[HA Bible Study is on hiatus through the November election as we honor Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney by studying the scriptures of his Mormon religion.]
Pearl of Great Price, Abraham 3:9
And thus there shall be the reckoning of the time of one planet above another, until thou come nigh unto Kolob, which Kolob is after the reckoning of the Lord’s time; which Kolob is set nigh unto the throne of God, to govern all those planets which belong to the same order as that upon which thou standest.
Discuss.
Of course, Mark Twain, on the Book of Mormon, and Joe Smith:
I’ve always found it amusing to insert: “in between the sheets” after every clause. It’s a hoot! Try it:
@3 HA!!
rotf
I followed goldy down the rabbit hole (sorry roger) and clicked the link, which takes you to an official LDS website for the text above.
Doing a very little bit of digging, and one finds that this ‘Book of Abraham’ was Joseph Smith’s (mis)translation of some pedestrian papyri that he bought off a huckster who was touring the country with mummies and other Egyptian artifacts.
About these papyri, Smith stated in History of the Church:
What do actual, you know, Egyptologists have to say about the papyri? Well….
What the LDS experience offers, which is invaluable to rational people, is a look, in close to real time, of the shameless hucksterism that lies behind most (all?) organized religion. We get a view of how this whole edifice was constructed, out of thin air, with the intent to deceive and bewilder and bewitch – magical papyri, magical angels, magical disappearing golden plates – without the fog of 2 or 3 thousand years to obscure and soften the edges of the irrational.
Do you think Mitt believes this stuff?
Or is Mormonism a necessary veneer, a club to belong to, a requisite ornament for an ambitious politician?
Is it just one more pack of rubes to rule, a microcosm of the larger nation, a source of gullible sheep for Mitt to emerge as a ‘leader’ of, ready to be fleeced?
I’ll show you my kolob if you’ll show me yours
While criticizing the Mormons’ origins, remember this … they have direct access to God and He can change what is truth.
Now imagine a President from Kolub and a Vice President who worships Ayn Rand,
Imagine that after 8 years as President, the Prophet Romney assumes an even higher calling.
The potential for a movie plot is hilarious.
Sadly, the true God, I that I am, does not change truth.
“Here are the simple facts,” Obama said. “I am a Christian. I am a devout Christian. I have been a member of the same church for 20 years. I pray to Jesus every night.”
@6 an ambitious politician would choose a religion that isn’t considered the largest cult in the world by many.
“I can’t belive I still have to protest this shit”
http://freethoughtblogs.com/ph.....s-feeling/
Hey, Steve, thanks for the link last night that took me to Wheedle’s Groove. Spent more than an hour listening.
@12 You’re very welcome, Bob. I’m glad you liked it.
Right-fucking-ON!
@9
And your ‘point’ is….
@9
Perhaps you’re responding, with shame, to the culture war panderings coming from your guy Mitt…
@ 15
My point?
Here’s part of @ 6, with two word changes:
Do you think Obama believes this stuff?
Or is Christianity a necessary veneer, a club to belong to, a requisite ornament for an ambitious politician?
@10
He was born into it, didn’t choose.
I guess a better question would be, if Mormonism had stood in the way of making money, would Willard still be embracing it?
@ 16
I believe that @ 9 is culture war pandering. Why else say something like “I pray to Jesus every night.”?
He was trying to convince somebody of something.
@17
Indeed. ‘Mormonism’ and ‘Christianity’ could both be changed to:
I do ask that question, and I do cringe when any politician, my side or yours, panders to religiosity.
But…as noted above, the very 19th century roots of Mormonism for all to see – gold plates, angels in New York, histories of massive civilizations for which there are no archaeologic findings, mistranslated Egyptian papyri…Mormonism is distinct from other Christian sects in that there are all sorts of rational, objective points that completely discredit the story that Joseph Smith was telling, that the LDS church continues to tell. It’s…embarrassing in its cartoonishness.
But the question applies…Does Obama really believe Jesus resurrected Lazarus? Does Romney really believe the angel Moroni showed Joe Smith golden plates? Is there a difference?
FYI, Bob was refering to this link,
http://www.wheedlesgroovemovie.com/
The movie documents Seattle’s early funk scene.
@ 18
I guess a better question would be, if Mormonism had stood in the way of making money, would Willard still be embracing it?
Well, I dunno. If being a gay man didn’t offer up far more opportunities for CL-associated free and anonymous sex than are available to heterosexuals, would a man still be gay?
Your question is asinine and offensive. It deserved an offensive reply. People are who they are. You can choose to accept them, or not. Alleging without basis the worst about someone’s beliefs does no one any good. All it does is make you an asshole.
It means they beleive in aliens?
BTW, this system apparently will not allow the term b*tt-fucking, if the asterisk is replaced by a certain vowel.
I think that’s true.
However, I think there is a difference with demonstrating one’s membership in the Christian Club and what is commonly called the ‘culture war’.
The former has been a constant, if noxious, to my mind, feature of politics in this country forever. The latter is a distinct phenomenon, and you’re trying to blur the two – because the second is a distinctly venomous and Republican attack posture directed against anything non-white, non-straight, non-paternalistic – epitomized by Pat Buchanon (one of the authors of the Southern Strategy, BTW) and his 1992 RNC speech and alive and well today.
In fact, the Obama quote you provide is likely a direct response to a culture war attack from the right, part of the constant refrain that he is ‘other’, ‘Kenyan’, ‘Muslim’ – a feature of the essentially racist core belief system of the modern Republican party. It’s an eternal stroking of the racist id in this country.
@22
Too cute by half.
Get in your requisite homophobic rant, and blame me for your offensiveness.
Fuck you.
@1: Great! I had read this long ago and was just thinking about it, seeing the post.
Many years ago I was ambushed by two bright-eyed, neck-tied neighborhood Mormon missionaries. They told me how the Indian legends of the Southwest bore witness to the new age of miracles described in the Book, by speaking of appearances of the great “White Bearded God.” I asked whether they believed that God actually was a white man with a beard, and then smiled at the nonplussed expression they gave me.
Between Twain, this experience, and the recent PBS documentary, this is all I know about Mormonism, so it’s really not for me to criticize.
@ 26
Rather juvenile of you to deflect deserved blame, although wholly unsurprising, Lib Despair.
@ 25
Hillary Clinton, racist.
By Jaketapper
Mar 2, 2008 11:03pm
Clinton Says Obama Muslim Rumor Not True “As Far As I Know”
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/po.....n-says-ob/
Too, too rich, cereal.
My comments about Mitt’s character stand. And you are a lugubrious, wheedling homophobic smarm-meister.
@ 12 @ 21 @ 30
The word for the day is ‘wheedle’, or some variation thereof.
I gotta go to work…later
Since you appreciate the music, a short story for you, Bob, one that I shared with the producer of the film after I saw it. I think that I can actually tie it into the LDS thread topic.
In the spring of 1969 the “Lake Hills” band decided to break up and have a last party down at the amphitheater at Seward Park. The park had left the power on there. Fools. A rock band called “The Trip” joined us. They soon evolved into “Push”, the white fuck band that the Wheedle film documents as taking gigs from Seattle’s black funk bands.
Instead of a private party, it turned into a mini rock festival with an awful lot of people showing up.
It was so cool that I was telling two black friends, the Noble brothers, that they just had to do it too. So the Noblemen, another band acknowledged in the film, plus another black funk band who I didn’t know, did the same thing a couple of weekends later. I went there and, like ours, it turned into a festival, only definitely more black. They had so much fun, they did it again.
Commenter “Greg” yesterday mentioned how the city “came down” on the earlier white band battles. Well, black people partying in Seward Park was definitely more than the city could handle. So the next time they showed up to play, they found that the power had been killed. Blacks, not to be detered, “took over” the south end of the park that summer. The city threw up their hands.
As an aside, the African Hut band was mixed race, four blacks, two white and a Filipino. It might have been Seattle’s first mixed race funk band, but I couldn’t say for sure. The Hut’s patrons were all black.
But back to the thread topic, I would be at the Hut until the wee hours on a Saturday night but would still manage to get to the LDS 4th Ward on Sunday morning – an unusual blend of lifestyles, I’m sure.
@29, It looks like Mormon Bishop Russell Pearce, and serial nut bag Sheriff Joe do not have enough people in Aryan-zona to to put on the birther show?
http://tucsoncitizen.com/in-th.....-interest/
Steve @ 33
I grew up in L.A. and inhaled everything Kansas put out. Chicago and Yes were on my turntable a lot.
In March I drove out to Pullman to see Kansas for the umpteenth time but for the first time in five years.
It’s very sad to see a group you idolized in such decline. Rich Williams, their guitarist, was having a very bad night.
I won’t see them again. I have their discography to console me.
Looks like versions of Wheedle’s Groove are still, occasionally, playing festivals in the area. I’ll look for them.
When I was in college I saw the Zasu Pitts Memorial Orchestra on regular occasion. Wish there was something like that around here. Also wish I had the energy to stay up late and see them if they existed.
@ 33
“Push”, the white fuck band
Heh.
@35 Here is a fine example of Mormon family values with Russell Pearce, JT Ready and the extreme right wing in the birther paradise of Aryan-zona.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqSSLj5C_C0
Mitt Romney lived in Rexburg Idaho with his family check out Mormon family values in the dark red conservative State of hate Idaho.
http://rawstory.com/news/2008/....._1112.html
“Mormonism is distinct from other Christian sects in that there are all sorts of rational, objective points that completely discredit the story that Joseph Smith was telling, that the LDS church continues to tell. It’s…embarrassing in its cartoonishness.”
Not really. There seems to be a fair number of distinctly Americanized Christian faiths, cult, sects or whatever, and all could be made to seem embarrassing in their cartoonishness.
People seem to have a spiritual side. I don’t think it’s so much important what the cartoonish aspects might be of what one believes, whether it be sky gods or an eleventh dimension, branes and infinite universes, it’s what you do with it. Does what one believes lead to an unfolding and development of human potential? Does it lead to good? Does it satisfy a search for meaning?
We can’t all be theoretical physicists. Not everybody can wrap themselves around the concepts of space-time and infinities, to “follow the logic”. And yet those who can’t still might feel the need for an answer to “Why am I here?”, and maybe they need answers that salve an aching spirit during these troubling times a little bit better than M-theory might.
In the big picture, mankind’s time on earth has been brief. But the time that has lapsed since we went from Corvis to many idols, to a single God, and now to an understanding of physics of the very, very small to the infintely large, has been far, far briefer. The direction we are going and the destination is clear. Must everybody arrive there as soon as you, a man of the sciences? Or wouldn’t the someone like you get there first? And what then? Do you look behind you and express scorn at the laggards? If so, how does that lead to an unfolding and development of human potential for anybody but you? Does that lead to good for anybody but you? Would that satisfy anybody’s but your own search for meaning?
Consider this. If mankind lags so far behind you, the men and women of the sciences, is it possible that it is because you are not very good leaders? That strikes me as being the usual reason why people won’t follow.
Just stirring the pot. You know I love ya.
“It’s very sad to see a group you idolized in such decline.”
Yeah, speaking of embarrassing.
I see that the inevitabel attack on the LDS Church has started. It will be conducted through Obama’s surrogates, so Goldy chiming in with his openbing statement:
[HA Bible Study is on hiatus through the November election as we honor Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney by studying the scriptures of his Mormon religion.]
It won’t be long before John Stewart and Robert Colbert will start lampooning Mormonism and everyone will laugh. David Letterman, true to form, will come out with a lot of dry, witty barbs against the religion, and his audience will laugh. O’Reilly will counter with yelling at someone on his show. Hannity will liken the attacks on Romney’s religion to attacks on his precious Catholicism and do a plug to make abortion illegal. In short, it will be the typical circus performance that passes as “intelligent” dialogue in our country today.
It doesn’t matter what religion one holds. All religions are all packs of lies, as I’ve stated before on this blog. I don’t beleive Obama’s attendance at that crazy church in Chicago, President Kennedy’s Catholcism, or Romney being a Mormon are relevant issues. Let’s get back to slamming Christianity, Goldy. One of these days you may even take on Islam or Judaism for a little ridicule.
@41 A whine will not alter the direction of discourse on this thread, PI. It’ll only likely make it worse.
“All religions are all packs of lies”
The unfolding of mankind’s potential is a process, not an event, although there are certainly events within that process. I view the “pack of lies” as part of the process of our growth as a sentient species, part of our evolution, so to speak. We are not fallen Angels, we are risen apes. The One God displacing many idols was a step up, not a step down, and it’s not the last step we’ll take. I see patience, understanding and compassion as good things which will remain relevant at any stage of our growth as a species.
“The word for the day is ‘wheedle’, or some variation thereof”
That’s a good one. I can go with that.
Hey, Lib Sci, quit wheedling around and respond to my comment!
@42 & 43,
@41 A whine will not alter the direction of discourse on this thread, PI. It’ll only likely make it worse.
I see patience, understanding and compassion as good things which will remain relevant at any stage of our growth as a species.
Nice “goodness and light” speech, Steve. When do we get to do a group hug and sing “Kumbayah?”
“When do we get to do a group hug and sing “Kumbayah?””
I’m afraid that any group hug will have to wait until the Klown gets back from the barn. That wait might require a bit of the patience I spoke of, PI.
@6
Bigot much?
@47
Birthers, Aryan-zona, & Mormon Bishop Russell Pearce.
http://www.azcentral.com/arizo.....yland.html
Mormon vs Mormon & Judas Goat.
http://politicomafioso.blogspo.....s-and.html
“And thus there shall be the reckoning of the time of one planet above another”
War of the Worlds!!!
@47 I don’t see where the bigotry comes in. This could as easily describe plenty of self-described “Christians” who frequent country clubs and Chamber of Commerce meetings.
I don’t see this as being a time for scientists to scorn nor for those of faith to judge. The people of this earth have problems that require solutions just so that billions of us might live decent lives, or even to live at all. Time’s a wasting.
I am a person of faith. I believe that faith can move mountains. Hey, but if I’m in a hurry to move that mountain, I’m going to put my faith in the strong backs and shovels of men and women, whether they believe in parallel universes or turtles floating in a fucking bowl of milk. The mountain doesn’t care and neither do I.
I don’t think the answers for what ails either America or humanity is going to be found in left or right political constructs or “I believe” or “I don’t” believe divisions of science, faith and ideology. To borrow a phrase, some see this world as it is and ask, “Why?”, some see the world as it could be and ask, “Why not?”
It took a child, a little girl, a Christian, to show me the way. We talk, she saves lives. Her drilling rig, her shovel, was born of the sciences. The will to use it for the good of mankind was born of her faith. She saw this world as it could be and asked herself, “Why not?” Then she moved a mountain.
http://www.mycharitywater.org/.....n_id=29811
I’m not talking down to you. I haven’t moved any mountains. No, I’m understanding that I’m part of the problem. I suspect we all are.
@41 “All religions are all packs of lies”
No wonder you’re such a pathetic cynic.
Child Rape, False Prophets, and convicted criminal Warren Jeff’s FLDS town.
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/201.....hpt=ac_bn4
Nat. Geo. story on people escaping from the Mormon Prophet Warren Jeffs and the FLDS cult of cruel.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kc7_032DRWc
“We don’t need someone who can think. We need someone with enough digits to hold a pen.” ~
GOP Lord of Taxes Grover Norquist
Speaking of making this a better world, who the fuck’s bright idea was it to let the damned Irish into this country? And now we treat them like white people?? WTF? Oh, can you imagine what a world this would be, if only all the Irish had once been shipped far, far beyond the Northern Sea?
The Irish not white. Did I just go there? Again? Heh. I love the Irish. No, really.
Speaking of the Irish and the world, Rory McIlroy is so obviously the world’s best golfer right now. He’s going to be good for the game and, with their friendship, maybe for Tiger as well.
Did you know that the rabbits living in burrows at Greenlake arrived with Seattle’s first Irish immigrants? Think about that one for a moment. It’s just one more thing for which we can blame the Irish, the true cause of our nation’s ills.
@56 I guess that means “Drown ‘Em In The Bathtub” Grover wants a president who will let Grover do his thinking for him.
@59 What’s wrong with rabbits in Green Lake Park? I say the more the merrier, especially the cute fluffy female variety.
He who does not want to tell us how he would govern says we should just trust him based on his “principles.”
“Mitt Romney argued Sunday that voters should have enough of a sense of his principles to have confidence in how he’d handle the nitty-gritty details of taxes, spending and health care as president.”
http://nbcpolitics.nbcnews.com.....overn?lite
Roger Rabbit Commentary: He reminds me of the health club salesman who became impatient when I insisted on reading the contract before letting my wife sign it. We walked away from that deal.
@62 They will say and do anything to get elected. I remember Nixon’s “secret plan” to end the war in Vietnam was to invade Cambodia?
“I don’t think our troops should be used for what’s called nation building.”
– George W. Bush, 2000
“What’s wrong with rabbits in Green Lake Park?”
Oh, nothing, although I much prefer mine with sour cream rather than yogurt.
http://www.nytimes.com/recipes.....ogurt.html
Just kidding! Although the NYT apparently isn’t. You might want to have a talk with that liberal rag, Roger.
Obama is a Muslim who prays to Jesus?
@65
Yep! He’s also a communist that’s fond of hiring bankers to work in the White House.
funny how you dont direct that criticism to LibSciBigot….
Obama has a list of them from the 2008 election – its funny though, when Obama phlip phlops, the progressives say he “evolved”
lmfao – lemmings and tools…..
@68 Here is a tool for you.
http://www.oddschecker.com/spe.....ion/winner
@68 Here is a song to go with your new tool.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aUeXhwmH5zM
BTW, to Steve – I find your comments thoughtful and intriguing, and I want to give them an answer they deserve. I’ve been working all day, now home and having a beer. I’ll cogitate for a while, answer later. No wheedling.
“I don’t reject Christ. I love Christ. It’s just that so many of you Christians are so unlike Christ.”
“If Christians would really live according to the teachings of Christ, as found in the Bible, all of India would be Christian today,”
M. Gandhi
@52 Rachel didn’t actually move the mountain. She simply appealed to the best in us. And we, moved by her tragic death, put our shoulders to the mountain and moved it for her. Some of us hoped she was looking down and smiling when we did this.
@72 As in everything else they do, these greedy fucks think they can buy their way out of everything they’ve done. They give loads of money to their churches, show up on Sundays, and smile a lot. If you go to lunch with a Republican, he’ll insist on paying the tab. The central belief of their religion is that money can buy friends in this world and salvation in the next one.
@ 59 @ 64
“Did you know that the rabbits living in burrows at Greenlake arrived with Seattle’s first Irish immigrants?”
The author of the recipe in NYT is named Burros.
Your second straight coincidental homonym of the day:
This photo:
http://twitpic.com/aswlo7
was taken in Seaman, OH.
Jus’ sayin’.
Katrina Vanden Heuvel just said on Maher, “Full frontal fiscal fraudulence,” and “Pale and stale” in reference to the RNC. Love it!
@71 I look forward to it.
@75 “Burros” That’s even better. I didn’t catch that.
I suggest that Roger be on the lookout for someone named Burros asking him out for lunch.
“Katrina Vanden Heuvel just said on Maher”
The extended on-line segment is hilarious. Christy O’Donnell has everybody pounding their heads on the desk.
“Some of us hoped she was looking down and smiling when we did this.”
I sure hope so.
@79 I didn’t get this old by being gullible.
Is Texas In Play?
The Texas GOP had a bad week. Courts threw out their redistricting plan and voter suppression law. There’s a damn good reason why Republicans are worried about the changing demographics there:
“When Barack Obama asserted … that Texas will be a battleground state ‘soon,’ he was echoing the belief, commonly held among Democrats, that the state’s changing demographics make the transition from red to blue inevitable. Howard Dean was so confident of it that in his 2009 farewell speech as DNC chairman he said he could ‘guarantee’ that Texas would vote for Obama in 2012.
“While that prediction is likely to be … off the mark in November — and perhaps for a few more years to come — if the demographic trendlines continue in the same direction, it’s only a matter of time before the GOP’s 38-electoral-vote presidential cornerstone slips from its grasp.
“The rise in Hispanic population in Texas, combined with the GOP’s inability to gain traction with those voters, is a time bomb that threatens not only the Republican hold on Texas but the party’s ability to compete at the presidential level.
“Of the nation’s five most populous states, three are Democratic locks at present – California, New York and Illinois …, placing them more than one-third of the way toward … an Electoral College majority …. With Florida typically up for grabs, Texas is the GOP’s lone reliable mega-state … if Texas was suddenly a battleground state, it would probably give rise to … a Democratic electoral lock.”
http://www.politico.com/blogs/.....29290.html
Roger Rabbit Commentary: Republicans understand this, of course, so they will do anything to keep Hispanics from voting in Texas. For example, imagine if Texas was a blue state today. That means Obama would have 260 electoral votes sewn up, and Romney would have no chance of winning unless he swept Florida, Ohio, Michigan, North Carolina, Virginia, Wisconsin, and Colorado. The loss of any one of those states would sink him. Texas’ 39 electoral votes are equivalent to Florida (29) and Wisconsin (10) combined. Losing Texas would be a devastating blow to any GOP candidate. While Texas is still reliably pink for this election, it’s getting bluer all the time. That has to be giving GOP strategists shit-fits. And that’s why the GOP is working so hard to prevent Hispanics from voting in Texas.
If we had a Republican president, there would be no DOJ lawsuits against the kind of gerrymandering and voter suppression taking place in Texas right now. President Romney might not order U.S. attorneys to frame Democratic politicians and election officials as Bush did, but there would be no federal interference with GOP voter suppression schemes in the south or anywhere else. That’s why it’s so important to re-elect President Obama. Even if he’s stuck with a Republican Congress and can’t get any legislation or a budget passed it’s important to have a Democrat in the White House so the Department of Justice is working against the slimeballs who try to keep American citizens from voting in their own country instead of working for them. We’ve got to win this one, not for the gipper, but for the idea of democracy itself.
I’ve donated to Little Rachel’s latest clean drinking water campaign. I encourage all of you to do likewise. You can find the link @52 above.
4 billion a day in new government debt and you people are worried about Mormonism.
Geeees talk about Gross Stupidity!
“I’ve donated to Little Rachel’s latest clean drinking water campaign. I encourage all of you to do likewise. You can find the link @52 above.”
I encourage everybody to do so as well.
http://www.mycharitywater.org/.....n_id=29811
Romney flip, flops, then flips on ACA again. Expect another flop by morning.
Note to the Romney campaign, the marketplace hath already spoken. If you have a pre-condition and you’re not rich, you die slowly as teabaggers cheer your passing. My, what a pleasant way to go.
I wrote:
…and Steve took issue, both with my specific characterization of Mormonism, and my rejection of organized religion and god-belief more generally.
To the first point, what I was trying to get at derives from a comparison of Mormonism and Christian sects that date back hundreds (so-called Mainline Protestants) or thousands of years (Catholic and Orthodox sects). Mormonism’s relative youth allows its founding events and early development to be seen more clearly and closely.
For example, goldy’s daily verse was from the ‘Book of Abraham’ – which Joseph Smith allegedly translated from an Egyptian papyrus that he bought off a traveling curiosity show. A facsimile of the partly-intact artifact is included in the ‘scripture’. This is from the LDS website – official stuff! The point is, such artifacts are not uncommon, and there is a large and detailed scholarship around both the translation and the sociological meaning of such artifacts – AND, such scholars universally indicate that this artifact is a run-of-the-mill depiction of Egyptian funerary practice, AND that Joseph Smith’s translation is completely wrong.
Yet this ‘translation’ persists as ‘scripture’ and is foundational to the LDS. Yet it’s total hockum from on objective scholarly point of view. Moreover, he acquired this and other artifacts from some dude who had bought some mummies and other Egyptian artifact when such things were quite exotic and rare, and was traveling around the country making a buck showing them.
When such artifacts were not well known, and hieroglyphs were not well translated (or translated at all), Smith’s claim that this:
was a scam that was easily concealed. However, examination of these artifacts in the modern era reveals them to be nothing of the sort that Smith claimed – there is a yawning chasm between his claims, on which LDS foundational documents are based, and objective reality.
To me this is devastating for the credibility of a religion that makes pretty extraordinary claims relating to real-life events – buried gold plates, massive Semitic civilizations in America for which there is no archaeological evidence, angelic visits, seeing stones.
It seems to me that one can see how Smith was a person of his time – the Burned Over region, the exoticism of Egypt, the claims of revealed truth from angels – but his claims, because they’re based on recent events and artifacts, are more falsifiable than claims of Jesus turning water to wine, for example.
To my mind, making claims of supernatural events, or specific natural events, that are then shown to be profoundly wrong, in an apparently self-serving fashion, is a massive blow to any sort of credibility.
Contrast this with the miracles attributed to Jesus. Water-into-wine, loaves-and-fishes, raising Lazarus from the dead, walking on water, to name a few. Powerful magical stuff. However, given the distance in time to these alleged events, there is no plausible way to rule-in or rule-out the accuracy of the accounts or the verification of the actual events.
Now, I don’t buy that Jesus did all this stuff, or that a guy named Jesus necessarily even existed, but for those who do, particularly modern, (otherwise) rational people, the fact that all this is said to have occurred 2000 years ago seems to make it far more palatable, far easier to suspend credulity.
It is much more difficult to impeach the veracity of these stories with objective analysis, simply given the temporal distance.
Similar are the accounts that are relied on to assert these supernatural events – the Bible – written, rewritten, edited, translated, included/excluded, bent, folded, spindled over 2000-3000 years by a host of political/religious committees and organizations and empires with varying agendas. Despite the ‘revealed Word of God’ and ‘inerrant’ claims, this book is not, cannot be, a reliable historical account in the ways claimed – though, again, the distance in time and culture allows for a disconnect with the present day, allowing an easier suspension of criticism.
******
More to come on Steve’s other points….
“Steve took issue, both with my specific characterization of Mormonism, and my rejection of organized religion and god-belief more generally.”
I think you miss my point.
First, you wrote,
“Mormonism is distinct from other Christian sects in that there are all sorts of rational, objective points that completely discredit the story that Joseph Smith was telling, that the LDS church continues to tell. It’s…embarrassing in its cartoonishness.”
Then I replied,
“There seems to be a fair number of distinctly Americanized Christian faiths, cult, sects or whatever, and all could be made to seem embarrassing in their cartoonishness.”
I was making the point that Mormonism was not so distinct. Now take a look at this list of churches, and these are just the ones oriented around Adventists,
I hope my point is now made slightly more clear.
It’s easy to make fun of Mormons, I do it myself. And as Puddy knows, I like to make fun of Adventists as well. Of course, with Mitt running, bashing Mormons is the thing to do these days. But I cannot agree that “Mormonism is distinct from other Christian sects in that there are all sorts of rational, objective points that completely discredit the story”. No, not with that list above, Lib Sci. And that list would be an awful lot longer if it went beyond the Adventists.
You pick on Mormons, which is fine. I just disagree with that one particular statement. There’s a smorgasboard of far-out distinctly Americanized versions of Christianity that are a hoot if one examines them more closely.
We take a magnifying glass to these faiths and we can see their flaws and laugh our asses off. But if we took that same magnifying glass and looked at our family and friends and what they really believe, they might not look so great. Would we laugh at them and make fun of them? Probably. And that’s likely why we tend not to examine those we love in the same way we examine those we don’t.
“More to come on Steve’s other points….”
I look forward to that, Lib Sci.
Oh, and I pulled that Adventist list off of Wiki, which I found after doing a Google search for “distinctly Americanized Christianity”.
Let me try a different approach,
I imagine, Lib Sci, and it’s only a guess, but I imagine that if Mitt had sprung from the Jehovah’s Witnesses, Adventists, Pentecostals, Holiness movement, or Christian Science, that you would have written a remarkable similar comment, only it would have started out (I’ll pick on Puddy’s Adventists again here),
“Adventists are distinct from other Christian sects in that there are all sorts of rational, objective points that completely discredit the story that Ellen Smith was telling, that the Adventist church continues to tell. It’s…embarrassing in its cartoonishness.”
I can imagine you doing that, Lib Sci. Now what’s more difficult to imagine would be if, say, the 2016 Democratic candidate was a Hindu whose policy positions perfectly matched yours.
What kind of comment would you write then? Would it be along the lines of “Har, har, har, a turtle in a bowl of milk, har, har, har!!! Cows! Har, har, har!!!”
For some reason, I can’t imagine you doing that, Lic Sci.
@ # 6:
Yes, I believe Mitt believes. He grew up in the Mormon church, his grandfather fled the country for his beliefs, and returned (or was that his great-grandfather – I get confused on this count). He went full-in into the Church heirarchy, becoming one of it’s bishops.
Like many who have made their way “into the world” from a rather cultish, insular background, he probably has some problems with some of the stricter teachings. He probably has had a cup of coffee or a soft drink or so, for example.
But if Mormonism aided him very early in his career, it was clearly an anchor he had to deal with later in his political career. If he wanted a religion which would advance his career, it certainly would not have been Mormonism.
Of course, and just so you know, if Mitt was a Hindu I’d probably be posting comments day and night along the lines of, “Cows!!! Har, har, har!!”
But Steve, how many members are represented by the list you gave? I don’t know, but my suspicion is that the Mormons are far more numerous, and therefore more relevant to society overall, not to mention that one of their members has a reasonable shot at being elected President.
I don’t disagree about your contention…
Though one doesn’t need much of a magnifying glass to see the logical inconsistencies (ahem, to put it mildly) in Mormonism, and its use of mistranslated/fraudulent Egyptian papyri as an important foundational document – and other craziness I pointed out.
I don’t disagree that there are other particularly American Christian traditions that are crazy – my dad’s side of the family are mainly Assemblies of God Pentecostals – my, oh, my they have some nuttiness going on there. However, I don’t think they’re as numerous as Mormons, nor as influential, and I don’t think (I could be wrong) they have quite the same sort of verifiable fraudulence, which was part of my point, that the Mormons do.
The Mormons make fairly outrageous claims – these Semitic-derived North American civilizations, for which there is no evidence, gold plates, for which there is no evidence, claims of ‘reformed Egyptian’ languages and mistranslated papyri which are manifestly wrong – so they set themselves up for particularly pointed criticism.
So, yeah, there’s craziness galore to go around among Christians, and religions in general – but the topic originally was the ‘Book of Abraham’ and my critique was directed at Joseph Smith’s apparent creation of this out of whole cloth – which he might have more credibility toward, if he hadn’t claimed it was a ‘translation’ of a text that can be shown he got wrong.
A note:
The U.S. armed forces have always had a problem with having it’s officers belong to the “right” church. Episcopalians are preferred from the Revolutionary War days. This was also true at the time of the Civil War, where Presbyterians were sometimes also tolerated (as long as they weren’t to Scots-Irish, despite Andrew Jackson’s reputation), but Baptists and Catholics were looked upon with suspician, and Jews were avoided altogether.
Well into the 20th century, you saw those prejudices continue – an officer who wasn’t Episcopalian rarely rose into the higher ranks. Even Victor Krulak, who rose within the highest ranks of the Marine Corps, hid his family’s Jewish faith a close secret from even his family (he just missed being named Commandant of the Marine Corps, although his son made that rank).
Mormons, Pentacostalists, Adventists, etc. never had a chance at being promoted above field rank. Of course, for the Adventists there was this little problem of their pacifist teachings, which they handled by giving their teenage boys medical training so they could go easily into the Medical Corps.
@90
Interesting questions.
Were Mitt an Adventist? I’m not sure what I’d think – I’d certainly ask if he believed the Earth (and Universe) was 6000 years old and created in 6 days.
I would have a very hard time – Democrat or Republican – with a candidate who so rejected science in favor of his/her faith that they believed in the literal truth of manifestly impossible things like Intelligent Design, Young Earth Creationism, Noah’s Ark, the 6-day creation story, and the like.
The ‘Inerrant’ Bible is a deal breaker for me.
A Hindu liberal? Interesting. Again, Hinduism benefits from the same long-timeline that older Christians traditions do, as described above – the distance of time softens the vibrancy of the craziness. If his faith led him/her to say things that are manifestly untrue, however, I would be here criticizing.
You said above…
I think that myth and fantasy and tradition of god-belief can very much get in the way of the rational analysis and logical critique that are so pressing. As I have said before many times here, if your faith leads you to doing good, to love, to making the world a better place, then great – I’m right there with you. My issue that that far too often the ‘faith’ is both a cudgel to beat one another with, and a tool to manipulate and exploit.
And if a prominent person in my society is standing up and offering himself as a leader, I’m going to examine his thinking, and if he is a magical thinker, I’m going to criticize that.
@94
Contrast that tradition to what is going on now, particularly in the Air Force, particularly at the Air Force Academy, though a problem in all branches.
Mikey Weinstein is doing excellent work on this at the Military Religious Freedom Foundation.
More and more Dominionist Christians are establishing religious tests for inclusion and promotion, and that’s a very frightening and disturbing development.
I accept your assertion that all religion is kooky!
;)
# 94: Well, the Air Force is a relatively new institution, which allowed it to quickly get beyond some of the prejudices against other Christian denominations. But if you are Mormon or non-Christian – well, that’s another story.
But the pattern in the Air Force Acadamy seems to be linked to the rise of the Moral Majority and the belief that religion and government/politics should be mixed. This is helpful those with specific political agendas, because what can’t be taught in the classrooms (or even the chapel) of the Air Force Acadamy can be tought without restraint at the Bible Study classes sponsored by local churches. They wouldn’t have had a problem with it except that some of the guys carried the agenda beyond persuasion and into hazing in the dorms and classrooms.
“But Steve, how many members are represented by the list you gave?”
Lib Sci, for what it’s worth, here’s some statistics on US church affiliation.
http://religions.pewforum.org/affiliations
In the grand scheme of things, there really aren’t very many Mormons, less than 2%.
You can see on the “Full Report” page that Pew polling shows that 78.4% of Americans identify themselves as Christians.
I’ve been saying all along that liberal wholesale bashing of Christians is not a very good political strategy. Perhaps we should think in terms of “divide and conquer”. I suspect rule one of that plan would be “think before bashing”.
You have bashed the Mormon faith of a family who once saved me, Lib Sci. I just looked at posts @87 onwards and I don’t see where you cut any Mormons any slack at all. You didn’t just bash that family’s faith, you bashed them. Now I’m not angry at you as I believe you wouldn’t do that to them personally. But I am telling you that this is not wise politics. When you are careless with words, you can come off as, well, looking down at people. In fact, I see that it’s at least possible that you look down on a lot of people, 78.4% of Americans, in fact, many of them Democrats, and many of them possible Democrat votes who are turned off by the perception that Democrats view Christians as being, um, somewhat inferior. Yours is a different flavor, but tell me how this differs from the the view of Mises as expressed to Rand?
I want you to know that I really appreciate your thoughtful replies on this subject, Lib Sci.
@99
Steve, you’re getting a bit hyperbolic.
That good people reached out to you in a time of need is wonderful, and I applaud them, and you.
That there was goodness and empathy and a shared sense of humanity in these people – excellent.
No. No I didn’t.
You assert that it was their Mormon faith that was responsible, or at least inseparable from the real-world good that they did by you – yes? Is that what you’re saying?
I would contend that they could have done good by you, just by choosing to do good. The goodness is in them, just like it’s in you, and me, and puddy.
My issue, as started at the beginning of this thread, is the real-world factual claims of Mormons regarding random Egyptian papyri as a basis for a system of belief.
(Which reminds me – Soggy wenches distributing scimitars is no basis for a system of government. But I digress.)
I am making a specific criticism of Joseph Smith and his fraudulent mistranslation of what seemed at the time an exotic Egyptian artifact, but what is really a fairly pedestrian object. He imbued this object with meaning that he made up. He attributed to this the words of Abraham and Joseph – thereby hijacking the legacy of these characters as had been developed previously.
Now, I’m not trying to defend the myth/legacies around established Biblical characters per se. As you know I think the Bible is an interesting cultural artifact, and may contain stories and lessons that are insightful or valuable, but is in no way the “Word of God” or inerrant or anywhere near literally true. I really don’t think it’s a basis for a modern, reasonable morality.
However, many people do (as you say) and I see Smith’s actions as trying to exploit the ‘transitive property of coolness’ by claiming new ‘scripture’ pertaining to established cool guys Abraham and Joseph as ‘discovered’ in this papyrus. And I find it fraudulent.
As regards your contention that it’s not good politics to bash religion, given the widespread religiosity of Americans, perhaps you’re right.
However, to be true to my vision, my understanding of the world, my sense of what is good and right – using the conscience that I would assume you would say God gave me – I have to speak out against phoniness, against making things up for which there is no evidence.
In my view, for far too long have we created gods when there’s no objective evidence for them or for what they want and expect from us, and inevitably, the loudest voice, the slickest huckster, the most manipulative sociopath gets to tell the rest of us what god ‘says.’ And then the trouble starts.
@100
Likewise, and that’s the way I’ve taken your posts.
Is Smith’s ‘translation’ of the Book of Abraham any more fraudulent than any other book of the Bible?
I would say no, but that it’s demonstrable, and that’s a big difference. We have his account, we have the provenance of the papyrus, and we have the actual translation and the identification of its actual cultural significance. It doesn’t add up to anything except that he made it up.
Did he make it up in the service of a vision to make the world a better place? in the service of megalomania? self-aggrandizement? polygamy?
Who knows.
Did his book lead people to do good? Did it stunt their independent moral development? Did it free people? Limit them?
Probably all of the above. My issue is that we need to see it for what it is, and be realistic, factual, straightforward. Is it a tool for good? Fine, then use it that way. Is it a tool for enslavement? Then smash it. But don’t pretend it’s something it isn’t.
You know, I just say what I think, trying to describe what I’m thinking about, and the places it’s taken me, the conclusions I’ve drawn.
‘conclusion’ is a bad word for this, because it implies an end – seeking and experimenting and exploring is always an ongoing process. My world view is a work in progress.
I try to be honest, with myself, and in what I write.
Am I arrogant? Not that I try. I’m really a seeker, trying to figure things out, trying to do good and be good, trying to make the world a better place – I’m an idealist for sure. And I get impatient when I see we humans, and we Americans, and me, too – making mistakes and missing opportunities. And I’m vocal about what’s going on in my mind. And I call out what I see as destructive and manipulative and dishonest, loudly, as you know from these threads.
Do I disagree with the majority of Americans on the topic of god-belief? I guess so. Do I think that their (your) vision is inferior? That vision certainly does not work for me, and I have to be honest with myself. It simply doesn’t work for me anymore. Do I think one can attain the things religion offers, but without the mythology or tribalism? You bet. Live the Golden Rule. All humans are family. We need to assume our place as a humble member of the living family on this planet and not fuck it up for everyone/everything else.
I just deny that you need a made-up divine father figure in order to be good. And I find rejection of that tradition very liberating.
Try it!
Later…gotta go work on the mancave…
“You assert that it was their Mormon faith that was responsible, or at least inseparable from the real-world good that they did by you – yes? Is that what you’re saying?”
I don’t see how I could say anything but that. Isn’t that kind of like separating the mind from the body or something? At least for the sake of argument, when you say, “No. No I didn’t”, I must repply “Yes. Yes, you did!”
In your work and where I have lived, we have both been around some extraordinarily evil people. And some bad people, some good people and on and on, from one end of the spectrum to the other. Why? Is it solely because some gene isn’t turned on or some wire is misconnected? Does it have something to do with early adolescent development and the role of adults inputting values? Do you really understand why that one patient was such an evil man?
I can’t say I know the answer. You studied medicine, I studied psychology. If you don’t mind, I’m going to believe that a lot of what is wrong with this world is what happens to children before they’re four years old. But I also acknowledge that other factors come into play. My notions of abreaction and catharsis can be really inadaquate. Some folks should seek your pill, other’s should meet Max’s noose.
Values. Learned early in childhood. I’ll believe until the day I die that that is what allowed me to survive what happened to me. And I’ll never forget the realization that the kids I had envied, many the sons and daughters of Seattle’s business titans, had grown to become fucked up beyond words. What the fuck went wrong? Genes? Wiring? After all that went wrong for me, how on earth was it that I less the fuck wrong with me than they did. Was it genes? No. Not me. It was values.
Values. If 78.4% of American Christians were actually being taught decent values, I do believe that would be a good thing. Alas, we both know that lip service is one thing and how we act out our true values, say, in front of our kids, is entirely another. It’s not the best situation, I admit.
Seeing as it appears we don’t have any theoretical physicists posting, as a layperson it’s not a stretch to say that I know as much about M-theory, parallel universes and whatnot as anybody here. Piles of Astronomy and Sky & Telescope magazines, a bookcase full of books, $15K worth of telescopes and eyepieces, and one Bible and somewhere a Book of Mormon.
There are no values to be found in M-theory. What are the useful day to day values we develop contemplating Dark Energy? An old Boy Scout handbook, or even a handful of half-way decent verses from the Book of Mormon offers more hope for addressing today’s social ills. What theoretical equation inspires you to help a little old lady cross the street?
Here’s the fact, 78.4% of Americans call themselves Christians. Hundreds of millions of people. My earlier point was that they all seem to get something from it. What is “it”, Lib Sci? I call it a frame of orientation with a potentially powerful association with good values. All in all, not so bad a thing. A question for you, the scientist, is what are you going to replace that with, the value part? How are you going to do it and how long will it take? Centuries?
A frame of orientation with a potentially powerful association with good values. Why bash it? Why not work with it? At it’s best, wonderful things can happen. In that religious context a little girl from the eastside can inspire people across the globe to bring clean water to children who need it. Weening takes time, and so I say were stuck with it for at least a few centuries so let’s work with it.
I’d have to find it, but there’s some discussion with a theoretical physicist about M-theory, the seventh dimension and how there could be beings there who could see us but we couldn’t see them. I tell you, to “follow the logic” can lead to some strange places. Some sound nearly as silly as sky-gods. But it made me think. It even made me hope. If true, I hope one of those beings is little Rachel Beckwith and, like Roger said, that she’s smiling down at us because she knows that we made her last wish come true.
I look at what you wrote in an odd way, perhaps. I see a mountain of negativity and the positive words are few and far between. So I call it a bash and I believe that it’s bad politics. Besides, it’s too easy for you, Lib Sci. I know what it’s like to blow off some steam. But I believe that you’d be far more challenged to try something else with it.
Fuck that was a long post!! WTF? Let’s just have a fucking beer!
“Am I arrogant?”
That’s not my impression. I think you see things the way they are.
We approach things differently. Take my dear Ms. Wingnut for example. I’ve mentioned before how whenever she’s going off on something I’ll mention some words of Jesus that suit the topic and it gives her pause every darned time. It’s become very obvious to me that the teachings of Jesus and the likes of Matthew 25 are far more deeply more engrained in her than the teachings of Glenn Beck. They’ve got their hooks in her, the fear buttons have been pushed, but there’s hope, and it isn’t to be found in my dissing her sky-god. That would only make things worse. No, I’m using her sky-god to save her from them and it’s slowly working.
If you’ve got a better plan to save her than that, I’d love to hear it. But my thought is that if it can work with her, then why not with 200 million more?
“I am making a specific criticism of Joseph Smith and his fraudulent mistranslation”
The Urim and Thummim. The short of it, Smith dropped a pebble into a hat, stuck his face in it, and then supposedly the revelations came. Heh.
Charletans and false prophets. There’s never been a shortage of those. I get them. I can see where they’re coming from. What I struggle with is with the ready followers. But empty vessels are most easily filled, I suppose.
I’ll buy the first Tricerahops!
I’ll buy the second.
I recall almost joining you and another guy or two for dinner. It might have been Zotz and Proud Leftist. I met them when I met Roger, at an earlier dinner. I might still have those emails in a folder. If so, I’ll drop you a note.
@111
Excellent. It was Zotz (Hi Zotz!), and I’ve been thinking about that – maybe time for an end-of-summer libcelebration!
best..beer…name…evar….!
Better than Red Menace? ;)
@114
lol…but of course!
Damn. You guys better order. I don’t know shit about beer.