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benedictus2
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True. But the pagan conception of God is false even though the heart may be moved by the same God. And this is why Christ puts the emphasis on the fact that He is the truth.
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TheExorcist
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Contarini
Guest
With all due respect, a lovesick teenager in a romantic tragedy is not the highest theological authority. Names are important–Acts 4:12 is the classic statement of this in Christianity.
Your account trivializes all religions. Buddhists do not think that “Buddha” is another name for God. Why not listen to what Buddhists mean by Buddha (different Buddhist groups mean different things) instead of assuming that they mean the same thing you mean by God?
“Shiva” is certainly a name by which many Hindus refer to what they understand as ultimate Divinity. But we should not simply assume that “Shiva” names what we call “God” until we have done some careful study of the attributes of Shiva, the way he is worshiped, etc. (We should also not assume, as some Christians do, that “Shiva” points to evil.)
And I’m not sure what you mean by distinguishing “Christ” from “Jesus.”
You’re assuming that all religions take us to the same place. It is certainly not true that all forms of a single religion are equally true. So it seems unlikely (though possible) that different religions are equally true. An obvious example of the former would be Osama bin Laden’s version of Islam (may God have mercy on his soul) versus, say, Sufism. I think most of us would agree that the latter is much closer to the truth about God than bin Laden’s version. (Note: this has absolutely nothing to do with the anachronistic non-issue of whether bin Laden’s version corresponds to the original form of Islam or not.) I’m picking an example from another religion because that’s easier to agree on. Now if Rumi, say, understood God better than bin Laden, it’s quite possible that St. Francis understood God better than Rumi (or vice versa).
God. I agree that we should be careful about using language like “absolutely correct.” Our understanding of God will always be limited and imperfect in this life.
Well, the claim made by Christianity, Judaism, and Islam is that God has revealed Himself to us. It limits God unduly to claim that this is impossible. (Eastern religions, in their own way, also claim that human beings can have some grasp of the truth and can declare some things truer than other things.) Of course, revelation itself needs to be interpreted. But it seems to me that it is not at all arrogant to place our faith in a particular revelation of God, given reasonable evidence (never 100% certain, of course). I believe that Jesus rose from the dead, and that the community descended from his earliest disciples has correctly understood the basic significance of this event. That doesn’t exclude the possibility (indeed, the near-certainty) that we have much to learn from other religions. But to me it seems arrogant (though amiable) to claim that all religions are equally correct. We can’t know that. Indeed, we have less reason to know that than we do that our own religion is true. So the latter is the humbler claim. Why do we need to pontificate about other religions at all? We can recognize truth where we see it, and we can reject what seems to us to be error (and particularly what seems evil–a point where our perceptions are relatively much more reliable).
Certainly. But it is also possible to move away from God while thinking you are approaching Him. (Again, Osama bin Laden is the easy and non-controversial example!) And those who approach God are not all equally close to God or approaching Him with equal speed.)
Edwin
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TheExorcist
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You’re kidding right? Oprah is one of the, if not THE most influential and powerful women in the world. Money is power. Money is influence. When she speaks MILLIONS of people listen.
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Contarini
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That statement, without qualification, does not agree with Acts 17:28, where Paul quotes not one but two pagan poets as if they had some true understanding of God.
Edwin
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Contarini
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No, I’m not kidding. Money and power are a lot less interesting than truth.
Understand what is true and what is false about what Smith says, and you’ll be well able to tackle the cruder version of the same ideas found in Oprah. Ignore serious thinkers like Smith and fixate on Oprah, and you’ll be just as shallow as she is.
I’m not saying that we should ignore Oprah. I’m saying that if we want to discuss the truth of the issue, we should do so, and then we will be able to tackle Oprah’s facile misrepresentations.
Edwin
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Contarini
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It’s not quite that simple. Most Hindus I know would deny being polytheists, because they believe that all the deities are manifestations of one divine Reality. And Christians are not “simple monotheists,” as any Jew or Muslim or Unitarian will tell you!
Edwin
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benedictus2
Guest
Not quite. It is not just a matter of different names.
Take for example our belief that God is a Trinity. That is definitely different to the Jewish or Islamic understanding. Take also our understanding that Christ is God. That is at odds with Jewish and Muslim faith.
The practice of each is different because the faith of each is different, the belief of each is different.
Let me give you an example.
Have you seen one of those street performers who paint themselves gold or silver or white and make themselves out to be a statue, scarcely moving? Let suppose Persons A, B, C and D are all watching him.
PersonA stays for the briefest moment and sees this person only fleetingly - when he was completely immobile. Not having seen anything like it before, he came to the conclusion that this is certainly a statue.
PersonB stays a little while longer, happens to see this statue roll its eyes and shake its fingers then thunder and lightning followed. So he decides that this must be some kind of God because he rolls his eyes and shakes his finger and thunder and lightning happens.
PersonC stayed a little bit longer comes to find out that he is a human being as he moved and stretched about.
PersonD, fascinated by this strikes a conversion with this man, talked with him over coffee and became really good friends with him. The man even stayed with PersonD for a while so he got to know him quite well - his wishes, his fears, dreams, etc.
If asked, everyone will have a different image of this man but only the last one will have a true picture of him. And yet, they are all referring to the same man. The first two are completely false, the 3rd is almost there but the last one got it all.
If you need to ask that then I suggest you read up on your faith.
If it is all the same, then why did Christ have to come? After all Buddhist, Hindu and Jewish would have done wouldn’t they? As a matter of fact, why would God need to make a revelation to the Jews if the beliefs of the pagans around Israel is of equal value as the Jewish faith?
You are very relativistic and that is where the error lies.
And isn’t that what we are called to do as Christians? To speak for God because He has already given us the revelation? What do you think the great commission to “make disciples of all nations” about?
Sure we can, but one point gives the clearest and truest view. Christianity. So why would one settle for less?
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benedictus2
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Would Hindus who deny being polytheists be correct and would the Muslim, Jew or Unitrian be right in saying that the Christian is not “simple monotheist?”
It is not a question of what one segment of the population opines but whether what is opined is true.
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benedictus2
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There are some facets of their understanding that is true, but this does not make their understanding true because it is mixed up with the false.
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TheExorcist
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I would definitely agree with that however I don’t think most people in our country would. People want to be entertained not given truth.
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benedictus2
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Agree. The whole advertising industry which pervades our every waking moment - and to which people have given allegiance - is predicated on that and the dispersion of lies.
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Contarini
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Contarini
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Indeed. What frustrated me about the initial mention of Oprah is that the OP said nothing about Oprah, but referenced instead a respected scholar of world religions. So why reply by dragging in Oprah? By all means address Oprah when you run into people who follow her. But why bring her in unnecessarily, when she already has more of a platform than most of us would like?
Edwin
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benedictus2
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And that would be nothing more than relativism yet again.
If I were to believe that Christ is only a prophet and not God and that He is the incarnation of the Buddha and still define myself as Christian, would i be right? After all, should I not be allowed to define what I believe?
Our monotheism is not qualified. We are monotheists because we do not have three separate Gods.
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Contarini
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Indeed. But we believe that one God exists in three Persons. That is a qualification of monotheism.
You are actually doing precisely what you accused me of doing. You are saying that we get to redefine language to fit our beliefs. I’m saying that monotheism has a commonly understood, simple meaning, and that while we don’t reject that meaning, we do put a tweak on it which no one would expect from the common definition of “monotheism.”
Edwin
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Sufjon
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I see. It would seem that as long as we see things in terms of “yours” and “mine”, we pretty much have nothing. That would be because we have totally missed the point. I would, however, agree that there is one God with different understandings and experiences of Him.
Your friend
Sufjon
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benedictus2
Guest
But your exact words were “And who gets to define what people believe if not the people themselves”
So if a non Christian (by our definiton) denomination defines themselves as Christians then they are Christians?
But that is not what I said.What I said was if someone claims that Christ is only a prophet, does that make him a Christian. Can the group like LDS who claim to be Christians rightly **define **themselves so?
And that is not what I was saying either.
But THAT is relativism, because either Jesus is ONLY a prophet or He is MORE than just a prophet.
And again, that is not what I was saying either.
Not a qualification but an explanation. We see God as a family, they see God as one Person.
Not at all. Saying that God is one family as opposed to one person is not redefining monotheism to fit our belief. To come to a greater understanding of God does not mean redefinition.
And that is true, but just because monotheism has a commonly understood meaning does not mean that that commonly understood meaning is true. Either the Trinity is correct or it is false. What Jews and Muslims believe about our conception is of no consequence if God is indeed a Trinity.
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benedictus2
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Not quite. If “my” understanding is proved to be the correct understanding as opposed to “your”, understanding, then we actually have something - the truth.
Putting everything in the wash where everything blurs into each other is hardly desirable. If this is the something you are hoping for then the nothing is probably preferable.
C
Contarini
Guest
I would not say simply that they are either Christians or non-Christians. The obvious example is Mormons. It’s unfair simply to lump Mormons in with other non-Christian groups, given the importance that Jesus and the Christian story have for them. At the same time, we can’t say without qualification that they are Christians, because what they mean by “Christian” is different than what we do. By my definition, Mormons are polytheists (more so than Hindus, in fact). But Mormons typically deny this. So I have to be careful in using the term about them. And that’s all I’m saying. It’s arrogant and unjust simply to dismiss people’s self-description and substitute your own. I agree that my initial statement was itself too simplistic.
Sorry for reading hastily there. That’s a good question: I would say that that’s where you have to start qualifying terms, just as in the question of whether Christians are monotheists. Someone who believes Jesus is a prophet (like Muslims) is not a Christian by the mainstream, traditional definition. Theologically, they are cut off from the visible Body of Christ by their false belief (though they may be “spiritually” among God’s elect if their belief is in good faith).
themselves so?
Their definition is not meaningless. But we have to say that what they mean by “Christian” is different from what we mean.
You’re abusing the term “relativism.” Recognizing gray areas and nuances is not relativism–quite the reverse, in fact. The reason we should use complicated, nuanced language is that reality really is complicated and nuanced. If I were a relativist, I could make simplistic statements cheerfully and without qualms!
If you define the dichotomy as “Jesus is either just a prophet or more than a prophet,” then my original claim is true: people get to define which side they fall. But if you define the dichotomy as “Jesus is either what orthodox Christianity says He is or he is not,” then people may claim to agree with what orthodox Christianity says but be mistaken, because they don’t understand the orthodox tradition very well and/or are twisting it for their own agenda. But if you define the dichotomy as “either Jesus is just a prophet or He is what orthodox Christianity says he is,” then you are creating a simplistic dichotomy that doesn’t match reality.
And, of course, there’s a range of views within orthodox Christianity, and reasonable people differ over where the boundary of orthodoxy lies.
None of this is relativism. I’m not saying that there is no truth about who Jesus is or that the truth depends on our perspective or definition.
But the term “monotheism” does not itself suggest that God is a family–indeed, it might reasonably be supposed to exclude such an understanding.
Of course it does, if the previous definition would have been assumed to exclude my present understanding.
Indeed, in the sense that the way the term is commonly understood may not adequately describe the nature of the One God. But the fact remains that when you say “we are monotheists but we believe God is a family” (not quite the way I’d put Trinitarianism myself–I think I smell Scott Hahn lurking behind your language!) you are introducing a significant tweak into the concept of monotheism.
It’s of consequence if we are not relativists and want to use language in reasonable ways to communicate with our fellow human beings.
Edwin
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