An idea is not false because the idea is old. Think of Socrates and his Method.
An idea is not impotent because the idea is old. Think of Jesus and the Gold Rule.
An idea is not true because it is hallowed by age. Ask the Victorians about colonialism.
The English Victorians did much good, but English colonialism did great evil. The novels, architecture, music of the Victorian era often is magnificent, even if most artifacts, as is true of every age, is trash. If you love Jane Eyre as much as my family, then one can feel like a Victorian, but one cannot really go back and no Christian could wish to do so. Sufficient to us is the evil of our time without adopting the evils of the past. We can sustain the good, truth, and beauty of any past age: Classical Greece, Tsarist Russia, glorious Aksum, and Han China, but we must not and cannot be citizens of that age.
If we tried, we could never review their virtues. We would not be shaped as they were shaped. Because vice is never very different we could revive from graves the justly dead wicked variations on vice, well buried, and so bring to life old evils, giving them a zombie existence. God help us they were hard enough to kill the first time!
One evil idea of the Victorian era is that there is nothing to learn from “illiterate” cultures. Social Darwinism suggested “religion” or “primitive” oral traditions were to be stamped out and had nothing of value. Polytheism gave way to monotheism which would give way to scientific atheism (in the elite), even if “Christianity” was preserved to placate the masses. The opiate the rich gave to the poor was “pie in the sky by and by.” As for now? Pie, the good life, was for the intellectual, the educated, the secularists who mouthed religious platitudes to their lessers, or colonial serfs, while they glutted on the good things. Watch HG Wells Things to Come to see how a lazy secularism assumed that white mostly men, scientists, engineers would remake the world in their image.
Naturally, white supremacy was openly promoted by atheists and adopted by “religious” people who wanted to be fit in with the smart set. All could agree that science and “faith” (mostly for the weak and woman) had been superseded.
That idea must die, having tried to commit suicide in World War I with genocide in World War II.
Against any local, temporal, regional, ethnic faith is the one holy, catholic Church. If we ever stand with only one place, at one time, in one way we are not Christian. When God is the topic, the Victorian atheist hopes to pin “God” to one place, one time, one people. The goal? Outgrow God.
This is self-referentially incoherent, but so it goes.
See this critic:
I certainly get why you’re so desperate to separate mankind from your god. Any so called ‘special-ness’ would be pointless if one accept idea Man created God rather then the other way around. It really not that hard to see how Christian created God either. If just look at the evolution of religion, you can see religion going from many weaker spirits, to many strong gods, to ultimate a single powerful entity. Single powerful divines pop up in ancient Egypt and Greece. They had no lasting power, but that true with any divinity. Gods are only as powerful people will let them be.
This is the old Victorian idea regarding the birth of religion and it is largely false. However, let us assume that this false Victorian account of the origins of Christian monotheism is true: polytheism to monotheism. If so, then this is development of an explanation about human experience with the metaphysical realm. Polytheism could be true and monotheism still be true. Early experiences with lesser spirits would give way to the speculation, philosophical development, and the discovery of God. We see something a bit like this over the course of the Sacred Scriptures as the sages and prophets begin to see the scope of the God they have encountered.
As for God only being as powerful as people will let Him be, this is absurd. If God exists, His considering us at all would be remarkable. Aristotle certainly doubted He would be bothered! God is sufficient to Himself and if there was no revelation at all, no bibles, no prophets, then I would still be a theist. He gives a ground for what I experience: consciousness, ideas, matter, motion, morals. That God also loves us and came to help us in the person of Jesus Christ is most excellent news!
However, my doubting God’s existence, my never thinking of Him, my ignoring Him, does not trouble Him as much as destroy me. Denying the ground of being is not, in the end, good for the soul.
But don’t Christians hope to become like God?
And yes, Christians, evangelical especially, ultimate hope to become like their god. Do you know how many blogs posts on this part of the site claiming God will give them control world, universe and other things..That they themselves will become administrators of God ‘new’ world. with powers that make them pretty much gods in all but name? Hell, I can understand why many of poor, desperate, and power hunger would like this faith. If one accepts God’s ‘gift’ he will give you all the control and power you are missing from this moral life, just by licking God’s shoes. Under his wing, of course, but the end it the same results.
Sadly, many confuse “becoming like” with “becoming.” My children are (God help them!) like my wife and me. They are not, thank God, my wife and me. They are and always will be themselves. God is essentially other than we are and we can never have His essential nature. We are a created being, not a Creator, so can never be as He is fully. We can reflect His glory and so become more excellent. This does make us more like He is and also more like what He made us to be. God wishes humankind to be more human. He loves our humanity so much that He created that humanity and even took on the fulness of our natures. He stands in solidarity with us in a way that we can never stand in solidarity with Him.
A mirror reflects light without ever being a source of light. So we humans might aspire to reflect the Glory of God, but we can never possess in ourselves that Glory. We do not generate, we reflect.
As a good God, our Father in Heaven will, we are promised, give us many good gifts for all eternity. This is most excellent. However, what if He did not? What if the soul were not immortal? If we see who God is as God, then we would love God and rejoice in His ample goodness now. This is sweet even if it gave us no immediate power or control in this life. This is why over history so many of the rich, comfortable, and powerful have given up all for Christ.
That all of us (and certainly me) are tempted to use the truth, goodness, and beauty to gain the world, the flesh, and the devil is also true. People often settle for a few millions when they might know Love Himself. The collection of books called the Bible reveal that Love to us. But the critic might demure:
Yes, I will keep consider the Bible just another book. It’s influence on the world can’t be deny that, but influence does not equal right or wrong. As far as I’m concern, the Bible is historical mythology mixed with a lot of legends. And before you launch into a rant about ‘fiction’ again, I myself is a fictional writer, so I know plenty about that, please note that I view myths as ‘story that are not untrue, but tales that don’t fit neatly into the historical records, which serve as the foundation of a culture.’ And there is some wisdom in the Bible. Yet there is plenty of wisdom in the Buddha’s words, that of native american’s faiths, and many other. You’re are more then welcome to favor the Bible over other sources. Yet you haven’t really done anything to prove your myths is more real then another faith.
Bad books certainly can be influential. Think of Mein Kampf! Let us assume with the critic that the Bible is “mythology mixed with a lot of legends.” A myth is not merely fiction, but as Plato defines it in his Timaeus (a work that helped create the scientific revolution!), is “a likely story.” The myth (as myth) is more like Lord of the Rings. It contains deep truths set in an ahistorical background. We do not, after all, think a parable (The Prodigal Son) or a fable (think Aesop) false because they did not literally happen. We look to the deeper truth that they mean to express.
So many confuse loving a revelation with hating everything else. If I love my wife, that does not mean I hate everyone else. What of other faiths? What of them? I assume they contain some goodness, truth, and beauty. The Christian revelation, found in the Bible, the life of the orthodox Church, and experience is beautiful. I happily invite others to that feast, that joy, that goodness. I do not have to assume anything other than this: by no merit of myself, I have seen the True Light and you can as well. If you do not agree, then we shall see.
This is the path of the lover of wisdom, the philosopher. My critic says:
And you really have a narrow definition of philosopher. A philosopher is pretty much anyone who willing to sit down and think about the world at large. They may not think it as you may want them, nor is all of them have great influence. But almost anyone can be a philosopher, even if not a great one. And as for philosopher and Jewish theology mixing, that probably one thing that we can agree on. Hell, I would argue that Christian is Hellenization of the Jewish faith, which is already a clumping together of Mediterranean, Mesopotamia, and maybe even a bit far eastern ideals. Of course, you’ll argue Christianity is own ‘unique’ faith that came up all it ideas by itself. Yet as far as history seem to note, your faith has always been absorbing and modifying ideas from day one. Of course, that just what a ‘unenlightened’ heathen as myself see. I’m sure an intelligent, faithful person yourself find a way to tramp down these charges.
I have no desire at all to deny these charges. I rejoice in them, have even written a book about them! We should all love wisdom, all aspire to philosophy, and all learn from anyone who loves wisdom. Any idea that is deeply true will not be ‘unique’ at all. . . shadows will have been seen everywhere. A sane way of life will always be absorbing and modifying experiences and ideas. I welcome the critic to join us.
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