the binding of Issac..

there is a moral of this story if one is willing to wait…

the Binding of Isaac is a story in the bible where god “demands” that
Abraham sacrifice his son Isaac as “proof” of Abraham loyalty/love…

so god directs Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac… they take a 3 day
journey to the place that god has directed them to…

Abraham bounds Isaac to a rock and is about to slay him when
somehow a ram gets into the picture and in place of Isaac, the
ram is slewed…

there are of course many different interpretations of this event…

one, out of many, suggest that this was nothing more then a Kabuki theater…
the point was to “play” out an sacrifice of his son when nether one was
interesting in doing so… it was an attempt to delegitimize the act of
human sacrifice… as a set piece in doing so…

one of the other interpretations is that this was really Abraham putting
pressure on god, not the other way around… read the bible, god is very
violent and not above killing anyone… even jesus…
by doing this, this forces god to either go along with violence or to end
the violence of the bible… spoiler alert, it doesn’t…

the interpretation I like speaks to me…
that the bible speaks of Abraham “willingness” to sacrifice Isaac to
demonstrate what should be our “willingness” to sacrifice for the good
of god… but what if, what if this act was something entirely different…

as god isn’t above making demands of the people, perhaps this event was
really about Abraham disobedience to god, his refusal to sacrifice his son in
the name of god…

I see this story as being one that bounces off the original story of
disobedience to god, that of Adam…

man/Adam was punished for his act of disobedience to god…
was Abraham? no, he was in fact rewarded… but in reading the
story closely, one does get a sense that this was more Kabuki theater
then a real actual test of man’s allegiance to god…

and the we have Kierkegaard and his fixation on this event…

tainted/colored by his relationship with his father…

would I have sacrifice my child, my daughter to god in
a bid to show my faith, my allegiance to god?

no, no and a thousand times no… and I think we hit another
aspect of this story…

even though god demands it, we must hew to what is right even
in the face of authority, authority like god… to sacrifice a child
to show loyalty is wrong even to a god…if we hold to a “truth”
and truly believe it, we must hold that truth even in the face of
one, two, a thousand or seven billion people…even if every single
person on earth demanded us to sacrifice our child, we must say no…

we must hold true to our own convictions…

but here comes the rub…

“A very popular error-having the courage of one’s own convictions;
rather it is a matter of having the courage for an attack upon one’s
convictions”

what convictions are really ours and what convictions are really just
slop left over from the indoctrinations from family, friends, the state,
religion, culture, society…

if we are to hold our convictions, we must have truly put them into
the fire of existence and test out those convictions…

we cannot just assume our convictions are strong enough to
hold in the face of trial and troubles…

we must forge our convictions in the face of living our life…

that is why I hold the convictions I do hold… because they
have been forged in the fire of life, of existence…

I believe in the messiah, be it god, jesus or IQ45… they must
pass the test of existence and one of those three listed above
haven’t passed the test of existence…I wonder which one?

to my way of thinking holding beliefs, convictions are
of the same nature be it convictions of religion or of life
or of politics or of economics… I don’t see a difference
between these convictions… I just see different sides of the same
coin…

Kropotkin

I’ve always been partial to Bob Dylan’s rendition of this:

Oh God said to Abraham, “Kill me a son”
Abe said, “Man, you must be puttin’ me on”
God said, “No.”
Abe said, “What?”
God said, “You can do what you want, Abe, but
The next time you see me comin’ you better run”
Well Abe said, “Where you want this killin’ done?”
God said, “Out on Highway 61”

Yup, that one was a bitch and kierkegaard tripped on it for like a whole book. Called the deed a teleological suspension of the ethical and worked out an impressive argument I remember being like ‘damn this dude can write’.

But his formula is bass ackwards. We need an ethical suspension of the teleological and to forget about notions of design and purpose.

I agree kierkegaard’s view can appear backwards depending on where you’re standing. I guess forgetfulness is one way to go.

K: it is a minor side point that Dylan is Jewish…

and what is the basis of the Jewish religion?

obeying the law set down by god…
so what laws are “higher” the law of god or the
laws of man? the escape clause for the religious in
this matter has always been this saying the new testament…

“rending unto Caesar what is Caesar and render unto the god
what is god” and that has been their get out of jail card…
because it doesn’t commit them to anything…who decides what is
Caesar and what is the god’s?

should have Abraham have render unto god or to Caesar?

this story illustrates some of the complexities of human existence…

to whom to we owe our allegiance to? this is not just a religious question,
but a modern question of where should we put our allegiance?

The modern GOP has put its allegiance to IQ45 and party over
country and the constitution…

this question of allegiance is a question that is political, economic,
social, philosophical and cultural…

so to return to the original question… I stand with Abraham…
and refuse to sacrifice one’s son to a god or to the state or to
the society…now does this mean we refuse to go to war?

yes… for if we all refuse to go to war, then all wars will end…
for war needs the cannon fodder of young men to make money…
refuse to… and the business of war ends…and war should never
have become business, big business that it is today…

Kropotkin

Still, this sort of intellectual speculation is wholly dependent on the actual existence of this particular a God/the God.

Kierkegaard’s “leap of faith” was just another existential contraption rooted in dasein from my own vantage point. In other words, in a world where a belief in God still remains predicated on a faith that is more or less blind.

If you truly do believe in an omniscient and omnipotent God able on Judgment Day to grant you both immortality and salvation in Paradise for all of eternity, come on, what wouldn’t you do to please Him, to obey Him?

Here Kierkegaard is interchangeable with all other mere mortals. He’s just more articulate.

Abraham believes in God. After all, God has spoken to him. Unless, of course, Abraham himself had a “condition”. But while some mere mortals insist if they were Abraham they would never allow their own son to be harmed, Dylan’s point seems far more realistic. Besides, the faithful are able to assume that it is all part of their loving, just and merciful God’s “mysterious ways”. That, in the end, they and their sons will be together again immersed in God’s salvation forever and ever.

That’s the beauty of religion. You merely have to believe something “in your head” in order to make it true.

K: ummmm, I think I was just called a “mere mortal” by IAM…I’m not sure how
I feel about that…

anyway, even if god were to speak to me, I would still reject him…

for a couple of reasons, one is living forever in heaven sounds like hell to me…
I have no interest of any kind in living forever… it just sounds terrible…the second
is, for me anyway, the more interesting point…the human condition…

the search is to become human and that cannot be achieved until we
human beings learn to take responsibility and accountability
for ourselves, our actions, our beliefs and our own existence in
the universe…

any type of belief in god, religion, the stars, the state or any other form
of being or system that we might hold allows us to escape our responsibility,
accountability that we must hold as human beings…

let us flesh this out…

a child is starving… it doesn’t matter who, what, when, where,
why or how… a child is starving…
we can escape responsibility and accountability by saying, I didn’t do
that… it was the… now take your choice of reasons that allow you to escape
accountability or responsibility for a child starving…

it was… god, the economic system, a different country, political,
not my problem, the libtards, any or all reasons that one uses to
escape the responsibility or accountability of a child starving…

if a child is starving… I am accountable… I am responsible…
and what am I going to do to change this situation?

if I am not accountable or responsible, then who is?
let the blame game begin…
and that achieves what exactly?

that child is still starving… while you do everything in your power to
escape accountability and responsibility…

and that is the beauty of religion… it helps u to escape responsibility/
accountability for our actions…

but Kropotkin, I can’t feed the children of the world… so does that
somehow exempt you from trying? apparently it does…

which is just another weak ass excuse to avoid taking accountability/
responsibility for who we are and what the state of our world is…

and so I fight with all my energy the notion of there being a god…
because if there is a god, then we can escape our own accountability,
responsibility for a child starving… for then god is to blame… and not us…

and heaven forbid, we take responsibility/ accountability for anything…

Kropotkin

For me, this would depend entirely on what “living forever” amounted to. You know, “for all practical purposes”.

If it involved my having access to the food I love, the music I listen to, the movies I cherish and all of the other things that still bring me enormous fulfilment and satisfaction, immortality definitely works for me.

As for the human condition, that is also ever and always bursting at the seams with pain and suffering. Utterly brutal, ghastly pain and suffering for some. Take that away in whatever paradise might possibly be and [hopefully] God and I can work something out. Especially after He explains it all.

Nope, for me, I’ll take my chances with a God/the God if, when push comes to shove, the pleasures still outweigh the pains.

K: nope, disagree… I will always take my chances with human beings…
I am ok with the frailty of the human condition… with the pain and suffering
and illness and finally death… I have suffered as we all have suffered…
I think of it as part of the price of admission into life…
that there is a price to life cannot be doubted… the question becomes
are we willing to pay for it… I am…

it gives me comfort that we are growing (again hopefully) from
animal to animal/human to finally becoming human, all too human…

that I disagree with god and every aspect of the divine isn’t really
a news flash…I hold that belief in god and religions to be the
single greatest failure of the human race…bar none…
and we are stuck/trapped until we learn to stand on our own…
and take accountability and responsibility for who we are
and what we believe in…

if god asked me, believe in me and I shall save the world,
disbelieve in me, and I shall destroy it…

and I will say, fire away, destroy the world…

I have no use for you… as I strive to become human, fully human…

Kropotkin

Yep, we definitely disagree about this.

My guess: it’s all tangled up in dasein somehow. I unequivocally have a “use” for immorality if it is in the general vicinity of the things that I love to do now. In a context where human pain and suffering is no more.

Now all we need is a God/the God to come down out of the intellectual/spiritual clouds and give us all the existential details.

IAM: For me, this would depend entirely on what “living forever” amounted to. You know, “for all practical purposes”.

If it involved my having access to the food I love, the music I listen to, the movies I cherish and all of the other things that still bring me enormous fulfilment and satisfaction, immortality definitely works for me.

As for the human condition, that is also ever and always bursting at the seams with pain and suffering. Utterly brutal, ghastly pain and suffering for some. Take that away in whatever paradise might possibly be and [hopefully] God and I can work something out. Especially after He explains it all.

Nope, for me, I’ll take my chances with a God/the God if, when push comes to shove, the pleasures still outweigh the pains.
[/quote]
K: nope, disagree… I will always take my chances with human beings…
I am ok with the frailty of the human condition… with the pain and suffering
and illness and finally death… I have suffered as we all have suffered…
I think of it as part of the price of admission into life…
that there is a price to life cannot be doubted… the question becomes
are we willing to pay for it… I am…

it gives me comfort that we are growing (again hopefully) from
animal to animal/human to finally becoming human, all too human…

that I disagree with god and every aspect of the divine isn’t really
a news flash…I hold that belief in god and religions to be the
single greatest failure of the human race…bar none…
and we are stuck/trapped until we learn to stand on our own…
and take accountability and responsibility for who we are
and what we believe in…

if god asked me, believe in me and I shall save the world,
disbelieve in me, and I shall destroy it…

and I will say, fire away, destroy the world…

I have no use for you… as I strive to become human, fully human…

Kropotkin
[/quote]
Yep, we definitely disagree about this.

My guess: it’s all tangled up in dasein somehow. I unequivocally have a “use” for immorality if it is in the general vicinity of the things that I love to do now. In a context where human pain and suffering is no more.

Now all we need is a God/the God to come down out of the intellectual/spiritual clouds and give us all the existential details.
[/quote]
K: perhaps and this is quite clearly speculation, but you are older then I am… and perhaps you
have a bit more use for a god, that may or may not be offer you something that isn’t
quite as clear as it is to me…

in other words, as we age and get closer to the end, this question gains
in importance… I may have overstep my bounds and for that I apologize,
but it is a fact… and does play a role in our thinking…

Kropotkin

That’s another way of looking at it.

Also, that’s a comforting and consoling frame of mind psychologically if you can think yourself into believing it. Some can, some can’t.

Back again to dasein.

But even if you can there have been hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of others down through the ages who have succeeded in turn. Only it’s in regard to their God and their religious/spiritual path…and not yours.

A mere detail though for some.

I was referring to how you look at it, not how others look at it.