A Christian challenge

[KarenNC]

I think both of are not seeing the multilayer meanings of the story…You must also look at it in context to the time it was written and not judge the story by the modern times we live in. If you look at the ancient world by our current view of things, you’ll miss the point

Part of my original point about dealing with sacred story was that one has to examine any sacred story of any culture in those terms.

The stories of a revealed monotheistic religion, however, do set themselves up for a bit of special treatment in terms of interpretation. Once one begins to say “these are the exact words of our God, exactly as He intended us to hear them” rather than “these are the stories the poets tell about our Gods” and “this (singular) God is the omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent Creator of all and the God of all the world” rather than “these are the Gods of our people, who are not omnipotent and they are not necessarily either omniscient or omnibenevolent” then you have set up a totally different set of criteria by which the messages of the revealed monotheistic religion are to be understood. This doesn’t even get into the murkier waters of Biblical literalism and sola scriptura (which I do understand Catholics do not teach).

 

[Morning_Star15]

Fair enough. I believe I can pretty safely say that I can imagine absolutely no conditions under which I, while sane, would feel at peace about being asked to act in direct opposition to my moral and ethical principles, much less murder my child, simply to prove my faith to anyone or any being, therefore I would say that I would have to conclude that a God who would ask that of me would not be one that had my best interests at heart nor one with whom I desire a relationship.

Don’t forget that God was willing to go through with sacrificing His own Son, Jesus Christ, on the Cross for our sins. He didn’t pull back at the last minute and say that Christ’s willingness to go through with the sacrifice was enough, and then spare Him - unlike Isaac, Christ died. But by dying Christ conquered death, and He then rose from the dead. So death is not some horrendous, final thing - good can come out of it, as God showed us with the death of His Son.

Also, this shows that God doesn’t ask us for anything that He himself was not willing to do (and didn’t do) Himself. He asked Abraham to sacrifice His Son as a sign of his love and commitment to God, and did not in the end require this sacrifice to make a covenant with Abraham and his descendants.

Then to show His love and commitment to us, His creation, God did sacrifice His Son on the Cross, and did not spare Him a cruel death (more cruel than what Isaac would have gone through - no beating, scourging, taunting, dragging a cross, humiliation, nailing of hands and feet, and slow and agonizing death on a cross for him, just a quick stab with a knife, and even that wasn’t required in the end). So to make a new covenant with us after we had turned away from the initial covenant made with Abraham, God made a greater sacrifice than He made Abraham, or anyone else for that matter, do to make the first covenant.

I don’t know about you, but I kind of like this God

On the other hand, you claimed yourself that pagan gods required child sacrifices from their followers in many cultures, and they never relented, but asked for more and more blood to be spilled. I don’t believe these gods ever existed, and therefore don’t believe that there was a divine request for this, but nevertheless children and other people were sacrificed to them. This relationship was then based on innocent blood being shed by the people to appease their gods. The only innocent blood shed in the relationship between God and Abraham’s descendants (which spiritually includes the Christians) was the blood of His own Son, to restore our relationship after we had messed it up, and not our own children’s blood. Which divine relationship sounds better to you?

 

[Bennie_P]

.

I don’t know about you, but I kind of like this God

Me too.

 

[Keikiolu]

Thus, since a God can not exist if you believe in gods, you can’t possibly consider monotheism (God worship) as valid if you hold that polytheism is valid.

Never said I did. In fact, in this and in other threads, I thought I had pretty bluntly stated that I don’t think monotheism is an accurate representation of spiritual reality. Shouldn’t be a big surprise .

Very cool…! We agree that you think I’m deluded…!

We, probably, then also agree that I think YOU’RE deluded…!

Thus,… we have no need to get “pissy” about calling each other deluded…!

Most excellent. Now we can be honest and not piss each other off…! Very cool.

What I’m getting at is that a polytheist cannot give validity to a belief in God, and therefore a polytheist CAN NOT RESPECT the beliefs of a monotheist.

I can respect that you thoughtfully and sincerely hold your beliefs, even if I consider them wrong. I wouldn’t say deluded, though I would say mistaken or incomplete.

I would call me deluded. I’m not concerned what you think of me, personally, nor about your respect for my sincerity of belief, but about your respect for my actual beliefs,… which you have no respect for.

And I agree, and accept, that you have no respect for my beliefs, which makes you a rare “polytheist” in that they usually say they respect my beliefs themselves in exactly the same way they repsect their own beliefs.

What I’m trying to drive home is the fact that monotheism and polyteism are mutually exclusive and cannot both be true.

To get a polytheist to say that is HARD. Thanks again…!

If I thought that Christianity and Hellenic Neopaganism were equally valid, why in the world would I have left the one for the other, when to do so has created a lot more issues for me and my immediate family socially and with my extended family?

Absolutely! You are a person of integrity, in seeing that it’s either one way or the other.

When I am actually still nostalgic for the ritual, beauty and music of the Episcopal service and wish I could see what mine will develop along those lines after several hundred years?

Just my personal opinion, but neopaganism will never develop into a real religion because it has no unifying force, as it’s basic structure is fragmentary.

But then,… what do I know…?

**I don’t mind being called deluded, but I don’t much ken to being called “equally valid” insincerely by polytheists. **

**The biggest problem I see with (so called) polytheists is that they flipantly grant the validity of my beliefs, while not understanding the implications of our respective definitions of each others deity(s), which are specifically mutually exclusive…! **

You’re really going to have to find someone who holds such beliefs if you want to have this part of the conversation. I don’t have a dog in that hunt.

Cool…!!

One reason that they (polys) AREN’T “honest” about that is simple ignorance of the definition of God, which I must admit I commonly find in monotheists (Christians!) in horrifyingly large numbers, which is that God isn’t omni-potent in all ways (all powerful).

I will agree that a lot of arguments I get (from Christians on this board) seem to stem from a belief that the Christian God is really only “mostly-potent.”

Yeah,… isn’t that amazingly annoying…!?

I mean,… it completely collapses the very meaning of God! Sheesh,… if you’re gonna be a polytheist, call yourself one.

But another common (actually the prevalent) reason that they aren’t honest is that they are in fact atheists who profess “gods” as a socio-political “utility” to have something (anything!) to form a “society” around that isn’t like their surrounding “dominant culture”.

see above about finding someone who holds this belief with whom to discuss it. I would have liked to have found some honest way to stay within the dominant culture as it would have been infinitely easier, but I could not.

I doubt that. But then,… once again,… we’re both free to make ludicrous statements as much as we like, aren’t we…?

I’d be interested to know what the “trigger” was to your “going over to the other side”…?

Mahalo ke Akua…!
E pili mau na pomaikai ia oe. Aloha nui.

 

[Keikiolu]

** What are, actually, the reasons you perform the “rites” of your faith?**

Are they to come into line with your (chosen at the time) god, or to “get something”?

So the question is: Do you try to “pay” your gods for their “powers of supplying wants”, or to recieve wisdom to accept the reality of that which is?

I can just imagine the reaction of the Gods if I were to approach with a shopping list of wants and expect to get them based on which offerings I have brought If you ever see anyone do that, you might want to step out of the way! No, I do not worship cosmic vending machines.

No, I pour libations, make offerings, etc to enter into a relationship with Them. To steal another post from my husband’s blog (it’s easier than re-typing ):
"I make the effort to do something nice for Them, not because I want something from Them or because I don’t want Them to smite me, but because I love and honor Them and want to give to Them of my time and effort. (ADDENDUM: This is part of one of the core virtues of our religion (and of many paleopagan cultures/religions generally) - xenia (literally “hospitality”, but more broadly covering the proper relationship between almost any two beings)).

I think the deep, true purpose of religious ritual is precisely to foster relationship (kharis). In the Hellenic tradition generally, prayer with offering is the nomos arkhaios, the customary and traditional way of initiating contact and establishing relationship."

What does “relationship” mean, in this context?

Does it mean “be like”? Does it mean “gain knowledge from”?

What I’m saying is that gods can, in fact, be “useful” in achieving goals. I would frame it as “demons” (and, rarely, angels, if the goal is “from God”) are effective in doing so, but that gods don’t provide the goals themselves, because they are “personifications” of specific “wants”, and have no real interest in any goal other than that for which they promote.

My issue with (so called) polytheists is from whence they get their goals?

My contention is that they always get them from “elsewhere”. It comes not from their gods.

Maybe if you gave a concrete example of some of the goals you mean, I could get a better idea of what you intend by this. As it stands, I really don’t understand what you are asking.

I’m interested in YOUR goals in wanting a particular “relationship” with a particular god at a particular time.

Do you mean that I operate under the belief that should I want a Maserati, I would create and pour libations to a God who was a personification of my desire for that Maserati and expect that, because I want the Maserati and so want the Maserati God to be real, therefore I would automatically get a Maserati? If so, then no.

What sort of goals do you expect the Gods to set?

You’re the one who believes in gods. You tell me…!

You DO profess a belief in, and worship of, and results (of some sort) from, your gods,… so you tell me what has happened in the past as a result of whatever it was that you do with respect to your gods.

Mahalo ke Akua…!
E pili mau na pomaikai ia oe. Aloha nui.

 

[Keikiolu]

When gods can be defined on an “as needed” basis, the “focus” they exhibit is utterly dependent on the need/want of the worshipper.

That would be true if tmy Gods were creations of humans. They are not.

I’m not saying they are creations of humans,… just creatures of God that are perverse and love to do the “bidding” (seemingly) of humans who will pay them by denying God and propping up their “egos”.

Even “established” gods, such as, say, Artemis, will “evoke” in direct correlation to the worshipper’s present wants.

The interest of a god is in SATISFYING the want of it’s worshipper, not in showing them how their want may not be wise.

Care to give a specific example of your source for this statement? I am pretty sure it doesn’t come from anything that I have said. If it did, then I have woefully miscommunicated.

What precisely do you mean by the term “evoke?”

Unfortunately, you haven’t said much of anything about your religion other than it’s true for you, and it’s antithetical to mine.

I am stating that gods have a “realm of influence” according to their individual persona, and “give” their worshippers “gifts” that “make sense” according to their persona (personality), and don’t give “gifts” which are more appropriate coming from other gods.

Just as we have various saints who we “turn to” to interceed for us according to the “persona” of the individual saint, you “turn to” a particular god because of their “persona”.

The “evil” that we see in turning to gods, as opposed to saints, is that saints don’t prop themselves up as “equals” to every other spiritual entity, and the final arbiter is the one God in whom all wisdom is contained.

Mahalo ke Akua…!
E pili mau na pomaikai ia oe. Aloha nui.

 

[KarenNC]

**Don’t forget that God was willing to go through with sacrificing His own Son, Jesus Christ, on the Cross for our sins. **

I do have to admit that I have trouble with the concept of an omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent singular God requiring Himself to be sacrificed to Himself in order to save from Himself creations that He Himself made in such a manner and placed in such a situation that He knew without a shadow of a doubt that many of those creations would transgress the laws that He Himself had put into place. Seems like a basic design flaw and an odd oversight for such a deity to make.

On the other hand, you claimed yourself that pagan gods required child sacrifices from their followers in many cultures, and they never relented, but asked for more and more blood to be spilled. … This relationship was then based on innocent blood being shed by the people to appease their gods. The only innocent blood shed in the relationship between God and Abraham’s descendants (which spiritually includes the Christians) was the blood of His own Son, to restore our relationship after we had messed it up, and not our own children’s blood. Which divine relationship sounds better to you?

You might have noticed that I am not following any such deities?

 

[KarenNC]

** I would call me deluded. I’m not concerned what you think of me, personally, nor about your respect for my sincerity of belief, but about your respect for my actual beliefs,… which you have no respect for.**

I tend to agree with Aristotle: “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”

I don’t actually equate “respect” and “understanding” with “agree is correct.”

What I’m trying to drive home is the fact that monotheism and polyteism are mutually exclusive and cannot both be true.

No argument here.

Just my personal opinion, but neopaganism will never develop into a real religion because it has no unifying force, as it’s basic structure is fragmentary.

I don’t believe there will develop a single “Neopagan” religion that incorporates all the religions that currently share that umbrella term, because I agree, some will simply not make it, just as many strands of Christianity did not make it to be considered orthodox (small o). In part this is because there is not a unified Neopagan religion now, it’s an umbrella term describing a very diverse group of religions that are as different between themselves as Hinduism is different from Christianity, much less as Catholic is different from Baptist.

I would not, however, be at all surprised to see a handful of those religions that currently exist continue and develop more of an infrastructure and traditions in the same way that Christianity did. That structure may or may not look identical to what we see today in the Neopagan community. We are already seeing some of the groups changing in response to the pressure to become more mainstream and less of a small, private practice as more convert to them and more children are born into the religion. To continue the religion longterm requires a very different dynamic, as Christianity found out when it began to realize that the end times were not imminent.

I doubt that. But then,… once again,… we’re both free to make ludicrous statements as much as we like, aren’t we…?

Which part do you doubt–that I would have preferred to find a way to stay part of the dominant culture or that to do so would have been easier?

I’d be interested to know what the “trigger” was to your “going over to the other side”…?

The trigger to formally leaving Christianity was the final admission to myself that I could no longer deny that I simply could not reconcile its teachings on the nature of God with my own beliefs and experiences.

 

[Morning_Star15]

**Don’t forget that God was willing to go through with sacrificing His own Son, Jesus Christ, on the Cross for our sins. **

I do have to admit that I have trouble with the concept of an omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent singular God requiring Himself to be sacrificed to Himself in order to save from Himself creations that He Himself made in such a manner and placed in such a situation that He knew without a shadow of a doubt that many of those creations would transgress the laws that He Himself had put into place. Seems like a basic design flaw and an odd oversight for such a deity to make.

**So loving His creation enough to give us free will instead of making us robots to keep us from messing up was an oversight. Well, maybe a slave-master relationship with your gods is all you’re looking for, but I’ll stick with my God who’s made me free to do what I want and forgives me if I mess up. I pray that you’ll discover God’s love for you one day as I have. **

On the other hand, you claimed yourself that pagan gods required child sacrifices from their followers in many cultures, and they never relented, but asked for more and more blood to be spilled. … This relationship was then based on innocent blood being shed by the people to appease their gods. The only innocent blood shed in the relationship between God and Abraham’s descendants (which spiritually includes the Christians) was the blood of His own Son, to restore our relationship after we had messed it up, and not our own children’s blood. Which divine relationship sounds better to you?

You might have noticed that I am not following any such deities?

How do you know that? You follow Hellenic deities, correct? Didn’t Agamemnon sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia to appease one of your deities according to Homer? You’ll probably say that this was not a true event, but a metaphorical story, and you’re probably right on that, but if every story told about your gods is purely metaphorical, then how do you know how people have really worshipped them in the past, and what that worship has resulted in? Do you have any accurate account of who these gods are and what kind of worship they require, or do you make it up as you go along? If you do, then how do you know that you’re really worshipping Hellenic deities and not your own creation? How do you know that the ancient worshippers of these Hellenic deities didn’t sacrifice their children to them as Agamemnon is said to have done, and as so many other pagan cultures did? Didn’t the Minoan Greeks practice child sacrifice (or cannibalism)?

 

[Chancellare]

KarenNC,
In studying Paganism and Hellenic culture, the Aristotelian philosophy and ethics has contributed to Western moral and ethical development. One of the main concepts here is the reality of Natural Laws as basis for determining moral order. So far I have not seen any Pagan religion that rejects the reality of Natural Laws. Is this also within your world-view?

 

[KarenNC]

I’m not saying they are creations of humans,… just creatures of God that are perverse and love to do the “bidding” (seemingly) of humans who will pay them by denying God and propping up their “egos”.

I can see where you would have to reach that conclusion to maintain your religious view.

Unfortunately, you haven’t said much of anything about your religion other than it’s true for you, and it’s antithetical to mine.

See posts 145 and 190 in this thread for starters. They were, I believe, before you joined the conversation and you may not have had a chance or desire to read all of the back thread.

I am stating that gods have a “realm of influence” according to their individual persona, and “give” their worshippers “gifts” that “make sense” according to their persona (personality), and don’t give “gifts” which are more appropriate coming from other gods.

Certainly each has an apparent sphere of influence, and most usually interact with humans in that sphere. Does that mean that they are unable to operate in other areas? I don’t believe so, but whether the sphere is an externally imposed limitation or a self-imposed one, I do not know. The spheres also do overlap, such as celebrating the gifts of Aphrodite in the service of Hera (the gift of sexual love and attraction within the bounds of the marriage bond).

Just as we have various saints who we “turn to” to interceed for us according to the “persona” of the individual saint, you “turn to” a particular god because of their “persona”.

Persona implies something assumed or put on, at least to me, a facade. It is more like if one is in need of a book, one does not usually go to the butcher’s shop, one seeks the bookseller. This does not mean that the butcher cannot read or does not own books, nor that the bookseller does not eat meat.

To put it in less commercial terms, if I have a question about music, I tend to go to my husband who has a much greater background in it than I do as that has been a focus for him. If I had a complicated question about photography, I would go to my friend who has made photography her profession rather than my husband who, while convenient and with a passing interest in photography, does not have her depth of knowledge in that field and may not have the answer I am seeking.

The “evil” that we see in turning to gods, as opposed to saints, is that saints don’t prop themselves up as “equals” to every other spiritual entity, and the final arbiter is the one God in whom all wisdom is contained.

Again, I can see why you would have to reach that conclusion given your worldview. You also do not believe that the saints have any power in and of themselves, unless I am mistaken, but only the ability to ask God for favors. So rather than going to the bookseller or the butcher, you go to the employee who is manning either the bookshop or the butcher shop for the person who owns both, but that employee has to get permission from the owner to give you anything, he can’t sell anything in his own right as the store does not belong to him.

For me, it is more a case of the Christian God having decided to claim that He is better than anyone else rather than the other deities “propping themselves up as equals.” Just as an aside, I don’t believe that all spiritual entities are equal. There

 

[KarenNC]

How do you know that? You follow Hellenic deities, correct? Didn’t Agamemnon sacrifice his daughter Iphigenia to appease one of your deities according to Homer? You’ll probably say that this was not a true event, but a metaphorical story, and you’re probably right on that, but if every story told about your gods is purely metaphorical, then how do you know how people have really worshipped them in the past, and what that worship has resulted in? Do you have any accurate account of who these gods are and what kind of worship they require, or do you make it up as you go along? If you do, then how do you know that you’re really worshipping Hellenic deities and not your own creation? How do you know that the ancient worshippers of these Hellenic deities didn’t sacrifice their children to them as Agamemnon is said to have done, and as so many other pagan cultures did? Didn’t the Minoan Greeks practice child sacrifice (or cannibalism)?

Interesting that you bring up Iphigenia
pantheon.org/articles/i/iphigenia.html
“Iphigenia is best known as the daughter Agamemnon, leader of the Greek forces at Troy, had to sacrifice in order to appease Artemis. Agamemnon, or perhaps one of the troops in the Greek force of Menelaus (the brother of Agamemnon) offended Artemis, the virgin goddess of the hunt either by killing one of her sacred animals and/or by boasting immoderately that his hunting skill exceeded even that of Artemis. Artemis sent a contrary wind, which held the Greek fleet in the bay of Aulis, where it had assembled before sailing to Troy. The prophet Calchas divined that the daughter of Agamemnon would have to be sacrificed to atone for the offence. Agamemnon then summoned Iphigenia from home under the ruse that she was to be married to Achilles. When the sacrifice was about to be made, however, Iphigenia is miraculously transported to Taurus, a city on the Black Sea, and an animal sent in her place.”

The article goes on to point out that Iphigenia is not found in either the Iliad or the Odyssey, where one would expect to find a major story about the nature of the Gods and given the relevance of the story line of both. Hesiod includes her in one of his works, but has her changing into the goddess Hecate rather than being sacrificed.

“The complexity of Iphigenia’s story is present in many of the heroines of Greek mythology. Many of them appear either to have been goddesses in earlier times–which powers they have lost in the historical period–or are so similar to known goddesses that they appear to be hardly more than a different name for the same divinity. Iphigenia is so closely associated with Artemis, that her name is frequently seen as a mere epithet for Artemis (H.J. Rose p. 119.), which justifies the suspicion that Iphigenia might have originally been another competing virgin goddess of the hunt, whose character and functions were subsumed by Artemis.”

I don’t doubt that there were incidences of human sacrifice in antiquity, particularly of war captives. It was not, however, the cornerstone of Hellenic faith, required by all the Gods, done simply to prove one’s faith nor does my unwillingness to contemplate doing so mean that I am not following the same Gods. Are you following a different God because you don’t bring in doves or a ram with you to be sacrificed on the altar on a Sunday morning?

Understanding that the poetic stories about the Gods means that they are not likely to be literally true does not mean that one then can have no knowledge that poeple “really worshipped” Them. There is plenty of non-metaphorical, non-poetical evidence that they did so and the results they reported. I certainly would be foolish not to at least take this information into account as my basis for worship and ritual, but I do not consider myself limited only to those forms or compelled to carry out every one that was practiced in ancient times. All religion includes innovation (see the guitar Mass, contemporary Christian music, services in the vernacular, etc). If the innovation appears to accomplish the same goals, be more readily in line with modern society and be acceptable to the deity in question, then there is no reason to discard it simply because the ancients did not do it. Hermes has seemed fine with a libation of Diet Pepsi when that was all that was available, but that doesn’t mean we don’t offer wine or oil when we can.

As to the Minoans, we have much less information on their religious practices, but based on what is known, the Minoan Gods (or, as far as we can tell, Goddesses, as they seem to have no male deities) are not mine.wsu.edu/~dee/MINOA/RELIGION.HTM

 

[Bennie_P]

Again, I can see why you would have to reach that conclusion given your worldview. You also do not believe that the saints have any power in and of themselves, unless I am mistaken, but only the ability to ask God for favors. So rather than going to the bookseller or the butcher, you go to the employee who is manning either the bookshop or the butcher shop for the person who owns both, but that employee has to get permission from the owner to give you anything, he can’t sell anything in his own right as the store does not belong to him.

For me, it is more a case of the Christian God having decided to claim that He is better than anyone else rather than the other deities “propping themselves up as equals.” Just as an aside, I don’t believe that all spiritual entities are equal. There

Your concept of the Communion of Saints really missed the mark. For Saints cannot give us anything, but offer prayer to God for us. Just has if you asked another to offer prayer for you, that has not yet passed on into enternity. And the only thing we ask for and expect is for God’s Will to be done. Relationship to what one would called “answered prayer” which seems to be in line with the petitions of the faithful, comes as one’s relationship grows closer to God, then one’s petitons and actions will reflect God’s will. Prayer is a tool to find peace in one’s situation. Even Jesus didn’t do anything that was not within God the Father’s will and in his humanity he even struggled with his upcoming suffering.

God cannot be manipulated, nor be controled, for God is God.

The biggest problem(misconception) I see with those that reject Christianity, expect God to make the world they way they want it.
God wants the world to be perfect for he made it good, but he wants us to love him by our free will. What people see as evil in the world is the result of that freedom givin us, for we are trying to be God ourselves, we think we know better. What many reject as punishment and rewards based on sin or the lack of sin are what you use in your signature the consequences of our own choices, if we choose selfish immoral actions then our consequences will be harmful, to our selves and others, thus we impose punishment unto ourselves and others. As we learn not to be selfish and self centerd then good consequences will be the fruit.

The scriptures outline the results of mankind’s struggle with their selfishness. Too many focus on punishment and restriction, thus reject the guidence of a loving Father.

Selfishness is what original sin is, God gave our first parents the whole world, with one restriction, but their selfish wouldn’t allow them to be satisfied with having that one restriction. They thought thy were better then God, or could be as God. That is the rebellion that continues in all of our sorrows today.

For example we think only about ourselves, we think if we can make our situation better without God, let us say, a women finds herself pregnant when she didn’t want to be. Then that unwanted pregnancy happen becuase she did and/or had something done to her. It was the consequence of her and/or somone elses action. If the child was not wanted she and/or someone else should not engaged in the action that caused the pregnancy. That was an act of selfishness, if the pregnancy was not wanted.

Then if the women decides that it would better for “her” not to have the child which is the result of the unwanted pregnancy, she then decides it would better to kill the child, then accept the responsibilty of her and/or someone elses wrong choice, the bad consequences continue.

This is just one example, but what I’m trying to show is, the rejections of morality, seen as unwanted restrictions or rules as based in Judea-Christian traditions affect not only the person that rejects it, but others even to the point of death.

And that is an example of the this Bibical verse about sin,
What fruit then had ye at that time in the things whereof ye are now ashamed? for the end of those things is death. But now being made free from sin and become servants to God, ye have your fruit unto sanctification, and the end eternal life. For the of is death; but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Romans 6:21 - 23

I appoligize for drifting from my main point…

 

[Morning_Star15]

The article goes on to point out that Iphigenia is not found in either the Iliad or the Odyssey, where one would expect to find a major story about the nature of the Gods and given the relevance of the story line of both. Hesiod includes her in one of his works, but has her changing into the goddess Hecate rather than being sacrificed.

And in other versions of the story, such as in Euripides’s Iphigneia in Aulis, she does get Iphigenia does get killed. But if you don’t believe this version of Iphigenia’s story, what about Hera, whom you worship, demanding that King Cepheus chain his daughter Andromeda to a rock to be eaten (she was saved eventually by Perseus, but no thanks to Hera).

I don’t doubt that there were incidences of human sacrifice in antiquity, particularly of war captives. It was not, however, the cornerstone of Hellenic faith, required by all the Gods, done simply to prove one’s faith nor does my unwillingness to contemplate doing so mean that I am not following the same Gods. Are you following a different God because you don’t bring in doves or a ram with you to be sacrificed on the altar on a Sunday morning?

**God did away with sacrificing doves and rams by offering His Son as a sacrifice that would be eternally sufficient. So we know that this practice changed. But that brings me to an interesting question about your beliefs which I have asked you before, including in my last post, and you have never answered. Maybe you’ll answer it now, or maybe you have no answer to give. The question was: How do you know that the Hellenic dieties you are worshipping are really the Hellenic deities and not your own creation? If all the stories told in antiquity about them are just myths and poems to you, how do you know who they really are: what’s your source of information? Also, how do you know that the people who created the cult around these Hellenic deities didn’t take the stories about them literally, and didn’t believe that the Hellenic gods really were as cruel as they’re portrayed in the mythology? Greek philosophers like Socrates and the Sophists believed that these gods really were cruel and severely flawed, and so didn’t worship them. They eventually convinced many Greeks to stop worshipping these gods as well, because they couldn’t reconcile the beauty of the universe with divine powers such as the Hellenic deities.

So who’s right about the nature of the Hellenic gods: you, or the ancient Greeks?**

Understanding that the poetic stories about the Gods means that they are not likely to be literally true does not mean that one then can have no knowledge that poeple “really worshipped” Them. There is plenty of non-metaphorical, non-poetical evidence that they did so and the results they reported. I certainly would be foolish not to at least take this information into account as my basis for worship and ritual, but I do not consider myself limited only to those forms or compelled to carry out every one that was practiced in ancient times. All religion includes innovation (see the guitar Mass, contemporary Christian music, services in the vernacular, etc). If the innovation appears to accomplish the same goals, be more readily in line with modern society and be acceptable to the deity in question, then there is no reason to discard it simply because the ancients did not do it. Hermes has seemed fine with a libation of Diet Pepsi when that was all that was available, but that doesn’t mean we don’t offer wine or oil when we can.

As to the Minoans, we have much less information on their religious practices, but based on what is known, the Minoan Gods (or, as far as we can tell, Goddesses, as they seem to have no male deities) are not mine.wsu.edu/~dee/MINOA/RELIGION.HTM

I threw in the Minoans to show that there’s a grain of truth in Greek mythology - children were being sent to Crete to be killed and eaten, just as the sotyr of the Minotaur says, only not by a Minotaur, but by the Minoan people. There really also was a Trojan War as recounted in many myths. So can you really claim that these are all just myths and abstract representations with no truth to them? And if you admit that there is some truth to them, how can you know what’s true and what isn’t?

 

[Keikiolu]

** I would call me deluded. I’m not concerned what you think of me, personally, nor about your respect for my sincerity of belief, but about your respect for my actual beliefs,… which you have no respect for.**

I tend to agree with Aristotle: “It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.”

I don’t actually equate “respect” and “understanding” with “agree is correct.”

Then we agree…!

You do indeed have no “respect”, as I meant it meaning “agree is correct”, to my beliefs while actually understanding what my belief is.

Cool…! All I was after was a clarification that you did in fact understand what my belief was, which you do, which proves, in this case at any rate, that you are indeed an educated mind with a set of “wrong” beliefs (in my not particulary humble opinion).

What I’m trying to drive home is the fact that monotheism and polyteism are mutually exclusive and cannot both be true.

No argument here.

Yea…!!

Just my personal opinion, but neopaganism will never develop into a real religion because it has no unifying force, as it’s basic structure is fragmentary.

I don’t believe there will develop a single “Neopagan” religion that incorporates all the religions that currently share that umbrella term, because I agree, some will simply not make it, just as many strands of Christianity did not make it to be considered orthodox (small o). In part this is because there is not a unified Neopagan religion now, it’s an umbrella term describing a very diverse group of religions that are as different between themselves as Hinduism is different from Christianity, much less as Catholic is different from Baptist.

I would not, however, be at all surprised to see a handful of those religions that currently exist continue and develop more of an infrastructure and traditions in the same way that Christianity did. That structure may or may not look identical to what we see today in the Neopagan community. We are already seeing some of the groups changing in response to the pressure to become more mainstream and less of a small, private practice as more convert to them and more children are born into the religion. To continue the religion longterm requires a very different dynamic, as Christianity found out when it began to realize that the end times were not imminent.

Yeah,… I agree. Some quasi-baha’i-ish/Zoroastrian sorta thing will develop,… but it’ll never be a “major” religion because of it’s necessity to be “locally oriented” due to it’s dependence on a local culture (racial/geographical/literally-bloodline).

Any pantheon which is “applicable” to a worldwide audience would “degenerate” into universal types, which dilute themselves over time into unity,… which points to the actual God.

I doubt that. But then,… once again,… we’re both free to make ludicrous statements as much as we like, aren’t we…?

Which part do you doubt–that I would have preferred to find a way to stay part of the dominant culture or that to do so would have been easier?

I doubt you prefered to find a way to remain within the dominant culture, because you could have found what you were seeking within it but chose not to. I can confidently say that you “could have found it” even without knowing specifically what you were seeking, because it possible to find ANYTHING you could possibly be seeking (that is of God) within Christianity.

Since you actually DID choose an “acceptable path” within the “dominant culture” (Which is NOT Christian only pseudo-Christian) it’s the same amount of ease either way, so there’s no “doubt” involved.

I’d be interested to know what the “trigger” was to your “going over to the other side”…?

The trigger to formally leaving Christianity was the final admission to myself that I could no longer deny that I simply could not reconcile its teachings on the nature of God with my own beliefs and experiences.

OK. That’s a perfectly good reason…!

The problem with that, of course, is that you’re comparing your beliefs with your beliefs, and not your beliefs with God Himself.

…but as you can’t accept that God’s “nature” is understandable except as a (relatively truthful) belief, that is a perfectly rational conclusion.

Mahalo ke Akua…!
E pili mau na pomaikai ia oe. Aloha nui.

 

[Keikiolu]

I’m not saying they are creations of humans,… just creatures of God that are perverse and love to do the “bidding” (seemingly) of humans who will pay them by denying God and propping up their “egos”.

I can see where you would have to reach that conclusion to maintain your religious view.

Thank you…! My religious view demands that interpretation, of course, and not the other way around, but I hear 'ya.

Unfortunately, you haven’t said much of anything about your religion other than it’s true for you, and it’s antithetical to mine.

See posts 145 and 190 in this thread for starters. They were, I believe, before you joined the conversation and you may not have had a chance or desire to read all of the back thread.

Okey dokey…!! Mahalo…!

I am stating that gods have a “realm of influence” according to their individual persona, and “give” their worshippers “gifts” that “make sense” according to their persona (personality), and don’t give “gifts” which are more appropriate coming from other gods.

Certainly each has an apparent sphere of influence, and most usually interact with humans in that sphere. Does that mean that they are unable to operate in other areas? I don’t believe so, but whether the sphere is an externally imposed limitation or a self-imposed one, I do not know. The spheres also do overlap, such as celebrating the gifts of Aphrodite in the service of Hera (the gift of sexual love and attraction within the bounds of the marriage bond).

I agree with you. Your logic is flawless.

Just as we have various saints who we “turn to” to interceed for us according to the “persona” of the individual saint, you “turn to” a particular god because of their “persona”.

Persona implies something assumed or put on, at least to me, a facade. It is more like if one is in need of a book, one does not usually go to the butcher’s shop, one seeks the bookseller. This does not mean that the butcher cannot read or does not own books, nor that the bookseller does not eat meat.

Yup,… we agree again. Your gods have a facade (persona) just as all the “personalities” of Christianity do.

You go to the appropriate for the appropriate wares. That’s perfectly correct.

To put it in less commercial terms, if I have a question about music, I tend to go to my husband who has a much greater background in it than I do as that has been a focus for him. If I had a complicated question about photography, I would go to my friend who has made photography her profession rather than my husband who, while convenient and with a passing interest in photography, does not have her depth of knowledge in that field and may not have the answer I am seeking.

Oh yeah,… we go to our respective “helpers” for what they are capable of helping us with.

We don’t argue about actions, but about who the appropriate “helpers” are.

The “evil” that we see in turning to gods, as opposed to saints, is that saints don’t prop themselves up as “equals” to every other spiritual entity, and the final arbiter is the one God in whom all wisdom is contained.

Again, I can see why you would have to reach that conclusion given your worldview. You also do not believe that the saints have any power in and of themselves, unless I am mistaken, but only the ability to ask God for favors. So rather than going to the bookseller or the butcher, you go to the employee who is manning either the bookshop or the butcher shop for the person who owns both, but that employee has to get permission from the owner to give you anything, he can’t sell anything in his own right as the store does not belong to him.

That would be correct.

My question then becomes: Where does each god get their power? The typical answer to that is, “I don’t know, and it doesn’t matter”, which just brings the Christian to the conclusion that the “idolater” (just being descriptive, not pejorative) has a general “I don’t care about that which is unrelated to my wants” attitude.

For me, it is more a case of the Christian God having decided to claim that He is better than anyone else rather than the other deities “propping themselves up as equals.” Just as an aside, I don’t believe that all spiritual entities are equal. There…

Well,… IF you believe that God IS in fact the only actual ultimate authority then the question of “Him claiming” isn’t a question at all.

Once again, our basic difference of accepting our mutual definition of “God as opposed to gods” dictates the situation of who believes what.

You are very conscious of why you believe what you believe and are fearless in stating your reasoning and conclusions.

That is VERY cool…! And is highly unusual.

In other words: I like you. You 'da good kine, fo real, eh…!

Mahalo ke Akua…!
E pili mau na pomaikai ia oe. Aloha nui.

 

[KarenNC]

**What does “relationship” mean, in this context?

Does it mean “be like”? Does it mean “gain knowledge from”?**

“Be like” would be “imitation” and there is no teaching of imitatio dei in Hellenism. “Relationship” means what it usually means, a state of interaction between two beings. Gaining knowledge can be part of that, certainly, but it is more about the actual relationship, as one might have with a friend–one who is more powerful, certainly, and worthy of respect.

I’m interested in YOUR goals in wanting a particular “relationship” with a particular god at a particular time.

I honor regularly those Gods whose spheres of focus interact with my life on a regular basis, on the theory that such are most likely to have an interest in me and my offerings and to have some desire to form a relationship based on shared focus. I honor as appropriate those other Gods with whom I come into contact more infrequently. There are some whose spheres of focus are not part of my life (Ares, for example) so I have no worship relationship with Them, but that does not equate to not “believing” in Them or saying that They are not appropriate dieties for others to worship.

Does that answer your question?

You’re the one who believes in gods. You tell me…!

Ah, but you are the one who brought up “goals.” Since your definition and mine of “respect” differ fairly widely, I need to understand what you mean by “goals” in this respect.

You DO profess a belief in, and worship of, and results (of some sort) from, your gods,… so you tell me what has happened in the past as a result of whatever it was that you do with respect to your gods.

There are events that I interpret as being answers to prayer. Would they be glaringly obvious or meaningful to another person? Not necessarily–we aren’t talking apparitions, phyiscal manifestations, fireworks, big brass bands, hands coming down out of the clouds.

Is it entirely possible that another person would interpret them as coincidence or simply natural occurrences? Probably, but I see them as responses from the Gods or reminders that They exist. Do I see everything that happens as such? No, to use the quote attributed to Freud, “sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.”

 

[KarenNC]

KarenNC,
In studying Paganism and Hellenic culture, the Aristotelian philosophy and ethics has contributed to Western moral and ethical development. One of the main concepts here is the reality of Natural Laws as basis for determining moral order. So far I have not seen any Pagan religion that rejects the reality of Natural Laws. Is this also within your world-view?

Aristotelian philosophy and ethics were (and are) certainly part of the Hellenic worldview (at least at a certain time period), but they are not necessarily the totality of it or even the main thrust of it.

What would you consider a rejection of Natural Laws?

 

[KarenNC]

Just fyi, it would make it infinitely easier to reply to your questions if you broke your responses out of the quote of the original question. It’s really easy to do. When you hit “quote,” look at the words in brackets ]–replace what is there with the letter b (for bold) at the beginning of the passage that you wish to quote, and put “bracket /b close bracket” (using the bracket symbols) at the end of that passage. Then insert your comments. Do the same for other areas you wish to respond to. That way, when a responder hits “quote” your responses will show up.

** But if you don’t believe this version of Iphigenia’s story, what about Hera, whom you worship, demanding that King Cepheus chain his daughter Andromeda to a rock to be eaten (she was saved eventually by Perseus, but no thanks to Hera).**

The fact that there are multiple stories simply illustrates the point. It isn’t a case of “believe” the stories in the way in which you are expected to believe Biblical stories. These are not revealed truths, they are the attempts of humans to express their interactions with divinity through the limited means of human language.

** But that brings me to an interesting question about your beliefs which I have asked you before, including in my last post, and you have never answered. Maybe you’ll answer it now, or maybe you have no answer to give. The question was: How do you know that the Hellenic dieties you are worshipping are really the Hellenic deities and not your own creation? If all the stories told in antiquity about them are just myths and poems to you, how do you know who they really are: what’s your source of information? Also, how do you know that the people who created the cult around these Hellenic deities didn’t take the stories about them literally, and didn’t believe that the Hellenic gods really were as cruel as they’re portrayed in the mythology? Greek philosophers like Socrates and the Sophists believed that these gods really were cruel and severely flawed, and so didn’t worship them. They eventually convinced many Greeks to stop worshipping these gods as well, because they couldn’t reconcile the beauty of the universe with divine powers such as the Hellenic deities.

So who’s right about the nature of the Hellenic gods: you, or the ancient Greeks?**

Sorry, I thought that I did answer you.

Firstly, I don’t see my Gods as any more cruel than yours, in fact, I consider yours to be worse, as I have stated. My Gods don’t claim to hold all the cards, yours does. Therefore nothing can happen outside of the will and intent of your God. Whatever happens, must by definition happen because He sees some purpose in it in line with His desires. I have a great deal of trouble reconciling the Christian teaching of an omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent God with the reality that I see all around me.

I do look to the myths and the understanding of the ancients about the Gods. I also look to my personal experiences with Them as well as to the experiences related by others. I do not see these as incompatible, but I also don’t see them as interchangable.

It might help you to understand that there was not a monolithic “ancient Greek understanding” of the nature of the Gods. The religion is and was about orthopraxy (right action) not orthodoxy (right belief). I am sure there were literalists in the ancient world. We certainly know that there was a broad range of understanding expressed by the various philosophers and the various poets and playwrights at various times.

Plato, for example, wanted to ban poets from his republic because he felt the myths portrayed the Gods improperly and were impious, so he was not a literalist but did see the Gods as real.

cont

 

[KarenNC]

I threw in the Minoans to show that there’s a grain of truth in Greek mythology - children were being sent to Crete to be killed and eaten, just as the sotyr of the Minotaur says, only not by a Minotaur, but by the Minoan people.

From what I can tell projectsx.dartmouth.edu/history/bronze_age/lessons/les/15.html there is a possible connection, but not what would be considered definitive evidence for the connection with the myth of the Minotaur and the archaeological remains found. If the Minoans did, in fact, include ritual cannibalism in the worship of their Gods, that does not alter my understanding of the Greek myths, because that understanding does not hinge on the literal existence of a being with the head of a bull and the body of a man.

Cannibalism is certainly not unknown, even in modern culture. This does not necessarily mean that it is the primary cult activity of a group.

** There really also was a Trojan War as recounted in many myths. **

There is certainly a city that Schleimann believed to be Troy, but there is not a consensus in the academic community on whether it is the Troy.

**So can you really claim that these are all just myths and abstract representations with no truth to them? **

You totally misunderstand my use of the term “myth.” I do not see myth as an abstract representation. Myths, whether of the Greeks or the Christians, are at core the sacred stories of a people, that tell what that culture believes to be most important about how to be human (how to interact with each other) and how to interact with that which is beyond human (the divine). All myths have truth to them or they would not be myths. That truth may not be in a literal, time-travel sense, but that does not mean it is not a truth, in fact it is likely a much deeper truth.

And if you admit that there is some truth to them, how can you know what’s true and what isn’t?

Some of the stories may recount, or at least reflect, actual historic events, some may not. We have no way of telling which is which, so I find it more productive to look for the spiritual value (the truth) in them than in general worrying about whether a particular story is or is not true in a time-travel sense.