What shaped your attitude(s) to Religion

[K. A. Pital]

Direct contact with US-type evangelists and Russian religious nutheads from the Orthodox church. Obviously hostile, because I can see daily how these people work to reverse science and secular education to a more backwards state (and the more backwards, the better).

[EarthScorpion]

I'm from a fairly standard British, nominally CoE, but not actually going to church for anything background. My dad's sort of Christian (although not enough to actually go to Church); my mum is, if she's religious, sort of deist, but only weakly. But, for myself, I have to say, it basically came down to being a bright child, who really liked mythology and science. I read the Greek myths, I memorised the names of the Egyptian gods, I read books on all the nasty things that the Aztec gods did, and I read the Bible. And... well, I knew enough scientific facts to see that the bible wasn't literally right, and once that happened, it was clear to me that it was just another mythological book, and one which was a lot less interesting than the Greek ones, or the Aztec ones (who even had a god of flaying people, which is the kind of thing a seven-year old finds really cool). Add that to the fact that going to a CoE school, they made us go to Church every Thursday, which was boring, and which nobody really liked, and it's rather obvious why I ended up believing that religion is just another belief, and, moreover, it's factually wrong, so shouldn't be given any more privileges than the Greek Gods.

And once you've reduced Christianity to another myth, then, well... it's easy to hold the people who try to use myths to justify themselves when they're doing bad things in contempt.

[General Zod]

When were they actively seeking converts?

They were huge on forced conversions of defeated enemies, for example during the expansion of the Hasmonean dynasty, before the Romans made them their subjects.

So nothing in the last thousand years?

[Darth Hoth]

When were they actively seeking converts?

They were huge on forced conversions of defeated enemies, for example during the expansion of the Hasmonean dynasty, before the Romans made them their subjects.

Additionally, there was also a lot of more peaceful proselytising in the eastern half of the Empire. You can see traces of this in the Bible itself, where Jesus denounces the Pharisees for travelling over sea and land to hunt for proselytes.

It is often said that the foreign Jewish mission was one reason why Christianity was so successful: It appealed to people who liked the general Jewish message but found it too onerous to abide by its ritual laws.

Of course, spreading the "atheistic" Jewish religion was illegal under Roman law, and it all stopped after the Jews tried to fight for their freedom and were stomped on by the Romans, circa AD 66-70.

[Darth Hoth]

Though this doesn't apply to me, as my views changed from "very liberal christian with non-literal views on the bible" to "screw religion" after joining SDN, I highly suspect that it has more to do with atheists and other non-religious types joining here because they want to be with other atheists and non-religious types. They might not speak up very often, but there are religious people on this board. Tirol, Broomstick (though she's a pagan, not a christian), SirNitram, and LadyTevar all come to mind (and the last two are both current or former supermods!). The thing is, the only kind of religious type this board actually likes to chase away are crazy science hating fundamentalist imbeciles and that's because they tend to say things that are objectively stupid or immoral. The rest don't feel they have anything to prove and they aren't into chest beating, so they don't make a big fuss about their religion. Some of them have even said as much in the past.

They need not be science-hating. Merely adhering to their religion's moral teachings, which usually tend to be what secularistic thought labels as bigoted, homophobic, transphobic, islamophobic, . . .

[Thanas]

When were they actively seeking converts?

They were huge on forced conversions of defeated enemies, for example during the expansion of the Hasmonean dynasty, before the Romans made them their subjects.

So nothing in the last thousand years?

Well, there is the Khazar Khaganate, though it had no state-forced conversions.

But as I explicitly said in my first post about Judaism here, judaism is peaceful today because they lived under threat of annihilation for so long.

[General Zod]

But as I explicitly said in my first post about Judaism here, judaism is peaceful today because they lived under threat of annihilation for so long.

You didn't exactly specify a time frame; and how a religion behaved a couple thousand years ago isn't really important to my point.

[Thanas]

I thought it would be clear that when I said "that has been put through the same things judaism has" I meant more than the last few centuries, since Judaism has existed for much longer than that.

[Manthor]

Glad that's cleared up.I thought you were referring to the recent (in historical terms) genocide of the Jewish people in World War 2 but you were instead referring to the state of near-annihilation they were always in. Actually could you help me clear this up - why were the Jews so despised? What was it about the Jew as a culture that placed them in such a precariosu position?

To my understanding, in earlier history in Europe the Jews were denied land ownership, forcing them in part to migrate to other such professions as banking and mercantile trade, being unable to own assets but being able to trade in them and take commissions from the flow of capital. So could their economic wealth have rendered them a target in part?

[lord Martiya]

To my understanding, in earlier history in Europe the Jews were denied land ownership, forcing them in part to migrate to other such professions as banking and mercantile trade, being unable to own assets but being able to trade in them and take commissions from the flow of capital. So could their economic wealth have rendered them a target in part?

I think they already were one for the simple fact of existing as a people after their 66-70 CE rebellion (the Romans always struck me as people who respected treaties to the letter and, while sometimes raping its spirit, really harsh on anyone breaking such letter. And that rebellion broke a treaty between Rome and them), and that passed on the post-Roman kingdoms with the addition of God-murder (please, someone tell me the right English term) charges.

[Kanastrous]

My parents' religious practice, which was a sort of gritted-teeth mostly joyless observance by-the-numbers motivated not by belief in any of the usual nonsense but by a devotion to what they regarded as the vital importance of things that to them meant 'history' and 'identity.'

And - something I only recently realized, when the program was in reruns on cable - Carl Sagan's Cosmos. For a young kid who was beset by endless suspicions and dissatisfactions concerning religious stuff being pushed at him, Cosmos was just a wonderful breath of fresh air in terms of clarifying that intelligent, rational approaches to universal questions do not need to be couched in terms of ancient near-meaningless rituals and woo-woo wolkenkuckucksheim fairy-tale intellect-deadening bullshit.

[Eternal_Freedom]

*snip* with the addition of God-murder (please, someone tell me the right English term) charges.

Deicide.

I thought Jews were persecuted because of their arrogance in proclaiming themselves God's Chosen Race.

Also, they confused race and religion, never a good idea I find

[General Zod]

*snip* with the addition of God-murder (please, someone tell me the right English term) charges.

Deicide.

I thought Jews were persecuted because of their arrogance in proclaiming themselves God's Chosen Race.

Also, they confused race and religion, never a good idea I find

Here I thought it was because they refused to acknowledge any other Gods, or even give a token nod to the Emperor in that respect that made them rather unpopular.

[Kanastrous]

Judaism originated in a period where religion frequently went hand-in-hand with racial or ethnic/tribal identity. Remember that the God of the Torah makes a specific covenant with a particular man that is intended to be binding specifically upon his descendants. This was not unusual at the time; it's just that of the religions based upon a specific patriarch's, king's, city-state's or lineage's relationship with god(s) Judaism is probably the last one extant.

There is no 'one reason' that Jews were/are/will be despised. Failure to render desired honors, holding to politically or morally-unpopular beliefs and practices, and - really, probably, most important - constant availability as 'the other' to serve as scapegoat, distraction, or convenient victim for those in power, and the people over whom those in power wish to retain their authority.

Theodor Herzl put it pretty well: When you have a speck of something caught in your eye, you don't care if it is a speck of dirt, or a speck of gold. You just want it out.

[Thanas]

Glad that's cleared up.I thought you were referring to the recent (in historical terms) genocide of the Jewish people in World War 2 but you were instead referring to the state of near-annihilation they were always in. Actually could you help me clear this up - why were the Jews so despised? What was it about the Jew as a culture that placed them in such a precariosu position?

In the time of the Romans it was because they were religious maniacs, way crazier and fanatical than any terrorist group today. This, coupled with a strategy by the Romans who misunderstood their religion or did not give a damn, led to three very nasty revolts. The Romans, not being skittish in that regard, eventually decided to show them who was the more powerful force.


Of course, the Jews did not take that lesson and tried to revolt again fourty years later - they lost again- and then they tried to do it again in another decade. (Though saying the Jews is wrong here, far better to say Jewish fractions backed by a local majority).

So you can pretty much say that in antiquity, they misjudged Rome's resolve and their own strength. Of course, Rome then showed them how strong they actually were and razed Jerusalem, renaming it as a roman colonia and forbidding all jews to ever set foot in it again on pain of death. Besides destroying hundreds of villages and killing possibly million of jews (the Romans were in many way more efficient than the Nazis, they simply checked the genitalia and then killed the ones who were cut) according to some sources.

[Kanastrous]

'As crazy and fanatical as any terrorist group today' might make some sense.

If you're going to posit 'crazier' I'm interested in your reasoning.

[Serafina]

the Romans were in many way more efficient than the Nazis, they simply checked the genitalia and then killed the ones who were cut

Okay, this is not really related to this thread, but anyway:
What did they do with female jews? Unless the jews in antiquity had female circumcision, that method would only work on male jews. Did they only kill male jews, or did they check the man and then killed his family (the latter would fit with both roman and jewish patriarchal society)?

[Temujin]

To my understanding, in earlier history in Europe the Jews were denied land ownership, forcing them in part to migrate to other such professions as banking and mercantile trade, being unable to own assets but being able to trade in them and take commissions from the flow of capital. So could their economic wealth have rendered them a target in part?

I think they already were one for the simple fact of existing as a people after their 66-70 CE rebellion (the Romans always struck me as people who respected treaties to the letter and, while sometimes raping its spirit, really harsh on anyone breaking such letter. And that rebellion broke a treaty between Rome and them), and that passed on the post-Roman kingdoms with the addition of God-murder (please, someone tell me the right English term) charges.

There was an old thread from a couple years back where Mike argued about how the Jews self segregation practices didn't help in regard to social cooperation with the greater society they were a part of.

[Temujin]

the Romans were in many way more efficient than the Nazis, they simply checked the genitalia and then killed the ones who were cut

Okay, this is not really related to this thread, but anyway:
What did they do with female jews? Unless the jews in antiquity had female circumcision, that method would only work on male jews. Did they only kill male jews, or did they check the man and then killed his family (the latter would fit with both roman and jewish patriarchal society)?

I would think they were more concerned about the males, particularly the young males as they were the core of the revolt. The females were not as important and thus not as much of a concern.

[Thanas]

'As crazy and fanatical as any terrorist group today' might make some sense.

If you're going to posit 'crazier' I'm interested in your reasoning.

How about starting mass rioting in cities? Back then that meant the legions would move in and massacre the rioters, no matter what. Or about Massada? It is hard to find an example of such fanatisim in modern times.

But that is just one aspect - for once, they actually believed their messiah was already walking the earth and leading the revolution (boy did that perception shift when the legions started knocking).

Okay, this is not really related to this thread, but anyway:
What did they do with female jews?

Raped and then sold as slaves or killed. Or, if they were nobles/importan personages/useful, they were taken into roman service and protected. Really, it depended a lot on the mood of the individual commander.

Iirc there was a theological discussion among jews back then on what one was supposed to do with the jewish girls that had been raped or sold to the brothels - I might be confusing things though, so do not believe it as I am unable to find a source ATM.

[Kanastrous]

How about starting mass rioting in cities? Back then that meant the legions would move in and massacre the rioters, no matter what. Or about Massada? It is hard to find an example of such fanatisim in modern times.

But that is just one aspect - for once, they actually believed their messiah was already walking the earth and leading the revolution (boy did that perception shift when the legions started knocking).

Admittedly the who's crazier, who's craziest game is played on a subjective field, but mass riots over mere rumors of the defacement of a particular 'holy' book are easily found among modern practitioners of a certain popular religion - wherein the rioters handle killing one another, without all that much need for anyone's legions to move in (albeit at a lower grade of efficiency than a legion would have done it) - is plenty fanatical. Regarding Masada, sure: a few hundred crazies got themselves killed facing off against a force against which they weren't going to win...but without a formalized set of metrics by which to assess 'crazy' it's tough to see why anyone should dismiss nineteen crazies killing over 3,000 people over *their* religious notions as 'less' crazy.

And we're saddled with a stream within Islam - certainly a major religion, for good or ill - who are quite convinced that their 'hidden imam' walks the earth and waits for the proper moment at which to reveal himself, which is close enough to the old-school messianic delusions, for me.

If anything, believers today are crazier, by default. At least two, three, four thousand years ago there was little by way of technological society, and just about nothing by way of scientific endeavor as we'd recognize it, today. A pack of know-nothing Bronze Agers can be forgiven their whacked-out superstitious bullshit behavior; it's a lot more difficult to cut that kind of slack for people living every day with the evidence that Scientific Methodology is the effective instrument for apprehending the world rather than woo-woo bang-the-rocks-together fantasy bullshit fairy tales.

[Thanas]

How about starting mass rioting in cities? Back then that meant the legions would move in and massacre the rioters, no matter what. Or about Massada? It is hard to find an example of such fanatisim in modern times.

But that is just one aspect - for once, they actually believed their messiah was already walking the earth and leading the revolution (boy did that perception shift when the legions started knocking).

Admittedly the who's crazier, who's craziest game is played on a subjective field, but mass riots over mere rumors of the defacement of a particular 'holy' book are easily found among modern practitioners of a certain popular religion - wherein the rioters handle killing one another, without all that much need for anyone's legions to move in (albeit at a lower grade of efficiency than a legion would have done it) - is plenty fanatical. Regarding Masada, sure: a few hundred crazies got themselves killed facing off against a force against which they weren't going to win...but without a formalized set of metrics by which to assess 'crazy' it's tough to see why anyone should dismiss nineteen crazies killing over 3,000 people over *their* religious notions as 'less' crazy.

There also is the quantitative angle - see the Bar Kochba revolt. Al-Quaida does not have a majority of people within Islam.

[Lagmonster]

Of corse by saying that I began to question more. If cavemen didn't have souls, when did we get them? At what point did we "evolve" souls? Why would God make so many people that couldn't goto Heaven?

Why do some people ask these questions as children and other people don't? I didn't ask questions like this until college, and I look at them now and they're so blindingly obvious. Why did I not think of these questions before then?

You may find that people are not predisposed to ponder metaphysical things. We have had a few 'wise men' in any generation who might do so, and they might be clever scientists or hokum witch-doctors or spacy-headed philosophers. Everyone else just shelves such things under 'stuff I know, but don't need to reference in order to do my everyday living'.

Of course, more simply, youth alone plays a large part. Everyone has 'if I knew then, what I know now' ideas of things they thought or did which, in retrospect, seem enormously naive or ignorant. If you don't mind my saying so, even now you're still young. If you were just looking back at the age of 35 and wondering what you'd been thinking all these years, you might have a reason to feel bad. But you're barely an adult, so you can feel good about having come around to rationality at a reasonable age.

[Darth Hoth]

How about starting mass rioting in cities? Back then that meant the legions would move in and massacre the rioters, no matter what. Or about Massada? It is hard to find an example of such fanatisim in modern times.

Regarding Masada, if what I have read is true, there is some historical dispute on whether Josephus's account of the mass suicide is actually trustworthy. It is entirely possible that the events there were more prosaic: The Romans simply slaughtered everyone, as was sometimes their wont. The argument has been raised that since he owed his life to the Romans, it would be very much in his interest for Josephus to downplay their brutality and up the fanaticism of the Jews.

[Kanastrous]

It seems to me like a 50/50 shot. Josephus tailoring the account to please Roman patrons and a bunch of fanatical guerrillas offing themselves to avoid capture (particularly when you considering who would have been doing the capturing, and what they would have done to their prisoners) each seem like reasonable propositions.