Can you be religious yet rational?

Hermeneutics is a lost skill...it actually was gaining much ground in the '60s and '70's but has lost a lot of ground since.

For those who don't know what hermeneutics means....it is the blending of science and art to decipher what the scriptures are saying.

The Bible requires a huge amount of knowledge to decipher....as well as a very inquisitive mindset to understand it. The original writers adopted a style of writing that was extremely concentrated. Little wonder because your average book cost a year's wages at a minimum. So all of the "common knowledge" was deliberately left out. (Not so common today 5,500 years later)
On top of this Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek and Early Latin are all idiomatic and metaphoric languages... just because you know the words doesn't mean that you understand what it's saying.

Then there's all the artistic use of language....poetry in its highest form... everything from syndoche to sonnets and even limrycs.

Meaning that it's extremely difficult for your average public high school graduate to understand what is really being said. (No matter how much Holy Spirit they claim to have)

That being said...most people who are religious have the absolutely worst hermeneutics skills. They don't understand period writing or why what was said in the manner it was said in. And when someone is actually capable of doing so they are routinely branded as a heretic.

I've studied the scriptures diligently...it's not easy. But I've found that it is the most complicated and intricate book on the planet.... absolutely impossible for anyone to emulate. It's very existence is a miracle in itself.

And all that being said....I do believe that demons exist as well as angels...but my beliefs surrounding them are not the same as what is commonly believed.
 
I don't hate people.

I'm not like you.

And I'm very thankful for that.

Now, go back to pretending to be a Christian.
You are the self appointed gatekeeper of the truth

Its your job to point out the shortcomings of your side also along with agreeing with them that Christians gave warts

its a sad day when one of the great unwashed has to say it for you
 
What do you think?
Rationality is paramount in Gnostic Christianity.

That fact, and believing only what can be logically surmised, known or shown with logic and reason, with a moral content, is what we live.

That is why the mainstream god religions hate us.

We rightly and intelligently, as well as morally, condemn their genocidal, homophobic and misogynous Yahweh/Jesus to hell.

Those who are literalists can only reply somewhat in the fashion that Martin Luther did.

“Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.”
“Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.”

Those reasons are why the religious who adore a genocidal prick of a god hate the non-religious and intelligentsia.

We kill the faith of fools with facts.

If by true believer, --- you mean one who has harmed his mind by supernatural belief, --- then no Gnostic Christian or intelligent person will be a true believer.

Regards
DL
 
God is a myth.
The story of god is the story of DNA.

The only fit god is DNA and nature.

Modern Gnostic Christians name our god "I am", and yes, we do mean ourselves.

You are your controller. I am mine. You represent and present whatever mind picture you have of your God or ideal human, and so do I.

The name "I Am" you might see as meaning something like, --- I think I have grown up thanks to having forced my apotheosis through Gnosis and meditation and “I am”, represents the best rules and laws that we have found to live by.

In Gnostic Christianity, we follow the Christian tradition that Christians have forgotten that they are to do. That is, become brethren to Jesus.

That is why some say that the only good Christian is a Gnostic Christian.

Here is the real way to salvation that Jesus taught.

Matthew 6:22 The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.

John 14:23 Jesus answered and said unto him, If a man love me, he will keep my words: and my Father will love him, and we will come unto him, and make our abode with him.

Romans 8:29 For whom he did foreknow, he also did predestinate to be conformed to the image of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren.

Allan Watts explain those quotes in detail.



Joseph Campbell shows the same esoteric ecumenist idea in this link.



The bible just plainly says to put away the things of children. The supernatural and literal reading of myths.

Regards
DL
 
One of the modern Christian apologists Dostoevsky said about the same thing, one of his heroes makes a choice between truth and Christ and chooses Christ
Without ever admitting that Jesus was never anointed to Christ by the Jews.

Christians never face their lies.

Regards
DL
 
“If someone proved to me that Christ is outside the truth and that in reality the truth were outside of Christ, then I should prefer to remain with Christ rather than with the truth."


I think that I understand what he meant.
Does truth include moral truth?

Is Jesus and his Armageddon and pending genocide shows him to be evil.

Right?

Or is genocide and killing when he could just as easily cure good to you?

The Gnostic Christian Jesus is not that kind of a prick.

Regards
DL

Regards
DL
 
Almost all the epithets of Yahweh's opponents carry the semantics of the ancient heavenly gods. Satan apparently descended from Set, the sun god of Egypt, Lucifer means the luminiferous, the "Devil" comes from heaven's aryan "Dev". The horned image of the devil is copied from Saman, the Celtic analogue of the heavenly god of the Aryans in the form of a bull, the good god of the Celts.
And the opposite is also true. "God" from "Hades", underground serpentine king, Slavic version of "Bog" is also identical to Sanskrit "Bhoga"(Serpent)
Kaa, the serpent in Egypt, represents soul.

The serpent was used by many as holy in the ancient religions.

Christianity sent many inquisitions to end the light bringers wisdom.

They failed, as more and more are recognizing the immorality in what was once a decent universalist religion to the divisive one of today.

Regards
DL
 
Kaa, the serpent in Egypt, represents soul.

The serpent was used by many as holy in the ancient religions.

Christianity sent many inquisitions to end the light bringers wisdom.

They failed, as more and more are recognizing the immorality in what was once a decent universalist religion to the divisive one of today.

Regards
DL
No...
In ANE culture the serpent was symbolic of wisdom. Even in Judaism it was the same.

Seraph is the Hebrew word for serpent...Seraphim is the plural form. You might know them as a form of Heavenly host but they were representative of God's wisdom.
 
What is irrational for atheists disdaining Bible stories is that they never see past the setting to the purpose--which is the lessons or moral--of that story.
Not too surprising when Christian morality has made them adore a genocidal, homophobic and misogynous god.

Anyone with those Christian morals belongs in hell, along with Yahweh/Jesus and St. Hitler.

Regards
DL
 
No...
In ANE culture the serpent was symbolic of wisdom. Even in Judaism it was the same.

Seraph is the Hebrew word for serpent...Seraphim is the plural form. You might know them as a form of Heavenly host but they were representative of God's wisdom.
No to what, and thanks for confirming the widespread serpent respect.

Regards
DL
 
No to what, and thanks for confirming the widespread serpent respect.

Regards
DL
In that aspect you were correct...
But it was just a symbol...a type or metaphor.

Pharaoh had one on one of his headresses. (His wisdom was supposedly supreme)

The serpent itself wasn't so revered as much as whatever it was symbolizing was.

That's what the "no" was about.
 
The US government passes about 40,000 new laws every year.

The better to hide corruption in.

No worries though.

Within, what, 30 years, most political decisions will be done by demographers and statistics.

Hiding the money trails will become impossible.

Hackers will make sure that all know what all are worth.

Regards
DL
 
In that aspect you were correct...
But it was just a symbol...a type or metaphor.

Pharaoh had one on one of his headresses. (His wisdom was supposedly supreme)

The serpent itself wasn't so revered as much as whatever it was symbolizing was.

That's what the "no" was about.
Fun fact.

The oldest serpent shrine is 75,000 years old.

Regards
DL
 
You might know them as a form of Heavenly host
All serpent cults originated only from the earth, they opposed the heavenly host. This is repeated in all ancient myths, starting from the ancient Mesopotamian myth of the confrontation between the Anunnaki and the Igigi, then the Vedic Assuras and Devas, the Greek Titans and the Olympians. The word for snake was almost the same as for earth, they have the same root in some languages. Serpents have never been heavenly anywhere, this is absolutely nonsense
 
in fact, they boil down to one concept: chthonism
I have no problem with that, given that the only worthy candidate for a god is nature.

Man first, of course, given that we invent all of our gods, but nature creates us and we should venerate her over the genocidal pricks, like Yahweh/Jesus, who immoral people venerate.

Regards
DL
 
All serpent cults originated only from the earth, they opposed the heavenly host. This is repeated in all ancient myths, starting from the ancient Mesopotamian myth of the confrontation between the Anunnaki and the Igigi, then the Vedic Assuras and Devas, the Greek Titans and the Olympians. The word for snake was almost the same as for earth, they have the same root in some languages. Serpents have never been heavenly anywhere, this is absolutely nonsense
Egyptian is one of the oldest forms of writing...Ebla is another. Hebrew is the absolute oldest written living language.

Any thing else claiming something is pure conjecture.
 

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