If theism stands and falls with theists ...

I'm half-convinced that you and Wynn are the same person, because you both have now asked a version of this poorly-phrased question. First of all, while many people believe in luck, "Lady Luck" is just a figure of speech. People who wear lucky socks or underwear aren't doing it to appease a god, they're doing it out of some vague superstition that repetitive action might bring about the same result.

The "real" goddess of fortune was, as one might expect, Fortuna. And she was among the pantheon of Roman gods. So yes, if someone literally worshipped Fortuna, the goddess of fortune, they would be a theist.

Is the concept of theism really this difficult to you? Did you really never put it together that polytheists are theists as well? I find it hard to believe that you really believed that monotheists were the only kind of theist.

 

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There are many things you find hard to believe ...

:shrug:

 

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JDawg,

There's nothing ''poor'' about the phrasing of the question, it is both clear, and to the point.

For future reference.
You say most people ''believe in luck, yet who goes declaring ''I believe in luck''? The point is that belief is actual through action, not declaration.

And what IS that ''vague superstition''?

Poopycock!
Anything Greek or Roman has it's roots in Eygpt, and Eygpt, from Babylon, and Bablyon, vedic. Everything is from the vedas. Period.

Because of your ignorance, you're only prepared to go as far back as Roman time, which in relation antiquity, was a very short time ago.
Go and do some reading if you are serious about gaining more information on the subject.

Polythiests, although believe in different gods, for different things, still believe in God. This is evident in Hinduism.

There are no ''kinds of theists'', just ''theist''. Either you believe in God or you don't. Get over it.

The current consensus is that there are different kinds of ''theism'', poytheism being one or various kinds. So even from that perspective, your meager analasys needs revision, and thought.

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jan.

 

People talk about "Lady Luck" all the time. For example, "Lady Luck is smiling on me today!" It's just an expression, not a profession of faith. Nobody really believes that there is a being that decides who is lucky and who isn't. Some might believe in luck as a concept in the same way they might believe in karma, but in neither case do they ascribe a god or goddess to their belief.

But okay, supposing they did. Suppose someone believed in Lady Luck as an actual goddess. Then yes, they would be a theist.

I explained it in the post you're quoting.

You have absolutely no idea what you're talking about, as usual. There are some elements of Egyptian mythology (mainly the iconography), but that is far from the only source. And none of this indicates "roots", just as Christianity's appropriation of local pagan elements does not mean then that Christianity has its roots in paganism. Its actual roots are from Judaism, it just also borrows from pagan practices.

And not everything is from the vedas. You don't even know what's in the vedas, so you're in no position to say one way or the other.

This from the person who just said "everything's in the vedas. period."?

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At any rate, you're just trying to distract from the point, which was that nobody actually worships Lady Luck.

Wrong again. Yahweh is the god of the Jewish faith, not Hinduism.

Polytheists and Monotheists are two kinds of theists.

That's true. But those who believe in God are either Jewish, Christian, or Muslim. Those who don't are everybody else.

You are making a false distinction between kinds of theists and kinds of theism. If one is a polytheist, then one is a different kind of theist than a monotheist, just as polytheism is a different kind of theism than monotheism.

If you put as much effort into your argument as you put into your sarcasm and emoticon selection, maybe you'd have more to offer to the conversation?

:shrug:

 

JDawg,

No they don't.
Unless they are gamblers.

Belief doesn't work like that. It manifests itself through action.
While they may proffess to not to believe, belief is actual in their actions, whether they realise it or not.

You don't have to ascribe to a god or goddess necessarily, one merely acts with conviction. Testimony of believe isn't worth much, because anybody can say anything in order to be percieved how they would like. The real communication comes in the form of habits, the oneness that unifies everything about the person. Testimony can be trusted once we see how the person acts. Well, that's my opinion anyways.

What would be the difference?

That's not an explanation.
Don't worry, I'll take it that you have no explanation.

I'm not talking about the ''mythology'', just the structure of society in general.
The so-called ''first world'' is cleary influenced by the babylon, egypt, greece, and rome.

The institute of christianity is paganism, hence the pagan holidays, rituals, and customs.

Why do you say that I don't know what's in the vedas?

The vedas is the road map of life in the material world (sanatan-dharma).
Save a few pointless details (pointless as in makes no difference to our life), the vedas (comprising of vedic literature) contain every we need to know.

I beg to differ.
We pay homage to people or things by making sacrifices, we may sing about them, have pictures of them, do little rituals that solidify our devotion to them. There are a whole host of actions we perform that add up to some kind of respect, or reverence, or even worship. Again, it's a complex issue.

If Yahweh is the origin of everything, then He is God.
His name may represent the aspect of God that the jews relate to, and His name may be different in other cultures and times. But He is God.

Because they both believe in God.
If they don't believe in God, they are atheist. Get over it.

From their perspective, I agree. That is the absurdity of religion.


jan.

 

but in the same token..beware of dismissing everything they have to say just because they get some things wrong..

just because a person is not perfect does not mean they are worthless...

 

That's factually inaccurate. If you're going to be dishonest about this, then there's no point continuing.

No. You don't get to redefine "belief" to suit your purposes, Wynn Jr. Actions are not belief, belief is belief. I can go to church with my wife, drink the wine and eat the cracker, but that doesn't make me a Christian.

And your opinion is wrong, unsurprisingly. And I'm not even talking about testimony. I'm talking about actual belief, and people who put on lucky underwear aren't doing so because they think there's some actual goddess of luck watching over them.

Acts mean nothing by themselves. I can do everything a Muslim does, but if I don't believe in Allah, then I'm not a Muslim. But even if you wanted to say that my actions make me a Muslim, you still couldn't say I believe in Allah just because I do things that a Muslim does.

The belief that a goddess called Lady Luck determines their fate.

I already gave you the explanation. It's the superstitious belief that recreating the circumstances (or wearing the same clothes, eating the same foods, etc.) at the time of one's good fortune will increase the chances of having more good fortune.

That's not so hard to follow, Jan.

That's not what you said, Jan. Clearly you have no working knowledge of Ancient Greece.

You assume a hierarchy, as if Babylon "birthed" Egypt, then Egypt begat Greece, and so on, but this isn't true. Rome obviously has a lot to thank the Greeks for, but to say that the Greek "comes from" the Vedic period is simply untrue. It has a history of its own.

And again, you know nothing about Vedism, or the Vedic texts, so what are you going on about?

Incorrect. It has adopted some pagan rituals and holidays, but it is essentially a forgery of Judaism.

You've never demonstrated any working knowledge of it. All of your relevant comments have been vague, and you ignore requests to focus those comments. This wouldn't be the case if you really knew what you were talking about.

More vagueness.

We're not talking about revering people, we're talking about theism. And theism at the very least requires a belief in a god. People can worship or idolize a president or a rock star, but unless they think that person is a god, it isn't theism.

No, he is the God of Abraham. Other cultures have different gods, and not all of them posit a creator of everything, let alone just one. You have all of your work ahead of you if you want to claim that the Abrahamic God is just one culture's representation of a historical being.

No, they don't both believe in God. Polytheists believe in gods. Monotheists believe in a god. Jews, Christians, and Muslims believe in the fictional character "God", known as "Allah" in the Islamic faith.

You don't understand, obviously.

 

JDawg,

Ready to pull the trigger so quickly?
Show me the evidence.

I didn't say actions were belief, pay attention.
I said actual belief of something is evidenct through ones actions.

The act of going to church and tucking in, doesn't make one a christian.

Well, they think something is there which is why they act in that way. They refer to ''luck'' as one would refer to any other diety, albeit ignorantly, so they the have the religious conviction (belief through action).

You can't do everything a muslim does, because you're not muslim. Other muslims will know almost immediately (if not immediately) that you are not a muslim.

See above.

How would YOU determine whether or not I believe in Lady Luck?

So you're saying that ''repitition'' is the factor that makes someone act in this way? Why would they think that this is the case, instead of a supernatural reason?

Well, let's see how you respond to my points.

I'm not a scholar in the subject, but I do have some working knowledge of Ancient Greece. In fact I have no choice, it was taught to me at school, along with ancient rome. We weren't taught about any other culture, history, peoples, spirituality, other than those two. Evidence again of it's influence.
Everywhere I go I see greek and roman style structures. The films on the telly which depicted ''other cultures'' were predominantly greek and roman.

The Christian religion is basically the religion of rome.
The freemason movement dates back to egypt with heavy babylonian influence (mystery schools).


The other day I watched a documentary where someone managed to sneak into the annual meeting of the worlds most powerful leaders, at Bohemien Grove, where he witnessed (camara) these people worshiping a gigantic owl diety. Again, a babylonian diety.

We have the ''Olympics'' starting up soon, another greek concept. The idea of stadium performances to masses of people is something that we have not seen in other ancient cultures.

So one doesn't have to be a scholar to get a load of how we influenced by these ancient cultures.

I assume a thread, kept alive through ancient bloodlines, and secret societies.

The early devout followers of Christ, ie, his most trusted deciples, including Christ himself, were more vedic than jewish, or babylonian. At the time of Christ, the original religion of Abraham, Moses, and the like, was finished, which is why Christ was there in first place. The Christian institute we see today, has nothing to do with following Christ

Most of my posts here, are done through vedic spectacles, at least what I understand of it (it is absolutely vast). When I talk about God, or the principles of religion, it is through a vedic looking glass. Even my name Jan Ardena, is from the vedic literature.

I tend to to discuss God in the bible, only because that's what most regard as God, or religion. But I have spoken regularly with wynn, and to some degree, Lg, about stuff from the vedic perspective. The notion of evolution, namely macro evolution, is undoubtedly a vedic concept, as is mathmatics, all the sciences, art, philosophy, politics, technology, religion, etc.

Essentially, there is nothing new, it goes round and round, each time becoming a little more gross and unintelligent.

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I've said to you in the past. If you want a scholarly account of vedic culture, then google it, or discuss it with wynn, or, Lg. But make the effort. I'm not going to waste my time wading through the vast amount of literature to show you a point, only for you to make an idiotic remark like, there's no evidence that God exists.

People do worship other people, and they do refer to them as a god (michael jackson, jimmy hendrix, john lennon, sai baba,johnny depp, alister crowley....),
but it's not theism mate. Sorry!

It's clear that you're attempting to belittle belief in God by equating it to belief in anything. You're basically showing that you have absolutely no respect for anything of that nature.

IOW, you're very transparent.

''God of Abraham'' is so called because He appeared to Abraham who ushered a new age of religion based on worship of God. A new linage, so to speak. So Abraham must have been an advanced soul, ready to undertake such a task.
Other than that, it's God.

That doesn't even make sense.
If God (regardless of scripture) is the origin of everything, and different cultures worship, or respect the idea the there is a one God from whom everything is coming, then they're speaking of the same personality/force/whatever, despite different names. Get over it.

So you're saying that although a hindu may worship Ganesha in return for a successful buisness, he does not believe in Vishnu (God)?

I understand very well, thank you very much.
Obviously, you don't.

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jan.

 

Just to set the record straight, and as a matter I find most interesting: what really happened, how did this all get so wrapped around the axle (the beliefs about beliefs, etc.); I thought I'd recommend you check out this list of ancient texts. It's really mind boggling to think of religion in this perspective. Anyone who would undertake to study all of these would make an excellent referee to most of these threads.

Here's the list.

And I really like the first one, because it almost predicts the rise of religion, from the idea of some revered archetype who instructs people on right living. In this case it's perfectly secular in the sense that a man is setting down some pretty good suggestion about how to behave - so it could be argued that even before the principle of a deity arose, it was simply wise people writing down common sense ideas of getting along in society.

This first of these oldest-known texts is The Instructions of Shuruppak

And the second is The Keš temple hymn which has a barely religious flavor.

If in fact these are the first texts ever conceived by humans concerning religion, it would almost seem that our roots are quite mellow. There's nothing at all strident about their view of the world. I also like that the first cite ever recorded is this:

Generous and polite, and giving credit where due, if in fact there was such a person who labored over the inscription. I guess the other point of view is that Nisaba made all of this up and gives herself a pat on the back. Either way, it reflects something positive about that ancient culture.

 

Is this a reply to me, or a new topic? :shrug:

jan.

 

Evidence? I'm talking from personal experience here. I know for a fact that I've invoked Lady Luck's name plenty of times, and have heard it said more times than I can count.

Another lie. This is what you said: "While they may proffess to not to believe, belief is actual in their actions, whether they realise it or not." So even if they don't believe, their actions make them believers, even if they don't know it.

This is your last warning. The next lie you tell in the course of this discussion will end it and land you on my ignore list. Since I'm one of the very few who actually bothers to engage you on your loony ideas, I would take this condition very seriously.

Exactly. But no act makes one a Christian without a belief in Christ. That's the point.

There's no deity, is the point. People who are what is common called "superstitious" have no conception of an actual deity to which they make the propitiation of wearing dirty laundry for a week, or following a particular routine. They may ascribe it to a sort of karma, or "the universe," but there is no deity. Unless, as I say, they do believe that some kind of deity controls their luck. In which case, they're theists.

You're right, but not in the way you think. The only action I could not perform is believing in Allah. I could, however, do everything else.

No they wouldn't. If I was doing all of the things a Muslim does for their faith, then there would be no way to know that I wasn't. Just as there's no way to tell the secretly atheist priests still performing mass because they're afraid to admit to anyone (except a questioner during an anonymous study) that they don't have faith. Hell, even Mother Theresa lost her faith, and for 50 years no one was the wiser.

What a silly thing for you to say.

Right back atcha.

I could only go by what you say. Even if you were a dirty underwear-wearing, step-counting, salt-over-the-shoulder superstitious freak, I'd have no reason to disbelieve you if you said you were doing it for another reason.

The reason would be supernatural. But supernatural reasons do not necessitate a deity.

Pretty well, I think. I ended up 19th on the all-time Jan-Smashing leaderboard for this session, so...

You're knocking down straw men again, Jan. Nobody questioned the fact that ancient cultures influence modern ones. The whole concept of Western civilization is basically an invention from Ancient Greece. I was merely debunking your assertion that "everything came from the vedas. period."

More piffle. Do you even know what you mean by that? Which ancient bloodlines, exactly? Which secret societies?

In what ways, specifically?

It wasn't finished. He didn't replace old law, he reinforced it. You'd think that if you wanted to have a debate about this stuff, you'd at least know it. Is that really too much to ask?

Well, that's probably the most accurate thing you've said in this entire thread.

Then why have you shown yourself to be so fundamentally lacking in understanding of it? All you've made are broad, vague pronouncements like "They are more vedic than Jewish," or "Vedas is the roadmap for life." You've offered nothing of substance, and nothing that couldn't have been said by someone who knew nothing of the topic.

I've never read LG's thoughts on it, but I know from experience that Wynn's knowledge of the vedas are about as broad as a hair follicle.

That's nonsense. It's every bit as nonsensical as the concept of evolution in the Bible, or fulfilled prophecy in the Bible. It simply is not true. Like Christian evangelicals (and believers in Nostradamus), Hindus have attempted to retrofit modern science into their ancient texts, and in the process have claimed that science stems from the "ultimate truth" of the vedas. It's bunk, and the fact that you regurgitate it here means that the scope of your understanding of the vedic texts is limited to what Wynn and LG sold you.

Essentially, bollocks.

Translation: "I'm talking out of my ass, but Wynn and LG told me that it was all true, so take it up with them."

Again, nobody really thinks Jimi Hendrix is a god. Nobody. That's not how they mean it. But supposing they did, then yes, it absolutely would be theism.

theism

1. the belief in one God as the creator and ruler of the universe, without rejection of revelation ( distinguished from deism).

2. belief in the existence of a god or gods ( opposed to atheism).​

That is the definition of theism. There are no more qualifiers than that. So if someone believes that Jimi Hendrix is in fact a literal god, then they are a theist. And no, you cannot change the definition of the word just because it blows your silly argument out of the water.

Straw man. I equated nothing. I simply defined theism for you, which is the belief in a god or gods. This says nothing of your experience as a theist, or what kind of impact belief has had on your life, or what it means or should mean to you to be a theist. I'm simply stating a fact.

Well, I don't have any respect for religious faith. But that has nothing to do with this. You can't simply redefine a term because you don't like that it applies to more gods than your own. No, belief in Yahweh is not special, and you don't get to pretend otherwise. Well, you can, but if you try to say so here, you'll get checked on it.

Good. I wasn't trying to be opaque.

No, he is called the "God of Abraham" because all of the religions which profess faith in it descend from Abraham. No faiths beyond those believe in Yahweh, and if you assert otherwise, you need to give evidence of the claim. Otherwise you're just talking out of your ass again.

Are you really having this much trouble with this concept, or is this an act? It's hard to tell sometimes.

First of all, there is no evidence to support the idea that all of the cultures in the world are describing a shared experience with the same being. None. Zero. Secondly, if you wanted to say that there was a non-denominational deity that created the universe, you need to both provide some evidence to support that claim, and then provide evidence to show that the cultures of the world are all describing a shared experience with the same being.

Because--and I'm not sure if I mentioned this already--there is no evidence to support such a claim. Get over it.

Vishnu is not Yahweh, and is therefore not the "God" character from the Judeo-Christian mythology. You are under the misapprehension that Vishnu and Yahweh are the same deity, but they are not.

Clearly you don't.