The truth is, contrary to common assumptions, there are many professors who are ignorant and close-minded. Who just repeat whatever party-line they swallowed however long age. — Fooloso4
That goes with someone wearing your hat does not keep your head warm. Philosophy should never be memorizing what was said but always be about understanding concepts and independent thinking.I did not find evidence of "moral training" but moral philosophy was often represented. — Fooloso4
I met with the head of philosophy at my university back in 1988. I had been somewhat annoyed by the approach taken over the year, which was essentially telling us how to think. He laughed and said, 'Son, you're not here to learn about philosophy, you're here to parrot back to us that which we think is correct. If you want to learn philosophy, leave this course.' Which I promptly did 30 minutes later. I never regretted the choice. Anyway now I'm here, sniffing around to see what I might have missed. — Tom Storm
By way of comparison, I went on to teach courses on Chinese, Japanese, and Greek philosophy. — Fooloso4
Abraham is a human ...
— Athena
If you mean he was a real person, a historical figure you will not find much scholarly support. If you mean that these stories had their antecedents then yes, but as they have come to us they reflect other ideas as well. — Fooloso4
By Cynthia Astle
Updated on May 04, 2019
Archaeology has been one of biblical history's greatest tools to sift out verified facts of Bible stories. In fact, over the past few decades archaeologists have learned a great deal about the world of Abraham in the Bible. Abraham is considered to be the spiritual father of the world's three great monotheistic religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. — Cynthia Astle
Where was Abraham from? The Bible states that Abraham was raised in “Ur of the Chaldeans” (Ur Kasdim). Most scholars agree that Ur Kasdim was the Sumerian city Ur, today Tall al-Muqayyar (or Tall al-Mughair), about 200 miles (300 km) southeast of Baghdad in lower Mesopotamia.Nov 19, 2023 — Britannica
According to Plato's Euthyphro the answer is no. Their less than exemplary behavior is the basis of Socrates' criticism of Euthyphro's misguided piety. — Fooloso4
An incantation, a spell, a charm, an enchantment, or a bewitchery, is a magical formula intended to trigger a magical effect on a person or objects. The formula can be spoken, sung, or chanted. An incantation can also be performed during ceremonial rituals or prayers. Wikipedia — Wikipedia
Archaeology has been one of biblical history's greatest tools to sift out verified facts of Bible stories. In fact, over the past few decades archaeologists have learned a great deal about the world of Abraham in the Bible. Abraham is considered to be the spiritual father of the world's three great monotheistic religions, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam — Cynthia Astle
Philosophy should never be memorizing what was said but always be about understanding concepts and independent thinking. — Athena
I want to know so much more about why you chose Asian philosophy. — Athena
I have a terrible feeling that Christianity has closed out those wonderful sources of wisdom. — Athena
I don't know exactly how to approach this subject but I hope you say more about that choice. — Athena
There is no problem getting sources to validate the existence of Abraham. — Athena
And Moses said unto God, Behold, when I come unto the children of Israel, and shall say unto them, The God of your fathers hath sent me unto you; and they shall say to me, What is his name? what shall I say unto them?
And God said unto Moses, I AM THAT I AM: and he said, Thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel, I AM hath sent me unto you.
God also said to Moses, "Say to the Israelites, `The LORD, the God of your fathers--the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob--has sent me to you.' This is my name forever, the name by which I am to be remembered from generation to generation.
(Exodus 3:13-15)
Are you thinking the story of Adam and Eve is anything other than a story equal to Aesop's Fables? — Athena
Both stories are about a god's concern about what humans will do with knowledge but the Greek story does not blame the first man and woman and he does not punish them for doing something wrong ... — Athena
Socrates was also condemned to drink the hemlock for his impiety. A person arguing the gods are not good does not cancel out the fact that the popular opinion was the gods are good. — Athena
I want to know so much more about why you chose Asian philosophy.
— Athena
It chose me. It is common to ask an instructor to teach courses outside their area. Some instructors will just find a textbook, and let it do most of the work. Some textbooks have teacher editions that discussion questions and sample tests. That is not the way I do things.
I use primary texts. Rather than reading about philosophers and schools we read and attempt to interpret and discuss their work. To keep this short I had to do a lot of reading to prep. — Fooloso4
I want to know more. Which philosophers did your class examine?
I am thinking, that some philosophers are extremely difficult to read and I like the shortcut of reading someone else's explanation of what the original person said. But mind you, until relatively recently I have done my reading on my own without others to discuss them with and that does not have the same motivation of knowing one will interact with others. I am stumbling in the dark with philosophy without guidance.
I also attempted to read the Bible for myself and found it to be as terrible as Socrates found the stories told of the gods. For me, the Bible says so many stupid and horrible things it is not worth my time, but then I read your explanations and I am favorably impressed by your deeper understanding. If they give trophies to people who expand the thinking of others, you deserve one because I am pretty belligerent when it comes to the Bible. I still think the Christian thing is very problematic and harmful to democracy but you have shown a well-educated person can see more meaning of the stories than a less educated person.
I think the quotes you chose make it clear Judaism is a tribal religion, not an explanation of a universal god whose children are equal under the sun. And that tribal religion comes with a hierarchy that is not compatible with democracy. I am edging us back to the subject of this thread- Is our greatness the result of working together or the result of great leaders? What part does God play in this? I am getting at the international point of view and the fact that in some countries Americans are obnoxious people because they believe they are God's chosen people and that what they want, God wills for them. As the story goes we are blessed by God and those who oppose us are evil. Why else would God give us the technology of nuclear weapons if He did not want us to rule? Or as Zeus might say, that technology for war is a forbidden fruit and the longer it takes for us to have such technology the better. :wink:
The Greeks had a war with the Maccabees because the Greeks favored merit hiring and did not comply with the Jewish notion of God-chosen men and inherited rights to certain jobs. Martin Luther did not question God chose who would be masters and who would be slaves. Only recently has science begun explaining how past favoritism unjustly held some men down. The US is still struggling with old beliefs that justify divisions of humans. The question of greatness has social, political, and economic ramifications. The US was a New Social Order, but I don't think anyone today understands that because we replaced education for good citizenship and good moral judgment with education for technology and left moral training to the church.
:worry: Oh darn, I am dealing with a mental breakdown. My brain absolutely will not follow the linear process essential to comprehensive thinking. I am trying to clear up my thinking so I can make a comprehensive statement about democracy and the human potential. Then religion comes into the discussion and things are so complex for me, and I am afraid I am getting further from my goal. In the past, the goal was to write a book and I did great until bumped into the Christian issue. Trying to deal with the Christian issue without offending anyone took down my effort to write a book like an iceberg took down the Titanic. But the original Greek understanding of humans and gods is nothing like the God of Abraham's understanding of humans and God.
And the Lord God said, “The man has now become like one of us, knowing good and evil. He must not be allowed to reach out his hand and take also from the tree of life and eat, and live forever.” (Genesis 3:22)
Man should not be allowed to become gods. Death, like life, is both a blessing and a curse. The dualism of blessings and curses in this story should not be overlooked. They go hand in hand. They are tied to the dualism of knowledge. Knowledge is productive. Its fruits are both good and bad. Adam knew Eve. — Fooloso4
I want to know more. Which philosophers did your class examine?
But mind you, until relatively recently I have done my reading on my own without others to discuss them with
I think the quotes you chose make it clear Judaism is a tribal religion, not an explanation of a universal god whose children are equal under the sun.
Oh darn, I am dealing with a mental breakdown. My brain absolutely will not follow the linear process essential to comprehensive thinking.
(Culture and Value)When you are philosophizing you have to descend into primeval chaos and feel at home there.
The words in bold talk about the world of Abraham. and the words underlined cites the bible as the source. This is no evidence at all that Abraham was a real boy, any more than the world of Gilgamesh or the world of harry potter, suggests they were real either. — universeness
But, I am an atheist who does not think that any of the biblical characters were real. — universeness
What does it mean to be like "one of us" and to whom is that God speaking? — Athena
Genesis 1:26-27)Then God said, “Let us make mankind in our image, in our likeness ...
So God created mankind in his own image,
in the image of God he created them;
male and female he created them.
Yes I am, what point/judgement about me, are you trying to make by those words?You aren't into history, are you? — Athena
So yeah, we have to separate reliable evidence, and those ancients who wrote down lies and claimed they were writing truth. Evidence for the existence of Abraham is not enhanced by evidence that a town or city he was placed in existed, or that Babylon or Sumer existed and we know the names of some of their Kings etc and some of the events that may or may not have happened, in the exact way they were memorialised/reported. Archeology can certainly find artefact's from of a time or a place, and use them to infer or gather data, but archeology has not found any indicator whatsoever, that is very compelling evidence, that the biblical character of Abraham ever existed. Same with the biblical moses, jesus, the disciples, Paul etc etc. Was Jesus also an illiterate? Why are there no writings signed Jesus Christ or the Aramaic equivalent? We also have no evidence at all, that the god Zeus or the goddess Athena existed, even though we accept that the ancient Greeks and ancient Greece existed and we know some of their names and some of the events that may or may not have actually happened. You agree, yes?We can validate this because people were recording their political agreements and histories, and even primitive tribes left evidence of their existence and movements.
However, the stories are not without bias and it takes a lot of digging to be sure which story is the most accurate. — Athena
When will the human race move beyond such nonsense Tom? — universeness
How do we have knowledge? If we believe we magically have knowledge then don't we have a serious problem? — Athena
Socrates thought we knew everything but when we are born we are in a state of forgetfulness. — Athena
You aren't into history, are you?
— Athena
Yes I am, what point/judgement about me, are you trying to make by those words? — universeness
We can validate this because people were recording their political agreements and histories, and even primitive tribes left evidence of their existence and movements.
However, the stories are not without bias and it takes a lot of digging to be sure which story is the most accurate.
— Athena
So yeah, we have to separate reliable evidence, and those ancients who wrote down lies and claimed they were writing truth. Evidence for the existence of Abraham is not enhanced by evidence that a town or city he was placed in existed, or that Babylon or Sumer existed and we know the names of some of their Kings etc and some of the events that may or may not have happened, in the exact way they were memorialised/reported. Archeology can certainly find artifacts from of a time or a place, and use them to infer or gather data, but archeology has not found any indicator whatsoever, that is very compelling evidence, that the biblical character of Abraham ever existed. Same with the biblical moses, jesus, the disciples, Paul etc etc. Was Jesus also an illiterate? Why are there no writings signed Jesus Christ or the Aramaic equivalent? We also have no evidence at all, that the god Zeus or the goddess Athena existed, even though we accept that the ancient Greeks and ancient Greece existed and we know some of their names and some of the events that may or may not have actually happened. You agree, yes?
archeology has not found any indicator whatsoever, that is very compelling evidence, that the biblical character of Abraham ever existed. — universeness
Was Jesus also an illiterate? — universeness
In the Bible Jesus reads and writes a couple of times. One is in Hebrew and the other times the language is not specified but it could be Greek — Frigorifico
Education has been defined as, "teaching and learning specific skills, and also something less tangible, but more profound: the imparting of knowledge, positive judgement and well-developed wisdom. Education has as one of its fundamental aspects the imparting of culture from generation to generation (see socialization)".
While curriculum and texts for schools has been found in other areas of the ancient near east, no direct evidence—either literary or archaeological—exists for schools in ancient Israel.[1] There is no word for school in ancient (biblical) Hebrew,[1] the earliest reference to a "house of study" (bet hammidras) is found in the mid-Hellenistic period (2nd cent. BC) in the book of Ben Sira (51:23).[2]
However, the writing of the Bible as well as the variety of inscriptional material from ancient Palestine testifies to a relatively robust scribal culture that must have existed to create these textual artifacts.[1] The best unambiguous evidence for schools in ancient Israel comes from a few abecedaries and accounting practice texts found at sites such as Izbet Sarta, Tel Zayit, Kadesh Barnea, and Kuntillet ʿAjrud.[1] However, these were probably not schools in the traditional sense but rather an apprenticeship system located in the family.[1]
The total literacy rate of Jews in Israel in the first centuries c.e. was "probably less than 3%". While this may seem very low by today's standards, it was relatively high in the ancient world. If we ignore women (on the ground of their not participating in society), take into consideration children above the age of seven only, forget the far-away farmers and regard literacy of the non-educated people (e.g., one who cannot read the Torah but reads a bulla, that is: pragmatic literacy), then the literacy rate (adult males in the centers), might be even 20%, a high rate in traditional society.[3][4][5] — Wikipedia
The metaphor of the tree of knowledge is not intended to be an explanation, magical or otherwise. But the story does point to desire and vulnerability as leading to knowledge. Even before eating Eve saw that the fruit of the tree was desirable for gaining wisdom (3:6). They saw that they were naked and sewed together fig leaves to cover themselves. (3:7) This was the beginning of technical knowledge. But this attempt was not adequate. God made garments of skin for them (3:21). The problem of nakedness is that they were aware that they were vulnerable, exposed. They hid because they were naked and afraid. (3:10) — Fooloso4
I would rather go with the empiricist, but I am not closed to the possibility of life after death or reincarnation. I think I am very open-minded. However, when it comes to having good moral judgment, I am 100% in favor of educating people for good moral judgment and good citizenship.The myth of anamnesis. I discuss it a bit in my thread on Plato's Phaedo. — Fooloso4
I think that the ancient fables/stories she see's such value in have caused far more trouble than they were ever worth. — universeness
fig leaves don't make good clothes it would be a very stupid human who doesn't know that. — Athena
And I strongly doubt that a metaphorical god made their clothes out of animal skins. — Athena
How did the god kill the animal and treat the skins? Do you know how hard it is to cut and sew leather? — Athena
Surely humans in cold regions learned to do that for themselves without the help of a god ... — Athena
Isn't there something wrong with telling us what is good about us is bad and should be punished? — Athena
People in warm climates such as Hawaii and Africa have no problem exposing their bodies. — Athena
And you left out the snake who lured Eve into eating the fruit. — Athena
Maybe this god and the snake had bodies or maybe they were just metaphors. — Athena
For sure a person has to have a set of beliefs before anything in the Bible makes sense. — Athena
Do you think less sophisticated people knew the difference between a metaphor and something that is real? — Athena
Remember the witch hunts and fear of being possessed? — Athena
I am not sure where Fooloso4 stands on the Christian thing, — Athena
I was expressing my delight that you enjoy history too. — Athena
While I know Artemis is not a goddess I called upon her when I was alone and lost in the mountains. I don't care that this was just imagination. Calling upon her worked as well for me as a Christian's prayers work for the Christian. Incantations and prayers do work. There is a scientific explanation for why this is so. How we think plays an important part in how we feel and our ability to get things done. — Athena
I am not sure where Fooloso4 stands on the Christian thing — Athena
You asked: "how do we have knowledge". The point is that knowledge of how to make clothes is something that begins with rudimentary attempts, not developed knowledge. — Fooloso4
I think Jesus was a real person, but that real person is not the person(s) created by the legends or the persons created by the interpretation of the NT legends. The "Christian thing" has from the beginning been different things. — Fooloso4
This is nothing more that personal placebo effects, imo. — universeness
I think we should acknowledge the power of incantations and prayer. — Athena
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