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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Do you believe in a "Fall"?
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Luigi
Shipmate
# 4031
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Posted
It is interesting how those who want to hold to some sort of fall event, end up suggesting things like a fall that happened just after the Big Bang or that the influence of our disobedience could go backwards as well as forwards!
They also want to try to hold onto ideas like vegetarian lions! Doesn't this all feel a little desperate? It seems incredibly hard work, holding on to ideas that 'once upon a time everything wasn't messed up.' Even though *all* the evidence shows a universe that was tough and brutal from the start.
Eutychus - I understand that there is a coherence to the traditional take, but I am surprised you resort so readily to that perspective, when you imply that you can also see that the (scientific) evidence is deeply problematic.
Posts: 752 | Registered: Feb 2003
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Luigi
Shipmate
# 4031
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Posted
Cliffdweller - I am unpersuaded that you get round this problem and that it is Augustine's and Calvin's fault. Your use of a devil to blame I don't think works. Well it does superficially as long as that line is only pursued so far.
Those, I used to know, who used a similar argument about free will and the devil to square this particular circle always hit problems. They believed God was omnipotent and omniscient and that Satan' power was only as great as God allowed. They also believed that Satan's evil influence would be dealt with in the end.
They also believed that in heaven would we have a loving relationship with God - free will without all the pain.
So to summarise God is quite happy for Satan to have significant influence even though he could be dealt with. Also, presumably, Satan isn't necessary for meaningful relationships and free will.
Now you might square those circles slightly differently but for the life of me I don't see how God is not responsible for the harshness of life in earth. He seems very willing (happy) to sustain a pretty harsh universe. I think we should learn to deal with this.
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
Eutychus - I understand that there is a coherence to the traditional take
At last! Somebody concedes I might not be completely out of my mind ![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
quote:
but
![[Waterworks]](graemlins/bawling.gif)
quote:
I am surprised you resort so readily to that perspective, when you imply that you can also see that the (scientific) evidence is deeply problematic.
I've been considering Macrina's "God of the gaps" challenge, even before it was raised.
To be frank, the scientific objections just sort of pour off me like water off a duck's back. This might be for a number of reasons (or a combination thereof):
(i) I'm too cowardly to face the evidence, and so take refuge in my primitive beliefs
(ii) My arts background means I just don't understand the science enough for it to have an impact
(iii) My arts background means that while I'm appreciative of science, I'm suspicious of scientific hubris (the idea that "modern science" has definitively "explained" things when what we really have is useful models (albeit increasingly refined ones); there's plenty of evidence of scientific hubris down the ages to point to)
(iv) I find the narrative explanation compelling not just intellectually but emotionally and spiritually in a way that to me, seems to encompass the human dimension in a way that scientific explanations don't*.
I think the way the Bible tells things (Eden...) just isn't designed to address the kind of questions science wants to ask (diet of lions in Eden) but that doesn't detract from its truth - or mean it's not rooted in something that happened at a point in time.
That "linear arc" component, as CK has dubbed it, is to my mind foundational to the truth of the thing; my thinking about the incarnation and everything following on from it is along similar lines: something of spiritual significance, beyond the realm of scientific explanation, happened in time and physical space; if it didn't, then there's nothing significant there at all.
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*this may sound cheesy, but on Sunday morning, furtively checking the Ship on my smartphone during church, the significance of worship came home to me. If it's all just cold rationality, worship goes. And "without worship you shrink, it's as brutal as that" (Equus).
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
# 13538
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Posted
No I don't believe in a 'fall'. I see our sinfulness and shortcomings as a 'failure to become'.
A failure to become fully human, compassionate, kind.
We all fall short ocasionally, our animal, selfish nature inevitably (and sometimes essentially) kicks in from time to time.
[ 05. April 2016, 09:38: Message edited by: Boogie ]
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
'Failure'?
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Lamb Chopped
Ship's kebab
# 5528
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by no prophet's flag is set so...:
Augustine. He's to blame for this isn't he? Some mixture of trying to explain himself to himself, and trying to justify structures of the nascent church. The Fall condemns people before they are born. Pious and harmful nonsense if taken literally and semi-literally.
Humans are not by nature evil. I've held children as they are born, and held older people as they died. Neither is evil by definition. Christian or any other religion. Rather people are capable of both good and evil. You'd think we might have figured this out by now, given the burnings in the middle ages, rape by clergy scandals, etc within churches, and things like wars and random murder-terror outside. Evil is just part of our potential. We don't need a fall to explain it. Built into us as part of who we are. DNA. We can be good.
Better to consider that we have co-evolved with all of the other life and that we have the possibility to avoiding our animal nature "red in tooth and claw" and behave with charity toward each other. Though we seem capable only of doing this on a one-to-one basis or in small groups.
It's not "evil by definition." More like "made wholly good and then got partially fucked up somehow," leaving us a complicated mixture of awesome and awful. It is not true human nature to be what we are now. It is human nature with a screw-up superimposed--or to change the metaphor, with an infection that is skewing things, and needs healing. Nobody was born evil. Everybody (bar Jesus) is born infected, and in need of help to get back to real human nature.
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Er, this is what I've been up to (book).
Oh, that you would rend the heavens and come down!
Posts: 20059 | From: off in left field somewhere | Registered: Feb 2004
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Somehow how?
[ 05. April 2016, 12:26: Message edited by: Martin60 ]
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Lamb Chopped:
It is human nature with a screw-up superimposed--or to change the metaphor, with an infection that is skewing things, and needs healing. Nobody was born evil. Everybody (bar Jesus) is born infected, and in need of help to get back to real human nature.
Yes, that is how I see it.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Infected with what?
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
Cliffdweller - I am unpersuaded that you get round this problem and that it is Augustine's and Calvin's fault. Your use of a devil to blame I don't think works. Well it does superficially as long as that line is only pursued so far.
...Now you might square those circles slightly differently but for the life of me I don't see how God is not responsible for the harshness of life in earth. He seems very willing (happy) to sustain a pretty harsh universe. I think we should learn to deal with this.
To some extent I would agree. This is a problem we all struggle with, and ultimately have to land on one of the unsatisfying options I laid out, none of which really deals with the problem. You can walk away (say there is no God), you can chalk it up to "mystery" (which I think distances us from God), or you can choose an unsatisfactory answer that leaves you itching for something more.
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
Those, I used to know, who used a similar argument about free will and the devil to square this particular circle always hit problems. They believed God was omnipotent and omniscient and that Satan' power was only as great as God allowed. They also believed that Satan's evil influence would be dealt with in the end.
They also believed that in heaven would we have a loving relationship with God - free will without all the pain.
So to summarise God is quite happy for Satan to have significant influence even though he could be dealt with. Also, presumably, Satan isn't necessary for meaningful relationships and free will.
Now you might square those circles slightly differently but for the life of me I don't see how God is not responsible for the harshness of life in earth. He seems very willing (happy) to sustain a pretty harsh universe. I think we should learn to deal with this.
The Open view would differ from this by not feeling bound to omnipotence and omniscience as essential characteristics of God. God's only defining essential characteristic is love-- the omnis are attributes but not essential characteristics (I think Phil. 2 supports this).
So love is the only essential, and love must be free, otherwise it's not love. So God creates free creatures-- not as a capricious choice, but because it is the only way to love. We are free, and arguably Satan and his minions are free. God is not "outside of time" but is inside time as we are inside time-- either by choice or by logical essence-- the only way to be in communion with a temporal creature is to be in time. So, if we are truly free and God is in time, then logically God cannot definitively know the future choices of those free creatures. God can anticipate and plan for every potential future choice-- which is what prophesy is, and why he is able to promise a future world where things will be different.
I believe God created the best possible world given those realities. And I believe a big (perhaps primary) purpose of this world is to learn-- to give us a true, real vision of what our choice truly is-- what it looks like to live life on our own terms and what it looks like to live life on God's terms-- the way we learn everything, thru trial & error. So that ultimately we can freely, knowingly choose if we wish to live in God's Kingdom or not. I don't think that necessarily excludes non-Christians because I don't think that choice comes in this life, but in the next-- when we see things clearly.
All of which does not, as you already pointed out "square all the circles". I wish it did. But for me, it squares more circles than I've been able to find anywhere else-- including the "walk away and give up on God" and the "mystery" options.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
The detail is in the Devil.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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shamwari
Shipmate
# 15556
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Posted
Pity nobody picked up on Boogie's contribution. She is right. One Biblical word for 'sin' can be translated as "missing the mark" -- as in an arrow falling short of its target. Paul had this in mind when he wrote to the Romans and said "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God".
Jesus is the proto-type of what we can be and are meant to be. He alone was fully human. Compared to Him we have all fallen short. Therefore Paul could say "all have sinned".
Irenaus ( I think it was) who said " he became what we are in order that we might become what He is."
We would be better off spending less time on berating people for their sins ( and 'fallenness') and more time offering them the possibility of becoming.
God, through the Holy Spirit, enables us to become what we are meant to be.
Posts: 1914 | From: from the abyss of misunderstanding | Registered: Mar 2010
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mousethief
Ship's Thieving Rodent
# 953
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by shamwari:
Irenaus ( I think it was) who said " he became what we are in order that we might become what He is."
Dunno about Irenaeus, but Athanasius said "God became man that man might become God."
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This is the last sig I'll ever write for you...
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no prophet's flag is set so...
Proceed to see sea
# 15560
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Posted
To clarify my thoughts - I don't disagree with Curiosity and Lamb: I think we have both evil and good potential. Both. We are not defined by the Fall and an evil nature. Nor are we defined by the Jesus example and a good nature. Neither is the default. We have to choose, both in our daily decisions, and for the general direction of our whole lives. I think we humans are all of us capable of horrible nightmares and beautiful dreams, even when we have made the general choice for one or the other. Potential is always both directions.
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Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower, safety.
\_(ツ)_/
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SusanDoris
Incurable Optimist
# 12618
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Still working my way through all that's been said while I've been sleeping/working here in lala land. Perhaps instead of yammering on I should have just started and ended with this:
I'm glad you didn't! I have been reading through latest posts and, as always, find what you say most interesting and thoughtful, even though I am a non-believer.
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I know that you believe that you understood what you think I said, but I am not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.
Posts: 3083 | From: UK | Registered: May 2007
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Martin60:
Infected with what?
The natural and understandable inclination to pay more attention to physical things than spiritual ones.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
That's a problem how? And what's it got to do with kindness?
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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PaulTH*
Shipmate
# 320
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Posted
I don't believe in a literal Fall. It's quite obvious that death existed long before human sin. It's rather more of a failure to rise. At some point in human evolution our ancestors developed the imagination to stand outside themselves and realise that all their actions have consequences, sometimes unpleasant, for others. They also began to contemplate their origins, their destiny and their Creator. All of which left them with a knowledge, as it still does for us today, that we don't always live up to our highest ideals. That is our fall.
With that in mind, I don't see the Incarnation as being primarily about saving us from this fallen state, but more about lifting us closer to the state we should be in. It's about Christ uniting the human nature to the divine, and lifting our humanity into the Godhead. This may well be another step on the road of our evolution as creatures who co-operate with God in His creation. Though Christ's work is complete, it's far from complete in most of us as individuals, but He takes us by the hand and leads us.
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Yours in Christ
Paul
Posts: 6387 | From: White Cliffs Country | Registered: May 2001
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by W Hyatt:
Being thirsty and getting a drink of water is physical. Seeing a stranger who is thirsty and giving them a drink of water out of kindness is spiritual.
Yes! That's what it has to do with kindness.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
WHAT failure? Whose?
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Luigi
Shipmate
# 4031
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Posted
Eutychus - your view of science is actually a great deal more negative than I thought it would be.
We could explore in detail the idea of consilience - where multiple strands of evidence all point in the same direction. I.e. areas that are much more likely to be refined than completely overturned.
Or your comments re scientific hubris. In my view science is a lot more interested in overturning / correcting erroneous past conclusions than traditional Christian theology. (Or to put it another way, I think inherent in its own way of working is a greater awareness of its tendency towards confirmation bias.)
But in the end this may well be like water off a ducks back - as you said!
In the end the problem I see in your approach is that anyone who is persuaded by the science, will really struggle to buy into your take on the Christian gospel.
[ 05. April 2016, 22:10: Message edited by: Luigi ]
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Oscar the Grouch
Adopted Cascadian
# 1916
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Boogie:
No I don't believe in a 'fall'. I see our sinfulness and shortcomings as a 'failure to become'.
A failure to become fully human, compassionate, kind.
We all fall short ocasionally, our animal, selfish nature inevitably (and sometimes essentially) kicks in from time to time.
I tend to follow this line, as well.
The basic "facts" of life are these:
a) The world is an imperfect, flawed place where pain, corruption and sorrow are frequently found.
b) Each of us - if we admit it - know that we are imperfect, flawed people. We are not the people we know we could be. We do things we know we shouldn't. We fail to act in the ways we know we should.
c) Despite these deep flaws in our world and in ourselves, we retain a vision of a better world and of ourselves as better people. (I would say that this persisting vision comes from God)
It seems to me that God's work in our world and in us all is to rescue us from the pain of our failures and to help transform us into the vision of our "new selves".
A concept of a "Fall" obscures all this, I think. At one and the same time it absolves us from blame ("I couldn't help myself - I've inherited my fallen nature from Adam & Eve.") whilst denying the possibility of real change ("Why bother trying to be different? You will always be a fallen sinner.")
Each of us is born with huge potential - for good and for evil. Hitler could have been a saint and Mother Teresa could have been a cruel bastard.
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Faradiu, dundeibáwa weyu lárigi weyu
Posts: 3871 | From: Gamma Quadrant, just to the left of Galifrey | Registered: Dec 2001
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by SusanDoris:
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Still working my way through all that's been said while I've been sleeping/working here in lala land. Perhaps instead of yammering on I should have just started and ended with this:
I'm glad you didn't! I have been reading through latest posts and, as always, find what you say most interesting and thoughtful, even though I am a non-believer.
Ah, now I'm feeling badly for being snappish with you on the other thread. Which is not unrelated to the fall, and sin & salvation, and the work of the Spirit in convicting us of sin...
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
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Posted
I cannot believe in a fall in any biblically meaningful way. Until someone can explain to me how death entered creation because of human sin, I simply cannot. What I think a lot of people fail to see is that it requires us to do away with most of St Paul's soteriology: 'since by man came death by man came also the resurrection... etc' and his idea that sinlessness means immortality. What was once the heart of so many Christian theologies is not working anymore now. I think evangelicalism is doomed because of this.
[ 06. April 2016, 01:11: Message edited by: Joesaphat ]
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Luigi, thanks for your response. It's less that my view of science is negative than that I seem impervious to it challenging my core spiritual beliefs, I think, as it doesn't scratch the right itches. Fair point about this working both ways, though. quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
What was once the heart of so many Christian theologies is not working anymore now. I think evangelicalism is doomed because of this.
But the numbers right now, worldwide, seem to be saying the opposite. Evangelicalism seems to be the part of the church that's growing, most of all in emerging nations. I'm simply noting that a lot of people seem not to be too worried about holding to Paul's soteriology despite (or as well as) what science is telling them.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
Evangelicalism has always (for better or worse) been open to re-invention. And that is certainly happening now, as we have begun exploring different theological paradigms (including Open Theism), some of which have different understandings of "original sin", the fall and atonement.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Agreed. But as posted earlier, I don't know of anywhere in evangelicalism (in my neck of the woods, at least, bearing in mind it's not English-speaking) that doesn't subscribe to some form of linearity in the biblical narrative: that not only will there be an "end" (a resurrection leading to some form of life after death), there was a "beginning" when things were not as they are now, in the "middle".
Evangelicals may think Paul's soteriology was something that can be diversely re-interpreted, but they don't think they can simply disregard it entirely. And I tend to think Jesus talked in terms of a beginning, middle and end too. It was a challenge to that assertion that got this thread started.
[ 06. April 2016, 05:52: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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cliffdweller
Shipmate
# 13338
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Posted
Sure, but "beginning, middle and end" doesn't have to equate with "Augustine's version of original sin". There's room for a broader, more figurative understanding of the Fall.
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"Here is the world. Beautiful and terrible things will happen. Don't be afraid." -Frederick Buechner
Posts: 11242 | From: a small canyon overlooking the city | Registered: Jan 2008
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by cliffdweller:
Sure, but "beginning, middle and end" doesn't have to equate with "Augustine's version of original sin". There's room for a broader, more figurative understanding of the Fall.
I agree with that, which is why I put "Fall" in scare quotes and kept lilbuddha's original, pithy summary.
The core aspect to my mind (and primarily in the context of the original DH discussion) is that the current state of affairs (i.e. the human condition) is, to borrow Jesus' words, "not as it was in the beginning".
Not a few people seem to disagree with that (the idea that there was a "beginning" after which things were different for humans), but I'm having difficulty understanding how their views interact (other than simply saying "well, that's obviously rubbish, we know better now") with what I see as intrinsic to the Bible narrative of there being an eschatalogical beginning, middle, and future end.
Personally, I keep trying thought experiments with such "non-linear" views, but I just can't make them work for me and set any store by the Bible at all (which is sort of where Eliab started the DH thread).
[ 06. April 2016, 06:07: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Martin60
Shipmate
# 368
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Posted
Conservatism as evangelicalism is a function of minimal western materialism. So it will grow in the developing world. It can't grow where it already exists as Catholicism, Orthodoxy, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism: religious culture.
It can't be sustained beyond minimal materialism. The lower middle class. Its abandonment is a direct function of education.
Jesus, being a man of His time, 100%, knew nothing of human origin, as conservatives here still choose to.
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Love wins
Posts: 17586 | From: Never Dobunni after all. Corieltauvi after all. Just moved to the capital. | Registered: Jun 2001
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
I think that those Biblical narratives in Genesis are trying to understand the world as it is to those peoples (skating rapidly over the several different accounts and times). That includes how the world came about and why something created by God is not perfect. Figurative explanations for something incomprehensible - finding patterns or making sense of our world being a human trait.
A linearity in the Biblical account is a way of making sense of that collection of books. It may well have been the understanding of those who collected those particular books together (and not others). (I am sure someone will come along and give me chapter and verse on the views of whichever Council chose which books.)
If we weren't presented with this collection of books as the Bible, would we really try to build patterns out of it? I fell badly out of love with this approach after discussing Joshua and Judges with one of my more fundamentalist friends, who was sure it was God's will that those genocides had to happen.
(I'm another one who's agnostic about life after death. I'll try to formulate a question on that one, before burying myself back into work. Today I am working from home so can procrastinate to a degree.)
But it does start begging the question, what message do we get from the Bible if we cannot make sense of it? What do we base our religion on?
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
Posts: 13794 | From: outiside the outer ring road | Registered: Aug 2006
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Luigi
Shipmate
# 4031
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Posted
Cliffdweller and Eutychus I'll try to answer you both.
CD - thanks for the reply. I knew I shouldn't have mentioned omniscience. I know your take on open theism and I am largely sympathetic to it. It is certainly preferable to Calvinism but it only makes a marginal difference (very marginal) to my main problem which you left largely unaddressed.
The whole idea that we have to have a groaning struggling creation (death, red in tooth and claw, pain, very little clarity about God etc) or free loving relationships would not be possible, is really depressing. The idea that this is the best universe God could come up with is hardly reassuring!
Eutychus - my point from the beginning has been that just moving from a fall event to a figurative fall isn't IMV a get out of gaol free card. To continue to cohere other aspects of faith are impacted. This I think we agree on.
However, if I can hold on to a faith that is based *on the Christian faith then it would have to deal with a whole load of significant problems other than the fall. So I am happy (need) to let go of a good 5 of the seven atonement theories - depending on how you count these things. The difference between a God who had to die and a God who came close and was willing to die, is massive for me.
Fulfilling sacrificial law is not tenable for me whereas deconstructing sacrificial logic - a la Rene Girard I can buy and is IMV very illuminating. Defending the many horrendous OT passages (and some NT passages) is equally not viable, so a belief system that accepts we need to 'go against the text' is also essential.
The fact that at least this position doesn't have to deny 95% of Biology, cosmology and anthropology is helpful IMV. So yes I have let go of quite a bit but then much of the more traditional narrative reads like magic realism to me. Beautifully written in places and it has a coherent narrative arc, the only problem is it lacks even the faintest whiff of credibility!
* Please note I said 'based on the Christian faith' not 'in the Christian fath' - the difference is important.
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
Eutychus - my point from the beginning has been that just moving from a fall event to a figurative fall isn't IMV a get out of gaol free card. To continue to cohere other aspects of faith are impacted. This I think we agree on.
Yes, definitely, you have put the finger on my angst very accurately, and I can't resolve this satisfactorily.
quote:
Please note I said 'based on the Christian faith' not 'in the Christian fath' - the difference is important.
Um, OK, but you're way over my head here. Right now this discussion is very much revolving around the issues I'm grappling with, but I'm not sure I have the tools to do so, nor do I have the time they deserve at present. It is at least helping me to have some idea of where other people are coming from with regard to the issues.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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mr cheesy
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# 3330
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Posted
I think this just shows the divide between those who believe that the natural way of things for humans is "solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short" (as per Hobbes) or that one thinks that - in general - by nature humans are co-operative and social (kind of argued by Hume and others).
I appreciate that this is a philosophical way to approach this issue, but it seems to me that the way one understands the fall will inevitably colour the way you think things happen in the world - ie whether things are naturally bad, with occasional sparks of goodness influenced by the divine or things are generally good with occasional black deeds by deranged individuals.
Personally, I'm more inclined to believe that things tend towards chaos, particularly within human institutions.
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arse
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Joesaphat
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# 18493
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
Luigi, thanks for your response. It's less that my view of science is negative than that I seem impervious to it challenging my core spiritual beliefs, I think, as it doesn't scratch the right itches. Fair point about this working both ways, though. quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
What was once the heart of so many Christian theologies is not working anymore now. I think evangelicalism is doomed because of this.
But the numbers right now, worldwide, seem to be saying the opposite. Evangelicalism seems to be the part of the church that's growing, most of all in emerging nations. I'm simply noting that a lot of people seem not to be too worried about holding to Paul's soteriology despite (or as well as) what science is telling them.
Yes, numbers would also prove that Islam is the one true faith. Numbers prove nothing. As for the fact hat most evangelicals seem rather unconcerned to hold to Paul's soteriology despite what science is telling them, it's a constant source of amazement for me. As Luigi stated earlier in this thread, to believe in a figurative fall is definitely not a get out of jail free card. What then? Did Christ become one of us and die to free us from a metaphor?
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Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
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Boogie
Boogie on down!
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Posted
mr cheesy
We have vast cities which work incredibly well - moving hordes and hordes of people round daily. None of which could happen if we weren't co-operative, social beings.
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Garden. Room. Walk
Posts: 13030 | From: Boogie Wonderland | Registered: Mar 2008
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la vie en rouge
Parisienne
# 10688
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
Luigi, thanks for your response. It's less that my view of science is negative than that I seem impervious to it challenging my core spiritual beliefs, I think, as it doesn't scratch the right itches. Fair point about this working both ways, though. quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
What was once the heart of so many Christian theologies is not working anymore now. I think evangelicalism is doomed because of this.
But the numbers right now, worldwide, seem to be saying the opposite. Evangelicalism seems to be the part of the church that's growing, most of all in emerging nations. I'm simply noting that a lot of people seem not to be too worried about holding to Paul's soteriology despite (or as well as) what science is telling them.
Yes, numbers would also prove that Islam is the one true faith. Numbers prove nothing. As for the fact hat most evangelicals seem rather unconcerned to hold to Paul's soteriology despite what science is telling them, it's a constant source of amazement for me. As Luigi stated earlier in this thread, to believe in a figurative fall is definitely not a get out of jail free card. What then? Did Christ become one of us and die to free us from a metaphor?
Way to move the goalposts. "Is it true?" and "Is it successful?" are two entirely different questions. Your comment that evangelicalism is doomed refers to success, not truth.
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Rent my holiday home in the South of France
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
Did Christ become one of us and die to free us from a metaphor?
That certainly encapsulates the problem I have nicely. It seems to me that either both (Christ becoming one of us and the condition he frees us from) are only metaphors, or neither are only metaphors.
Otherwise, what LVER said.
[ 06. April 2016, 09:01: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
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Posted
I don't think anyone is saying that the state that Christ rescues us from is metaphorical. I don't think there's a debate about the lack of perfection in the world, or the world as it was 2000 years ago. That's very real. Isn't the debate about whether the Biblical explanation is metaphorical?
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
My immediate question about Joesaphat's comment was born of wondering whether he thinks the Incarnation is only* metaphorical, too.
*not meant in a pejorative sense. I mean as opposed to material.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Freddy
Shipmate
# 365
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
I cannot believe in a fall in any biblically meaningful way. Until someone can explain to me how death entered creation because of human sin, I simply cannot.
I don't think the idea of literal death entering creation because of the fall is in any way the heart of the concept.
The heart of the concept of the fall is that whereas God created humanity in a pristine state, in which unselfish love was the norm, the same is no longer true. The fall means that people's natural state shifted from being unselfish and God centered to being selfish and self centered.
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
What I think a lot of people fail to see is that it requires us to do away with most of St Paul's soteriology: 'since by man came death by man came also the resurrection... etc' and his idea that sinlessness means immortality.
I think that most Christians have always understood Paul to be referring to spiritual death, not physical death. Spiritual death is a state of damnation.
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"Consequently nothing is of greater importance to a person than knowing what the truth is." Swedenborg
Posts: 12845 | From: Bryn Athyn | Registered: Jun 2001
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Freddy:
I think that most Christians have always understood Paul to be referring to spiritual death, not physical death. Spiritual death is a state of damnation.
But what I understand Luigi, Joesaphat et al. to be saying is that if it's only moral and spiritual, there is no reason for it to have had an impact on the rest of the universe, which, even if we concede that vegetarian lions are a trifling detail, nevertheless leads to questions about what Paul means by the "whole of creation" groaning and so on.
Is it only "groaning" "spiritually", and if so what does that mean? Does it mean anything more than "metaphorically"?
And if so, where does that leave his thoughts on the resurrection? Is that only a metaphor, too?
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Joesaphat
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# 18493
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
My immediate question about Joesaphat's comment was born of wondering whether he thinks the Incarnation is only* metaphorical, too.
*not meant in a pejorative sense. I mean as opposed to material.
No, I don't, neither do I believe that he is the new Adam come to rescue us from the curse of the first, though.
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Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
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Luigi
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# 4031
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Posted
Freddy - I think there are a fair number of us who are arguing that we don't buy the idea we were initially made in a pristine state - no evidence whatsoever. And if there was we'd never stop hearing of it from the conservatives.
Curiosity - this may be where we differ. I don't think our lack of perfection is an issue to God and shouldn't be to us. How on earth can we be perfect in the light if our evolutionary development? Indeed struggling to address this is the very point at which some of the most destructive elements creep into our thinking.
For me Jesus came to show what God was really like and not some sacrifice obsessed capricious bully who has dominated most of ancient religion (both within and without the Judeo-Christian tradition!
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Joesaphat
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# 18493
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Posted
I mean just as I cannot believe that death invaded the cosmos because of human sin, which is very much what Paul literally says, neither do I believe that we are saved from death by the death of a sinless one.
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Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
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Joesaphat
Shipmate
# 18493
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
Freddy - I think there are a fair number of us who are arguing that we don't buy the idea we were initially made in a pristine state - no evidence whatsoever. And if there was we'd never stop hearing of it from the conservatives.
Curiosity - this may be where we differ. I don't think our lack of perfection is an issue to God and shouldn't be to us. How on earth can we be perfect in the light if our evolutionary development? Indeed struggling to address this is the very point at which some of the most destructive elements creep into our thinking.
For me Jesus came to show what God was really like and not some sacrifice obsessed capricious bully who has dominated most of ancient religion (both within and without the Judeo-Christian tradition!
The man's right IMV. That's pretty much where I stand too. ![[Razz]](tongue.gif)
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Opening my mouth and removing all doubt, online.
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Joesaphat:
No, I don't, neither do I believe that he is the new Adam come to rescue us from the curse of the first, though.
Okay, I'm beginning to get a feel for where you're coming from in terms of how you view Paul, then ![[Biased]](wink.gif)
But if you believe in a literal incarnation (doubtless with metaphorical implications which are also important...), what do you see as being the point of going to all that bother if not to somehow reconnect the human with the divine (which to my mind suggests a disconnect some time previously...)?
Isn't that idea there in the protoevangelium in Genesis, or is that just another bit of ex-post eisegesis in your view?
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
For me Jesus came to show what God was really like and not some sacrifice obsessed capricious bully who has dominated most of ancient religion (both within and without the Judeo-Christian tradition!
Sorry, cross posted with Josesaphat's response here.
I think there's a bit of theological headspace between those two extremes.
And again, even if we discount your second 'sacrifice-obsessed' option, why would we need to know what God was really like if we weren't somehow disconnected from him in the first place?
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Curiosity killed ...
Ship's Mug
# 11770
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Luigi:
Curiosity - this may be where we differ. I don't think our lack of perfection is an issue to God and shouldn't be to us. How on earth can we be perfect in the light if our evolutionary development? Indeed struggling to address this is the very point at which some of the most destructive elements creep into our thinking.
I have very carefully not said where I think God comes into this (lots and lots of practice with fundamentalist friends).
I posted a link earlier to a BBC article on the evolution of evil that points out that the Dark Tetrad of evil behaviour - all four types of behaviour identified as evil, Machiavellism, psychopathy, narcissism and sadism can be found in the animal kingdom, which suggests that nature tooth in claw is our natural state.
I believe that God is our hope to save us from these behaviours, but I am not sure how much He had to do with its creation. (Back to deism, theism, panentheism and atheism and the rest.)
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Mugs - Keep the Ship afloat
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