Isn't the smalltown preacher the real face of religion? — TheMadFool
Maybe it is for you. Maybe that’s why you see it as you do — Wayfarer
That was Marx's economic-class-based view. But a more general view of the god/man relationship might be Dominant/Submissive. In other words, the gods represent human leaders who are both feared and respected. And in polytheism, the gods had hierarchies of their own.Is belief in god then a symptom of slave mentality? — TheMadFool
Is belief in god then a symptom of slave mentality? — TheMadFool
Someone can correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't this quite similar to the lines of Nietzsche?I then realized that theism is, at its core, a belief that there is a being whose commands one has to obey without question. Isn't this slavery? A slave must obey his master's command and the master makes it clear that he has zero tolerance for any disobedience. - Is belief in god then a symptom of slave mentality? — TheMadFool
The concept of men being slaves to the gods or being slaves to the city state temple priests who commune with the gods is very ancient
— christian2017
Islam isn't ancient, in fact it's the very latest incarnation of religion we know of and it means "surrender" or "submission". — TheMadFool
You were contemplating a rational voluntary belief in a debatable concept. But that's a calculated cost/benefit approach; it's a gamble. It's the rational pragmatic solution that Pascal came up with. The problem with that kind of belief is that it can be swayed by a change of circumstances. For example, many Christians & Jews in Europe became practicing Muslims or Christians, when it was the lesser of two evils : death or conversion. Yet, when the dominant political entity changed, some of those pragmatic folks switched their allegiance to a different god-concept.As I wrestled with the idea of the divine, a thought crossed my mind - should I just take the plunge, make the leap of faith, and just believe in god, a benevolent creator who will unfailingly look out for me no matter what? — TheMadFool
Formal Theism is a late development in human religion. For thousands of years, Neanderthals and primitive Homo Sapiens were "slaves" of Nature. They had no control over natural events, including life or death scenarios. So, all they could do was pray to whatever powers might be for some very practical interventions : recovery from illness, rain for crops, a healthy baby. But as people began to form complex societies in bronze-age civilizations, they also formed more specific images of the gods : one god for each major aspect of Nature & Culture --- weather, success in battle, etc. Eventually Universal Montheism, of the sort you seem to be contemplating, was devised to reflect the all-powerful emperors & courtiers of the Iron Age earthly empires, wherein everybody was a slave to his superiors in a rigid top-down hierarchy. Some modern liberal Christians and New Agers, though, seem to imagine God as a sort of democratic president in the sky, so all men are free, and subject only to the beneficent laws of reason.P.S. This isn't a comprehensive analysis but is just an exploratory effort on my part into how theism maybe a reflection of a slavish instinct within us all. — TheMadFool
You were contemplating a rational voluntary belief in a debatable concept. But that's a calculated cost/benefit approach; it's a gamble. It's the rational pragmatic solution that Pascal came up with. The problem with that kind of belief is that it can be swayed by a change of circumstances. For example, many Christians & Jews in Europe became practicing Muslims or Christians, when it was the lesser of two evils : death or conversion. Yet, when the dominant political entity changed, some of those pragmatic folks switched their allegiance to a different god-concept. — Gnomon
One of the elements Kierkegaard introduced in his Works of Love is the idea that what is taken as examples of the highest discrimination of pagan Love actually requires another ingredient.
That the interest in another person is not just a bundle of instincts but a kind of emptiness of self. Not as a exemplar of perfection but as a means to a way of seeing. — Valentinus
Yes. Christianity and Islam have made unbelief, and especially apostasy, into a one-way ticket to Hell. That embedded fear may be why I was so slow to make a clean break from Theism, long after my disbelief in the Bible was rationally confirmed. Actually, I still believe in what I call "G*D", but I'm not afraid of Mother Nature. She may punish violations of natural laws, but everlasting fire is not a natural punishment. It's a sadistic torture device dreamed-up by religious rulers to keep the unruly in line with the stick of awe & fear, because the carrot of promised blessings is so mundane by comparison, and also because mere Death happens even to fervent believers. :worry:In essence, Pascal considered it an extremely dangerous affair not to believe in god - that's fear and fear is precisely what sustains the beast of slavery. — TheMadFool
I then realized that theism is, at its core, a belief that there is a being whose commands one has to obey without question. Isn't this slavery? A slave must obey his master's command and the master makes it clear that he has zero tolerance for any disobedience — TheMadFool
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