tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3734257202887710232024-03-13T09:17:54.399-05:00Church DisciplineThis is a blog for people interested in church discipline with a focus on the mechanics and the practical impact, not the theology. It is to serve the community of people who are subject to church discipline or recovering from it, so the discussions here view discipline from a member's not from a pastor's perspective. Comments from pastors, people who themselves have been involved in any capacity, have information about it, or just would like to discuss discipline are all very welcome.CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.comBlogger238125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-81310131226934024872014-04-10T13:52:00.003-05:002014-04-10T14:01:27.623-05:00Nasty MacPorts bug (sudo not working right)If you are regular reader of this blog, this post is on a different topic just skip it. <br />
<br />
I'm posting this here because this was a hard to find MacPorts bug that comes with the latest version of dbus. dbus is a KDE utility that's a dependency for lots of packages.<br />
<br />
dbus creates a user called "Message Bus" whose shortname is "root". Which of course trashes sudo, su and creates all sorts of other problems. To tell if you have been hit by this you can either you will get password errors with sudo and su. <br />
<br />
To see if you have this problem do a<br />
<b>dscl . -read /Users/root</b><br />
<br />
If you just get an error you are fine. If you got hit with the bug you should see something like this:<br />
<br />
<code>dsAttrTypeNative:_writers_passwd: root<br />
AppleMetaNodeLocation: /Local/Default<br />
AuthenticationAuthority: <i>deleted</i></code><br />
<code>GeneratedUID: <i>deleted</i><br />
NFSHomeDirectory: /var/empty<br />
Password: ********<br />
PasswordPolicyOptions:<br />
<br />
<br />
<plist version="1.0"></plist><br />
<dict></dict><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><key>failedLoginCount</key><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><integer>0</integer><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><key>failedLoginTimestamp</key><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><date>2001-01-01T00:00:00Z</date><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><key>lastLoginTimestamp</key><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><date>2001-01-01T00:00:00Z</date><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><key>passwordLastSetTime</key><br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><date>2014-04-10T17:54:50Z</date><br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
PrimaryGroupID: 80<br />
RealName:<br />
Message Bus<br />
RecordName: root<br />
RecordType: dsRecTypeStandard:Users<br />
UniqueID: <b>507</b><br />
UserShell: /usr/bin/false</code><br />
<code><br /></code>
<br />
Notice the 507, that needs to be 0. OK now to fix this bug:<br />
<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>Open Users & Groups preferences, click Login Options, then click the lock icon to unlock it. If necessary, type your password, then click Unlock.</li>
<li>In the Network Account Server section, click Join or Edit.</li>
<li>Click Open Directory Utility.</li>
<li>Click the lock icon to unlock it, then enter your administrator name and password.</li>
<li>Change Viewing to Users and look for "Message Bus"</li>
<li>If you have more than one delete the one currently set to root</li>
<li>If you have only one change the RecordName from "root" to "messagebus" </li>
</ol>
<br />
<br />
<div>
And now open another shell sudo and su should be working fine. I'm going to go report this bug into MacPorts but for I couldn't find anything when I Googled so I'm posting this because it was nasty. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-69178730384819161322013-10-25T12:53:00.000-05:002013-10-25T12:53:20.457-05:00historical revisionism -- how churches handle changing doctrine<blockquote>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://www.change-management.com/tutorials/employ1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://www.change-management.com/tutorials/employ1.jpg" width="288" /></a></div>
</blockquote>
Imagine 150 years, if the world in it’s “enlightened” state in 2163 universally accepts that gay marriage is the right and proper rule, there is simply no controversy at all. Let's pretend it is 2163 and that the faiths handle their historical problems the way they do today.<br />
<br />
<b> Protestants -- True Christianity defense</b> It is blatantly obvious to all that the bible perspicuously teaches that homosexual marriage is godly. It is a pity that in 2013 man's fallen state and sin led them to misread the bible and be opposed to homosexual marriage; worse yet that they tried to justify their sin on what they claimed were biblical grounds. It is wonderful gift of the grace of God that we have been given scriptures to correct such sinful doctrines, which just proves ecclesia semper reformanda. <br />
<br />
<b>Catholics -- Development of doctrine</b> The magisterium of Christ's church has always taught that homosexual marriage is a godly sacrament and a Christian duty. There were debates in the 20th and 21st century on this topic, bishops on the other side of the issue. It may even have been the case they were the majority, but God infallibly guides his holy church. His Eminence's 2158 encyclical has made homosexual marriage a matter of personal conscience so as not to cause schism with those remaining traditionalists. Bishops from all over the world are currently compiling historical information about their diocese's historical pronouncements on the issue. After these are compiled national cardinals will gather the bishops into conferences to create a consolidated national report. These reports will be sent to the vatican for further study.... <i> and finally in the 2318 encyclical attitudes towards homosexual marriage are no longer a matter of personal conscience </i><br />
<br />
<b>Fundamentalists (a) -- historical denial</b> True Christians never believed homosexual marriage is ungodly, they can read the bible as clearly as I can. Teachings like this are spread by ungodly secularists to discredit the Christian faith.<br />
<br />
<b> Fundamentalist (b) -- holding fast</b> Homosexual marriage is sinful and a denial of God's intent for marriage as expressed in Genesis. Anyone can clearly see that by reading scripture, the convoluted interpretations that are popular today are nothing more than justifications for sin. <br />
<br />
<b>Liberal Protestant -- Progressive revelation </b> Our churches were leaders on the move towards homosexual marriage and this is something we are justifiable proud of. While scripture itself is murky the direction of scripture is perspicuous and along with the Holy Spirit has led our church to help rectify many past wrongs. <br />
<br />
<b>Jews -- restricted understanding </b> It is important not to confuse a marriage between homosexuals and "Homosexual marriage". Homosexual marriage is still banned as sinful. However, a proper understanding of Rabbinic law on the issue has led towards us assembling the 23 criteria that were present in homosexual marriages in the 21st century. Modern marriages between homosexuals do not fulfill criteria 5 and 16. For example #5 marriage at that time was a state contract recognized between states while today it is international and state recognition is automatic; since no act of recognition takes place no marriage in the 21st century sense is taking place today between homosexuals. <br />
<br />
<b> LDS (a) -- implicit denial </b> The church simply revises manuals dealing with marital doctrine to fully embrace homosexual marriage with quotes from the bible and the Book of Mormon. Mormons who jack into the information matrix can get brain dumps from anti-Mormon sites and see a full history of revisions to this doctrine, which somehow is supposed to be a justification for Protestantism. Mormon apologists argue that the church's stand on prop 8, even though it was directly funded by the church was never official doctrine.CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-45283782286742201552013-08-13T19:37:00.004-06:002013-10-29T15:07:56.179-05:00Did Jesus found the Catholic Church?<a href="http://www.marypages.com/LastSupperKl.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://www.marypages.com/LastSupperKl.jpg" /></a>One of the regularly reoccurring topics in apologetic debate is the idea that Jesus founded an earthly church that is contiguous with today's Roman Catholic Church. The historical evidence we have almost completely contradicts any possibility of this theory being true and it worth assembling a short list of samples that demonstrates this. In general it is important to understand the arguments below are evidence. Each in isolation does not absolutely disprove the possibility of Jesus having established a material church in Palestine which became today's Roman Catholic Church. But each does make it unlikely and since they are often quite independent of one another in the aggregate they do make it at the very least statistically impossible.
<br />
<br />
<b>Bible:</b><br />
<br />
The first piece of evidence is the bible itself. Starting with the synoptic gospels. In Catholic lore Mark was a secretary for Peter, the first Bishop of Rome. Matthew was an apostle who composed his gospel independently. Luke was a late companion of Paul who wrote Luke/Acts shortly before Paul's death independently of either Mark or Matthew. As soon as literary analysis was performed it was concluded that there was clear dependency. Luke and Matthew were dependent on Mark and some other not independently existing source text. Mark itself uses literary forms not common in Catholic writing but very common in Jewish and Gnostic writings, moreover forms totally unlike those found in the Petrine corpus which makes the Petrine Catholic authorship unlikely.
If the Catholic church wrote the synoptic corpus then how come they don't know how these books were authored? <br />
<br />
Similarly, Catholic theology was that an apostle of Jesus named John wrote the Gospel of John, internally literally analysis indicates that Canonical John is a heavy redaction of a smaller work whose order has been scrambled. Which demonstrates that the Catholic church is either ignorant of the origins of the gospels, dishonest about the origins of the gospels or both. If they are ignorant than as an institution they didn't write them. If dishonest then what are they covering up?<br />
<br />
1st and 2nd Corinthians demonstrate this sort of redacted structure indicating multiple authors. Colossians has a decided non-Catholic theology of Jesus as the greatest among the aions. There is some literary dependence between Colossians and Ephesians. The internal structure of Romans is a morass of layers between groups with different theologies. The pastoral epistles have language bearing almost no resemblance to the rest of the Pauline corpus. On the other hand they bear striking resemblance to later Catholic works. Indicating they likely were written after the primary Pauline corpus was regularly used. Incidentally the Catholic Church used to attribute Hebrews which has both entirely different literary structure and theology to Paul.
Under Catholic theology all of these books were written by the same 1st century Apostle who was influential in the church from early on. If the Catholic Church wrote these books how come they don't know how they were authored?<br />
<br />
Let's move beyond the bible's structure to the core theological debates. During the writing of the bible we see the Paul character as well as other epistles like Hebrews and John making an appeal to scripture to justify their theological point. They see their opponents as peers. These authors seem completely unaware they are living in an monarchical episcopate run by Peter in Rome. How could they be unaware of this? How could later church writers like Justin Martyr be similarly unaware in their arguments?<br />
<br />
<b>Biblical History:</b><br />
<br />
Then let's move to the bible's history. Peter is the central figure in 1st century Roman Catholic theology, the first Bishop of Rome. In Catholic history Bishop Serapion of Antioch has a congregation in Rhossus which is using the Gospel of Peter. Other churches in the area believe Gospel of Peter is Marcionic and complain. Serapion contacts a Rhossus Docetic church to get a timeline, believing they predate Marcion. Evidently the Catholics and the docetic church are on friendly terms even though Serapion is not docetic. He gets from the entire Petrine corpus and kicks it up the chain of command. How could the Catholic church not have had the Petrine corpus until almost the 3rd century if it were founded by Peter? Why would the status of Peter's writings not be known? Why does Bishop Serapion need to go to docetic Christians to get the history of Catholic church's founders?<br />
<br />
Non-Catholics claim that Marcion invented the concept of a New Testament and brought the Pauline corpus to the attention of the wider Christian community including Catholics. The early church fathers are ignorant of Paul. Clement (1Clement 47:1) seems to believe there is only a single epistle a form of 1Corinthians. Ignatius (Ephesians 12:2) believed that Paul was exclusively associated with Ephesus. Polycarp (Philippians 3:2) has Paul writing to them. How is that level of ignorance possible for early Catholics if Paul is a central founder of Catholicism? Given that the earliest commentaries we have are from Basilides and Hereacleon isn't it more likely that Paul and early Paulism has no association with Catholicism at all during his life? That the Catholic story of his central role is pure fabrication?<br />
<br />
<b>Non-Catholic Christianity Record:</b><br />
<br />
Then there is the evidence from the Gnostics, both Jewish and Christian. With the recent archeology men like John Turner and Birger Pearson have been able to reconstruct timelines for Gnostic sects and regions. And they have shown quite decisively that Christian Gnosticism developed from Jewish Gnosticism not Catholic Christianity. If Catholicism was around during the early 2nd century why doesn't it know how Christian Gnosticism developed? Why did it present over and over a theory of an origin from Catholicism?<br />
<br />
In addition to documents we have archeological evidence. <br />
<br />
<b>Ignorance of Judaism:</b><br />
<br />
Finally, there is the issue of the breathtaking ignorance of Judaism one finds in Catholic literature. The Catholic theory is that the Catholic church emerged directly from Judaism. Yet early Catholic writers makes statements about Judaism which are simply so far from realities of first or second century Judaism that they must have emerged from groups who had no or little contact with the Jewish religion. A perfect example being the role of "priest" in Catholicism and the apologetic for it based on "priests" in Judaism. In the Judaism of the 1st century priests were primarily involved in the sacrificial cult, it was not a governing office, outside Jerusalem, nor was it a teaching office a role primarily occupied by the Pharisees. Catholic Priests, while certainly performing ritual, are also responsible for teaching and governing, the three are united. Far from embracing the Jewish priestly system typologically, this is an outright rejection of it. Which would be fine were it not for the fact that the Catholic authors are ignorant of the Jewish system, a system which at least for the Ignatius letters was still in effect during his life. This sort of ignorance couldn't have happened if Catholicism had emerged directly from Judaism. Christian Gnosticism, as an aside, might quite often despise Judaism and the Jewish God but it shows extensive knowledge of the religion. The difference between an x-wife and someone pretending to know a man she's never met.<br />
<br />
<b>Conclusion:</b><br />
<br />
Almost every piece of evidence we have is consistent with Christianity having emerged organically from 1st century Judaism primarily Jewish Gnosticism and later developing towards Logos Christianity and Encratite forms of Christianity. If Jesus founded the Catholic church why is it the case that almost all the evidence we have is supports Catholicism having evolved came from these sects and contradicts Catholicism originating from a foundation in the Palestine of the 30s?CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com17tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-68237629973520098552012-11-08T13:40:00.002-05:002012-11-08T13:40:34.940-05:00Lifeboat, what is this supposed to teach?<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cnfyRjxAoxY/UJv8bt_OnlI/AAAAAAAAAc8/hnSMfu_m4c4/s1600/75Trouble_in_theLifeboat_736x450_opt6ADV.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="195" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cnfyRjxAoxY/UJv8bt_OnlI/AAAAAAAAAc8/hnSMfu_m4c4/s320/75Trouble_in_theLifeboat_736x450_opt6ADV.jpg" width="320" /></a>So I ran into a reference to an exercise that's taught in schools called "lifeboat". I'm rather unclear what this is supposed to teach. I believe the idea is to explicate how values lead to morals, but if someone has used this exercise and would like to weigh in I'd love to hear. <br />
<br />
The exercise is below<br />
<br />
______<br />
<!--StartFragment-->
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Values
Clarification Exercise<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The Queen Elizabeth III, a major
ocean liner, left the coast of England two days ago. The ship is on its way to New York. There is an international passenger list and
the majority of the people have just entered the dining room for lunch. All of a sudden there is a major explosion in
the engine room. Life boats are released
and the passengers start to board them.
The ship is slowly sinking and there remains only one more
lifeboat. It holds six people, but there
are ten people on deck. Here is the list
of ten people:<br />
<br />
<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>1.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>African-American activist, second-year medical student<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>2.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Rabbi, 54 years old<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>3.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Swedish bio-chemist<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>4.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Hollywood actress-singer-dancer<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>5.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Arab diplomat<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>6.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Japanese accountant, 31 years old<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>7.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>his wife, six months pregnant<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>8.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Brazilian athlete-all sports<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>9.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>Hispanic poet, 42 years old<br />
<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span>10.<span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span> CIA agent with interpreting skills<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The task for your group is to decide
which six people will board the last lifeboat and which four will down with the
queen Elizabeth III. You will have ten
minutes to decide. Which four will you
eliminate? Why?<o:p></o:p><br />
<br /></div>
<!--EndFragment-->CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-54952832382744507832012-09-14T13:36:00.000-05:002013-03-14T13:08:31.777-05:00Sects to Evangelicals<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lnxNQwqfLy4/UFN4IvBA9HI/AAAAAAAAAco/vqxp0A7Lz2g/s1600/ChristianOrigins-20120913.jpeg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lnxNQwqfLy4/UFN4IvBA9HI/AAAAAAAAAco/vqxp0A7Lz2g/s640/ChristianOrigins-20120913.jpeg" width="544" /></a></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<br />
This is my 3rd versions in the sects series. This image is large and may not be laying out clearly on your browser. This link is to a vector graphics version <b><a href="https://9038a0a0-a-62cb3a1a-s-sites.googlegroups.com/site/churchdiscipline/files/ChristianOrigins-20120913.svg">link</a></b> to download or view isolated. I had originally put this image together up to about the year 1000 for a debate on Christian origins. I got inspired to expand when I had to discuss origins of the Reformation and ideas from it. I think this is a useful reference post, and also might lead to some good discussion. Something like the above is likely what happened. <br />
<br />
At this point the chart covers the origins of the those sects that were fundamental to the development of American Christianity, going all the way back. Arrows are for <i>strong influence</i> or descent, these sects are interacting with one another and passing ideas between them just as religions today do. Coloring of the arrows is to help reduce visual complexity, and it doesn't mean anything beyond that. Where possible I've tried to include a sample work in parenthesis for each sect making it clear how I'm using the term and also demonstrating at a glance the evolution in thought. It is also for the early part, letting the chart do double duty explicating the origins of the bible.<br />
<br />
In terms of the colors of the circles:<br />
<br />
<b>Salmon </b>is for groups that are Jewish sects. They may have Christian aspects but they are not yet meaningfully Christian, they are most senses fundamentally Jewish or Samaritan.<br />
<b>Light Blue</b> are proto-Christianities. <br />
<b>Yellow</b> are full blown alternate Christianities, from ancient times. "Gnosticism" used in the religious sense.<br />
<b>Purple</b> is for groups that I can meaningfully call Catholic, western or eastern rite.<br />
<b>Pink</b> groups that broke away Catholicism. Sects that I would agree are "schismatic".<br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: bold;">Dark Olive Green </b>non-Christian religions.</span></b><br />
<b>Yellow-Green</b> is for non-Christian groups with strong Christian influence.<br />
<b>Muddy Pink</b> I'm using for Hermetic Christianity. <br />
<b>Dark-Brown</b> for proto-Protestantism<br />
<b>Red-Brown</b> for Protestantism<br />
<b>Magenta</b> for the non-creedal sects of the Radical Reformation and their descendants <br />
___<br />
<br />
In terms of the history it presents the following structure of development:<br />
<br />
<b>Hellenistic Judaism:</b> When Alexander invades Judea, Judaism starts to fragment. When the Maccabees come to power they institute religious persecution and send fringe jewish movements all over the Roman Empire. After the Romans gain control these fringe movements roll back into Palestine.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Gnostic Judaism:</b> As (from Jewish perspectives) the promises of Yahweh in terms of national salvation failed to be fulfilled many of these fringe movements begin to spiritualize or eschatologize these promises and begin experimenting with different ways of conceptualizing the Jewish scriptures. We can call this Their are aspect of what will later become Christianity in their theogy but they still mostly Jewish. We can call this Gnostic Judaism but there are non Gnostic sects like Hermetic Jews that are also part of these groups.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Jewish Christianity:</b> These sects begin to interact with one another and try and unify their theologies. They are at this point starting to diverge from Judaism heavily become a full blown schismatic religion. These schismatic forms of Judaism are much more attractive to non-Jews, especially "god fearers" which were quite often the products of intermarriage between Jews and non-Jews or marginal Jews. These Jewish-Christians sects grow to become the dominant forms of Christianity. (this in answer to the earlier question is where Paul comes in). As an aside the defining characteristic of Jewish Christianity is a strong degree of emotion tied to the Jewish God, some Jewish Christian sects will over the next two centuries become increasing negative about his role, considering him a liar that tricked them into destructive wars and a false religion.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Catholicism and Manichaeism</b> Judaism is almost entirely annihilated in the three Jewish Roman wars between 66 and 134 CE. Christianity begins to appeal to slaves and the lower classes even among people with little Jewish association. It becomes a religion loosely based on Jewish Christianity which lays claim to the entire deposit of faith calling itself "Catholicism". Meanwhile the Jewish Christian sects come into contact with other faith traditions like Persian Buddhism that allow them to reconceptualize their faith and evolve into a few non-Christian Gnostic forms the most popular being Manichaeism.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>Roman Catholicism:</b> The Catholic church offers a system for unifying religion having just recently pulled together the different strands of Christianity into a single whole. It is first fought against and then adopted by the Roman state. It fails to unify the people's fast enough to benefit the Roman empire, but is able to unify then during the next 400 years becoming one of the main the vehicle by which Western Culture survived the Dark Ages. It overcomes most other forms of Christianity completely overturning Arianism in the north and leaving remaining Pockets of Christianity which are closer to the original forms existing only in fragments of the Byzantine empire.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<b>proto-Protestantism:</b> As the Byzantine empire falls to Islam these alternative Christianities and early writings are rediscovered in the West and start to change people's outlook on their relationship with God. Western forms of Christianity which are theologically closer to Jewish Gnosticism start to emerge and hybrids of those "European Gnostic sects" and Catholicism form.<br />
<br />
<b>Protestantism</b>: Religions reformers, political reformers who want a more nationalist church and the radical reformers who hate the Catholic church and want to found a new church agree to work together. The elements the Protestant Reformation are very old with the Cathari and the Beguines as the father and mother of the reformation, Christian Humanism playa an important role and everything develops from the 13th century combination of: primitivism, a desire for a lay church and a theological neo-Gnosticism lite. In America the ideas of the Radical Reformation spread and become the dominant form. <br />
<br />
In terms of remaining issues there are two that bother me. The first is that the Catholic section is terrible. Originally the chart just covered Catholic development up to the ancient world, so I only needed a 1/2 dozen Catholic sects. This one covers Catholicism in the middle ages, so to do it justice I'd probably need over a 100 sects and the diagram would be a sea of purple with a border in the other colors. I think top priority for the next round, is a full treatment of the origins of the Eastern Sects. <br />
<br />
The other is I'm not sure about the Ebionites and the Elkasaites. If anyone has any suggestions there about the relationship please jump in. I think I'm going to need to jump into some Dead Sea Scrolls material to work this out. And of course any other suggestions are welcome. <br />
<br />
<br />
______________________________________________<br />
<br />
<b>See also:</b><br />
<ul>
<li><a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/08/christian-origins.html">Christian origins</a> an earlier post this post came from.</li>
<li><a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2009/07/king-james-onlyism-interview-initial.html">KJVonlyism series</a> which discusses the origins of the bible.</li>
<li><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/74/The_Trail_of_Blood.jpg">Chart for Trail of Blood</a> which is the Baptist perpetuity version of the above. </li>
</ul>
CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-24163995765305764262012-04-22T21:21:00.000-05:002012-04-22T21:21:02.503-05:00Religious change terminology<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-28GEmcfGlpE/T5S8PRZ6gMI/AAAAAAAAAb8/G18cCgazaYg/s1600/venn.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="223" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-28GEmcfGlpE/T5S8PRZ6gMI/AAAAAAAAAb8/G18cCgazaYg/s400/venn.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Ryan Cragun has written an interesting dictionary for religious change (<a href="http://www.stuorg.iastate.edu/gsp/Cragun%20Hammer%2011%20-%20H&S%20Terminology.pdf">source</a>). Since this is embedded in a pdf here are the highlights broken out:<br />
<br />
<b>exiter</b> any person who leaves a religion<br />
<br />
<ul><li><b>disaffiliate </b>a person who leaves a religion by formally requesting their name be removed from the membership roles of the religion</li>
<li><b>disidentifier </b>a person who leaves a religion by no longer self-identifying as a member of the religion</li>
<li><b>apostate</b> a person who leaves a religion and then fights against that religion</li>
<li><b>deserter</b> a person who leaves a religion with no intention of returning</li>
</ul><br />
<b>switcher</b> a person who leaves a religion and joins another religion<br />
<br />
<ul><li><b>within family switcher </b>someone who leaves a religion and joins a religion that belongs to the same broad religious family (e.g., Methodist to Baptist)</li>
<li><b>between family switcher</b> a person who leaves a religion and joins a religion that belongs to a different broad religious family (e.g., Catholic to Buddhist)</li>
<li><b>taster</b> a person who repetitively joins and leaves religions</li>
<li><b>defector</b> a person who leaves a religion with the intent of joining a rival group</li>
</ul><br />
<b>convert</b> anyone who experiences a change in religious identity<br />
<br />
<ul><li><b>deconvert</b> a person who leaves a religion</li>
</ul><br />
<b>none</b> a person who does not associate with a religion<br />
<br />
<ul><li><b>re-none</b> a person who leaves a religion and becomes a religious none</li>
<li><b>native none</b> a person raised without a religious identity who has not joined a religion</li>
<li><b>religious independent</b> a person with no religious affiliation</li>
<li><b>dropout</b> a person who leaves a religion and becomes a religious none</li>
<li><b>unchurched</b> a person raised without a religious affiliation who has never joined one</li>
</ul><br />
<b>identifier</b> a person who self-identifies as being associated with an organized religion<br />
<br />
<ul><li><b>affiliate</b> a person who claims formal membership status in an organized religion</li>
<li><b>stayer</b> a person who was raised with a religious affiliation and remains religiously affiliated later in life, regardless of any changes in affiliation.</li>
<li><b>loyalist</b> a person raised with a specific religious affiliation who maintains that affiliation later in life. </li>
</ul>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-14935130768746393582012-04-09T12:05:00.001-05:002012-04-09T18:02:26.559-05:00It gets better and MormonismIn dealing with the very high rates of homosexual suicide there is a movement called <a href="http://www.itgetsbetter.org/">"It gets better</a>" aimed at convincing kids not to take drastic action. Generally the videos are aimed at middle to high school aged students. This is a similar video aimed at BYU students.<br />
<br />
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<br />
In 2007 BYU stopped expelling gay students and in 2010 they allowed the creation of a gay alliance movement on campus. The results are, as is obvious from this video, obviously positive. This is keeping with the broader direction of the church. In 1998 many officials within the LDS church stopped using "so called gays and lesbians" effectively denying the existence of homosexuals. It appears that more officially the last few years the church has shifted position and no longer considers the homosexual inclination to be a result of sinful behavior, nor even sinful. <br />
<br />
They still encourage people with same sex attraction to enter into heterosexual marriages, with no acknowledgement of how devastating that can be for both parties. They still, officially and culturally blame homosexuals for homophobia because of their political activities which to me is reminiscent of anti-Semites blaming anti-Semitism on Jewish obnoxiousness. They support <a href="http://www.evergreeninternational.org/">Evergreen International</a>, a "pray away the gay" scam. <br />
<br />
So certainly the LDS continues a shameful history of anti-gay activism, but the last decade shows hope are addressing it and making some rather dramatic progress. Hopefully seeing their children not have to leave the church and instead make videos like the above, is a source of pride of their progress. For me it is wonderful to see a conservative church, especially one that has consistently focused on encouraging homophobia and anti-gay activities moving in the right direction.CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-18256213124524007022012-03-15T12:51:00.004-05:002012-10-11T02:05:09.763-05:00Why Natural Family Planning (NFP) is a non answer<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sMKvc7oxV-w/T2IsDrrCEEI/AAAAAAAAAbo/AOcT52gZKww/s1600/CMM2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="278" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sMKvc7oxV-w/T2IsDrrCEEI/AAAAAAAAAbo/AOcT52gZKww/s320/CMM2.png" width="320" /></a></div>
The problem with NFP is the results in practice. It is the case among people with years of experience who practice in a disciplined way that NFP has a pregnancy rate of .6-1.8% which is in line with chemical methods (<a href="http://humrep.oxfordjournals.org/content/22/5/1310">study</a>). But actually doing this is rather difficult, for example in the study cited above 13% of the women who had originally expressed interested in NFP refused to continue to use NFP in practice, even with extensive support services made available to them. Support far beyond what can be given in a widespread way.<br />
<br />
When NFP is used by people who take it semi-seriously they have 7.5% chance of getting pregnant <b>per cycle</b>, to put that in perspective couples having frequent sex with no contraception of any type have 28% chance of pregnancy per cycle. <br />
<br />
Because differences like this, though generally not this large, are common, when measuring birth control effectiveness: means are evaluated using a "typical use" scale not a "perfect use scale". So for example condoms when used every time and with a spermicidal gel have a 98% effectiveness rate (i.e. with perfect use a sexually active woman will get pregnant only 2% of the time). When used by actual people mistakes happen and the actual actual effectiveness rate is measured at 85%. Where NFP methods are heavily used unintentional pregnancy rates among sexually active women are about 24%. Considering we are talking several decades of sexually active fertility even a 10% failure rate would mean 2-3 extra children over the course of a woman's lifetime. <br />
<br />
Western women seem to be heading towards a fertility rate of 1.3 children per woman, and even in America non immigrant woman are at 2.1 children per woman; NFP simple doesn't seem effective enough in the absence of heavy use of abortion. <br />
<br />
Moreover, there is a bit of irony. If one adopts the currently fashionable definition that life begins at conception NFP greatly increases the incidence of implantation failure, which would be miscarriage under this definition, by encouraging sexual activity during the period when women still conceive but the fetus tends to fail to implant successfully. NFP, the Catholic church's recommended practice causes vast vast numbers of natural abortions over the course of a couple's life. So I would strongly disagree with the church, that it is not the intentional killing of children, if one defines life to begin at conception, and one defines "intent" in any consistent way. <br />
<br />
The church is simply aiming for an irreconcilable situation:<br />
<ol>
<li>They have over the last 200 years redefined abortion to apply much earlier than quickening, i.e. when the woman first feels fetal movement. This eliminates the sorts of birth control methods that were popular in previous centuries, which we would today call "abortion inducing drugs". It also introduces the moral issues with NFP I cited above.</li>
<li>They have redefined marriage to be primary about sex rather than primary about property and legitimate heirs. Thus there is no longer any distinction made between non-marital and marital pregnancy, as well as making much distinction between adultery and fornication. This to some extent is compounded in our society that has moved towards late marriage.</li>
<li>They dismiss artificial contraception of virtually any type as immoral. Thus eliminating the only means humans have discovered that in a widespread and reliable way is capable of keeping a woman's fertility down to 1-3 children per lifetime without heavy use of abortion (in the modern sense of the word).</li>
<li>They do aim for their standards to be adopted in a widespread way, and not seen as just theoretical goals that no one in practice actually follows.</li>
</ol>
When people talk about supporting birth control what they mean is keeping the fertility numbers down at the 1-3 children per woman over the course of their life. Standards of living correlate very strongly with per capita energy consumption. Energy production is not substantially boosted by population, it should be thought of as a limited resource growing slowly. High energy demand, effectively high energy prices, have been "a" if not "the" primary cause of global economic growth being constrained for the last 2 generations. That is, what is primarily preventing 3rd and 4th world people from having a good standard of living are these high energy prices. While technology is allowing us to boost energy production somewhat every percentage point of population growth is a percentage point of growth not available to raise the living standards of the poor. This tradeoff translates into millions of lives lost every year, not even discussing quality of life. Quite simply, overwhelming number of people, even people who care deeply about the sanctity of life, on this planet would prefer less children being born to everyone being subjecting to grinding poverty. <br />
<br />
If the church wants Humane Vitae to be taken seriously they either need to indicate:<br />
<br />
i) What is the unknown secret for massive energy production to allow for a growing population?<br />
<br />
ii) How to maintain fertility at the rate of around 1-2.25 children per woman over the course of their life in practice using NFP?<br />
<br />
-----<br />
<b>See also</b><br />
<br />
<ul>
<li><a href="http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199906103402304#t=articleResults">Time of Implantation of the Conceptus and Loss of Pregnancy</a></li>
</ul>
<br />
<b><br /></b>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com12tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-50086944050123272132012-03-10T15:40:00.021-05:002012-03-11T21:30:20.166-05:00Thoughts about Adam-God<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tjhYuSmyjR4/T1uJ5VWDgJI/AAAAAAAAAbE/YZu4XAk3oXc/s1600/Adam_Kadmon_1_3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tjhYuSmyjR4/T1uJ5VWDgJI/AAAAAAAAAbE/YZu4XAk3oXc/s320/Adam_Kadmon_1_3.jpg" width="245" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sara Clugage's<br />
Adam Kadmon</td></tr>
</tbody></table>There is an Evangelical myth which comes up frequently when there is a discussion of Mormonism that is probably worth dispelling. The myth goes something like this: <i> in 1852 Brigham Young started teaching that God the Father and the Adam from Genesis were the same person. Adam was an exalted mortal man who came with one of his wives Eve to earth, ate of the tree of knowledge to become mortal and begat human children. This Adam later returned to earth to have sex with Mary and become the father of Jesus. In the Evangelical timeline version of the story, Orson Pratt objected to this teaching and Brigham continued to teach it throughout his life, with most Mormons of the 1850-1870s believing this. Later the church covered it up, and denied this doctrine had every been taught. This incident proves that Brigham was a false prophet, and the LDS a false church.</i> To prove this rather substantial theory they present two pieces of evidence: a few second hand paragraphs with some scattered quotes from sermon records of the time spread over two decades, and the fact there are also several fundamentalist Mormon sects that still hold to a view that Adam was Elohim and physically impregnated Eve to start creation. And that is the extent of the evidence. <br />
<br />
Conversely the LDS church's version of events initially appears less convincing. What they argue is that Brigham Young gave several sermons on the divinity of Adam, a popular doctrine called "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam%E2%80%93God_doctrine">Adam-God</a>" developed from these sermons as a misunderstanding. The mainstream church starting with Joseph F. Smith became aware of this folk Mormon heresy and tried to surpress it. This folk Mormon theology did however pass onto splinter sects that broke off from the LDS like the FLDS and Apostolic United Brethren. I intend to argue the LDS church's version is correct, they are telling the truth. And not only do I intend to prove that but to further present evidence that what Brigham was actually teaching was neither terribly controversial nor original, rather mainstream Hermeticism.<br />
<br />
The first thing that happens if one begins to examine evangelical theory is that the very words of Brigham Young in his quotes about Adam-God contradict the fundamentalist doctrine. For example:<br />
<ol><li>If Adam is Elohim why does Brigham speak of “revelation given to Adam” revelation from whom?</li>
<li>Why does Elohim refer to “my son Adam” in Brigham’s sermons?</li>
<li>Why does he in these reports of the sermons say of Adam and Eve “they are the children of our Heavenly Father” and refer to us as their children which contradicts the entire supposed point?</li>
</ol>Even thinking of Elohim as a plurality of God's doesn't resolve these issues and I have yet to hear an evangelical define an Adam-God doctrine that is consistent with their theory and consistent with Brigham's quotes on the topic. This in and of itself disproves the theory that the FLDS / AUB version of Adam-God represents the "authentic Brigham". Brigham either contradicted himself and there was no consistent doctrine, or the fundamentalist version doesn't match his teaching.<br />
<br />
But if the Mormon fundamentalist view is not what Brigham was preaching that leaves unanswered the crucial question; if Brigham didn't mean that Adam was Elohim what did he mean? Brigham gives a crucial clue in those few paragraphs where he tells us he learned this doctrine from Joseph Smith. Now we do know a lot about Joseph Smith's theology near the end of his life (see <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/mormonism-as-hermetic-christianity-part_11.html">Mormonism as Hermetic Christianity part 3</a>), he was a lifetime member of the Free Masons, studying Kabbalah and delving into Hermetic Christianity all three of which have a doctrine called "Adam Kadmon" that does fit with the Brigham quotes. <br />
<br />
The story of creation in the Hebrew is extremely poetic. Joseph Smith was aware of this, and in sermons of his he frequently complained about the poor quality of the English translation of his day (the King James Version) in capturing the nuances of the Hebrew for the introductory chapters of Genesis. The issue for any translator is that various word plays in the Hebrew are impossible to translate into English. For example when Adam and Eve eat the forbidden fruit they discover they are naked in English. In Hebrew they ambiguously discover they are naked and/or cunning. There is simply no way to be ambiguous in English between naked and cunning, the translator into English is forced into making an interpretation and suppressing the ambiguity.<br />
<br />
In the same way there are problems with the tradition language regarding Adam. Adam is literally "the man", it also used by convention as a name of a specific person (Adam). This convention breaks down in several places, for example in Genesis 1<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">26 And God said, Let us make man (adam) in our image, after our likeness (order is reversed from what is normally gramatical. The word for image here is literally statue) and let them have dominion (verb tense indicates purpose) over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.</blockquote><blockquote class="tr_bq"> 27 So God created man (this time ha'adam literally "the aforementioned man" ) in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female he created (created is in the singular, refers to a singular entity) them (them in English makes "created" plural which isn't capturing the Hebrew. "It" would be standard English for singular so something like "it/them" would be needed here to capture the Hebrew).</blockquote><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: right; text-align: right;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4aLRGrUbGbk/T1ugoWHEmmI/AAAAAAAAAbQ/8KelsotDCfo/s1600/Adamtree.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-4aLRGrUbGbk/T1ugoWHEmmI/AAAAAAAAAbQ/8KelsotDCfo/s400/Adamtree.jpg" width="190" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Adam Kadmon<br />
with 10 Sephirot</td></tr>
</tbody></table>etc... In Hebrew there is a lot more going on that isn't in your English translation. Hellenistic Judaism, which after all saw its mission as to reconcile Judaism with Platonic philosophy, dealt with this language by introducing the idea of a spiritual Adam, Adam Kadmon. This spiritual Adam is an image of the ten <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sephirot">sephirot</a> (attributes of God). The image to the right has thse marked off and associated with body parts. A configuration of the sephirot (Partzufim) is in a platonic / Hellenistic Jewish sense a particular image of God, a conception like an avatar. So Adam Kadmon is a way of talking about a will of God, the same way God's wisdom is made manifest in works like: Sir 1:1-18; 4:11-19; 6:18-31; 14:20-15:10; 24:1-31; 51:13-30; Wis 7-9; Baruch 3:9-38. This spiritual Adam, doesn't have material properties like sex, so if you look at the image of Adam Kadmon at the top of the post, you'll notice that the model (Brittany Spears) is female. As such Adam Kadmon is the perfect image of the Logos. The material Adam, the one in the garden, as well as Eve would both be a reflection of Adam Kadmon, in keeping with the Hermetic "as above so below". So God -> Logos -> Adam Kadmon -> material Adam / mythic Adam. <br />
<br />
This theology was fully developed by Philo and has remained part of Jewish mysticism since. It passed directly into primitive Christianity. Paul uses it casually in 1 Cor 15:45-50. The idea is explicated in the Clementine literature, Jesus is the incarnation of the heavenly image, Adam Kadmon i.e. a materialization of the Logos. Historically this idea becomes popular with the Elkasaites and other Gnostic Jewish groups and thus makes its way into Manichaeism where the 7 incarnation of Adam Kadmon are: Adam, Seth, Noah, Abraham, Zoroaster, Buddha, and Jesus. From here no particular order it gets incorporated into Druze and Islamic Gnosticism where it makes its way back into Christian Hermeticism, which acts as an indirect base for Free Masonry. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-T9IpgdchLm4/T11aoB_eK8I/AAAAAAAAAbc/e7GD0w_ToBY/s1600/nkadamandrogyneblavatsky.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-T9IpgdchLm4/T11aoB_eK8I/AAAAAAAAAbc/e7GD0w_ToBY/s400/nkadamandrogyneblavatsky.jpg" width="362" /></a></div><br />
This doctrine did not however make it into mainstream Christianity. Saint Augustine, wrote the definitive interpretation of those early chapters of Genesis. That interpretation was based on the Greek bible (the Septuagint) which does not have the poetic ambiguity of the Hebrew, though it contains hints of it like the English. His interpretation is the classic view: original sin and the fall, both of which Joseph Smith rejected. While he is familiar with the Adam Kadmon view, being a former Manichean himself, he rejects it.<br />
<br />
Joseph in teaching Adam Kadmon would have been teaching a lost doctrine of early Christianity (at least of some major sects) that is engaging in Christian restoration. His belief in this doctrine would be fully consistent with the "bible is true in so far as it is translated correctly" as this is a doctrine which comes directly from a good understanding of the originals. This doctrine justifies many of his other theological shifts. And the doctrine isn't even much of a stretch since, the idea of a heavenly Adam can easily be thought of as the "spirit child Adam". <br />
<br />
I think it not just possible but likely that Brigham was preaching this, but being a bit loose on a few occasions about distinguishing between Adam Kadmon and material Adam. What's more Adam Kadmon in Judaism is the father of all human souls, which is Elohim's role in traditional Mormonism. As mentioned above Adam Kadmon is seen as either the father of the earthly Jesus, or earthly Jesus is an incarnation of Adam Kadmon. And equally material Adam is either the son or an incarnation of Adam Kadmon. So I can easily see how the roles in a few paragraph summary of Brigham's sermons got muddled. For example in the December 28 1845, Adam-God sermon Brigham talks about how Adam got his name from the "more ancient Adam", which would be confusing to anyone not familiar with this doctrine. <br />
<br />
So for example:<br />
<ul><li>Adam and Eve were the names of the first man and woman of <b>every earth</b> that was ever organized and that Adam and Eve were the <b>natural father and mother of every spirit</b> that comes to this planet</li>
<li>When you see your Mother <b>that bear your spirit</b>, you will see mother Eve</li>
</ul>And so I propose:<br />
<br />
a) That Joseph Smith ran across a very mainstream Hermetic Christian doctrine in his studies.<br />
b) That Joseph Smith taught this theory to Brigham.<br />
c) That Brigham gave a few lectures on it over a period of decades, but did not cite the Hebrew. Rather he used terms like "father Adam" for Adam Kadmon and Adam/"our father Adam" for material Adam. <br />
d) Because he did a bad job explicating this theory, the roles got muddled in the reports of these lectures and a folk Mormonism developed with these muddled roles / theology. <br />
e) The muddled roles got passed on to fundamentalist sects and codified. <br />
<br />
Is all you have to believe to fully believe the LDS church's version of events. What I would suggest is go back and read Brigham's reported sermons with this doctrine in mind, and you'll see how they suddenly make sense. <br />
<br />
The next question is, why the opposition from Orson Pratt at the time? Well the primary argument the two had was their respective theologies of exaltation. Brigham saw it as progressing in quality, while Orson saw it as progressing in terms of quantity. That is for Brigham God continues to progress in what he knows while for Orson the progression is in terms of his domain. Adam Kadmon himself is timeless, eternal, non material. He is a divine creator of human life but unquestionably subordinate to the Logos and from there to Elohim. In other words the doctrine of Adam Kadmon from a Mormon standpoint requires belief in Brigham's not Orson's theory of eternal progression. <br />
<br />
Consistent with this, Orson was the primary advocate of Mormon Materialism (<a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/orson-pratt-and-alternative.html">post on this topic</a>), the doctrine that everything including the spiritual was matter that was simply re-organized by God. The Adam Kadmon theory posits a non material Adam, cutting out the heart of Mormon metaphysics for Orson. Moreover a non material image of Adam, certainly leads to returning to a "God without passions or parts". Mormonism is an incarnational theology, Adam Kadmon is inherently adoptionistic. Orson could have been concerned about the difficulties of reconciling adoptionistic view of Adam with a material view of the Godhead. This view of Adam would have presented no problem for early Christians that supported adoptionism. Moreover, religions like Judaism, Islam, Druze and Hermetic Christianity are adoptionistic in their view of all prophets strongly disbelieving in even the possibility of an incarnational theology in the orthodox Christian sense. So Orson's objection is understandable. <br />
<br />
_______<br />
<br />
<b>See also:</b><br />
<ul><li>Wikipedia article on Adam-God (<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam-God">link</a>)</li>
<li>Article in Dialogue on the History of Adam-God (<a href="https://dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V15N01_16.pdf">link</a>)</li>
<li>Geoff Dennis article on Adam Kadmon: <a href="http://ejmmm2007.blogspot.com/2007/01/adam-kadmon-i-spiritual-man-primordial.html">part1</a> <a href="http://ejmmm2007.blogspot.com/2007/01/adam-kadmon-ii-human-cosmos-conduit-of.html">part2</a></li>
<li><a href="http://www.chabad.org/kabbalah/article_cdo/aid/380321/jewish/Chaos-and-the-Primordial.htm">Chabad article</a>, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adam_Kadmon">wikipedia article </a>on Adam Kadmon</li>
<li>Adam-God on Mormonwiki (<a href="http://www.mormonwiki.org/Adam-God">link</a>) (hostile) </li>
<li>Adam-God on MRM (<a href="http://www.mrm.org/adam-god">link</a>), this page links to additional resources</li>
</ul>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-59816764703081973832012-02-22T12:37:00.000-05:002012-02-22T12:37:11.863-05:00Paula Kirby on AtheismI couldn't resist reposting this essay from the Hibernia Times (Ireland's newspaper)<br />
<br />
Here is a link to the originals: <a href="http://thehiberniatimes.com/2011/06/03/atheism-is-the-true-embrace-of-reality">part1</a> <a href="http://thehiberniatimes.com/2011/06/12/breaking-out-from-the-prison-of-religion">part2</a><br />
<br />
Everything below this line is Paula's<br />
<br />
_____<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yazBKL0Ai_U/T0Ukw8i2aLI/AAAAAAAAAa4/uKsMIkLqJwc/s1600/Paula-Kirby1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-yazBKL0Ai_U/T0Ukw8i2aLI/AAAAAAAAAa4/uKsMIkLqJwc/s320/Paula-Kirby1.jpg" width="299" /></a></div>By Paula Kirby<br />
<br />
Until 2003 I was a devout Christian. And I mean devout. I believed absolutely, and my faith was central to my life at that time. Various clergy thought I had a calling to “the ministry”; one even suggested I might have a vocation to be a nun. Now I am an atheist: the kind of atheist who is predictably referred to by religious apologists as “outspoken” or “militant.” So what happened?<br />
What happened was four little words: “How do I know?”<br />
<br />
One of the things that had struck me during my Christian years was just how many different Christianities there are. Not just the vast number of different sects and denominations (over 38,000 by one reckoning), but the huge amount of difference between individual Christians of the same sect or denomination, too. <br />
<br />
The beliefs and attitudes of an evangelical, biblical, literalist Christian compared with a liberal Christian are so wildly different that we might almost be dealing with two completely different religions – as I discovered from personal experience when moving from a liberal church in the south of England to the Presbyterian depths of the Scottish Highlands back in 2000.<br />
<br />
Like every other Christian I have ever known, I had clear ideas about the kind of God I believed in and, on the basis of those ideas, I accepted certain bits of Christian dogma while utterly rejecting others. Again, let me stress: this is par for the course. In practice faith is always a pick-and-mix affair: believers emphasise those bits that sit comfortably with them whilst mostly ignoring those bits that do not, or concocting elaborate interpretations to allow them to pretend they do not mean what they actually say. So this was the question I faced up to in 2003: What was there to suggest that the version of Christianity I believed in was actually real? Was there any better evidence for the version I accepted than there was for the versions I did not?<br />
<br />
The Bible could not help me. Both kinds of Christian – the ultra-conservative and the ultra-liberal – find abundant support for their views in the Bible provided they cherry-pick enough (and, of course, they do just that, filing the bits that don’t suit their case under the convenient headings of “Metaphor” or “Mystery”). Tradition was not reliable, either: a false belief does not become true simply through having been held through many generations.<br />
<br />
So what else was there? A Roman Catholic I was debating with once argued: “To those who say there is no proof, there is the question of the numinous. I know there is a God, I have a relationship with him and spend time in meditative prayer on a daily basis.” Perhaps that’s where the answer lay?<br />
<br />
Well, of course, I thought I had a personal relationship with God, too. I, too, spent time with him in meditative prayer every day. And as a result, I not only “knew” there was a god; I “knew” what that god was like. I didn’t believe – I really thought I knew.<br />
<br />
Just about all the Christians I came into contact with “knew” there was a god, too. They, too, spent time in meditative prayer with him on a daily basis. And as a result, they, too, “knew” what God was like. So what did that knowledge tell us about him? How reliable were these personal relationships when it came to establishing the truth about God?<br />
<br />
Some of us, on the basis of our relationship with God, knew him to be loving, compassionate, generous, always reaching out to us, pitying our mistakes rather than condemning them. Others, on the basis of their relationship with God, knew him to be angry, jealous, punitive.<br />
<br />
Some of us knew that God had more important things to worry about than our sex lives; others knew that human sexual impurity was deeply offensive to him.<br />
Some of us knew that God wanted us to respond to other people’s shortcomings with tolerance and forbearance and humility; others knew that he wanted sin to be made an example of, to be held up and publicly rebuked.<br />
Some of us knew that God was offended by conspicuous consumption when so many people had nothing; others knew that God showered wealth along with other good things on those of whom he approved.<br />
Some of us knew that God saw all religions as different expressions of people’s yearning for him; others knew that traditional, orthodox Christianity was the only route to him.<br />
Some of us knew that the devil was just a myth to explain the existence of evil; others knew that the devil was very real and a genuine threat to our souls.<br />
Some of us knew that there was no way God could ever allow such a thing as hell; others knew that hell was very much a part of God’s ordained order.<br />
We all knew we were right, and we all based that knowledge on the personal relationship we had with him. How could any of us possibly be wrong?<br />
What was striking about these observations was that those of us whose personalities led us to embrace the world and other people in a spirit of openness, generosity, warmth and tolerance “knew” that God did the same. And those who lacked the confidence for that, and consequently saw the world as threatening and evil and bad, “knew” that God saw it that way, too.<br />
<br />
This is why subjective experience cannot tell us anything about God. Knowing what kind of god someone believes in tells us a great deal about that person – but nothing whatsoever about the truth or otherwise of the existence of any god at all.<br />
<br />
And this brings us to something very important about atheism. Atheism is not in itself a belief. Few atheists would be so bold as to declare the existence of any god at all utterly impossible. Atheism is, quite simply, the position that it is absurd to believe in, much less worship, a deity for which no valid evidence has been presented. Atheism is not a faith: on the contrary, it is the refusal to accept claims on faith.<br />
<br />
Atheists recognize that we need evidence in order to come to reliable conclusions about reality and that, so far, those who claim there is a god have signally failed to provide it. And atheists care about reality: not what it might be comforting to believe, or what has traditionally been believed, or what we have been instructed to believe. And this focus on reality, far from diminishing our experience of life, as so many religious people imagine, actually makes our lives all the richer: once you have faced up to the reality that there is no evidence to suggest there is another life after this one, it becomes all the more important to live this finite life to the full, learning and growing, and caring for others, because this is their only life, too, and there is no reason to believe there will be heavenly compensation for their earthly sufferings.<br />
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An atheist life, well lived, leads to the only kind of afterlife there is any evidence for whatsoever: the immortality of living on in the fond memories of those who loved us.<br />
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____<br />
<br />
Many Christians don’t wish to question their beliefs, of course. Many genuinely feel to get something from their faith which they fear they would lose without it. For many believers, faith is a comfort: they find comfort in the thought of not really dying, of being reunited with loved ones in an afterlife, of a benign and powerful being watching over them and “working all things for the good.”<br />
<br />
Someone who derives comfort from such thoughts may well prefer not to question the truth of them too closely. Besides, in a community where the majority are religious and censorious of non-belief, there is huge social pressure to conform.<br />
<br />
Another reason lies in the lamentable fact that even now, in 2011, lack of scientific understanding is the norm in many societies. Not only do most people not understand even the basics of science themselves; they often have no idea of the huge range of questions that science really has begun to shed light on. People unschooled in scientific knowledge or methodology may quite genuinely be baffled about why there is “something rather than nothing,” or how life could possibly have arisen from non-life and then developed into the vast array of forms we see around us, and be unable to conceive of any answer other than God.<br />
<br />
So there are reasons for not questioning belief that many Christians may themselves be fully conscious of and even happy with. However, I would suggest that there are other reasons, too: reasons arising from the way Christianity actively manipulates its followers and suppresses the natural spirit of enquiry.<br />
<br />
The first is Christianity’s emphasis on faith. Faith is the acceptance of claims for which there is no good evidence; when someone invites you to take something on faith, they are actively telling you not to challenge it, not to question it, not to enquire whether it is really true: they are telling you to simply accept it on their say-so. And this “accepting it on their say-so” is at the very heart of Christianity.<br />
<br />
It is the only absolute requirement for salvation: that you accept — on faith —<br />
that Jesus died for your sins and took the punishment for them on your behalf. Faith is incompatible with genuine questioning. The moment you begin to question faith-claims, you are told you must stop, that to continue will be to lose your faith. And this is a dire threat indeed, for in Christianity everything you hope for is dependent on faith — on simply taking someone’s word for it, on simply accepting a particular set of claims as true.<br />
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Churches certainly pay lip-service to asking questions, of course; but never doubt that there are limits to the questions that are acceptable. “Does this verse mean this or does it mean that?”: this kind of question — the unthreatening kind that stays within approved boundaries — is smiled upon. But be careful not to voice questions that suggest doubt! That question the truth of Christian dogma!<br />
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It is no coincidence, I would suggest, that Doubting Thomas is second only to Judas in the Recalcitrant Disciple stakes.<br />
<br />
Closely linked with faith is authority. It is there in the structures of all churches, but explicitly so in the case of the Roman Catholic Church, which claims infallibility for the pope when speaking on matters of dogma. (How does he know he’s infallible on these matters? How do you?) Authority reinforces the demand for blind faith, insists that you remain in your role of passive recipient of priestly wisdom. But these claims to authority are not always overt: they are also concealed within the very structure of church services. You are told when to sit, when to kneel, when to stand; when to pray, when to sing, when to say Amen, when to be silent. And you are told, in the creed, in the hymns, from the pulpit, what you are required to believe. There is no discussion, no Q&A, no opportunity to ask, “But how do you know?” Church services require congregations to be passive and unquestioning. (Have you ever wondered why the Church puts so much emphasis on obedience?)<br />
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All this is reinforced through ritual. When was the last time you actively stopped to think about how you drive? Unless you are newly qualified, the answer is almost certainly so long ago that you cannot remember it. After a while driving becomes automatic, reflexive, something you do without much conscious thought. This is what happens when we do something over and over again: we stop noticing the details. And churches — especially those, like the Roman Catholic Church, with set liturgies — exploit this to the full. In service after service there is the same rhythm, the same pattern, the same order of the individual components. The effect? We can switch our brains off; we don’t need to think; we are lulled into a state of passivity in which the words wash over us and we barely even register them. If you don’t believe me, see if you can recite — without looking! — the third verse of your favourite hymn. Or see how much you remember of the content of last Sunday’s sermon.<br />
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The combination of the insistence on faith, authority and endlessly repeated ritual all combine to lull our brains into unquestioning, passive acceptance. And as if this weren’t enough, believers’ confidence in their own judgement and ability to deal with life on their own is constantly undermined by the teaching that their every success is down to God’s goodness, their every failure firmly down to their own weakness.<br />
<br />
Yet there still remains one more weapon in the Church’s armoury: a powerful weapon, a desperate weapon; you might even say a diabolical weapon. That weapon is hell. “Accept our authority; accept our claims on faith; believe and don’t doubt — or burn for all eternity.” How many generations of children have been psychologically scarred by this obscenity? How many adults still harbour lingering fears that this sadistic fabrication might just be true? How many cling to their faith for fear of eternal torment if they don’t? And how much must the Church fear the act of questioning, if it has to resort to such monstrous and perverted threats in order to deter you from doing it?<br />
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The forces arrayed against the believer who dares to question, dares to challenge, are formidable indeed. Small wonder that many believers never truly stop to reflect on their beliefs from the perspective of asking whether they are really true.<br />
<br />
And yet an increasing number of us are doing just that. Increasingly we are shaking off the hobgoblins of belief, and in so doing we are discovering the joys of a life where no question is off-limits and where we no longer have to make do with pseudo-answers based in faith, authority or threats.<br />
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Abandoning religious faith is like waking after a deep sleep. Good morning! It’s a beautiful day…CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-36985798574317767082012-01-18T16:04:00.010-05:002012-04-02T07:40:59.311-05:00The Rock-paper-scissors of Apologetics<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Oqw3HgaijTM/TxcrYpgpdlI/AAAAAAAAAag/c9NcMHs--dM/s1600/rock-paper-scissors-1r0r6th.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Oqw3HgaijTM/TxcrYpgpdlI/AAAAAAAAAag/c9NcMHs--dM/s320/rock-paper-scissors-1r0r6th.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>So I tried another round of Catholic apologetics and yet again I'm discovering that the Catholic apologetic falls completely apart in the face of typical Baptist counter arguments. On the other hand I can't help but notice how quickly your more traditional Protestants, with a poorly thought out position on sola scriptura get tied in knots by the Catholic apologetic. <br />
<br />
So I've come up with this theory based that apologetics have a big circle similar to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock-paper-scissors">rock-paper-scissors</a>.<br />
<ul><li>Catholic apologetics tie Calvinism in knots.</li>
<li>Calvinism biblically refutes Arminian credobaptists.</li>
<li>Arminian credobaptists doesn't let Catholic apologetics get off the ground. </li>
</ul>Most modern Catholic apologetics came from the continent, they aren't American and don't deal with the sorts of claims that a Baptist would make. I've tried again and again to see if Catholics have refutations to basic Baptist theology and so far it appears they don't. <br />
<br />
There really are about 5 principle arguments in Catholic apologetic.<br />
<ol><li>Sola scriptura is not taught in the bible, in fact the bible teaches a historic church.</li>
<li>Protestants have to accept tradition on the question of canon and quite often on creed. </li>
<li>The Reformation failed to produce a robust orthodoxy. That is sola scriptura doesn't produce a unified belief and any basis for a true church i.e. the "there are hundreds of Protestant denominations..." </li>
<li>The key arguments some reformers had with the Catholic church: physical presence, Marian rites, infant baptism, special authority of bishops/pope go back very early. So the apostasy could not have been near the time of the reformation. </li>
<li>Church authority is non-severable, the church cannot fall into apostasy. The gates of hell shall not prevail.... </li>
</ol><div>To see how these arguments work consider them against, say a Presbyterian. The Presbyterian wants to tie himself tightly to historic Christianity. He doesn't want to put himself in the same boat as fundamentalists, Mormons and Adventists. So he ends up having to argue all sorts of subtle and disprovable theories. He wants there to be some absolute sense in which he is Christian and a Jehovah's Witnesses is not even though the Jehovah's Witnesses is at least as committed to an accurate read of scripture. Which means he has to grant historic creeds authority, but the creeds are far later than many other doctrines he would reject and he's off to the races of slitting his own throat. </div><br />
The Baptist response to those arguments is easy. In order:<br />
<div><ol><li>References to the church in the bible only apply to a local church. There is no further entity, thus no broad ecclesiology. The only church Jesus founded was the Jerusalem church, the one church he destroyed, to prevent the idolatry of tying a material church to God. </li>
<li>Baptists reject the idea that canon comes from tradition. Rather they believe God raises up a bible for his faithful in their languages. So for example, the Wulfila, the Gothic bible, doesn't have the book of Acts yet most Baptists believe the Wulfila to have been the legitimate scriptures for that community. </li>
<li>Baptists believe in a regenerate church. There will never be a broadly believed orthodoxy. </li>
<li>They grant that the errant theology was early, but because they aren't tied to any churches beyond the 1st century they are able to clearly look at the history and see the origins accurately. Baptists, believe that the apostasy started early, almost always by the 2nd century. The Reformation didn't reconstruct the church, the Protestant churches are just as bad, rather it created the room for further reform. </li>
<li>Many Baptists do believe that the Catholic church fell into a deep apostasy. They often believe in a faithful remnant existing inside or outside the church and quite often a restoration in the last 500 years. </li>
</ol></div><div>The big difference is that the Baptist makes no claim to be in a qualitatively different situation than the Adventist or Jehovah's Witnesses; they believe themselves to be in a quantitatively different situation. Salvation comes from asking for Jesus's intercession. What exact level of understanding is needed, is unclear. </div><div><br />
</div><div>I suspect ultimately this is a short term phenomena, mostly having to do with English speakers and the internet. Most of the internet Catholics spend their time debating the internet Protestant apologists that are reformed, James White types. So this analysis may already be dead in the Spanish speaking community. In Latin America the real battle is between Pentecostalism and Western Rite Catholicism, the traditional apologetic won't work for the reasons above. Pentecostals also believe in "Landmarism-lite". </div><div><br />
</div><div>So... my question to the internet is... does anyone know what's happening in the Latin American apologetics community? What's happening in Spanish? </div><div><br />
_________<br />
<br />
<b>See also:</b><br />
<ul><li>A direct Baptist / Catholic debate: <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=CSQQAAAAIAAJ&pg=PR6&output=text">Campbell / Purcell debate</a>.</li>
<li>In terms of addressing the argument of government, which is the core of the Neumann apologetic: <a href="http://www.reformedreader.org/rbb/mell/correctivechurchdiscipline/toc.htm">Mell's book on church government</a> and <a href="http://www.reformedreader.org/rbb/savage/mcdsavagetoc.htm">Savage's book on church government</a>. More books of this type can be found on the <a href="http://baptisthistoryhomepage.com/">Baptist History Homepage</a>.</li>
<li><a href="http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2012/03/remember-lots-wife.html">Remember Lot's Wife</a>, an example of the Baptist apologetic in response to an article lementing the disunity of the reformation. </li>
<li>For a Baptist understanding of church history an easy to read and famous presentation to familiarize yourself with the Baptist mindset is Ellen White's Conflict of the Ages Volume 5 <a href="http://www.whiteestate.org/books/gc/gc.asp">The Great Controversy</a>. For material about the early church, <a href="http://www.whiteestate.org/books/aa/aa.asp">Acts of the apostles (Vol 4)</a> which discusses the early church. Especially her last few chapters of this volume address Catholic claims. As an aside these books are well written and a good read so, this would be where I'd start. </li>
<li>A short introduction which contrast baptist theology with liturgical churches: <a href="http://baptisthistoryhomepage.com/why.be.a.baptist.taylor.b.html">Why be Baptist</a>.</li>
</ul></div>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com25tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-47262065015062641822012-01-06T08:05:00.004-05:002012-01-08T08:24:19.585-05:00Sects to the Reformation<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cUbY58FbMBg/Twbu3NsxPmI/AAAAAAAAAaQ/HxgKLrpYR0U/s1600/ChristianOrigins2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cUbY58FbMBg/Twbu3NsxPmI/AAAAAAAAAaQ/HxgKLrpYR0U/s640/ChristianOrigins2.jpg" width="531" /></a></div><br />
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This image is large and may not be laying out clearly on your browser. Try clicking on the image to see it better, and magnify if you need to. Or click on this <b><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-cUbY58FbMBg/Twbu3NsxPmI/AAAAAAAAAaQ/HxgKLrpYR0U/s1600/ChristianOrigins2.jpg">link</a></b> to download or view isolated. I had originally put this image together up to about the year 1000 for a debate on Christian origins. I got inspired to expand when I had to discuss origins of the Reformation and ideas from it. I think this is a useful reference post, and also might lead to some good discussion. <br />
<br />
Because the reformation is so huge, I had to limit scope. At this point the chart covers the origins of the those sects that came to America from England, the English reformation and development. It doesn't include the minor dissenting sects that don't appear to have had influence on America. <br />
<br />
Arrows are for <i>strong influence</i> or descent, these sects are interacting with one another and passing ideas between them just as religions today do. Coloring of the arrows is to help reduce visual complexity, and it doesn't mean anything beyond that. Where possible I've tried to include a sample work in parenthesis for each sect making it clear how I'm using the term and also demonstrating at a glance the evolution in thought. It is also for the early part, letting the chart do double duty explicating the origins of the bible. <br />
<br />
In terms of the colors of the circles:<br />
<br />
<b>Salmon </b>is for groups that are Jewish sects. They may have Christian aspects but they are not yet meaningfully Christian and are in some sense fundamentally Jewish or Samaritan.<br />
<b>Light Blue</b> are proto-Christianities. <br />
<b>Yellow</b> are full blown alternate Christianities, from ancient times. "Gnosticism" used in the religious sense.<br />
<b>Purple</b> is for groups that I can meaningfully call Catholic, western or eastern rite.<br />
<b>Pink</b> groups that broke away Catholicism. Sects that I would agree are "schismatic".<br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><b style="font-weight: bold;">Dark Olive Green </b>non-Christian religions.</span></b><br />
<b>Yellow-Green</b> is for non-Christian groups with strong Christian influence.<br />
<b>Muddy Pink</b> I'm using for Hermetic Christianity. <br />
<b>Dark-Brown</b> for proto-Protestantism<br />
<b>Red-Brown</b> for Protestantism<br />
<b>Magenta</b> for the non-creedal sects of the Radical Reformation and their descendants <br />
___<br />
<br />
A few things worth noting. <br />
<br />
<ol><li>Christianity originated from a variety Jewish and Samaritan cults, which were not part of the mainstream nor the branch that survived. </li>
<li>Catholicism represents a coming together of various groups. An early partial consensus, not some sort of original revelation.</li>
<li>Christianity has always been highly diverse. </li>
<li>The elements of the Protestant Reformation are very old. In a way, the Cathari and the Beguines are the father and mother of the reformation, with Christian Humanism playing an important role. Everything develops from the 13th century combination of:</li>
<ul><li>primitivism</li>
<li>a desire for a lay church</li>
<li>a theological neo-gnosticism lite</li>
</ul>trying to fight their way to the surface for the next 300 years. While the specifics in classical Landmarkism are a bit off, the general idea of Christian primitivism are quite correct. </ol>In terms of remaining issues there are two that bother me. The first is that the Catholic section is terrible. Originally the chart just covered Catholic development up to the ancient world, so I only needed a 1/2 dozen Catholic sects. This one covers Catholicism in the middle ages, so to do it justice I'd probably need over a 100 sects and the diagram would be a sea of purple with a border in the other colors. I think top priority for the next round, is a full treatment of the origins of the Eastern Sects. <br />
<br />
The other is I'm not sure about the Ebionites and the Elkasaites. If anyone has any suggestions there about the relationship please jump in. I think I'm going to need to jump into some Dead Sea Scrolls material to work this out. <br />
<br />
______________________________________________<br />
<br />
<b>See also:</b><br />
<ul><li><a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/08/christian-origins.html">Christian origins</a> an earlier post this post came from.</li>
<li><a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2009/07/king-james-onlyism-interview-initial.html">KJVonlyism series</a> which discusses the origins of the bible.</li>
<li><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/74/The_Trail_of_Blood.jpg">Chart for Trail of Blood</a> which is the Baptist perpetuity version of the above. </li>
</ul>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com26tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-24213608289362050352011-10-05T17:52:00.000-05:002011-10-05T17:52:38.846-05:00How the denominations see each other<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VKrMITIS8xY/TozfKAqaO6I/AAAAAAAAAY8/PYtnmD-Qy64/s1600/How%2Bdenominations%2Bsee%2Beach%2Bother.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-VKrMITIS8xY/TozfKAqaO6I/AAAAAAAAAY8/PYtnmD-Qy64/s640/How%2Bdenominations%2Bsee%2Beach%2Bother.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
Got this indirectly from <a href="http://stthomasthedoubter.tumblr.com/post/10243417443">Thomas the Doubter's blog</a>, Think it is a great example of a picture is worth 1000 words.CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-85461381848785076392011-10-03T16:57:00.005-05:002011-10-04T16:20:46.998-05:00Amanda Knox is free<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4DsyEWTu8rk/ToozyMg93MI/AAAAAAAAAY0/P6x3XmpVIyQ/s1600/Amanda%2BFree.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="286" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-4DsyEWTu8rk/ToozyMg93MI/AAAAAAAAAY0/P6x3XmpVIyQ/s400/Amanda%2BFree.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>Wonderful wonderful news, Amanda Knox is free. I feel fantastic being able to have a purely positive post. This was an example where a popular pressure was able to create effective political change.<br />
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We've been hearing for years how we should ignore the evidence, ignore police misconduct, ignore the fabrication of evidence. But thankfully large groups of people said "no" and justice won out. Its very nice to see the good guys win for a change and I hope Amanda all the best and happiness. <br />
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I don't know if she will ever again be the joyful girl we saw pictured but the tears of joy or relief show her coming back to life. We can hope and wish it for her. To everyone I met involved in this case, you saved a life, you did good! And for Italy we can wish and hope that they use this as an opportunity to overhaul their judiciary. To make sure that judges do not again fill in holes in cases with wild conjecture and the words, "it is probable". <br />
<br />
The court ruled today that the "crime" of the staged break in never happened. Which is clear evidence of how truly silly the original verdict was, a theory based on a minor crime whose very existence is now disproven. In Italy there are 2 levels of not guilty: reasonable doubt and proven innocent, "per non aver commesso il fatto"; and as a result of the court looking at the evidence and not speculating she met the higher burden of proven innocent on the murder charge. I'm hoping that comes from using the autopsy, the medical examiner's timeline that the first court casually dismissed because it didn't agree with Mignini's theory. The people of Italy should not have to live under a law where judges freely fabricate evidence because they can't fill in the wholes with the evidence they have.CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-7307021138354120252011-08-29T05:13:00.006-05:002012-01-06T08:20:07.550-05:00Christian OriginsThis post is for historical reasons only. Please go to <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2012/01/sects-to-reformation.html">Sects to the Reformation</a>, for an expanded and updated chart.<br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7csm0AeHG-4/TtfNrTmIaYI/AAAAAAAAAZ4/Z0mjyiIxucc/s1600/ChristianOrigins.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="524" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-7csm0AeHG-4/TtfNrTmIaYI/AAAAAAAAAZ4/Z0mjyiIxucc/s640/ChristianOrigins.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>This image is large and may not be laying out clearly on your browser. Try clicking on the image to see it better, and magnify if you need to. Or click and download. I'm about to enter into a debate on Christian origins, the "one true church" debate. I put together this little diagram, which still has some definite flaws, breaking down how various groups merged to form ancient Christianities. <br />
<br />
Arrows are for <i>strong influence</i> or descent, these sects are interacting with one another and passing ideas between them just as religions today do. Where possible I've tried to include a sample work in parenthesis for each sect making it clear how I'm using the term, and also letting the chart do double duty explicating the origins of the bible.<br />
<br />
In terms of colors:<br />
<b>Yellow</b> are full blown alternate Christianities.<br />
<b>Light Blue</b> are proto-Christianities<br />
<b>Salmon</b> is for groups that are Jewish sects. They may have Christian aspects but they are not yet meaningfully Christian and are in some sense fundamentally Jewish or Samaritan.<br />
<b>Purple</b> I'm using for groups that I can meaningfully call Catholic.<br />
<b>Pink</b> I'm using for groups that broke away Catholicism. Sects that I would agree are "schismatic".<br />
<b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-weight: normal;"><b>Dark Olive Green </b>I'm using for non Christian religions.</span></b><br />
<b>Yellow Green</b> I'm using for non-Christian groups with strong Christian influence.<br />
<br />
___<br />
<br />
The core argument for the Catholic apologetic is:<br />
<blockquote><ol><li><i>There was a unique historical church that had a clear hierarchy with other local churches and sects in the Early Christian world (say 30-150 CE)</i></li>
<li><i>The church from (A) is contiguous with the current day Catholic church (I'm being ambiguous here with respect to Wester or Eastern for flexibility).</i></li>
<li><i>Continuity is the key determining factor for what church one should join now.</i></li>
</ol></blockquote>Classically Protestants have disputed (2). That debate generally comes down to the Catholic arguing the "gates of Hell shall not prevail..." doctrine vs. the Protestant citing lots of bad stuff the Catholic did or believes. Unlike Protestant, I will grant (2). I see no evidence for a sharp breaks anytime after the early church. As this diagram implies. <br />
<br />
(1) is very tricky to prove. I would argue the evidence we have is that pieces of proto-Christianity formed around 200 BCE and from 200 BCE-200 CE these diverse sects merged. The 2nd century debates over Montanism show most clearly that it there was a great deal of ambiguity about which churches were or were not associated with other churches; totally inconsistent with the notion of a universally accepted hierarchy<br />
<br />
Going back further to the first century we see debates among equals. Paul is arguing in his letters against Judaizers and proto-gnostics based on scripture (the LXX) because he doesn't have access to an authoritative hierarchy. <br />
<br />
From a Protestant perspective this diagram is to some extent supportive of the theory in Landmarkism, of Baptist perpetuity. The idea that the Baptists have always existed. Certainly for example the Sabians are a baptist sect: believers baptism, salvation by faith... Though I'm actually putting it several centuries earlier and disagreeing that they have rolled back nearly enough. Renowned English Baptist preacher Charles Spurgeon described Baptist perpetuity as:<br />
<br />
<blockquote><i>We believe that the Baptists are the original Christians. We did not commence our existence at the reformation, we were reformers before Luther and Calvin were born; we never came from the Church of Rome, for we were never in it, but we have an unbroken line up to the apostles themselves. We have always existed from the days of Christ, and our principles, sometimes veiled and forgotten, like a river which may travel under ground for a little season, have always had honest and holy adherents.</i></blockquote><br />
As for point (3) I see the affirmative primarily rests on sacramental authority. That is apostolic succession is mostly demanded in a situation where sacraments (in particular the eucharist / mass) need a laying on of hands (sacramental) to be valid.<br />
<br />
I'd argue for any Protestant which has a theory of ordinances rather than sacraments (3) falls apart and this is mainly a begging the question argument for most Protestants. For those like Anglicans or Lutherans that do have a sacramental theology the question becomes is there any reason to believe other than assertion in the claim that the chain is completely unbroken for the first 1500 years but shattered in the last 500? <br />
<br />
As an aside the diagram above was a lot of work and is still has errors, I'm reserving the right to update and make improvements; though the basic structure will remain intact.<br />
<br />
_____<br />
<br />
<b>See also:</b><br />
<ul><li><a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2009/07/reply-to-ecclesial-deism.html">reply to Ecclesial Deism</a> an earlier thread on this topic.<br />
</li>
<li><a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2009/07/king-james-onlyism-interview-initial.html">KJVonlyism series</a> which discusses the origins of the bible.</li>
<li><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/74/The_Trail_of_Blood.jpg">Chart for Trail of Blood</a> which is the Baptist perpetuity version of the above. </li>
</ul>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com40tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-46194104440510559042011-08-13T06:21:00.000-06:002011-08-13T06:21:38.631-06:00The concept of choiceThis is a discussion of choice and and causality.<br />
<br />
Context is a debate and a conversation that you can read (<a href="http://www.debate.org/debates/The-concept-of-choice-contradicts-determinism-and-causality/1/">here</a>). Essentially I'm arguing for positivism and the existence of freewill, my opponent strict determinism with no free will. CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com39tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-6368088251274515252011-07-30T15:49:00.004-06:002012-04-22T16:36:23.001-05:00Data on anti-Mormonism<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-7ObbZ3X1YxE/TjR0Nc1kM6I/AAAAAAAAAX4/RiEeKOwcy0Q/s1600/Anti-Mormon_protest.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-7ObbZ3X1YxE/TjR0Nc1kM6I/AAAAAAAAAX4/RiEeKOwcy0Q/s320/Anti-Mormon_protest.jpg" width="250" /></a></div>So I ran into some interesting data on anti-Mormonism from <a href="http://www.howamericansviewmormonism.com/">How Americans View Mormonism</a>. They asked the question of why people didn't trust or support Mormons in positions of leadership 45% of Americans were able to answer that question. And there answers basically amounted to: I don't know enough about the religion and what I know I don't like, but it was all about the religion:<br />
<br />
25% Ignorance -- Don't know enough about Mormons to trust them<br />
9% Different Beliefs -- Non biblical beliefs.<br />
8% Polygamy -- Belief that this practice is still widespread though secret.<br />
6% Non Christian -- Openly don't like non Christians and don't consider Mormons Christian.<br />
5% Fear of unknown -- People don't know enough about Mormons and thus fear them.<br />
5% Book of Mormon -- Disapprove of making your own bible<br />
4% Joseph Smith -- Believe he is a false prophet<br />
4% History -- racism, polygamy....<br />
<br />
Conversely I did <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2008/05/what-people-under-30-think.html">an article a few years back</a> with corresponding numbers for Evangelicals relative to people under 30s (includes Christians) and you can see the stark differences:<br />
<ul><li>antihomosexual 91%</li>
<li>judgmental 87%</li>
<li>hypocritical 85%</li>
<li>old-fashioned 78%</li>
<li>too political 75%</li>
<li>out of touch with reality 72%</li>
<li>insensitive to others 70%</li>
<li>boring 68%</li>
</ul>There was no complaints what-so-ever that people didn't know what Evangelicals stood for. The Mormon list is primarily defined by knowing Mormons and elsewhere on the site they comment quickly on how knowing any Mormons drops the antagonism of these issues down. Their religions doctrines seem to create opposition, and some level of fear. But other than polygamy and history there is a complete lack of stuff Mormons have done that irritates people. I was actually shocked proposition 8, or the anti-ERA position didn't show up. I think in both cases the LDS took a strong political stand and then backed off when they started picking up enemies on the left faster than they were making friends from their activism. <br />
<div><br />
</div><div>This contrasts strongly with evangelicals where depending how you could only a single issue of doctrine is on the list, antihomosexual. Rather everything else comes down to some variant of obnoxiousness. And the percentages are much much higher. Which is something I'd also point out to Mormons who seem intent on joining evangelicals. This looks like a perfect case of out of the frying pan into the fire.</div><br />
As an aside the authors give an example of where Mormonism becomes non-understandable , which I found interesting. The claim to be the only restored church is viewed very negatively. Quite simply the vast majority of people are unable to even understand the claim that Mormons are making. Slightly rephrasing to this triple:<br />
<ol><li>Christ organized a church.</li>
<li>Men changed it.</li>
<li>It has been brought back.</li>
</ol>Brings to light the vast majority of Christians are not rejecting #3 but rather have never considered #1 before. Once the position is understand 48% agree immediately with point #1. Of that 48%, 74% agree with point #2 immediately. And that probably corresponds to a all but a few percent of non-Catholics, And then from there 1/2 the people that agree to points #1 and #2 are willing to consider the Mormon claim for #3. Once this is understood as 3 separate claims:<br />
<ul><li>17% -- Maybe Mormons are right</li>
<li>36% -- Mormons are probably wrong</li>
<li>29% -- Mormons are definitely wrong</li>
<li>18% -- No opinion</li>
</ul>Without the need for anything more than a 3 paragraph explanation.<br />
<br />
<b>____</b><br />
<b><br />
</b><br />
<b>See also</b><br />
<br />
<ul><li>Poll on American attitudes towards Mormons from 2011 (<a href="http://www.parameterfoundation.net/mormonsbelievewhat/wp-content/uploads/2011/08/Poll.pdf">link</a>)</li>
</ul>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-80196895390315795882011-07-26T18:48:00.011-06:002011-07-29T10:20:25.026-06:00Orson Pratt and alternative organizations of matter<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0pixSG1k5sM/Ti7DWWGCJeI/AAAAAAAAAXo/-RHHTRGOGio/s1600/Orson_Pratt_engraving.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-0pixSG1k5sM/Ti7DWWGCJeI/AAAAAAAAAXo/-RHHTRGOGio/s320/Orson_Pratt_engraving.png" width="238" /></a></div>One of the things about Mormonism that is quite interesting is that it tries to address the issue of how spirit and body interact in a meaningful way. That is what is the soul. This is a key theme in Hellenism, on what basis would God communicate with man? Cessationist Evangelical Christianity has essentially abandoned this question, God communicated through people in a book and now doesn't meaningfully talk. Further in terms of soul, it officially takes the orthodox position of a bodily resurrection, while the membership more and more takes the position that such a thing is impossible and believes in a non-corporeal soul. Which immediately raises the question in light of our modern understanding of the brain: what does the soul do that the body does not do? Contemporary evangelical Christianity simply doesn't have an adequate answer to this question. <br />
<br />
Mormonism conversely has a very different answer. It essentially adopts hylozoism, "life generates form" that spirit is another form of matter that interacts with standard matter providing an organization. God is thus expressed in laws of interaction and man's spirit is a participant component of the Godhead. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baruch_Spinoza">Spinoza</a> was a well known advocate of this idea with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immanuel_Kant">Kant</a> having been a well known opponent. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Buber">Martin Buber</a> is probably the most recent prominent advocate. This idea fit well within <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deism">Deism</a>, which is probably where Pratt encountered it. Because of the Pantheistic overtones, most religions reject this theory and even in Mormonism it seems somewhat under developed in terms of specifics. <br />
<br />
In modern usage there are 3 main schools of understanding regarding matter and determinism:<br />
<ul><li><b>hylostatism</b> The belief that the universe is deterministic, thus “static” in a four-dimensional sense, classical mechanics, which was a view Orson Pratt was attacking at the time. </li>
<li><b>hylostochastism</b> The belief that the universe contains a fundamentally random or stochastic component, which has been proven by quantum mechanics. </li>
<li><b>hylozoism</b> The belief that the universe contains a fundamentally alive aspect, which is was discussed above. That the structures have in some sense intent, a drive or an intelligence behind them. </li>
</ul>For Orson Pratt addresses the key argument was the mechanism for the organization of matter. He believed that matter was capable of different types of organizations and these types of matter would have different relationships to one another. The first type of matter we know of <b>baryon matter</b>. These are stable <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hadron">hadrons</a>, quarks bound together, organized in the way we typically think of matter organized. This is the structure you heard all your life, protons and neutrons forming a nucleus with a negative charged electrons bound to them, forming molecular bonds via. chemical reactions. This idea was just becoming understood during the period Pratt wrote on materialism. Since he's died he have a bunch of examples of differently organized matter that we know of.<br />
<div><br />
</div>Of course in theory, we could imagine a situation with a negative charged nucleus and positive charged particles bound. This is called <b>antimatter</b>, or anti-baryons. This is exactly the same as traditional matter but with quarks who have reverse "spin". This can be created in low energy situations because, certain types of traditional matter radioactive isotopes produce anti-matter (anti-baryon) emission during radioactive decay, which is how a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Positron_emission_tomography">PETscan</a> works.<br />
<div><br />
</div>Additionally we have found a virtual zoo of <b>short lived hadrons</b>. These are combinations of quarks that are fundamentally unstable. A far far greater number of organizations of matter then we had previous thought possible. In a dimension or an environment where certain physical constants were altered our traditional forms of matter (baryons) protons, neutrons, electrons...would be unstable and these other hadrons would be stable. <br />
<br />
More recently we have discovered <b>dark matter</b>. This is a type of matter that we are able to detect by gravitational lensing and other effects but doesn't seem to exhibit any chemical or nuclear properties. Because of this it;s rather difficult to study but we can construct on paper a possible candidate the neutralino, but so far mostly haven't been able to prove or disprove this model. What is interesting from Orson's perspective is if true dark matter only lightly interacts with traditional matter proving that matter can exist, can interact and can be virtually undetectable. <br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4b/DarkMatterPie.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="244" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4b/DarkMatterPie.jpg" width="509" /></a></div>Another organization that is still rather speculative is <b>dark energy</b>. This is still theoretical and we don't have widely accepted models but it appears that dark energy exhibits a collective effect in large quantities and makes up most of the mass/energy of the universe. <br />
<br />
So in short Orson Pratt proposed a type of organization of matter, he called spirit which is capable of some sort of reaction with baryons but isn't itself baryon. The existence of such types of organizations of matter is now proven, and it appears there are plethora of examples. <br />
<br />
Now to end on an apologetic note, there is frequently a claim that Mormons believe God lives with his spirit children on a planet called Kolob. Dark matter passes right through planets, as does dark energy. Further a planet effects you because you have mass, and spirit matter doesn't have mass or at least not much mass, thus no gravitational effects. If it did dead bodies would weigh less than living ones. That is most of these different organizations or matter have vastly different properties a "planet" in the conventional sense would mean nothing to them, they wouldn't even "know it was there". They would be stabilized / organized by entirely different sorts of structures. So I think Mormons are absolutely correct to object. <br />
<br />
What is interesting though is that Joseph Smith seems to have hinted at a solution in <a href="http://lds.org/scriptures/pgp/abr/3?lang=eng">Abraham 3</a> where he does describe Kolob. He describes it as exhibiting properties both of a star and a planet. He also mentions one other curious property that time passes on Kolob at a rate of 1 day for every 1000 years on earth. Taking this far more literally than Joseph Smith intended gives us some intriguing possibilities:<br />
<ol><li>Doing the math, sqrt(1-1/<over>365250)</over> yields that Kolob moves at 99.99986% of the speed of light relative to earth. Galaxies move faster from us the further away they are. If that held up we could imagine Kolob as extremely far away. But we have no evidence anything that far away exists and our theories about the size of the universe would be contradicted if it did. Though, many Mormons do believe in an <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chaotic_Inflation_theory">inflationary multiverse</a> and this sort of speed is fully consistent with that view.</li>
<li>If it were an object in the known universe just moving that fast it would have all sorts of weird properties whenever it came in contact with anything from our universe moving in sync with known galaxies. At those sorts of high energies relativistic masses are enormous for even extremely lite objects. That still wouldn't allow for unusual organizations of matter, but it would allow for what would highly unusual during "slow down". </li>
<li> The second possibility is this slowdown is caused by relativistic gravity, and the only place there would that much gravity is inside the event horizon of a black hole. And of course black holes are one of the areas where the rules of quantum mechanics overwhelm classical constant and all sorts of bizarre organizations of matter are possible. If we assume that Abraham really was a vision I could imagine someone in the 1840s being at a loss for how to describe events within the confines of a blackhole, somewhere between a planet and a star. If we imagine spirits to be interacting with things near the event horizon that can escape, again we get unusual organization of matter there are immense amounts of heat energy available, billions of times what's available in the core of a normal star, which produce all sorts of quantum effects this is the theory of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hawking_radiation">Hawking radiation</a>. In many ways that would meet all the criteria that Orson Pratt described. </li>
<li>Of course there are things like other dimensions. via super strings which have a different organization of matter, because there would be different physics constant and have the possibility of affecting baryon matter. Assuming Orson Pratt were right, this is likely the most promising. </li>
</ol><div>In short the theory has held up rather well, and the idea that Mormons believe in a "planet" in the traditional sense is just unsupportable. The term is being used in the sense of the book of Abraham not in the sense of a large rock circling a sun. <br />
<br />
_________<br />
<br />
See also<br />
<ul><li>Mormon metaphysics has discussed these topics <a href="http://www.libertypages.com/clark/">old blog</a>, <a href="http://www.libertypages.com/cgw/">new blog</a></li>
</ul></div>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com38tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-56899051030856431392011-07-11T17:55:00.016-06:002013-02-27T11:27:34.407-05:00Mormonism as Hermetic Christianity (part 3)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-j7HdWip52vA/Thr_r6ssDMI/AAAAAAAAAXQ/kxuDd-qA07M/s1600/220px-JosephSmithTranslating.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-j7HdWip52vA/Thr_r6ssDMI/AAAAAAAAAXQ/kxuDd-qA07M/s320/220px-JosephSmithTranslating.jpg" width="203" /></a></div>
This is 3rd part where I finally address Mormonism more directly for background on Hermetic Christianity: <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/mormonism-as-hermetic-christianity-part.html">Part1</a> <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/mormonism-as-hermetic-christianity-part_07.html">Part2</a>. The idea that early Mormonism was Hermetic is not original to me. The best known sources on this are (and they wrote in this order):<br />
<ul>
<li><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/D._Michael_Quinn">D. Michael Quinn</a> : Early Mormonism and the Magic World View (Revised and Expanded Edition) (<a href="http://www.amazon.com/Early-Mormonism-Magic-World-View/dp/1560850892">link to Amazon</a>). (<a href="http://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=/byustudies&CISOPTR=4358&CISOSHOW=4351">4 hostile reviews from BYU studies)</a></li>
<li>The Refiner's Fire: The Making of Mormon Cosmology, 1644-1844 By John L. Brooke (<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=eyvftt-1F_kC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false">link to preview</a>). </li>
<li>Essays: <a href="http://www2.blogger.com/goog_72747557">Joseph Smith: </a><a href="http://www.gnosis.org/ahp.htm">America's Hermetic Prophet</a>, <a href="http://www2.blogger.com/goog_72747561">Joseph Smith and Kabbalah:</a> <a href="http://www.gnosis.org/jskabb1.htm">The Occult Connection</a> by Lance S Owens.</li>
</ul>
In fact it is so blatantly obvious as to be almost indisputable: Divining Rods, Treasure Digging, and Seer Stones; Ritual Magic, Astrology, Talismans (Jupiter talisman); Magic Parchments and Occult Mentors, magic dagger (Mars dagger)....<br />
<br />
<a href="http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/King_Follett_Discourse">The King Follet Discourse</a> itself presents a thoroughly Hermetic Christianity.<br />
<ul>
<li>The eternal nature of man</li>
<li>The Doctrine of heavenly councils</li>
<li>The Plurality of Gods</li>
<li>Deification of Saints (theopoiesis or theosis)</li>
<li>Temple ordinances </li>
<li>The Celestial Kingdom</li>
</ul>
Mormons often bristle at the mention of magic, "occult" and "magick" are loaded terms. Magick is used in a Christian context to be supernatural activities that the religion either doesn't believe in or doesn't support; which tautologically wouldn't apply here. Occult is generally used to mean non-Christian religious activity / form of worship, which again wouldn't apply. "Religious rite" would be a positive term. If one believes the Eucharistic celebration, baptism, efficiency of prayer, reconciliation by confession, marriage, laying of hands / conferring of holy orders, anointing the sick are all magick actives. They all rely on "as above, so below", they all assert that via. material manipulations supernatural events can be induced. Without this core belief religion is reduced to a gathering of an ethical society, so really what distinguished the Mormon church was that it was re-introducing older rites back into a mainstream faith, that is doing precisely what it had always claimed to be doing restoring the church. <br />
<br />
It is worth pointing out that Evangelical Christianity, rejects completely the notion of sacraments instead often asserting that there rituals are merely "ordinances", demonstrations of faith that have no supernatural effects what-so-ever. They can often be quite inconsistent in this view, but not withstanding Protestantism has been moving away from even the sacramental theology of Catholicism for its entire history. Such an ideology is needless to say hostile to introductions of more religious rites, and especially claims that such rites are claimed to be efficacious. There is no getting around this core disagreement between the Mormon church and Evangelical churches, but it is worth pointing out the core disagreement would be equally strong with the Catholic church. Phillip Lee's <a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=nMz3pyJvEqsC&printsec=frontcover&dq=phillip+lee+against+the+protestant+gnostics&hl=en&src=bmrr&ei=IikbTtiJA5Kn0AHOu9mWBQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCsQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false">Against the Protestant Gnostics</a>, points out that generation by generation modern Protestants adopt point after point after point of the Gnostic positions on where they disagreed with the Orthodox. There is no question that Gnosticism and Hermeticism looked at the world in fundamentally different ways, and still do today. <br />
<br />
The 2nd generation of Mormons extended these ideas. Orson Pratt argued that all life, including vegetable life was infused with celestial spirit. Brigham Young asserted the divinity of Adam. God himself was viewed as interacting with the universe Hermetically:<br />
<blockquote>
<i>Universal Matter Is Indestructible. Matter is eternal, that is, everlasting. Whether the various forms of matter may be converted one into the other, is not definitely known. Any such conversion would, however, leave the total quantity of matter unchanged. God, the supreme Power, can not conceivably originate matter; he can only organize matter. Neither can he destroy matter. <b>God is the Master, who, because of his great knowledge, knows how to use the elements, already existing, for the building of whatever he may have in mind.</b> The doctrine that God made the earth or man from nothing becomes, therefore, an absurdity. The doctrine of the indestructibility of matter makes possible much theological reasoning that would be impossible without this doctrine.</i> John Andreas Widtsoe, Rational theology as taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints </blockquote>
and from this comes the a Hermetic doctrine of salvation:<br />
<blockquote>
<i>Self-effort, the conscious operation of will, has moved man onward to his present high degree. However, while all progress is due to self-effort, other beings of power may contribute largely to the ease of man's growth. God, standing alone, cannot conceivably possess the power that may come to him if the hosts of other advancing and increasing workers labor in harmony with him. Therefore, because of his love for his children and his desire to continue in the way of even greater growth, <b>he proceeded to aid others in their onward progress</b>.</i> John Andreas Widtsoe, Rational theology as taught by the Church of Jesus Christ of latter-day saints</blockquote>
So the 2nd generation was continuing the themes of Joseph Smith's work, divinity of Adam is implied in Doctrine and Covenants <a href="http://classic.scriptures.lds.org/en/dc/27/11a">27:11;</a> <a href="http://classic.scriptures.lds.org/en/dc/116/1a">116:1</a>; <a href="http://classic.scriptures.lds.org/en/dc/138/38a">138:38</a>, but made explicit in 1852. Now its interesting this is the same time that polygamy becomes institutionalized. That is, if we look at the Joseph Smith, Joseph and possibly a small number of leaders practice plural marriage, and often this involves little more than having sex with multiple woman as they continue to reside with their previous husbands. Sect leaders acting as "alpha males" and having sex with multiple female members is not out of the ordinary. Other leaders like Brigham Young are marrying widows who would be unlikely to find new husbands, essentially he seems to be primary funding and modeling a social security program. <br />
<br />
What is out of the ordinary is the polygamy that starts in 1852, here you have 20-33% of the men in the church having 2 and quite often more wives. Humans produce male and female children in roughly equal numbers, polygamous households would create a massive shortage of marriageable women. I can see only 4 possibilities for how this would play out in practice:<br />
<br />
<ol>
<li>There is a wide age discrepancy men and their wives, men marry late women early. The problem with this scenario is that it creates a large number of middle aged widows, who naturally do not wish to remain chaste for life and a large number of men who until their 30s are getting their sexual activity elsewhere. This is basically the situation in the high middle ages, which I described in <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2007/08/defense-against-patriarchy-part-5.html">a defense against patriarchy part 5</a>. We see no signs of this, in fact the whole reason Joseph is marrying women is because the church is so firmly opposed to extra marital sex. </li>
<li>Same sort of age discrepancy as the first situation but with a small number of women with a large number of male lovers, essentially a prostitution culture. Again, given the opposition to extra marital sex this is unlikely. We have no record of anything like this.</li>
<li>Effective polyandry. That would be a situation where the head of household marries a woman and shares him with his sons until they are old enough to establish their own households. This is not an uncommon human sexual arrangement, for example it is the norm still in Tibet (though in this case brothers share). But, there is 0 evidence for it being the norm in 1850s Utah. </li>
<li>There was an over abundance of women. Given the Mormons were actively engaging in missions, if say 70+% of the recruits were female and they were losing even a small number of missionaries to apostasy, this would create a huge imbalance. </li>
</ol>
So if for a moment we assume (4) is what actually was the case, we see immediately the problem. The women recruits need to be fed and housed. One could have large numbers of women living in sort of convent setup, or amply opportunity for women to work and live alone. But given a gender imbalance new recruits might not have an opportunity to marry, and whether they did or didn't without widespread polygamy the culture would have had a large number of sexually available women, creating lots of extra marital sex. So an ethical way to handle that would by polygamy. And if you ask what sorts of women would have been attracted to a Hermetic faith, the budding Spiritualist movement comes immediately to mind. Young women from conservative backgrounds unhappy with their strict lifeless churches, would easily be drawn into the affirming Mormon faith of the 1850s. Moreover polygamy effectively creates a situation of a male head of household and a large number of women in a relationship of sisterhood, and a desire for female bonding and not the isolation of 1850s middle class America drew in a lot of the Spiritualists and drew them away from Congregationalist, Presbyterian, Anglican... churches.<br />
<br />
So the 2nd generation of Mormon leaders had a membership that was primarily composed of either the the children of the religious radicals that had followed Joseph in Kirtland, in Zion in Nauvoo or Spiritualist female converts. Every step Brigham Young took towards Hermetic Christianity would have been met with strong approval. The goal was integration and maintaining them within the church authority, "ministrations for the salvation and exaltation of the world can only be obtained by one holding the keys of the oracles of God, as a medium through which the living can hear from the dead." (Journal of Discourses, , 1:36, 1855). Brigham Young said:<br />
<blockquote>
<i>"You are right," say I. Yes, we belong to that higher order of Spiritualism; our revelations are from above, yours from beneath. This is the difference. We receive revelation from Heaven, you receive your revelations from every foul spirit that has departed this life, and gone out of bodies of robbers, murderers, highwaymen, drunkards, thieves, liars and every kind of debauched character, whose spirits are floating a round here, and searching and seeking whom they can destroy; for they are the servants of the devil, and they are permitted to come now to reveal to the people. . . . That is the difference between the two spiritual systems—yes, this is the higher order of spiritualism, to be led, governed and controlled by law, and that, too, the law of heaven that governs and controls the Gods and the angels. </i>(Brigham Young, "The Word of Wisdom—Spiritualism," JD 13:274-83, 281)</blockquote>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-p6XV19ztI9U/Ths64Okd1eI/AAAAAAAAAXY/I6DU8rClYaU/s1600/sunstone.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="242" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-p6XV19ztI9U/Ths64Okd1eI/AAAAAAAAAXY/I6DU8rClYaU/s320/sunstone.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
But in the 3rd generation this completely shifts. We can see this immediate by looking at the temples. First generation temples like Nauvoo are loaded with Hermetic symbolism, the image on the left is a "sunstone" known to occultists as the symbol for Ba'al. <br />
<br />
Second generation temples are simlarly Hermetic, Salt Lake City for examples has: Earthstones, Moonstones, Sunstones, Cloudstones, Starstones, a representation of the big dipper, clasping hands, all-seeing eye (the most fameous Hermetic symbol derived from the eye of Horus, from eye of Ra and before that the eye hieroglyph of the goddess Wadjet). <br />
<br />
Third generation temples feature geometric shapes in a sort of toned down art deco style. The art is so de-personel except for a few details like the baptistry could be mosques. <br />
<br />
Religiously a neo-orthodoxy starts which emphasizes the atonement of Jesus rather than traditional Mormon teachings. And moreover there is almost no progression towards Hermeticism. Mormons stop in this generation and from the 1950s outright reverse course. I suspect there are 3 reasons for this:<br />
<ol>
<li>The church is no longer being led by religious radicals, but rather conservatives. The leaders the 1880 church are not the sort of men who would have joined with a wild young prophet in Kirtland, even missionary efforts start to fall off. </li>
<li>The membership is 4th generation and Mormons don't want the struggles of being outside the mainstream.</li>
<li>The changes in Spiritualism have made Spiritualist bad recruits and at the same time Mainline Christianity is amenable to restoration. So the church needs to emphasize its similarities with mainline Christianity. </li>
<li>The Spiritualism inside the church is becoming more threatening to the Mormon faith. </li>
</ol>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
(1) and (2) are frequently discussed. And its important to understand the the 3rd generation of leadership was acting broadly in line with these goals:<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>The abolition of Christian Socialism. Mormons would no longer have a closed economy but engage the larder American economy. </li>
<li>A generation later Mormons would abandon the People's Party (the Mormon party in Utah) and instead become Republicans and Democrats.</li>
<li>Polygamy was abandoned.</li>
<li>Rather than wanting distance from the American government the Mormon church worked hard to address the issues preventing Utah from becoming a state. </li>
</ul>
<br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OQYE5OseDdk/Tht76MFbX4I/AAAAAAAAAXg/gBT-wxz39io/s1600/Crucified%2Bdionysus.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-OQYE5OseDdk/Tht76MFbX4I/AAAAAAAAAXg/gBT-wxz39io/s320/Crucified%2Bdionysus.png" width="210" /></a><br />
But (3) and (4) have not been raised, and I think it gives insight into why the Mormon church is becoming more mainstream. In 1877 Helena Petrovna Blavatsky bursts onto the religious scene with the immensely popular and influential <a href="http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/isis/iu-hp.htm">Isis Unveiled</a>. Isis Unveiled, transformed Hermetic Christianity and the spiritual movement. Up until then the movement had seen itself as restoring a better form of Christianity, peeling off layer after layer of dead traditions that pulled one away from the simple pure message of Jesus. Blavatsky threw down the gauntlet, the picture you see to the right is not Jesus, its Dionysus from hundreds of years before Christianity emerged. As we talked about briefly in the first part, Jesus emerged from dying reborn gods: Hermes Trismegistus and Sophia. Behind them stand: Adonis, Tammuz, Amun-Mir, Attis and back another layer Horus, the son of Isis, Isis unveiled as the mother of all faiths. <br />
<br />
The problem for restorationist Christianity is the layers are the onion. Everything is pagan if you go back far enough, religious debates are more than anything else about which pagan gods to follow in their modern forms. I suspect the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, like all Hermitic Christians, were shook by Blavatsky. I think the 3rd generation of church leaders, saw where their fellow travelers a few steps ahead had gone and lost their nerve, they began to doubt in a truly profound way Joseph Smith's vision in 1820 and where it led, and froze in their tracks. And from there started to regress slowly back to the Evangelical mainstream. <br />
<br />
Moreover just as the dynamics of missionary activity and membership had encouraged the 2nd generation in building towards Joseph's vision the dynamics of the Isis Unveiled moved things in the opposite direction. The new Spiritualists stopped being Hermetic and became Gnostic with groups like Theosophy and Christian Science being the mainstream. Gnosticism, with its deep suspicion of any temporal leadership especially religious leadership and its profound individualism would have run counter to everything the church would desire in recruits. Spiritualists from the late 1870s on, would have been terrible missionary candidates, very difficult to integrate after their baptism. Finally, because the church had recruited heavily among Spiritualists it had deep problems in preventing this new anti-authoritarian Spiritualism from infecting the church. Quite simply the bridge no longer served its purpose. <br />
<br />
At the same time, mainstream Christianity was itself going through a quest for Christian primitivism. What would become Liberal Christianity was fermenting in every mainstream denomination. The idea that the creeds were an artificial barrier to understanding the scriptures, was no longer a radical idea. Moreover, a critique that the bible was not the inerrant word of God, but rather an inaccurately transmitted creation of church was becoming more mainstream. Why go after a niche when the broader public was available?<br />
<br />
The next hundred years would be a time of the LDS more and more and more integrating into the mainstream of America and trying to make the Mormon faith seem absolutely mainstream. But the membership appears to not share that goal and has held on to the revelations of Joseph Smith and Brigham Young. When McConkie's Mormon Doctrine was pulled Sandra Tanner commented on the radio (<a href="http://mormonmatters.org/2010/05/20/the-death-of-mcconkies-mormon-doctrine/">link</a>)<br />
<blockquote>
<i>I believe the main reason McConkie’s “Mormon Doctrine” was taken out of print was due to its candid discussion of LDS doctrines that the church is now trying to hide. Such teachings as God once being a man, his wife–Heavenly Mother, and Jesus being the literal, physical son of God are just a few of the doctrines that are being minimized in current manuals. If the LDS Church felt “Mormon Doctrine” presented a faulty compilation of their doctrines, why haven’t they issued an authorized compendium of their beliefs? Mormons often say to me, “That’s not official doctrine” as though there was some place to look up the official teachings. Where is the official systematic theology of Mormonism?</i></blockquote>
And that leads us to where we are today. A church leadership intent on mainstreaming a radical form of Christianity. A constant tug of war between the goals of restoration of the primitive church, and a desire to acceptance. Arguably repeating the very mistakes that led to the great apostasy (see part 2 on the orignal death of Hermetic Christianity).<br />
____<br />
<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">
I hope this argument proves for both Evangelicals and Mormons that Hermetic Christian offers a compromise meeting the goals I set out in the first part of this essay. Now I'd like to comment on why its something Mormons should enthusiastically embrace:</div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Wx1T6Zh2KOM/ThZ-QfSHPTI/AAAAAAAAAWo/1ujnsQB6jzk/s1600/ladygagahandoffatimamannequin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="307" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Wx1T6Zh2KOM/ThZ-QfSHPTI/AAAAAAAAAWo/1ujnsQB6jzk/s320/ladygagahandoffatimamannequin.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
Lady Gaga, the number one entertainer in the world, has built an empire on the emotional and intellectual draw of Hermetic imagery. Its not just her presentation its her content. The video for <a href="http://youtu.be/qrO4YZeyl0I">Bad Romance</a> is a phenomenal exposition of what Mormons would call the estates of progression and atonement. Like Song of Songs it uses sex as a metaphor, for the relationship with God, which generally makes conservatives uncomfortable, though Mormons I suspect less so given a theology in which God is a father in a more literal sense. I'd challenge any Mormon to watch the video, which opens with the scratched star (<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Bi2uBqfLt_c/Tew68uJ69ZI/AAAAAAAAAYw/YDlNiUJkZDQ/s1600/StarWashingtonDCTemple.jpg">link to this symbol from the DC temple</a>), moves right on to birth in spirit vs. birth in flesh, talking in the mirror reflecting the relationship between spirit and flesh in prayer, birth in water (Eve) in innocence...her flashing the all-seeing eye and not see obvious material for a dozen sermons? What other church with millions of members and a missionary culture has a symbology tied to their theology that incorporates this symbolism? Who else can explain in a Christian context what those visuals mean? This is a slow-ball they should have been able to hit out of the park. <br />
<br />
And this video isn't uniquely rich. <a href="http://youtu.be/wagn8Wrmzuc">Judas</a> presents salvation where the Lady Gaga character rejects Jesus choosing Judas instead fails to be saved and becomes the Whore of Babylon in Revelations. Just about any Christian could present the theology in those verses but only the Mormon and Catholic churches have a semiotics rich enough to explore the accompanying visuals, and the Catholic church lacks a missionary culture. I'm not suggesting a theology book based on Lady Gaga for Mormons, I suspect the amount skin shown makes her a problematic source, but rather the fact that the number one musical act to come along in a long time is preaching their message and they won't take advantage is depressing. <br />
<br />
Mormons are gong to have a culture conflict with any modern Hermetic Christianity. But putting the problems aside, we live in a a time when youth are losing all interest in churches and retention is terrible, there is one major church in the United States and possibly the world with the resources, missionary culture, understanding and theology to fill this gap, a desire to relate to God expressed Hermetically. The Mormon church has the ace of trump for the millennial generation. But as we discussed above over the last 100 years rather than embrace their Hermetic aspects the Mormon church has been losing their distinctives: these videos are the temple imagery acted out. <br />
<br />
The Mormon church was founded by a man with no official station who used divination to arrive at new revelations and understandings of the scriptures. Was that a legitimate activity? The church still claims prophetic powers, though rarely uses them. Judaism, Islam and Orthodox Christianity all claim the time of revelation is over and now all we can do is study the existing revelations and draw meanings. Christian mysticism allows for personal insights but argues that drawing doctrinal conclusions is illegitimate. In the 21st century does the Mormon church want to be the sort of place it was in the 19th century or the sort of place the 19th century Mormons were fleeing? <br />
<br />
Back in the 1950s there was a move within the Seventh Day Adventist church to eliminate the few remaining distinctives that prevented them from being seen as orthodox, to join the Evangelical mainstream. The book <a href="http://www.sdanet.org/atissue/books/qod/">Questions on Doctrine</a>, was a series of answers to questions that toned down Adventist beliefs, getting them to just barely qualify. In their case it was being driven by their academics who wanted to be able to speak and not just attend Evangelical conferences. The Adventist membership reacted strongly, in their mind if they had wanted to join an Evangelical church they would have. And today I still don't see 7th Day Adventists invited to Evangelical conferences as speakers, Evangelicals still detest Ellen White. <br />
<br />
For the Mormons, they could throw out 90% of their distinctives and still not be where the Adventists were in the 1950s. Ellen White wrote commentaries about the bible, Joseph Smith wrote (translated) his own bible. Ellen White shifted the theological focus of salvation from Romans to Hebrews with its heavenly sanctuary, Brigham Young redefined heaven. The unique characteristics of the Mormon church are what make it so special. The Mormon church should play to its plentiful strengths, it should happily identify as Hermetic Christians. <br />
<br />
_____<br />
<br />
<b>See also</b>:<br />
<ul>
<li>An article by the Maxwell institue critical of Owens research: (<a href="http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/review/?vol=8&num=2&id=229">link</a>)</li>
<li>A Catholic / Mormon dialogue on Lance Owen's paper (<a href="http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2005/03/dialogue-with-mormon-apologist-on.html">part1,</a> <a href="http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2005/03/dialogue-with-mormon-apologist-on_17.html">part2</a>)</li>
<li><a href="http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/books/?bookid=103&chapid=1155">One Eternal Round the Hermetic Vision</a>, an article by Hugh Nibley (very well regarded Mormon theologian) on the Hermetic / Mormon comparison and connection. </li>
<li>A hostile but insightful article from James White where he talks about this tension (<a href="http://www.aomin.org/aoblog/index.php?itemid=4576&catid=5">link to 1st</a> of <a href="http://danielomcclellan.wordpress.com/2011/05/16/responding-to-james-white-part-6/">10 parts</a>)</li>
<li><a href="http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/review/?vol=6&num=2&id=151">Review of Refiner's Fire</a> by BYU professors: Daniel C. Peterson, William J. Hamblin, and George L. Mitton. A hostile apologetic arguing for supernatural origins of Mormonism vs. Brooke's theory of natural origins. </li>
<li><a href="http://content.lib.utah.edu/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=/dialogue&CISOPTR=16574&REC=16">Joseph Smith, The Gift of Seeing</a>, a discussion about the use of seer stones</li>
<li>The best seller <a href="http://www.paganchristianity.org/">Pagan Christianity</a> by Barna and Viola, and the house church movement show that the language or restoration, the goal is shared, the language is frequently used.</li>
<li><a href="http://www.boap.org/LDS/Parallel/1844/7Apr44.html">Parallel versions of the King Follet Discourse</a></li>
<li>Michael Homer <a href="http://www.dialoguejournal.com/wp-content/uploads/sbi/articles/Dialogue_V27N01_183.pdf">Spiritualism and Mormonism: Some Thoughts on Similarities and Differences</a></li>
<li>Some original <a href="http://contentdm.lib.byu.edu/cdm4/document.php?CISOROOT=/JournalOfDiscourses3&CISOPTR=9599">sermons on Spirit rapping</a> from the Journal of Discourses </li>
<li>In the 1860s a Spiritualist faction broke off from the Mormon church, primarily over political issues called the Godbeite movement. <a href="http://www.media.utah.edu/UHE/g/GODBEITES.html">Short introduction</a>, <a href="http://www.yorgalily.org/~yorgasor/church/ComprehensiveHistoryOfTheChurch/hc5.html">detailed context</a>.</li>
<li>The accusations tying Mormonism directly to demonic occult activities are common and unfounded. Here is an example of a <a href="http://utlm.org/newsletters/no65.htm">refutation of a specific accusation</a>, refuted by an anti-Mormon evangelical missionary, showing that the borrowing went in the reverse direction (Mormon to Wiccan not visa versa). </li>
<li>A <a href="http://www.booktalk.org/christ-in-egypt-the-horus-jesus-connection-by-d-m-murdock-f180.html">discussion on booktalk</a>, that's just started about Christ in Egypt which is sort of a modern version of Isis Unveiled.</li>
<li><a href="http://signaturebookslibrary.org/?p=3775">Mormon neo-Orthodoxy Chapter 5</a>, a discussion of the movement within Mormonism to make it compatible with Pauline theology. </li>
<li>A discussion of polygamy and lesbianism between sister wives at the start of <a href="http://connellodonovan.com/abom.html">A Revised History of Homosexuality & Mormonism, 1840-1980</a>.</li>
</ul>
CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com36tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-70558106154380598372011-07-09T23:48:00.007-06:002012-02-02T08:10:05.313-05:00C. J. Mahaney stepping down<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-VtKOPM077E8/Thp7v98Ii2I/AAAAAAAAAXI/uuZPReXFW_Y/s1600/CJ_Headshot.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="200" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-VtKOPM077E8/Thp7v98Ii2I/AAAAAAAAAXI/uuZPReXFW_Y/s320/CJ_Headshot.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>I've posted twice before regarding SGM <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2008/01/sovereign-grace-ministries.html">Sovereign Grace Ministries</a> which was a look at structural problems in their discipline process and <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2008/04/sovereign-grace-ministries-use-of.html">Sovereign Grace Ministries' use of demotivational methods</a> which was a particular abusive technique they made heavy use of which was a distinctive. The leader of SGM <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._J._Mahaney">C. J. Mahaney</a> is stepping down. <a href="http://www.sovereigngraceministries.org/blogs/cj-mahaney/post/2011/07/06/Why-Im-taking-a-leave-of-absence.aspx">Note on his blog</a>, <a href="http://www.sovereigngraceministries.org/blogs/sgm/post/A-note-on-CJ-Mahaneys-leave-of-absence.aspx">note from the board</a>, <a href="http://www.scribd.com/sgmwikileaks">leaked documents regarding the dispute</a>. C.J. heads up <a href="http://t4g.org/">Together for the Gospel</a>, and is bringing in his friends from that organization to guide him during his stepping down.<br />
<br />
I'd like to congratulate the people at the various SGM blogs: <a href="http://sgmsurvivors.com/">SGM Survivors</a>, <a href="http://sgmrefuge.com/">SGM Refuge,</a> <a href="http://spiritualtyranny.com/">Spiritual Tyranny</a>, <a href="http://thewartburgwatch.com/">Wartburg Watch</a>, <a href="http://sguncensored.blogspot.com/">SGM Uncensored</a> . Mahaney has been a major leader in the whole <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Calvinism">New Calvinism</a> movement. So far the issues being discussed are internal problems regarding Mahaney creating problems with other pastors, rather than the more widespread longstanding pattern of abuse of membership. Its the authoritarian culture that's the problem, Mahaney, as dictators go is not unusually bad. Part of being a dictator is terrorizing or at least intimidating those around you, that's the job. If you don't like the behavior don't create authoritarian structures that necessitate it. <br />
<br />
So the doctrinal and structural problems remain. But what has changed is the problems are being widely talked about on the web. When Joshua Harris rereleased Boy meets Girl the fact that 2 of the couples in his previous edition were getting divorced was public knowledge. Stories about church facilitated sexual abuses have leaked. Stories about embezzlement have leaked. Stories about wrongful terminations, ruined marriages, and how miserable so many women are in SGM have leaked. SGM is not able to act in secrecy anymore and the blogs above, and several others that were active over the last few years are responsible. <br />
<br />
I don't have much to say other than this was an important step in people banding together to try and prevent the sorts of rampant abuses in authoritarian churches. And the offer I made to Josh Harris 3 years ago remains open. If SGM wants to start trying to build structures to stop abuses rather than to facilitate them I'd love to engage in constructive conversation.<br />
<br />
<br />
____<br />
<br />
Post Script (Feb 2, 2012)<br />
<br />
It appears that way these allegations were handled was to create a biased board that investigated it and exonerate C.J. Mahaney. The results are still not published, but the underlying facts to present Mahaney as having threatened someone to keep them silent years ago. I'm not sure what is going to ever get published but I'll update here as more information becomes available:<br />
<br />
<br />
<ul><li><a href="http://www.sgmsurvivors.com/?p=3304">Response to SGM panal report from Larry Tomczak</a></li>
</ul><br />
____<br />
<b>See also:</b><br />
<ul><li><a href="http://blogs.courier-journal.com/faith/2011/07/12/mohler-backs-mahaney-dismisses-accusations-of-abusive-leadership/">Al Mohler dismisses documents regarding Mahaney and abuse.</a> </li>
</ul>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com29tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-15093467804427259992011-07-07T15:40:00.004-06:002011-08-04T05:52:32.440-06:00Mormonism as Hermetic Christianity (part 2)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CcYM1KZSTjY/ThXqVABliBI/AAAAAAAAAWg/UxZM40sOd6k/s1600/delacroix_faust2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CcYM1KZSTjY/ThXqVABliBI/AAAAAAAAAWg/UxZM40sOd6k/s320/delacroix_faust2.jpg" width="248" /></a></div>We take up our story where <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/mormonism-as-hermetic-christianity-part.html">part 1</a> ended in the middle of the 2nd century with a spectrum between Hermetic Christianity and Gnostic Christianity with Orthodox Christianity choosing between them. Gnosticism and (proto-)Catholicism fought throughout the 2nd and 3rd centuries for control of the Christian narrative. Hermetic Christianity conversely submitted to the discipline of the Church. The Church didn't persecute Hermetics within its body, the study of magick and science while mostly discouraged was not seen as a major threat. Even additional religious rites weren't seen as a major threat since the people performing them and the people receiving them identified them as part of Catholic church and submitted to the discipline of the Church on the issue of rites. That is 2nd and 3rd century Hermetic Christianity was mostly a movement within the Catholic Church, while 2nd and 3rd century Gnostic Christianity was mostly a movement alongside it. <br />
<br />
And this friendly relationship meant that on the key points of debate in 3rd century Christianity the Catholics adopted many of the Hermetic viewpoint. Sacraments are, in keeping with Hermetic Christianity, not representations of supernatural events but rather earthly processes by which supernatural events occur, "as above so below". For a Catholic, the Eucharistic celebration involves a magick transformation of the host and eating the actual physical cracker in and of itself induces a supernatural change, "<i>the mind is filled with grace, and a pledge of future glory is given to us</i>." (see <a href="http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/paul_vi/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-vi_enc_03091965_mysterium_en.html">Mysterium Fidei</a>, for the official doctrines). And one sees the same thing in the LDS, ordinances, their word more-or-less for sacraments, are actual requirements for exaltation (the good thing you are aiming for in the Mormon faith). And this contrasts completely with the Protestant notion that the Eucharist is an act of prayer and nothing more than a symbolic reenactment, the host/cracker does not in and of itself possess supernatural powers. Philip Lee's<a href="http://books.google.com/books?id=nMz3pyJvEqsC&printsec=frontcover#v=onepage&q&f=false"> Against the Protestant Gnostics</a>, has an excellent discussion of the drift in Protestant thought into essentially agreeing with Gnosticism on almost every point of dispute between Catholics and Gnostics (about 1/3rd of the book is available via. the link). <br />
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Moreover Hermeticism, Hermetic Paganism, was also on friendly terms with Catholic Christianity. Catholics began to view Hermes Trismegistus as a great Egyptian King who had lived in the time of Moses and his wisdom as important and key insights. The Hermetics preached that a proper religion should moderate between pure rationality and pure dogma, that the truth lay in-between those two extremes, was essentially an apologetic for Catholic Christianity as opposed to many of the then contemporary forms of paganism which fell on one side or the other. And so by the end of the 3rd century of any kind of distinct Hermetic Christianity was gone. Hermetic Christians had either become Hermetic leaning Catholics or Hermetic Pagans. Hermeticism itself began absorbing Christian thought because of the friendly dialogue and an offshoot form of 1/2 pagan, 1/2 Christian sect developed, Hermes Christianus which was quite often a way point between conversaion away from paganism to Christianity, a bridge religion. Hermeticism died in the 5th century, along with the rest of paganism. And if we identify Hermetic Christianity as the true Christianity, then this death and absorption of Hermetic Christianity, becomes a plausible historical defensible version of the great apostasy that matches the traditional Mormon timelines. And while it was a peaceful death one wonders if Hermetic Christianity had fought, had beaten Orthodoxy, and become the mainstream faith we would be looking at a Christianity of:<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><ul><li>Sacramental theology especially expressed via. church / temple rituals with a magical flavor.</li>
<li>Legalism.</li>
<li>Diffuse ambiguous theology drawn from a multiplicity of conflicting sources and open acknowledgement of that rather than hiding behind dogmatic assertions.</li>
<li>Monotheism with an underlying polytheism. </li>
<li>Syncretism, an openness to multiple forms of revelation. In particular an open canon. </li>
<li>A desire to engage creation, to improve it, not to escape from it.</li>
<li>A desire to improve and develop one's self. In particular the doctrine of metempsychosis, that human soul is perfected during a series of earthly lives; essentially purgatory on earth. </li>
<li>The idea that salvation is not binary but a degree. </li>
</ul><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Does that not sound like Mormonism?</div><div><br />
</div>Between the 6th and 10th centuries there is almost no hint of Hermetic activity in any existant literature. In the early 11th century Hermeticism has a revival in the European monasteries. And in this revival we see many of the themes that will come to dominate the Enlightenment. These monks believed that because God is the author of the universe, God's makes his will known through his actions on the material universe. Because we have such clear access our primary source of revelation should be natural. In keeping with that belief that God is not silent they felt that today just as in the ancient world we can establish supernatural contact with the spirit realm and achieve revelation (prophecy in Mormonism). Dogma / revelation is a source of knowledge it is not the definition of all that is to be learned. Knowledge of science and magick grants to men new powers and thus new temptations, but these powers even if they appear intrinsically evil can be used for the good. The legend of Faust (<a href="http://www.cummingsstudyguides.net/Faust.html#Faust">link to plot summary</a>), which originated around the same time, is an exploration of exactly these themes in myth. Faust takes knowledge and power from the devil, falls into temptation, but mostly tries and succeeds in doing good with the devil's assistance, and in the end is saved and the devil defeated. <br />
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These monks created a new Latin body of literature from the Greek, Coptic and Aramaic originals making a Corpus of works and collecting them. During the Renaissance collections of Hermetic works began to circulate. Before moving on to to the Renaissance and the Reformation its worth commenting that, Hermetic Christianity as the term is "officially used" does not include the folk religions, even those magical aspects, that existed alongside this rebirth in the Monasteries. Hermetic Christianity, is Egyptian and incorporates Egyptian / Hellenistic notions of magick not the kinds of Germanic magic one sees on the continent. However it would be fair to say that this folk magick was Hermetic in spirit, and perhaps Hermeticism of the highly educated monks was inspired by the folk magick coming from the last remnants of European paganism. <br />
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Hermetica is the term for any Hermetic books. A particular set of translated collections of works, called the <a href="http://www.gnosis.org/library/hermet.htm">Corpus Hermeticum</a>, circulated widely by the end the 15th century. Alexandrian Christianity, with its mixture of ideas from Orthodox Christianity, Egyptian Paganism, Neo-Platonism, Judaism freely drawing from, contrasting and exploring these things fit with the mood of the Renaissance. All of Europe was trying to figure how to intermix their culture with ancient wisdom and here was a model. <br />
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Potentially we could have had a Hermetic reformation, but the Hermetic revival was killed off by two main things. First <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isaac_Casaubon">Isaac Casaubon</a> showed that the Corpus Hermeticum could not possible date to the time of Moses (i.e. the still believed Christian dating for Hermes Trismegistus) but rather to 3rd century Egypt. Secondly the success of science in so many areas caused magick to go out of fashion. And by the early 17th century the Corpus as an inspiration in the mainstream was dead, the Corpus Hermeticum stopped circulating widely and became of interest primarily to scholars. <br />
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However, the Corpus was the only definitive guide to magick that existed in Europe at the time. So while no longer mainstream among European intellectuals the Corpus did remain active starting from the mid 18th century among European occultists. Those people in <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alchemy">alchemy</a> (supernatural transformation of materials) and <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theurgy">theurgy</a> (union with supernatural forces to gain, powers or insights). This existed side by side with 18th century sexual radicals who were interested in sex magick, as John Wilkes put it, "to celebrate woman in wine and adding ideas from the ancients just to make the experience more decadent". And when we talk about Christian Hermeticism today what we generally mean groups that are continuous with the 18th century occultists, and from this arises the cultural problem I alluded to the in first part of this essay. These European occultists, and from the 19th century on their American and Canadian cousins, continued to advance our knowledge of Hermetic literature and have conducted innumerable quality research projects, so today a modern student, even one not interested in magick but just history, is in their debt. <br />
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In the 19th century though the situation was quite different. Occultist studies became popular again with the middle class in Europe in 1845. And the scholarly translations began to recirculate along with a pletora of new materials that had been researched over the preceding century by the occultists. This movement exploded on the American scene as the American spiritualist movement in 1848. The Spiritualist movement was middle class in its orientation and while drawing inspiration from the literature wouldn't associate socially with libertine upper class variety. American Spiritualism in this first generation definitely identified as Christian. They saw themselves as practicing a form of the Christian faith that used supernatural means to gain revelations form the spiritual realm. The defining beliefs were:<br />
<ul><li>Communication with spirits.</li>
<li>The ability for the soul to improve after death.</li>
<li>Legalism and a strong belief in personal responsibility. </li>
<li>Christian language though quite often over various non Orthodox theologies like Pantheism or Gnostic Christianity, </li>
<li>A rejection of a view of God as harsh, sending unbaptized infants to hell. </li>
<li>Political support for abolition and woman's rights. This often led to a rejection of traditional churches that were opposed or ambivalent on these issues. </li>
</ul>Again, 1850s Christian Spiritualism were less radical than the 1880- variety most people are familiar with. Christian Spiritualism sought to enhance Christianity, not repudiate it. Their argument was with the Christian churches, not the Christian God. While Christian Science is a bit radical for what existed at the time it is right sort of model. But like Christian Science today, from a cultural standpoint it was a religion for Protestant woman, women mostly growing up in a Reformed tradition that were unwilling to accept a traditional role of submission and cultural isolation. This massively popular social movement lasted for 3 generations and by the time it was done had transformed every church in America. It is my contention that its influence was particularly felt by the Mormon church, that a huge number of these women in the 1850s joined the Mormon church, a church was already amenable to the ideas of Hermetic Christianity and in doing so moved the Mormon church outside the realm of Charismatic Christianity into a new distinctive form of Hermetic Christianity.<br />
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In the next section we are going to have to back two decades to the 1830s and talk about the development of the Mormon church prior to the arrival of American spiritualism. That the Mormon church was even during the Joseph Smith years leaning heavily in a Hermetic direction, that it already had most of the aspects of Hermetic Christianity already in place. And thus the Mormon church would have been amenable to the theology and attractive as a religious option for American Spiritualists. It's my contention that most of truly distinctive doctrines of the Mormon church that developed under Brigham Young, including the normalization of polygamy and the infinite regression of Gods, can be explained by this wave of converts reinforcing an already existing motif. Between 1850 and 1870 American churches were not in a growth phase in general (<a href="http://www.d11.org/PALMER/social_studies/teachers/schulzki/IB/Progressive%20Era%202008/religion%20in%20America/Turning%20Pews%20Into%20People%20Estimating%2019th%20Century%20Church%20Membership.pdf">link</a>) but the Mormon church grew from around 20,000 to 80,000 persons, even while experiencing persecution. So our 3rd part will concern itself with the history of the Mormon church. <br />
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Link to <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/mormonism-as-hermetic-christianity-part_11.html">part3</a>.CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com47tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-4907816852849053412011-07-05T17:25:00.018-06:002012-04-05T21:45:46.069-05:00Mormonism as Hermetic Christianity (part 1)<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xx0nJoeImNs/ThOaS3X7loI/AAAAAAAAAWY/R9e8NW_sUYA/s1600/hermes_trismegist1.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-xx0nJoeImNs/ThOaS3X7loI/AAAAAAAAAWY/R9e8NW_sUYA/s320/hermes_trismegist1.gif" width="226" /></a></div>I have to admit to being remarkably ignorant about the Mormon religion prior to a few weeks ago. I had always viewed Mormonism as a legalistic branch of Christianity combined with a ridiculous story about Jesus having come to America to preach to American Indians. For all the exotic religions from the ancient world, from the middle ages, from the more recent past, I'd explored I never looked at a faith with 6 million modern day Americans with anything more than a passing glance because I assumed there would be nothing interesting to see. And just recently with one of those passing glances I did a double take. I ran into an internet discussion with a bunch of religious Mormons the kind that don't know what coffee tastes like and were married by 23, using authors from History of Religions in a religious debate, the sort of authors and more importantly concepts that usually only atheists or radical theologians would cite; and the Mormons showed clear signs of having read, understood and at least in some part approving of those books. <br />
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And so I was caught off guard, so I read more and more of the discussions on that board, and saw ideas from <a href="http://www.spiritunited.com/articles/exotericesoteric.htm">esoteric Christianity</a>, what looked to me like ideas from <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosicrucianism">Rosicrucianism</a>, being used casually. A bunch of people who all think George W. Bush was a good president, citing religious ideas that Paul Tillich might think but would figure too radical to speak? This warranted more investigation. And after a few weeks I've come to the conclusion that Morminism is genuinely cool. A truly new American religion, a blend of ingredients I've never seen before. That would be worthy of discussion in and of itself but a month ago if you would have asked me, "what would happen if a Conservative version of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helena_Blavatsky">Helena Blavatsky</a> had set up a mainstream church that grew to millions and thinks it's part of Evangelical Christianity"? I would have considered the question an oxymoron, not even possible enough to warrant discussion, until I looked at <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brigham_young">Brigham Young</a>'s church. I must admit I'm still getting over the idea of KJVonlyists who are to the left of <a href="http://www.fordham.edu/academics/programs_at_fordham_/theology/faculty/elizabeth_a_johnson_/">Elizabeth Johnson</a> on re-imaging God with Holy Mother(s). If you are someone who likes this blog, and haven't looked into Mormonism, I'll stop you right here and say this is religion worth looking at. It is frankly amazing that such a thing even exists much less is a church with million and millions of members, who have been in the church for 5-7 generations plus new recruits. It is shattering many of my assumptions about what is possible. <br />
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Mormons defines itself as a close cousin of Evangelical Christianity Evangelical Christianity defines itself first and foremost in terms of adherence to Protestant doctrines. Protestantism defines itself based on: its definition of scripture, faith defined by creeds, its understanding of grace within a narrow band between Luther and Calvin, a creedal understanding of Christ, and a rejection of sacramental theology. All 5 of which are contradicted by Mormon theology, and contradicted not by a little bit, either. From an evangelical standpoint 7th day Adventists, sit on the border between Christianity and heresy; Jehovah's witnesses while Christian are preaching clear cut heresies and Mormons well is just another religion.The paradox that gets beaten to death on the web is "Is Mormon Christian?" Now the average evangelical who understands something about Mormonism usually responds with some variation of, "What are you kidding?" <br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">Ah but... Mormonism is a very theologically tolerant religion. It takes an open view of relationship between theology and religion, we are not saved by our knowledge of biblical doctrine. Catholicism fought against the ancient alternative forms of Christianity with a: one God, one creed, one Bishop slogan. And while Protestant Christianity has rejected the "one Bishop" in their mind that requires they cling all the more tightly to "one creed". So, is it really fair to use a evangelical standard, or can we possibly come up with some sort of neutral standard? There wouldn't even be a question if Mormonism didn't identify heavily with Evangelical Christianity, but it does, and further culturally and linguistically there are a lot of similarities. It would be hard to imagine someone who didn't take the ties with Evangelical Christianity serious writing an argument or an article like the <a href="http://timesandseasons.org/index.php/2007/07/guest-post-the-apostles-creed-and-the-book-of-mormon">Apostle's creed and the book of Mormon</a>. Self identification is a key criteria, so we should treat it as respectfully as possible. As an aside, the argument about the Apostle's creed IMHO ducks the key issue, most evangelicals are willing to grant that at the time the book of Mormon was authored Joseph Smith was still essentially Christian in his religious views, its the developments after that, the beliefs that are held over and beyond those which are of at this point the largest source of conflict. And this is evidenced by the fact that a more mainstream group than the LDS, a group that rejects the later revelations, The Community of Christ, joined the NCC in 2010 (<a href="http://www.ncccusa.org/witnesses2010/ga2010.nov1011.1.htm">link</a>), without the later revelations there simply is not nearly the same degree of theological hurdles. </div><div><br />
</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">So I actually have something different to say about this never ending debate; a possible compromise on the "is Mormon Christian" debate which:</div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><ol><li>Is historically accurate and is not an abuse of language. </li>
<li>Is supportive of Mormon theology regarding being a restored church. It provides some genuine historical meat to what is otherwise a vague claim, making "we are the re-established, original Christian church" plausible in a genuine historical context, capable of holding up to scrutiny and scholarship. </li>
<li>Is respectful of the theological objections that Catholics and Protestants express towards Mormonism by openly acknowledging their "non-normative" theology. </li>
<li>Offers a plausible theory for how the distinctive aspects of the Mormon faith developed as quickly as they did, and why Mormonism diverged from "normative" Christianity as far as it did under Brigham Young. </li>
</ol><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">What I'm proposing is that we answer the question in the affirmative, Mormonism is a form of Hermetic Christianity, a form of Christianity that coexisted in the ancient world along with Catholic Christianity, and has continued to off and on exist throughout the next two millennia. Before getting into my argument for that answer let me first qualify by saying there are a few problems with this solution. </div><div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><ol><li>The Mormon church is probably over ten-times the size of all the other Hermetic churches worldwide, put together. Mainline or Evangelical Christianity are big enough that the Church of Later Day Saints could be "just another denomination" if grouped with Hermetic Christianity the Mormon church would redefine the entire group.</li>
<li>Culturally they are not a fit. Hermetic Christianity has a 1000 year history of having essentially always been associated with political and/or sexual radicalism. Hermetic Christian churches further have a more limited ecclesiology, they aim to be an activity their members engage in, they make no attempt to form an inter-generational relationship guiding their lives. </li>
<li>Because of (2) above, this doesn't address the core issue in terms of ecumenical dialogue, which is I suspect the main reason Mormons want to identify as Evangelical Christians. The religions themselves travel in different circles. Hermetic Christians groups in today's world along with Gnostic Christianity, form a bridge between the left end of Liberal Christianity and Neopaganism, New Age movement, Spiritualism... Its unlikely the people in those groups know who Al Mohler or John MacArthur even are, much less have a desire for their acceptance. If evangelicals came in contact with Hermetic Churches, while the counter arguments would be different, the level of hostility would likely be almost equally high. </li>
</ol><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qZnBpDkF-gM/ThM_ODMtOyI/AAAAAAAAAWI/m4v9vDqwbQs/s1600/Ankh_Hermes_hanger.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-qZnBpDkF-gM/ThM_ODMtOyI/AAAAAAAAAWI/m4v9vDqwbQs/s320/Ankh_Hermes_hanger.jpg" width="249" /></a></div>So a fairly good case could be made that this article is irrelevant, I'm just ducking the issue. But I think its worth a conversation as a possible compromise. So lets start with a quick discussion about what is <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hermeticism">Hermeticism</a> and Hermetic Christianity. In the ancient world, Hermeticism was a branch of Egyptian paganism created after Alexander the Great, merging the cults of Hermes, the Greek messenger (writing) god, the source of hidden wisdom, and for later Greeks the Logos; and Thoth an Egyptian god, the only begotten son of Ra the high god, who was the teacher of man, the god of writing. <br />
<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-b76GDoZCCuk/ThNCsV_CPfI/AAAAAAAAAWQ/Glke4e2Tv1M/s1600/medicine.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="246" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-b76GDoZCCuk/ThNCsV_CPfI/AAAAAAAAAWQ/Glke4e2Tv1M/s320/medicine.jpg" width="248" /></a> The attraction for both sides was a well developed magick (we'll adopt the Hermetic convention of using magic for a form of stagecraft involving illusion and magick for ritual activities aimed at altering the material world through supernatural means) cult in each of the respective religions. Hermeticism became an international religion, centered in Egypt, focused on creating a synthesis between Platonic philosophy and its religious offshoots with more traditional, religious forms. To left you see pictured the Hermetic symbol, the symbol of Hermes Trismegistus, their merged God which has the the Ankh of Thoth merged with the twin snakes of Hermes. For later Hellenists, Hermes Trismegistus was the Logos who had become incarnate to teach man hidden wisdoms of the high God, including the magick healing i.e. medicine. You can see the obvious derivation with today's modern symbol for medicine, pictured to the right. I'll won't focus on the obvious symbolism of the cross but will (<a href="http://www.seiyaku.com/customs/crosses/coptic.html">link</a>) and mention in the Coptic church even today you can see Ankh crosses, hybrids between the Ankh and the cross and these go back to the 1st century. <br />
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<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;">In many ways this was exactly the goal of Hellenistic Judaism, to create a merger between Jewish ritual and theology with Greek culture and philosophy. This friendly alliance between Hermitics and Hellenistic Jews was strengthened with Julius Caesar's and Mark Anthony's conquest of Egypt. Hermetics rejected Roman rule and got involved political resistance, Jews were fighting the occupation of Judea and Roman customs and laws like circumcision prohibitions; another great friendship forged based on "the enemy of my enemy". This merger is evidence in both the literature and archeology of 1st century Judaism, its from this period that we find a wealth of Jewish magical amulets all over the ancient world using Hermetic incantations modified with Jewish / Babylonian angels rather than Egyptian / Greek names. Jewish Hermeticism sought to reinterpret Hermes Trismegistus with the Logos, the divine word or message reinterpret as Torah (the first 5 books of the old testament), the Word of God in essentially modern usage. Now if we consider the Gospel of Mark for a moment<br />
<ul><li>A long Jewish midrash, a religious biography of a messianic character constructed from the Septuagint.</li>
<li>Miracles of healing including their wording a magical character (see for example Morton's Smith, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Magician-Charlatan-Son-God/dp/1569751552">Jesus the Magician</a> for a long discussion of magick as a theme of Mark). </li>
<li>An adoptionist view of Jesus, in particular a description, bird and all (Mark 1:9-11), of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greek_Magical_Papyri">Hermetic magick rite</a> for gaining divine powers.</li>
<li>The idea that the God, has secrets (the Messianic secret) openly only to the select few, a motif that hadn't appeared in Judaism to this point but was common in Hermeticism. </li>
<li>A focus on baptism, common for Jewish baptismal cults.</li>
<li>The Hermetic eating the god rite, eucharist, presented in a Jewish context (Mark 14:22-26). </li>
</ul>Hermetic Jews / proto-Christians are by far the community most likely to have authored Mark. The same relationship that Mark has to Matthew and Luke (<a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/01/mack-knife-and-biblical-development.html">Mack the Knife, and biblical development</a>) is founding underlying the Gospel of John, is a <a href="http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/signs.html">Signs Gospel</a> which presents a list of earthly miracle worker in the Jewish community as a savior (see my post <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2009/04/bultmanns-order-for-john.html">Bultmann's order for John</a> for more on the construction of the Gospel of John). A focused tie on the connection between magick and revelation of truth which could have emerged from a Hermetic Jewish / proto-Christian community. <br />
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In terms of the Epistles, we also run into some pretty clear evidence in Colossians 2:8-23: <br />
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<ul><li>Col 2:8, Col 2:20 manipulation of matter through spirits, secret magick rituals; </li>
<li>Col 2:11 circumcision, the importance of earthly acts to control powers, Hermeticism is not gnostic "as above is below" is the core idea of magick. </li>
<li>Col 2:16-17 special ritual holidays</li>
<li>Col 2:18 angel worship, a truly distinctive part of Hermetic Judaism provides the strongest evidence for the identification</li>
<li>Col 2:21-23 legalism, a focus on ritual purity for the laity. </li>
</ul>The opponents in Galatians, the Judaizers, with their demand for an earthly circumcision could very easily have been Hermetic proto-Christians. Interestingly enough, Paul's own methodology, of searching through scripture for mystical revelation has a Hermetic feel but then the lack of earthly action is Gnostic. And can view Paul, a 2nd generation Christian trying to steer the church between the two extreme of Hermeticism and proto-Gnosticism. Corinthians provides a wonderful example where he seems to be confronted with a congregation unable to decide whether material things are of no importance (Gnosticism) or what is bound on earth is bound in heaven (Hermeticism). We can imagine the world of Paul, confronting a Hermetic i.e. messianic congregation which has seen its earthly expectations of redemption crushed under Roman might. Jewish / Christian Gnosticism started as a reaction against what the Jews believes was their defeated god, fake god, a god who had promised that his faithful would be redeemed and then allowed them to be humiliated and defeated. Paul's message that it was not an earthly redemption, and far from a defeat that the cross represented a heavenly triumph against the powers and principalities would have represented an appealing message. When reading the epistles you can hear Paul viewing early Christianity caught <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Between_Scylla_and_Charybdis">between Scylla and Charybdis</a>, Paul moving the congregation away from both magical thinking, believing they could change the course of human history through supernatural means; and at the same time fighting the utter dispair in history and this world that Gnosticism represented. In Paul's 7 authentic epistles we can view a second generation of Hermetic Jew, his Christianity which will uphold the power of the material sacraments, codes of morality while asserting that their effects are heavenly not earthly; in effect moving his congregation from proto-Christianity to Christianity. Jude can be seen in the same light loaded with mystical references and obscure literature while still asserting the key importance of earthly events. <br />
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Revelations is traditional apocalyptic literature, that could have been written at almost anytime. The theology is Hermetic with an interplay between levels of heaven. For example giving birth to a heavenly savior with a dragon cast down to represent the beasts of the earth and land. It could very easily have been an earlier work recast with the Christian community recasting Jesus as God's earthly redeemer. <br />
<br />
<br />
Hebrews presents a mythical savior as a new form of priest establishing a new type of mythical priesthood, based on a new heavenly sacrifice in his heavenly sanctuary where he acts as High Priest making ineffectual earthly sacrifices. Nope not Hermetic Judaism. Hermetic Judaism would have been an argument that earthly sacrifices <b>are</b> effectual because they mimic the heavenly sacrifices of the heavenly Christ in his heavenly temple, or that the earthly ones aren't close enough to actually work. Hebrews is also unavoidably early, as it predates the destruction of the temple, so this theory of origins is going to require a belief in at least one other strand of early Christianity. But in the Essenes we have obvious candidates for its original authors. And we both sides of this for James, an early version from the Dead Sea Scrolls and the later "Christianized" version which is canonical James. And that solution of the Essenes would work for Hebrews as well, an argument for community holiness and God's deliverance over what they saw as Herod's perverse temple. So for the purpose of believing in a unique early church we could have the Hermetic Judaism influencing the Essenes and then literature passing between those communities.<br />
<br />
The pastoral epistles with their obvious 2nd century references, as well as most of the catholic epistles belong to a later phase; a community done migrating from Judaism, that has concerns over governance. The two main strands of Q: Greek cynical philosophy and Jewish apocalyptic traditions are not part of Hermetic Judaism. Matthew's theology would not have come from this group, though again the Essenes would work. Similarly Luke/Acts (and even the earlier form of Luke, <a href="http://www.gnosis.org/library/marcion/Gospel1.html">The Gospel of the Lord</a>) is not Hermetic Jewish either but I'd date this well in 2nd century. The reworking Signs into John, is hard to date with confidence but we can be assured its later than most other works in the New Testament. Hence, those remaining books present no contradiction to the theory. <br />
<br />
Hermetic Judaism was even without any other influence already a fairly complete proto-Christianity. It could very well have represented the original church, the church that authored most of the bible. A plausible source for the sort of group a primitive Christianity could initially have emerged from. This sort of naturalistic framework for viewing the bible is fully in accord with Mormon tradition:<br />
<blockquote><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">“The Hebrew and Greek manuscripts of the Bible from which translations have been made, are evidently very much corrupted,…the learned are under the necessity of translating from such mutilated, imperfect, and, in very many instances, contradictory copies as still exist. This uncertainty, combined with the imperfections of uninspired translators, renders the Bibles of all languages, at the present day, emphatically the words of men, intead of the pure word of God.” (Pratt, </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;"><a href="http://kobobooks.com/ebook/Necessity-for-miracles-Spiritual-gifts/book-h2bcUqEBoEiElxFVF2do9g/page1.html">Spiritual Gifts</a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: italic;">) </span></blockquote>We will stop here and take up the rest of the argument in the 2nd half.<br />
<div style="margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-top: 0px;"></div><ul><li>What happened to pagan Hermeticism and its collapse into Catholic Christianity, Hermes Christianus. </li>
<li>Hermetic Christianity, its disappearance from the ancient world and its rebirth as a religion of European aristocrats and religious radicals. </li>
<li>How a religion of European aristocrats might have made contact, transformed and been reborn in a middle / lower class rural American sect run by Brigham Young. </li>
</ul>___________<br />
<br />
<b>See also</b>:<br />
<ul><li><a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/mormonism-as-hermetic-christianity-part_07.html">part2</a> and <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2011/07/mormonism-as-hermetic-christianity-part_11.html">part3</a> of this series</li>
<li>The ideas about Hermetic Christianity and its tie to Christian origins were first proposed by<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_August_Reitzenstein"> Richard Reitzenstein</a> in <a href="http://www.archive.org/details/poimandresstudi00reitgoog">Poimandres: Studien zur Griechisch-ägyptischen und frühchristlichen</a> which unfortunately has never been translated. A good summary is found in <a href="http://www.sacred-texts.com/cla/pr/pr10.htm">chapter 8 of Pagan Regeneration</a>, by Harold R. Willoughby. Also a more modern <a href="http://www.religion.emory.edu/faculty/robbins/Pdfs/ReitzensteinOutline.pdf">summary from lecture notes</a> one by Vernon Robbins. </li>
<li>Wikipedia has a nice summary / introduction to<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magic_in_the_Greco-Roman_World#Magic_in_the_Hellenistic_period"> magic from that period</a>.</li>
<li>The idea that early Christians didn't in fact believe that the gospels were relating events in Palestine but viewed them mythically, like the stories of hercules, is extensively argued elsewhere. A fairly good treatment which examines references in depth is <a href="http://www.jesuspuzzle.humanists.net/soundofsilence.html">Earl Doherty's site</a>. </li>
<li><a href="http://byustudies.byu.edu/PDFLibrary/38.4Griggs%2052ce3ffe-60be-4ccc-99f9-1cabaf94bfa0.pdf">Rediscovering Ancient Christianity</a> by C Wilfred Griggs, a historically accurate approach from BYU agreeing overall with the Walter Bauer style analysis above. The article itself even goes further in addressing theorists like David Strauss who made strong negative claims about the historicity of the bible texts. </li>
<li><a href="http://www.fairlds.org/apol/ai017.html">Fair LDS page</a> on the diversity of early Christianity. </li>
<li>Evangelical analysis of the Colossian Heresy: <a href="http://cicministry.org/commentary/issue69.htm">part1</a>, <a href="http://cicministry.org/commentary/issue70.htm">part2</a>, <a href="http://cicministry.org/commentary/issue70.htm">part3</a></li>
</ul><div><br />
</div></div>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-7310666464867204722011-06-30T19:25:00.000-06:002011-06-30T19:25:00.188-06:0075 bible sayings<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://mantisbible.com/Portals/0/ProductImages/INKT.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://mantisbible.com/Portals/0/ProductImages/INKT.jpg" width="206" /></a></div><br />
Terrific little list from http://www.av1611.org/kjv/fight.html of expressions that came from the KJV<br />
<blockquote>1. Genesis 4:2-5: can't get blood from a turnip<br />
2. Genesis 7: don't miss the boat<br />
3. Genesis 11:7-9: babbling<br />
4. Genesis 15:5: teller<br />
5. Genesis 43:34: mess (of food)<br />
6. Exodus 19:16-18: holy smoke<br />
7. Exodus 28:42: britches<br />
8. Exodus 32:8: holy cow<br />
9. Leviticus 2:14: roast ears<br />
10. Leviticus 13:10: the quick (raw flesh)<br />
11. Leviticus 14:5-6: running water<br />
12. Leviticus 16:8: scapegoat<br />
13. Leviticus 25:10: Liberty Bell<br />
14. Numbers 21:5: light bread<br />
15. Numbers 35:2-5: suburb<br />
16. Deuteronomy 2:14: wasted him<br />
17. Deuteronomy 24:5: cheer up<br />
18. Deuteronomy 32:10: apple of his eye<br />
19. Judges 5:20: star wars<br />
20. Judges 7:5-12: under dog<br />
21. Judges 8:16: teach a lesson<br />
22. Judges 17:10: calling a priest father<br />
23. I Samuel 14:12: I'll show you a thing or two<br />
24. I Samuel 20:40: artillery<br />
25. I Samuel 25:37: petrified<br />
26. II Samuel 19:18: ferry boat<br />
27. I Kings 3:7: don't know if he's coming or going<br />
28. I Kings 14:3: cracklins<br />
29. I Kings 14:6: that's heavy<br />
30. I Kings 21:19-23: she's gone to the dogs<br />
31. II Chronicles 9:6: you haven't heard half of it<br />
32. II Chronicles 30:6: postman<br />
33. Nehemiah 13:11: set them in their place<br />
34. Esther 7:9: he hung himself<br />
35. Job 11:16: It's water under the bridge<br />
36. Job 20:6: he has his head in the clouds<br />
37. Psalm 4:8: lay me down to sleep<br />
38. Psalm 19:3-4: he gave me a line<br />
39. Psalm 37:13: his day is coming<br />
40. Psalm 58:8: pass away (dying)<br />
41. Psalm 64:3-4: shoot off your mouth<br />
42. Psalm 78:25: angel's food cake<br />
43. Psalm 141:10: give him enough rope and he'll hang himself<br />
44. Proverbs 7:22: dumb as an ox<br />
45. Proverbs 13:24: spare the rod, spoil the child<br />
46. Proverbs 18:6: he is asking for it<br />
47. Proverbs 24:16: can't keep a good man down<br />
48. Proverbs 25:14: full of hot air<br />
49. Proverbs 30:30: king of beasts<br />
50. Ecclesiastes 10:19: money talks<br />
51. Ecclesiastes 10:20: a little bird told me<br />
52. Song Solomon 2:5: lovesick<br />
53. Isaiah 52:8: see eye to eye<br />
54. Jeremiah 23:25: I have a dream (MLK, Jr)<br />
55. Ezekiel 26:9: engines<br />
56. Ezekiel 38:9: desert storm or storm troopers<br />
57. Daniel 3:21: hose (leg wear)<br />
58. Daniel 8:25: foreign policy<br />
59. Daniel 11:38: the force be with you (star wars)<br />
60. Hosea 7:8: half-baked<br />
61. Jonah 4:10-11: can't tell left from right<br />
62. Zephaniah 3:8-9: United Nations Assembly<br />
63. Matthew 25:1-10: burning the midnight oil<br />
64. Matthew 25:33: right or left side of an issue<br />
65. Matthew 27:46: for crying out loud<br />
66. Mark 5:13: hog wild<br />
67. Luke 11:46: won't lift a finger to help<br />
68. Luke 15:17: he came to himself<br />
69. Romans 2:23: breaking the law<br />
70. Philippians 3:2: beware of dog<br />
71. Colossians 2:14: they nailed him<br />
72. I John 5:11-13: get a life<br />
73. Revelation 6:8: hell on earth<br />
74. Revelation 16:13: a frog in my throat<br />
75. Revelation 20:15: go jump in the lake </blockquote>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-26583468974352253132011-06-27T07:41:00.000-06:002011-06-27T07:41:59.918-06:00Don't reassure me, empower meTerrific line I ran across today which of course applies more broadly:<br />
<blockquote><i>I make my peace with the LDS Church’s institutional sexism every day, every week, because I believe that this is where God called me to be. I’ve also been very lucky to have local leaders who understand some of the challenges that women face in the Church and try to do what they can to encourage progress. </i></blockquote><blockquote><i>However, here’s the thing: <b>no man gets the right to reassure me that I’m his equal when every single outward sign of how the Church is run tells a different story</b>. </i></blockquote><blockquote><i>Salt Lake City leaders, here’s a request: <b>Stop telling me I’m incredible, and start giving me responsibility and authority befitting an adult and not a child.</b> Stop standing up each Mother’s Day to wax on about how women are fantastically spiritual and start taking a hard look at the institutional sexism that repeatedly devalues women.</i> (<a href="http://blog.beliefnet.com/flunkingsainthood/2011/04/mormon-women-are-mens-equals-kind-of-sort-of-maybe.html#ixzz1QU2Mx857">read the full article</a>) </blockquote>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-373425720288771023.post-45374826799722617232011-06-26T17:47:00.002-06:002011-09-01T05:43:01.148-05:00Objective measure of translation accuracy<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-sbbZJOxjfhw/TgfTB-B_p8I/AAAAAAAAAWA/dp6MfwqUKis/s1600/Precise-IQ-Test.gif" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="223" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-sbbZJOxjfhw/TgfTB-B_p8I/AAAAAAAAAWA/dp6MfwqUKis/s320/Precise-IQ-Test.gif" width="188" /></a></div><br />
So I've had this idea for an accuracy test between bibles. The idea was to pick verses each of which has a different kind of complication and see how all the various bibles handle it. The complications and scoring is is thought for thought not word for word, but at the same time highly detailed so it should be fair between formal, dynamic translations and hopefully going further out in either direction. Score the various bibles form 1-5, with 2 being the "wrong answer" 4 being the "right answer" and 1 and 5 being additional penalties and bonus, and 3 being 1/2 credit. I'm going to score both translations and study bibles on how well they handle this, because there may be (and probably will be) differences between study bibles and some translation have excellent study bibles while other's don't and availability of good quality notes matters. I was going to do NT only so I can include a lot of bibles like The Voice, The Source, Gaus which don't usually get rated. I also intend to include bibles from non-Protestant groups: Catholic bibles, New World Translation (Jehovah's witnesses), Clear Word (Adventist)... <br />
<br />
And hopefully with time:<br />
<br />
a) Expand out to more translations<br />
b) Expand out to more tricky aspects<br />
c) Maybe move to a more random sample 3 of each type of issue<br />
<br />
The idea being this gives something of an objective measure of "accuracy". Here are the types of issues and corresponding verses I was thinking about:<br />
<br />
1 Corinthians 2:6-10 dual meaning of archons of the aion, as both heavenly demons manipulating the earth, ephemeral powers and their earthly representatives, "princes of this age". Most bibles just have this as earthly.<br />
<br />
2 = earthly<br />
4 = heavenly, both or ambiguos. <br />
5 = captures the relationship between both. <br />
<br />
2 Corinthians 12:2 "third heaven" <a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2009/07/venus-translation-vs-transculturation.html">Venus translation vs transculturation</a> covers this one. Frequently bibles use "heaven" or "with God" and God simply doesn't live on the 3rd heaven.<br />
<br />
1 = With God<br />
2 = Heaven<br />
4 = 3rd Heaven<br />
5 = 3rd Heaven with an explanation of what the the term means. <br />
<br />
Romans 6:8 (tense complexity and the Greek notion of time) (<a href="http://church-discipline.blogspot.com/2008/07/bible-translation-ebonics-and-aorist.html">Bible translation: Ebonics and the aorist tense</a>)<br />
This is a tricky passage since the tenses are hard, particularly hard in standard English. This is a key verse of great theological importance that is tough to translate, and because it is tough to translate people often just change the underlying theology. Moreover the Greek notion of timelessness isn't really part of American / Christian culture so there is a temptation to consider what Paul is considering an act that takes place in eternity to have taken place at a simple point in the past. <br />
<br />
2 = Simple past tense.<br />
4 = Captures the aorist / continuing action of death in some way.<br />
5 = Capturing the notion of an eternal act in a mythic realm rather than an act in the human realm, i.e. capturing the middle platonism of the original.<br />
<br />
Romans 11:36 / Romans 12:2 (lack of concordance across chapter boundaries) <br />
This is a tricky pair of verses because aion is frequently translated "world" or "age" depending on context. Normally bibles are concordant with aion within a single paragraph or idea because otherwise it converts Paul into speaking gibberish. But... this pair happens on a chapter boundary so translators often miss it. Of course chapter markers weren't added until centuries later so this split is part of our tradition not part of the original.<br />
<br />
2 = Using world & age without treating this like a single thought.<br />
4 = Using the same word.<br />
5 = Doing something creative so it works in context.<br />
<br />
1 Timothy 6:20 (de-historical ideology over accuracy). This verse is a great test because in it "Paul" makes reference to a 2nd century Christian book called the Antitheses, that the author of Timothy is hostile to. Generally conservative translations will try and obscure this issue so the verse makes no sense, because they don't want to undermine Pauline authorship. Liberal translators are quite often not any better. The word Antithesis means literally Oppositions, but in this case it is a proper noun. So a correct translation is something like: “O, Timothy, guard the precious deposit recoiling from profane and empty jabbering and the Antitheses (Oppositions or Contradictions in English) of the falsely labeled ‘gnosis’ for some who profess it have shot wide of the faith ”<br />
<div></div><br />
2 = gibberish, meaningless comment like translating "opposition" lower case without any context.<br />
4 = Right idea<br />
5 = Antitheses capitalized or any explanation of what "Paul" (the author(s) of Timothy) is talking about here.<br />
<br />
Romans 16:7 (Sexism over accuracy) This verse is often translated so as not to have a woman called an apostle even though unequivocally that's what Paul is doing. Here is a link to a meta article on BBB: http://englishbibles.blogspot.com/2006/11/junia-apostle-index.html )<br />
<br />
2 = Cop-out, either making Junia male or dropping apostle<br />
3 = Junia is an apostle but not highlighting Junia is a woman's name. <br />
4 = Junia is a female apostle<br />
5 = Discussion of this drawing attention and why there is resistance.<br />
<br />
Galatians 5:6 (Protestant Orthodox corruption) this verse should be faith working through love. But quite often translators want to duck any hint of salvation through work and so change this to "faith expressing itself through love" so as not to offend. J.D. Kirk has a funny short article on this verse: <a href="http://www.jrdkirk.com/2010/02/19/boo-theologically-manipulated-translation-boo/">Boo… Theologically Manipulated Translation. Boo…</a><br />
<br />
2 = Non work<br />
4 = Faith working through love<br />
<br />
Mark 1:41 (proper footnoting) This is a simple verse where the textual information is split. The reading found in almost the entire NT ms tradition is σπλαγχνισθείς (splancnisqei", “moved with compassion”). Codex Bezae (D), {1358}, and a few Latin mss (a ff2 r1*) here read ὀργισθείς (ojrgisqei", “moved with anger”). It is more difficult to account for a change from “moved with compassion” to “moved with anger” than it is for a copyist to soften “moved with anger” to “moved with compassion,” making the decision quite difficult. Given a split original with experts cleanly divided on both sides:<br />
<br />
2 = one side only<br />
4 = both options<br />
<br />
So what do you all think of the idea of objectively measure of accuracy? Do you like the list? Anything I should add or remove? Most importantly does this list meet the fairness criteria? <br />
<div><div><br />
</div></div>CD-Hosthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00304535091189153224noreply@blogger.com0