a question of respect.

It is no good to ask somebody to ask. The pressure serves only to double the trouble of it.

Better to assume that nobody wants to suffer, no matter how odd the behaviour. Nobody wants to be in Hell or to be told to go there.

Given the right conditions people ask readily enough and if the conditions are wrong you need to know why.

Most often it is for want of the need to give, for somebody at least to know of something to give and this is not unreasonable. All relationships need to find a balance of give and take, in practical terms and in the deeper psychological sense.

We could sit here all day to sing the praises but it would still be up to the person to believe in herself and her choice of friend. There is no way for anybody else to force that as an issue.

Tell her you love her or tell her to go to Hell, the choice of which to accept is her own.

--- Ron.

 

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That's exactly what I do.

But there's the thing: I'm not trying to 'catch' out anyone or anything. Do note that I did not write the damn thing. I see what is there and comment on it, you just ignore what's there if you don't like the sound of it. That's where we differ.

Rather obvious you'd pick the ones that completely obliterate the actual statements in favour of not having to acknowledge it's existence:

"Do not think I have come to make life cozy".

Please, don't take the fucking piss.

Surely the people that have done the translating have already done that job for me? And yet here you are giving me the "cozy" version just to hopefully dissuade me from even knowing what the actual text says. I'm very dissapointed in you.

Would you concur that none of those religious or political leaders were god, or the son of?

I have never stated otherwise, indeed you've been arguing against it. He came specifically to set a man against his father yada yada.

*correction: He did not come to bring peace at all. His goal was to not bring peace... remember?

Yes it is, but it only looks stupid when you do it.

Yeah, for jesus to have bought it along instead of the sword. My point.

That is why I have absolutely no respect for the religious, and also why we're disagreeing here - and exactly why you'd rather believe he said life wouldn't be "cozy".

 

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Do you believe defense is attempting to rob those who try to rob you and attempting to harm those who try to harm you?

 

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So far, whenever I defended myself when attacked or offended, the other party thought that wrong, expected me to not defend myself.

 

Excuse me, but so what? You didn't answer Raphael's question.

 

To rephrase Raphael's question:

Was this defense or revenge or some other kind of game?

One may well wonder what is or was the need for any of this sort of argument in any case.

Of course, it is tempting to analyze others when you feel like it. Faultfinding is something humans are prone to do.

But note: To a faultfinding mind, other people's faultifinding will be twice as stressful.
Is this what you want to do to people? Hit them on their heads, just because you can?


--- Ron.

 

Then you shouldn't have the problems you're having with a single translation - or type of translation.

As most translators would tell you, there's no such thing as a pure literal translation - there's always interpretation involved. Can you back up your interpretation of the passage in question with some scholarly references? Are there translators, modern or ancient, religious or secular, that share your conclusion?

You seem to have a love/hate relationship with the translators of the Bible. When their reading suits you, you appeal to their authority; when their reading doesn't suit you, you question their expertise.

Obliterate? What do you base that conclusion on? Have the translators turned against you now? The Message and the Amplified complement each other very well, being a paraphrase and a literal-explanatory translation, and both are generally well-respected. The agreement between the two should be enough to make you think twice about your particular interpretation of the passage. Unless your next claim is going to be that there is a great conspiracy among translators to hide the truth that is plain to you?

I rest my case. You rely on one translation for being the "actual text" (since you have no knowledge of the original languages or idioms), and you shoot down another for contradicting your interpretation.

As I said before, if you really used a few translations in parallel, and informed yourself of the pros and cons of each, you wouldn't run into the problems your having. Yet you'd rather jump at the opportunity to question my motives. Is this an example of the attitude you suggest as an alternative to religious bigotry?

Is that who you believe he was? Because if he wasn't divine, why is it a problem for you that he accurately predicted division, rather than peace, would follow in his wake?

And if you accept the premise that he was divine, why don't you accept the other premises implicit in his teachings? Like the binding authority of his command to love one's father and mother (as he did himself, by example), or to love even ones enemy, or to "try hard to be reconciled to [your adversary]" - which would be binding regardless of the strong reaction he knew he would provoke against himself and his followers. This is certainly the conclusion his disciples came to: "So then, those who suffer according to God's will should commit themselves to their faithful Creator and continue to do good", "If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone" and "God has called us to live in peace."

So from your reading of the Bible and everything Jesus said, you have come to the conclusion that this was his ultimate goal? The focus of his ministry?

Or was it rather that because he came to forgive sin, people who were outraged at being judged in need of forgiveness would actually turn against him - and by extension his followers? If you're going to tell people what they need to do to have lasting peace, you are going to upset those who don't want to do it, and it would cut across even the closest of relationships. But if Jesus didn't step on any toes, he would have been part of the problem, not the solution.

Imagine yourself in a similar position for a moment: let's say your ideas for a secular society are really revolutionary, and guaranteed to restore peace on earth, would you risk upsetting the religious world against you by proclaiming them, polarizing them against everyone who share your views? Or would you stand back so that you can say to everybody you bring peace? Isn't keeping the problematic groups happy and unoffended the same as keeping them alive? Or is that where Marx got it wrong?

You haven't explained how you reconcile this extreme belief with the bulk of Jesus' teachings? If preaching something will bring fierce opposition, how does saying so make opposition the object of preaching? Shouldn't you actually take the subject into account?

I am rubber you are glue?

But that sword was the means of your salvation. The persecution that came down on Jesus from his enemies is what crucified him, and its the same force that is behind all suffering and injustice in the world. By conquering it, he paved the way for everybody who would follow after him and experience the same injustice and suffering, which brings us to the passage in question.

The passage speaks about the cost of following Jesus to the end God promised, which is lasting peace and eternal life. If the cost is too high (because our immediate life, family or possessions seem more important) then they dictate our judgement, even though we will surely lose those valued things to death and decay. But if we make God our first priority and follow Jesus, we have learnt to value those things regardless of their value to us or to the world, but according to their value to God. That is how you can manage to love your enemies, or seek reconciliation with parents or friends who have wronged you, or be comforted from unfair pain and meaningless suffering. Your motives, values, principles and peace will come from internal conviction rather than people's opinion or relative worth.

And with that this thread would seem to have come full circle. If you admit that there are circumstances under which respect will not be granted, then you have defeated your own argument: that there are priorities that justify division, especially if they are towards a more noble and lasting end than just "getting along" for the moment.

No doubt it would seem more cozy and acceptible to say you put family and friends first, while there's no cost to saying it, but if you ever have to choose between blood and morality, that luxury might be gone.

 

Don't even know what this is all about, but i've bet ten € on Snakelord.

[/cheap]

 

No, I don't believe so.

 

You don't see yourself and your own actions at all, Ron.

Anyone can wield the sword of truth. But fools chop off limbs and heads, even though what they set out to do was to break the chains.

First Jenyar made my life a living hell, and then you came in to impersonate the devil himself.
I'm sure you both had good intentions -- but they lead straight to hell.


You have nothing I want. Leave me alone.

 

But do I see at least that you refuse to see that our actions have much in common?

So it is the fool who owns the power, not the effect of truth itself?

That would indeed appear to be a very dangerous situation though strange to me, such an extreme potency of thought expressed online.

How extraordinary.

She knows what I see better that I do.

She comes here not to learn, not even to try, but to declare the verdict, which it would seem we were all supposed to accept with no further ado, nothing more wanted.

How then, one wonders, was it possible to achieve such an absolute omnipotence?

Off to Hell with us....!!!!

The Jehovah's Witnesses or the Spanish Inquisition could hardly do better than that.

Not even my approval?

That then, perhaps, is progress.

But what is this then, that I see in my inbox?

What is that for?

I'd thought it was because, as a matter of fact, I have my actions there to see while you do not.

Or are we rather involved here with yet another attempt to restore the comfortably familiar status of the victim sufferer, not as if Nejka herself was ever the prime cause of making her life a living hell?

You accused yourself of stealing; "What I have is stolen."

How did that fit with a lack of want? Do you steal just for the sake of it or does the want come and go like the weather?

You also wrote "and the reality of my situation is that I have more work to do than I think I can handle." but you recently seem to afford to spend most of your time online like this.

What is going on here?

Please be kind, bless me with your wisdom.

----- Ron.

 

So who then declares the winner?

How is it supposed to work?

With this business of self appointed judges juries and prosecutors I was rather inclined to suspect that the race was rigged from the start.

--- Ron.

 

You see, this is just the sort of thing that I do not begin to understand, why anybody would want to argue with somebody that they had no respect for in the first instance, the need to disagree but with no apparent purpose other than that.

Is it possible to explain this to such is fool as me, in terms perhaps of perceiving one's own actions?

Just how long did it take to work out that Jenyar is religious?

--- Ron.

 

Me and Snakelord go all the way back to his first post on sciforums, when water was still RosaMagika and tiassa made ten posts a day.

 

That was YOU?

I never knew that!

 

Hey, folks. The Christians I meet here vary from people you can have a sensible conversation with, but our views are not exactly mutually respected, to outright lunatics who hate me and everything I believe in and vice versa.

In real life I know a devout Anglican, a Jehovah's Witness, and my own sister remains a believing Catholic. I've never had any difficulty maintaining mutual respect, friendship and love, with any of these people.

 

Speaking of first encounters, water also knew what she was getting into when we met. At the time she was flirting with wesmorris's atheism and explaining [post=560814]how reason defiles us[/post] (perhaps in favour of infallible intuition). I argued [post=561372]for[/post] redemption and forgiveness, she argued [post=561472]against[/post] it. "I think true religious faith can exist only if one hasn't rationally decided to become religious, ie., true faith is if one cannot identify a reason why one has become religous". It's no wonder she found me intolerable. Reasons are excuses, and excuses are... inexcusible... because they make you personally responsible for consequent gains or losses, put a price on your soul, and make decisions too necessary... like a business transaction. Laying the foundations for the future.

 

So what was going on there then? Which of the two of you was short of respect?

I happen to agree with her, and with Shakespeare:

"Lovers and madmen have such seething brains, such shaping fantasies, that apprehend more than cool reason ever comprehends."
(Midsummer Night's Dream: Act 5)

That is the very Hell of it, the pain, the struggle for reason to catch up with a force beyond reason, the need to think more subtly.

We think we've got it all sussed and then along it comes again to knock us on the back of the head, and just when we least expect it.

Are you totally immune to this?

Seriously?

--- Ron.

 

If disagreement was per se a sign of disrespect, respect would be a very shallow and convenient thing.

And I don't disagree with that. Reason has its place - it's a powerful tool but limited to its uses. Lovers and madmen may apprehend more, but would we have them make decisions that require the tool of reason? I think passion and intuition can be abused and misapplied just as easily as reason, and we lose any benefit we might have gained from it. If reason can defile us, why not passion, and would it not require an equal amount of forgiveness and reconciliation?

My question would be whether what Shakespeare said, and the respect we have for passion and intuition is itself reasonable or unreasonable. Is it an unjustified, unmeditated exclamation of our feelings, prone to change as such feelings are, or will we really put some faith into it as a premise, filtering it through every recess of our minds, couple it with reason, and put it to practical, consistent action?

To be immune to that would be close to being dead. "The man who thinks he knows something does not yet know as he ought to know" about sums it up for me.

I see reason as a kind of dam, complete with walls, channels and sluices where necessary. By itself it is quite empty and useless, and though we fill it with information - water - that information comes from a number of sources. We might be tempted to think that the particular river we're connected to is the only authorized and trustworthy inlet, because that's what we count on and understand from day to day. But to discount the rain would be just short-sighted. Though it comes expected and unexpected, in storms or in drizzles, timely and untimely, to rely on rain is not unreasonable, even though reason has no hold on it.

 

That should be said more often.

Did you ever actually fall in love?

Fail to accept it as a premise and what happens then, with no practical consistent action?

I think I get what you mean, but I'd call that a midden or a latrine, not a dam.

Reason defiles because it accumlates like scum, like bones in the graveyard, and then it eventually rots away with the rest of us.

Passion burns like fire, destructive and refreshing.

--- Ron.