as Adam, Moses, Jesus and Mohammad.
You are talking nonsense. In religions with multiple Gods, each one serves a certain function. This constitutes a vision and approach to life that is radically different and incompatible with believing in one God. Those Gods formed a pantheon and constituted the reigning religion. Again, the notion of monotheism did not appear until later.
The analogy could not be further from logical. Can clothes manifest their cleaness ? Are they inclined to remain clean ? Are they thinking beings that manifest their nature ? Are we expected to find signs of their cleaness in nature as testimony ?
Souls you say...Do you have any proof that such a thing exists ? And the clothes get dirty because something made them dirty. What makes "souls" become "dirty" and push people to believe in polytheism ?
So you are saying that one of the evil desires you talked about is bias (how ironic !). You know what can make people biased ? Their nature. If people are naturally born to believe in something, it will affect their judgements. What God is saying in your analogy is that all people are born as United fans. So people should all be biased towards monotheism yet it appears late in religions' development.
The term 'Abrahamic religions' refers not which person the religions consider their first prophet, but refers to the story that Abraham had sons with two different women (what a sexist cnut, eh? Why can't his wife have a second lover too?) and that those sons went off and became their distinct civilizations.
And if Adam was the first prophet, then surely you're referring to the Fitrah which you just told Werewolf isn't that important?
What kind of nonsense is this?! I'm not talking about the people who believed in the Gods you found. It's so ignorant to think that when you find something dating back to 100,000 years ago then that means that everybody who lived thousands of years after and before that believed in it. What kind of bullsh*t is that?!
Read my previous post. The comparison you're making doesn't make any sense. Souls also don't have "sleeves", so?! Who said that souls are inclined to remain clean? We're talking about it's primary status, not its inclination. Are you sure you know what you're talking about?
You also seem to think that being a mono-theist means that you declare to the world that you're a Muslim! Or you're a Christian! Do you know that many Muslims are actually poly-theists? Solve this riddle!
The difference is you're calling "bias" as the nature of (the soul) of everybody.. We believe that people become biased because they choose to get biased to make personal gains. If there was no hate, if everybody got everything he wants, nobody would be biased. The more people hate, the more people get biased.. The more people love things, the more they get biased. In a neutral situation people are actually inclined not to get biased, and to be fair and objective..
But Islam also tell stories about other prophets. Nothing special about Abraham..
No Adam was a prophet just like Abraham was a prophet.
What does that have to do with it? They're called the Abrahamic religions for that reason.
What did Adam teach us then? That he didn't really exist?
Because your claim is wrong. Abraham was not the first to call for one God. Adam was the first one to call for one God.
Danny, I wish I could give you an answer, but I have no idea what you're on about.
You've gone completely cuckoo. What relevance do genetics have to this weird tangent we are going off on is beyond me.
And you know this because Muhammad said so hundreds of thousands of years after a first human who definitely didn't exist?
And, again, 'Abrahamic religions' as a phrase has nothing to do with who was the first prophet or any such thing. It just has to do with the story of him having sons who supposedly started their own civilizations. If you want to take this up with the people who coined the phrase, go for it.
If you really believe there was an Adam, care to prove that an evolutionary scientist was wrong?
dont you lot get tired of having a debate which wont lead to anything?
Listen, there is absolutely no evidence whatsoever that there was a monotheistic religion before the Abrahamic ones came along. There is overwhelming evidence that those people believed in everything but one God. Islam is making an extraordinary claim which says that everyone is born a Muslim. Thus you not only need evidence, but you need extraordinary evidence to back this claim. There is none. You can claim whatever you want, the burden of proof is on you. I could claim that people then believed in the flying spaghetti monster and you would ask me for proof. Not only this but we know that certain organizations of people favor certain religions. The nature of hunter-gatherers societies favored a certain type of religion and the transition to sedentary lifestyle favored another type of religion. It is the organization of society (economic, social,...) that favors certain kinds of religions, political systems, etc which in turn influence on the organization of society. You find this notion in Karl Marx's superstructure/base concept.
Thus, not only is there no evidence of monotheistic religions before Abrahamic ones but even what we know about the lifestyle of people throughout history would not have favored the apparition of monotheistic religion. It would have been counter-productive for those people and thus not in their nature.
Again, do you have any proof that souls exist ?
Fitrah means that people are born with their brain "wired" a certain way so that they believe in one God. Of course they would be inclined to believe in one God, their brains would be wired that way !
Oh really ? Enlighten me please !
Fitrah is real = People are naturally biased to believe in one God. Simple. If all people are naturally biased to believe in one God, monotheism would have appeared a long time ago, in the first manifestations of religion. You can deny this as much as you want it is simple logic.
And you still did not show me what bad influences make people become polytheist.
What do you think it should lead to?
It should lead to you giving me a proper answer to my question. Dont you lot get tired of having a debate which won't get you anywhere?
Don't you get tired of asking question that only get questions as an answer?
Funny.
That's it, I'm telling god to punish you.