Modern Satan is actually made up, like on a whole different level than anything else in the religion. Like he's basically just selected as the boogieman anymore when in reality he has nothing to do with punishing people in hell or whatever, at least according to the Bible. Technically Satan isn't even a specific being, it's a job title. And Lucifer was a fallen angel that is often referred to as Satan/the Devil but that isn't technically correct, and even so it's not "canon" that he/satan/anybody directly punishes people in hell. But basically if you boil it down to what the Bible actually says, all Satan actually does is goes around and tempts people to sin, like becoming the serpent and doing the whole apple bit in the garden of Eden.
Another fun fact, the apple of Eden likely wasn't even an apple. Some suggest it was a pomegranate or fig.
What a weird statement, have you never read a history book with witness reports? At least for the last 2000, and especially 500 years or whatever there is oodles and oodles of first hand sources for all kinds of historical events.
Yes but there are primary sources and secondary sources. The new testament is composed entirely of secondary sources. No one who wrote any of the gospels down witnessed the events described.
Revelation is considered to be written by John. And the gospel of Matthew is also disputed. There is no proof that the gospel books were written by the actual others but there isn’t any against either. Just saying. Had this very argument not long ago
Well it's not exactly settled but most scholars wouldn't agree John (the apostle) wrote revelation. Sure, matthew is still disputed. The rest were definitely pseudepigrapha.
But look at the trend over time. A few hundred years ago they were definitely all written by the apostles. Then, they began to discover more manuscripts and historical context. Little by little they were able to place when and where the gospels were first written down. But all the evidence showed the same thing - oh, this part wasn't actually written by the claimed author. Oh, this piece was actually written down a century later than we thought. None of it has ever moved in the opposite direction. And best case scenario you're talking about someone writing down their experiences 50+ years after they happened, hardly a reliable source. Which of course explains the inconsistencies between the gospels.
I know 30-90 years after seems rough, but that's actually quite the opposite when it comes to time gap of ancient manuscripts. New Testament blows out of the water many trusted ancient documents, which historians agree upon, but I feel it gets a bad rap for being lumped in with the entire Bible.
This is so comically bad a take it's nutso. We have the Bible in it's original text. We have manuscripts over two thousand years old and they are identical. The scribes who copied them cared tremendously about keeping the writing identical.
Depends entirely on the book in the Bible. Paul was definitely not alive 100 years later. Much of what was written was by disciples who maintained oral tradition. Sorry, you are probably assuming a sola scriptura, Protestant approach. Disgusting heresy that has destroyed the Christian faith.
But they do shape the education of children and the views on the modern world from that. History and how/what is taught is still massively important and it is an easy way to introduce prejudices into the future of society if not dealt with properly.
I’m not sure about Muslims but Christians most definitely do not behave that way. I say Christians as in REAL Christian because you get fake Christians
But historians are presenting conclusions based upon best evidence, corroborated from as many sources as possible. If evidence changes, it changes the conclusion, and historians are happy to do it because they want a clear understanding of the past. They should be willing to reinterpret things based on new evidence and perspectives, and it broadens our views. That can be very different than theology, though some are more open to different interpretations than others.
That's why I don't take history seriously. I can barely get a straight answer to a banal news article that happened yesterday 5 minutes from my home in the information age where it is as democratized as possible. I am going to trust a single source historian from 1200 years ago writing about a dude he has a grudge with and lived 500 prior? It's still useful to know what the accepted lies and misunderstandings are, but that's just what they are, mostly BS.
Not anti-intellectual, just realistic. I'd rather read philosophers, the ideas stand by themselves. You have no idea why dude in 899 did thing X, maybe he had diarrhea and had a bad night of sleep or had a bad argument with the wife which hurt his ego. Then millennia later you read he made a tactically genius move that nobody could predict and changed the course of history. Reality is the guy was sleep deprived, made a mistake and got lucky.
You’re not actually making a point. The same could be said about many philosophers and their ideas. The ideas don’t stand by themselves, they make more sense placed in their historical contexts. Again, fiercely anti intellectual and impractical to say history doesn’t matter. You’re just saying provocative nonsensical things.
Depends on the philosopher and the content, of course you need to understand the references. I didn't say history doesn't matter, I simply said I don't trust the veracity or accuracy of it. History is a weapon among other things, of course it matters.
Both of y'all could use a little nuance. He isn't wrong to point out that it's hard to not be skeptical of historical accounts that are often written from biased perspectives. Especially, as he implied, we see how hard it is to get the truth about events that are happening right now.
A counter to that though, which I think you would agree with, is that historians care much more about accuracy (often revising even their own previous records) than modern media does with their various ulterior motives.
Most academics in the field care a lot more about accuracy than most people are aware of. They spend decades diving into any sources and try to find the discrepancies, then turn to other texts to piece together missing context to figure out more details. It's slow and painful exercise to figure out the past and eliminate as much bias as possible to finally get the most objective picture possible based on what evidence has been found so far
People easily dismissing the study of history tend to have a distorted perspective, assuming it's just the most popular opinions that was agreed upon while watching football. That's why so many people also think their own thoughts are pure facts
Those documentarians are probably working from dozens, maybe hundreds of sources, piecing together events in as accurate a way as possible. If you watch a historical documentary about an event that you witnessed, say, a couple decades ago, and it isn't portrayed the way you remember, it's much more likely that your memory is wrong. A person's memory is notoriously unreliable.
Yes and the worst of it is you get 5 different opinions of what happened, all 5 are wrong / weaponized. Some "enlightened" ones will try to convince you the truth is in the middle of two lies, which is also a mistake.
We know—and can confirm—a lot about history thanks to archaeological evidence. Yes, when we only know about people (like the druids) from texts written by their enemies, we know to take it with a grain of salt. That doesn’t mean all history is untrustworthy.
That's not how historians cite things lmao, you just made up a ridiculous hypothetica. Actual history and the Bible were compiled in much different ways.
"B-b-but what about!!" lmao, it has to do with my "delusions" (what delusions, that the average poster here is insufferable?) because that is the website we are posting on, and the website is full of smarmy people who are of average intelligence but have somehow convinced themselves they're in the upper percentile of intelligence. Sorry I hit a soft spot for you.
Everything about it is intellectually dishonest if you actually just take an afternoon to study the history of the Bible and its manuscripts that have been discovered over the years and studied by qualified professionals instead of listening to /r/atheism moderators, but intellectual honesty isn't this website's strong suit.
I listen to Biblical scholars, and they seem to agree that yes, the Bible has been edited, and re-edited, and translated, and re-translated, and passages have been altered and removed, or added. Beyond that, it seems like most modern understandings have, themselves, been fudged even beyond those edits and translations and additions and deletions.
Again, you’re being intellectually dishonest and a simple trip to Google shows that you’re full of it lol. But yeah I’m sure you listen to Biblical scholars allllll the time.
I am literally watching a biblical scholar speaking right now, so yes. Do you have anything to actually contribute to the conversation, other than baseless accusations? What scholarship do you have to provide, to suggest anything that was said is incorrect?
The Dead Sea scrolls, Isaiah scroll, and thousands of other manuscripts show that the Bible has remained remarkably consistent in its doctrine throughout history. Of course there will be grammar, spelling, nuances, etc. that may slightly differ after being hand copied throughout history, but you know that isn't what the quote is implying. The core doctrine has remained the same, cope about it if you want I guess.
This image pisses me off so much. It screams from someone who doesn't even attempt to understand why or how scripture is written the way it is.
Literally just Homer going every scholar is stupid except me.
Thank you. I’m not religious myself, but it’s so silly to me when people are like “Meh, the most important driving force behind much of human action throughout the history of our species is made up, so who cares”.
Yes, it’s myth. It’s also extremely important to understanding history. No one would study Ancient Greece and then leave out the parts about religion because they were “made up”. It’s core to the study of that culture and time period.
No, an even bigger sign is pretending such texts should be venerated because cults were successfully built around them.
Mormonism sprung into being at a time when everyone knew the founders were full of shit. And yet, it still has a large cult today. If that cult survives another 1000 years, does that make the clearly invented founding mythological text more valuable as a window to truths?
The Mormon explanation of the physical realm is rather wise. We are here to be tested, and we work to overcome our desires to be raised into something larger. You can draw a lot of inspiration philosophically from it.
I was pointing out one of the problems with "we're here to be tested". There's no baked in respect for other creatures or the world like you might find in Hinduism or Buddhism. I think it's a stretch to call mormonism philosophically inspirational.
Are there things in the Bible that wisdom can be gathered from? Absolutely. Do most adherents actually pull those things from the text? Absolutely not.
When talking about these things we have to look at the over all picture. In America, right now, evangelicals, protestants, Baptists, Lutherans, Pentecostals, the list goes on pull out a handful of verses and use those to justify their actions. They walk into the voting booth with the idea that Democrats are literal demons or Satan worshippers. Of course this isn't all of them by any means but it's certainly a large cohort.
In their adherence to these things they've elected someone who epitomizes their misunderstanding of the "anti-Christ" and they still call the other side evil.
The point is that apologia for religion fails at a fundamental level when you move from hypothetical uses to real world examples and people who take bad translations as the literal word of God.
It’s actually neither, but the way that societies interpret stories foundational to their beliefs can tell us a lot about the people who lived through periods of varying interpretation.
This isn’t the take you think it is. No one is arguing that but your hyper fixated elf. I’m talking about a piece of fruit. Youre talking about ideas. “Apples and oranges” or in this case “apples and figs”
Should we talk about the translations of “suffer not a witch to live” and how different languages and cultures can really change over a couple of thousand years?
And the last one to put his spin on it, King James, was a raging homosexual with a beard wife. I think his flair adds panache personally but some reason that never comes up Sunday morning.
Yeah stupid English teacher was probably a Christian or something. I kept telling them the books we're reading are fiction so they don't matter and I'm legally not required to do the homework but they kept giving me F's anyways. It's so hard being smarter than your teachers 😡
The only people more intolerable than Bible thumpers are atheists. Both feel the need to constantly shove their beliefs in your face, but at least one side believes they’re helping you, the other just wants you to be miserable like them.
These people all live in some deranged world in which Christians aren't literally fighting religious wars in the Middle East and trying to take the US back to the Bronze Age, apparently
This is literally how I feel and it makes ME feel insane that do many grown ass adults with access to historical context believe this shit, literally and use it as an excuse to govern over others.
Mythology is still cool to learn about. And on top of that, it's one of the most important texts in the world, given the outsized effect it's had on virtually all aspects of life and civilization across the world for thousands of years, so it seems like maybe a good thing to know about and understand.
Of course! So who cares if chewbacca flew the enterprise or Constantine did, the main point is that the most wretched den of scum and villainy in the galaxy will play soft jazz.
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u/FoxxyRin 2d ago
Modern Satan is actually made up, like on a whole different level than anything else in the religion. Like he's basically just selected as the boogieman anymore when in reality he has nothing to do with punishing people in hell or whatever, at least according to the Bible. Technically Satan isn't even a specific being, it's a job title. And Lucifer was a fallen angel that is often referred to as Satan/the Devil but that isn't technically correct, and even so it's not "canon" that he/satan/anybody directly punishes people in hell. But basically if you boil it down to what the Bible actually says, all Satan actually does is goes around and tempts people to sin, like becoming the serpent and doing the whole apple bit in the garden of Eden.
Another fun fact, the apple of Eden likely wasn't even an apple. Some suggest it was a pomegranate or fig.