...Of Interest

Philosophy Forums Religion and Spirituality
61

Heard something called Socratic irony? :unamused:

Edit: Have a look at this article by The Guardian. :laughing:

62

Hi Chan,

I think that JT is right, you need to look into what ‘truth’ is.

Synonyms: truth, veracity, verity, verisimilitude
These nouns refer to the quality of being in accord with fact or reality. Truth is a comprehensive term that in all of its nuances implies accuracy and honesty: “We seek the truth, and will endure the consequences” (Charles Seymour).
Veracity is adherence to the truth: “Veracity is the heart of morality” (Thomas H. Huxley).
Verity often applies to an enduring or repeatedly demonstrated truth: “beliefs that were accepted as eternal verities” (James Harvey Robinson).
Verisimilitude is the quality of having the appearance of truth or reality: “merely corroborative detail, intended to give artistic verisimilitude to an otherwise bald and unconvincing narrative” (W.S. Gilbert).
dictionary.reference.com/search?q=truth

If something is deemed to be true, it is in keeping with reality as we experience it. In that way, a fictional story of someone who has lost their mother after caring for them through ten long years of suffering could be said by someone who has experienced the same to be ‘very true’. There are reasons for writing fiction rather than fact, one of them could be that fact doesn’t bring over the message in the way I feel it needs to be, or that the story becomes boring over many pages.

If we however adapt the facts to make the story more compact and convey the experiences in a more direct manner, perhaps including some ideas that were expressed somewhere else, the story is no longer pure fact, but inhanced by imagination- however, it could be seen to be very true by readers. They are not saying that the book is ‘historical’ - portraying an historical event - but that the message is true, i.e. what it is like to look after someone critically ill over a long time.

Nobody would say that the story was a ‘fairy tale’, because the ‘fairy tale’ is often trivial (but not always) and meant to entertain or educate children. Then again, a ‘fairy tale’ could be said to be very true if it is in accord with our experiences.

This is where you become ridiculous! When I say that I do not believe that someone called Jonah was in a whale, but that the story is clear without such a necessity, I am not ruling anything out. All I am doing is to use my common sense. If I were to read that ‘pigs flew’, I would immediately assume that someone was speaking fguratively, or that there was some physical explanation, but not that they had sprouted wings.

Why start ranting?

Gullivers Travels is satire! The Gilgamesh, or Illiad, or the Egyptian Book of the Dead are trying to transport something - perhaps there are things that are very true in them. I am also an ardent reader of Tao te Ching and I find many statements very true, but I don’t read anything ‘instead’ of the Bible, but ‘as well as’ the Bible.

The Bible speaks to my soul on many occaisions and I am far from finished. I am, after all, a Christian Mystic. Maybe that isn’t your style of faith, but you have to accept that the evangelicals haven’t been around that long. The problem that I have with evangelicals always occurs when they demand that the Bible is historical in every point - I have never disputed the fact that it is very true.

What you do is reduce the witness of scripture to ‘then’ and insist that it happened some time in history. I say that the witness of scripture is timeless and that what it speaks of happens all the time (now).

You then try to convince me that the things that supposedly happened ‘then’ are examples of God demonstrating his power to push the laws of nature aside. I say that if God made the laws of nature, he will hardly push them aside - which is corroborated by the fact that we don’t experience the laws of nature being pushed aside.

What I however say is that we are still a long way off from understanding everything and I am open to surprises - such surprises are however few and far between.

Shalom
Bob

63

Hi,
hasn’t it become quiet …

Shalom
Bob

64

Hi Bob,

Perhaps we’re just off ‘cogitating’. :stuck_out_tongue: I like your new avatar. “through the looking glass darkly…” This has been a bitch of a week. Really worked the Baileys over-time. All this **** with fundamentalism has pushed me into a collection of new ideas that give’s agnosticism and/or mysticism greater clarity and strength. The thoughts are still in there sloshing around with the Baileys, but maybe this weekend I’ll be able to get 'em out with some coherency.

JT

65

‘True’ Fairy Tales

The story is a more robust form for the carriage of meaning. Stories are less susceptible to translation, scribing and memory errors, and can also be transmitted in various forms and means, from the written text, to oral narratives, to songs, plays and even as pictures. Stories can also be recontextualised, ie the elements being mapped to a new context with an analoguos structure, giving new insights and applications to the story’s meaning.

But this do not make any story true.

Aesop’s fable of the ugly ducking is a very robust one. It have been translated to many languages, told in many forms, from bedtime stories for children to plays for corporate motivation, but is it true that anything that starts bad and ugly will always become good and beautiful in due time in a corrected context? It is a ‘good-feeling’ story but it is truth or delusion?

The truth of a story have to be determined elsewhere. Until then a story is just that, a story.

And truth can be ascertained from such as who is telling the story, what’s the reason for the telling, and of course, the simplest of all tests, whether the events in the story are historical ones.

Talking Donkeys and “Laws of Nature”

What is God’s relationship to the “Laws of Nature”? Can not God “violate” his own laws, or the Laws are gods instead?

And a strange thing to your experience, to your ‘common-sense’, even the entire common experience of mankind, is no criteria for that thing being impossible or false, does it? Strange things do happened, even within the laws of nature.

And aren’t mystics most familiar with mysterious and strange things? Your soul cannot recognise the hand of God when it is shown, or hear his voice when he speaks, even in a donkey? You are seemingly more scholarly than mystical.

Strangeness is no criteria to help us tell if a story like a man-swallowing whale is certainly fairy tale. And similarly tall tales of Abraham, of Moses, of Gilgamesh, of Zues, etc in and of themselves don’t make them myths.

And the story of Jonah unnecessary? Seemingly it is necessary for Jesus [Matt 16:4; Luke 11:29].

And finally is the resurrection from the dead a strange thing, a thing that violates the laws of nature, an impossible thing? Do you say that there is no resurrection, no literal coming back to life of the dead?

Inconsistency between Religions

If two things do not agree, either both or at most one of them is true.

How then do you resolve inconsistencies and contradictions when you read the bible ‘as well as’ other religious text?

And one glaring one is this: in the bible Jesus claimed he is the only way to his Father, who is God. The other religions have their own formula for their own ends, heaven or otherwise. You do not see a conflict and contradiction in all these?

Your argument, apparently, have been that whatever ‘John’ purported Jesus to say was meant for the Jews only, whatever a Jew is. If so then does Jesus have any thing to say to non-Jews and the world? Did not Jesus preached to the Gentiles and the Samaritans, or these are just later day fabrications to justify Gentiles claims to Jesus too?

But then what about what Peter said, in Acts as recorded by the Gentile doctor, Luke, to the Roman jailers [Acts 16:31], or Paul in his epistle to the Romans [Rom 1:16], the Ephesians [Eph 2:14], etc etc. Or are these all part of the Gentile conspiracy starting with Paul? And thus Paul became an enemy to Peter?

So if indeed Gentiles have no claim to Jesus, then what is the gospel of Jesus Christ for the world? or there is no such thing? Jesus for Jews, and everybody else go their own ways?

66

Hi Chan,
I see you’ve read a lot of books whilst you have been away.

Of course you are right, what makes a story true is if it is consistent with fact or reality or when it is not false or erroneous. But I have already given an example of a story that could be called ‘true’ and all of the things written above show how advisable to put truth into a story and not just take the pure facts on to the street – especially if the ‘facts’ are meant to have more relevance than todays newspaper.

It is also a question of authenticity and of how genuine the message is. I find that the scriptures of the Bible have enough authenticity, if you do not insist for example that the Pentateuch was written by Moses or that David wrote all the Psalms ascribed to him. It isn’t the authorship that is primarily of interest. The very fact that the Bible is full of discrepancies makes it sympathetic. I would be extremely discouraged if such ancient scriptures would be without discrepancies.

What I have found, is that the Bible is reliable in its description of Humankind. It is accurate in its portrayal of the dilemma of Humankind to come to terms with their strange fate of being part of nature, whilst actually transcending it with their intellectual capabilities. However, had I read this in some scientific magazine, I would have probably put it aside after the first paragraph. The way this is portrayed in the legends and mythology of the Bible, it is alive and real.

I also feel that what the Prophets express is sincerely felt and unfeigned. Their distress at the prospect of Israel losing it’s calling whilst having the intuitive insight of what blessings are attached is something that can inspire reams of sermons from me. There is something fundamental in the simple message of the Prophets, something that Jesus picks up and follows through. His essential message is that Israel should hold on to it’s hope in the dire situation of the occupation by Roman forces. He says, we’ve been through this in the past and have done the wrong thing – doesn’t Torah show us the way?

I also find it rightful and legitimate regard Jesus as a true Son of God, a peacemaker and someone who was pure at heart. He was the one who personified the ‘Sermon on the Mount’ and was a true heir of Abraham. He exactly conformed to the rule of the Torah – in the spirit it was written. We can see how he opposed the second Temple because it was built by the grace of Rome and betrayed basic instructions of the Tenakh. The basic example was the encouragement of the rich to offer sacrifice with a bell, whilst scoffing at the widow and her farthing.

So you can see how I regard the Bible as true in many ways – except in one: in that it is historically reliable. The Letters of Paul give rise to criticism of the Acts, because Luke has glossed over a number of important issues. Of course it may be that such issues from his perspective no longer had relevance – I have no criticism of the intentions of Luke. But you can see that he wasn’t interested in presenting a ‘Church History’, but wanted to tell later generations what happened around Jesus and how it continued after the crucifixion and ressurection.

But hasn’t there been umpteen examples of ‘ugly ducklings’ who have become beauties when they reach the end of their teens – some even manage without plastic surgery! In that way this story represents something that happens – not always, but that is the Disney version of the story (and favourite among evangelical kids).

You certainly do try, I must give you that! I have already told you that my immediate reaction to statements that things have happened outside of the laws of nature is to assume someone is speaking figuratively. The second reaction, should the first be wrong, would be to assume that some physical cause has made something otherwise impossible to appear to happen. I wouldn’t disbelieve immediately, but try to understand. If both cases proved to be incorrect, and something really has happened that violates the Laws of nature, I would stand back, duly gobsmacked and perhaps I would praise God. But this incident has never occurred whereas the other two have.

Yes, we are familiar with strange things, but we are a long way off from understanding them fully. That is why the figurative description of such occurences are familiar to us as well. Having had to use figurative speech ourselves, it makes us all the more receptive for other people doing the same.

‘A generation evil and adulterous doth seek a sign, and a sign shall not be given to it, except the sign of Jonah the prophet’ - What sign is that? Jesus didn’t turn up on the market square in Jerusalem after three days and preach repentance, so that wasn’t it. However, when the news of the resurrection spread, many repented and followed him – was that it?

Luke writes: ‘This generation is evil, a sign it doth seek after, and a sign shall not be given to it, except the sign of Jonah the prophet, for as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so also shall the Son of Man be to this generation. A queen of the south shall rise up in the judgment with the men of this generation, and shall condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon; and lo, greater than Solomon here! Men of Nineveh shall stand up in the judgment with this generation, and shall condemn it, because they reformed at the proclamation of Jonah; and lo, greater than Jonah here!’

Aha, Jesus is telling his brothers, who doubt his word, that they are failing to recognise the ‘Kairos’ of the moment. They will stand layed bare and with no excuse, but ‘goyim’ who have seen less will be reconciled. Do you think that in such a moment it is important that these people actually lived, or is it more important to use the examples of the Tenakh to make a point? The thing is, that historicity wasn’t an issue in Jesus’ day. It was a tradition in which people lived – something I do today – and I may some day make a similar comparison to the Story of Jonah, but I wouldn’t explain first that the story has to be taken literally.

Now here is an interesting part. If you read Paul’s statements against people who say that the resurrection is impossible, he tells them that it is the teaching of the Church and the hope that holds them together. These people can’t seriously expect to deny the resurrection and expect to remain a part of the church. He tells them that the Apostles and nearly 500 people at one time have seen the apparition of Christ. But he doesn’t argue that the resurrection itself is a proven fact – but rather, a hope ‘according to scripture’.

There are many strange occurrences around the story of the resurrection that indicate that it was a mystical experience. The grave seems to have been empty – but the grave is not the central place of the disciples concern. Surely that would have been a ‘proof’ of resurrection, but it soon fades and other things become important, namely, the visions and apparitions.

‘Proof’ loses value after thirty or forty - or seventy – years. ‘Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.’ It becomes a matter of faith, not proof, when the Apostles have all died and even the Jewish Christians have all left or died away. That is why the emphasis is not upon proof, but on faith. The case presented in the Gospels is for faith, not proof.

If you are stood on a junction facing west and I am on the other side facing east, you could say we see the same thing if an accident occurs. However, if our statements differed, would one of us necessarily be lying? Our different perspectives give us a different perception. If you add the different cultural perspectives, varied scope of experience, grade of education and literacy, you may find that our statements differ greatly – but would we be lying? Would one of us be wrong?

Now look at the world with its amazing variety of life (which was even more varied to begin with) and cultural development and tell me that God presented us with this variance but expects us to only consider one version of Religion as absolutely true? If a Church is abundantly blessed with so many gifts, can the world be less abundantly bestowed? Is the God that showed incredible generosity suddenly a miser?

Sorry, ‘your’ God is too small to be the Mystery, the ‘I am’ of Moses. You are idolising some folklore fantasy but not the God who is not to be named and of whom no image is to be made.

Shalom
Bob

67

Bob it is not so much reading books as reading you (and this includes thinking, ie making purposeful imaginings about you) - who are you and what you mean in the many many words you used, and trying not to misinterpret you; and you do not write simply and directly but fuzzily and much puffed-up.

68

and

and

and

What I think you are saying here is that the bible concur with what you think being human is about, and your feelings, and thus ‘authentic’ and ‘true’. And seemingly you do believe in myths and legends too, and on the same basis of ‘truth’ for you, namely concurrence with what is within you and your feelings.

You feel what you feel Bob, you believe what you believe, but you cannot expect to convince people rationally and reasonably in this manner, ie I cannot rely on your feelings as acceptable evidence for me to agree with you that what you felt is true. And I will not consider myths and legends as true, by definition.

Now Bob, you may well be correct, ie your feelings and intuition did not lie, mislead or delude you, but, my point is I cannot share nor know nor affirm the truth of what you feel, and know. They are entirely private to you and I have no access to them, and I am no less knowledgeable than I was before I heard you said anything. You are speaking a private language as far as I am concern, although you used familiar words.

Oh!? Are you saying that you cannot recognised truth per se? You need the packaging to inform you? Does not truth stands on it own? Whether a fool, or a donkey or a king speaks it, does not the ear tests words just as a tongue tastes food? Does the packaging makes a difference? Would you not become susceptible to deception if you cannot discern truth in and of itself? The same with lies: whether a president, or a ILP member, or some respectable scientific journal says it, a lie remains a lie, and - perhaps eventually - recognisably so, shouldn’t it?

Who’s “us” Bob?

I think when the second temple was built Rome did not even exist.

Why not?

I am not in disagreement if you say the bible have errors. Those are obvious. Only those blind would deny it. But to sweep aside the bible as entirely mythical and unhistorical is a different matter altogether. For example, were not the discoveries of the Hittites, Babylon and Nineveh, etc inspired by the biblical accounts?

How do you know? Or you just felt it that way, or intuit it, is it the reason you know?

Can you come simply and directly to the point. Did or did not the resurrection happened as a historical event? Yes or No?

Sure, but not every difference is a question of perspective. I am talking about inconsistency and not exact similarity. So again, please come straight to the point, are there or are there not inconsistencies in the various ways to know God in the various theistic religions in the world?

And surely religions that claimed that there is no god is already an immediate inconsistency? No? If so please explain how this is just another case of a “different perspective”?

You are saying two things here, namely that you know who ‘my’ God is, and secondly this ‘God’ is a false god, an idol, and therefore not the ‘I am’ of Moses. Is this what you are saying?

69

Hi Chan,

I haven’t got enough time for a longer answer right now, but my wife just came in and gave me a hint.

Perhaps the difference between me and you is the way we meet people. If I were to meet a Buddhist or an Jew or a Moslem or whatever, I am known to say, “thats interesting, perhaps we can learn from each other.” I have had many conversations with people in various countries and of various creeds, and have always found such conversations enlightening.

The only type of conversation that was the same in all countries, was the conversation with evangelicals. Wherever you meet them, they are always trying to convince you that Jesus is Lord and without him you end up in hell. It was a strange thing to hear from people all over the world, that they all know what an evangelical is.

Are you able to open up your heart to the people of the world without condemning them for what they believe?

Shalom
Bob

70

Is this the part where we break the bread?

Here Bob, you can have my piece. I’m full.

71

And you have no clue whatsoever.

Perhaps for you your real life and this virtual persona is the same, but you cannot assume that it is necessarily so for anyone. I can pretend and play a role here. How do you not know I am not arguing with myself with two different nicks taking opposed positions, ironically, just to arrive at the truth?

And in the real world I could just as well be a quadriplegic typing this out with the movements of my eyes, or a prisoner, awaiting death, condemned to die for murders, or a teenager secretly struggling to think in an oppressive religious society, where independent thinking is deemed a sin worthy of death.

So the morale of the story: stick to the things being said and play by the “rules”, ie we are here to philosophise, which is, in a manner, to seek the truth. If what you said is woolly nebulous rubbish so shall it be called, nothing more, nothing less. And I do not cast any aspersion as to who ‘you’ are. But to say that I condemned people in real life is way beyond what is justified by what went on in this small window of the virtual world.

72

Will I be condemning someone if I tell him he is walking over an edge?

It does not make a difference if he is aware of it, and continues to walk on.

It may make a difference if he is not aware. Of course I have to tell him in a reasonable and believeable way, until perhaps it is too late. Then I may have to physically intervene and forcibly turn him around, ie if I bothered at all.

It may again make no difference if he thinks he knows better, or is under a delusion that there is no edge. And he may even feel insulted and be offended at my telling him, even to kill me.

No one is condemning anyone for whatever you believe; rather your own beliefs condemns you.

73

Shhhhhhhh.