A Study in Impertinance
Three major religions, and every sub-sect of these three religions, believe God commanded the following: THOU SHALT NOT KILL! Three major religions! The Jewish Religion. The Religion of Islam. The Christian Religion. All three believe somebfivebthousand or so years ago a prophet named Moses, also known as Musa, climbed a mountain named Sinai where he found two stone tablets with words written on them by The One True God, also known as Allah, also known as Yahweh, and by the tetragram YHWH.
All three of those religions, broken now into smaller and smaller sects too many to name here, are still around today. And all three of them profess to believe these Commandments came from the Supreme Being in our cosmos and are theregore sacrosanct — unbreakable. So will someone please tell me why we are killing each other all over this globe we call Earth.
Is this God not someone to be reckoned with? Is this God not someone we are supposed to fear? Is this God not someone we are supposed to revere? Is this God not someone we are supposed to worship? Is this God not someone we are supposed to emulate? If so, we are not worthy!
Even worse than us not being worthy, our leaders are certainly not worthy! All over this world our leaders are telling us to murder each other. They support armies, and they support police forces. They pay people to kill other people in their name (Putin and Netanyahu are two. HAMAS is yet another!) and pa?y people to kill in our name (Me, You, We the People!) I don’t know about you, but I have certainly never given anyone permission to kill in my name — not under any circumstance! Have you?
The worst part of this situation is, people who do not believe in killing are being killed right now. They never gave anyone permission to kill them. Yet they are being killed. Children, women, men, seniors, sick people, doctors, shopkeepers, all kinds of people. So why are we being killed?
Believe it or not, many of us are being killed in the name of the being we call God. Remember him. He is the Being who told us not to kill! He is the Being whom we are told holds every life precious in his hsnds. Yet people are killing, supposedly for him, and people are being killed, supposedly for him. Do you believe that? I do not believe that!
Humans are telling people to kill. People are killing because they want to kill. And people are being killed because other people don’t care if they die!
Does any of this make sense?
If it does not make sense to you, tell someone! Especially tell your leaders. Tell the people who are doing the killing. Tell the people who tell the peoplebto kill. And if you believe in God, tell God too. If anyone will listen, surely it will be God!
A New Spirituality 
No you are quite right my friend. It does not make sense, we have a distinct commandment, edict call it what you will.
Once that was given we all snook off to invent ways to get around it, because We say ‘What God Meant Was….’ (Which is one heck of a thing, saying that God’s Word was imperfectly phrased by….. God?)
And since then we added another rider, that since some folk were hideous and blasphemous their very presence offended God so we had to kill them (not that we asked God in the first place).
That in turn led to the other which was ‘Well We Do Have The Right To Defend Ourselves’. Which meant we could regrettably kill folk who were attacking us.
The next ‘improvement’ was ‘Religion Cause All Wars’ so let’s kill everyone who is religious or says we shouldn’t kill folk who are religious. Which allowed religious folk to fight back under the ‘We’re only defending The Faith’ clause.
After this came the Western improvement ‘Religion Should Keep Out Of Politics’, which was followed by ‘Religion is Politics. And By Chance We Know What God Wants’…..Both allow folk to kill of course.
Yes, since the arrival of that commandment great strides have been made in getting around the wording.
Various sections of Buddhism and Hinduism have also studied this at great length to get around their own strictures on killing. In Myanmar (Burma) and India various violent groups will explain at some length why not killing doesn’t apply to them.
Whichever faith system you have, there is no doubt when we get where we are supposed to go after death…Our excuses just an’t going to hack it.
At least the Vikings were uncomplicated and honest about the business.
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Well spoken, Mr. Christian (said lovingly, without rancor). Turning the other cheek and loving thy neighbour have bcome words that are “from God” but which have no meaning here on Earth anymore. I am not a Christian, a Muslim, or a Jew, but if I were any one of them I would needs renounce my “faith” and become a Godster — or an Atheist.
Oh, yeah, I did the latter 50 years ago! Now I can live without killing, or hating….
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Thanks my good friend.
Once more to paraphrase Thomas Paine
‘These are times which test people’s souls,’
Ones which can test a person’s faith to breaking point
OR
To test adherence to edicts such as ‘Love Your Neighbour As Yourself’ – which has to be a day to day thing.
And there’s that silent little prayer anyone of faith should be uttering
‘Forgive Us God for We Have Screwed Up’
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Oh oh! You just heat the hammer on the nail that started my whole adventure 65 years ago. The concept of forgiveness. My Sunday Scnool teacher spent every Sunday asking for forgivebess for what he did Ssturdsy. It was like he gave himself permission to be a jerk becsuse he knew his God would forgive him the next day. I could not understsbd that concrpt — and still do not!
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Yeah more than a few ‘believers’ reckon ‘It’s a get out of jail free card’.
Now that’s a load man.
Basically you are not supposed to do something wrong in the first place. And if you do then you really have to mean you are asking for forgiveness.
Now where it gets complicated is that there a good chance you have going to do something wrong again, and so it goes on in a cycle.
HOWEVER going around wracked with guilt at every little thing and making every one else miserable. Is not the deal either.
And then there’s the idea that no matter how often you screw up God will forgive you, ask long as you realise you have to get better or try to do anyway.
In short it’s like any other caring relationship.
Complicated isn’t it?
No Faith an’t easy. It isn’t enough to quote selected passages from religious works, out of context to suit your purposes.
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Yet it seems that is what so many religious people do, Roger. They wittingly or unwittingly “sin,” and when they realize what they did they ask for forgiveness. Forgiveness seems to cost nothing. It should be as costly as death itself. Maybe this world would not be the crazy place it is. We are capable of being good, yet most are too lazy to try. When you have the “forgiveness” card to play, your actions become less important.
I’d rather be Atheist, with my own set of standards to live by, set by myself for me to succed as a person. That is why I live as I do. I do not want to disappoint myself!
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Yeah good friend, some do tend to to flip flop either way, either the sackcloth and ashes or ‘Oh well that’s done’ routines.
They don’t seem to get it is actually a very deep process that is supposed to be part of your life, part of the balance. No one gets it truly right, of course, that’s why you keep on trying. It gets complex, but you try.
Your approach is fine by me.
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I’ll leave that conversation there. Sounds like a good ending.
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I concur.
Keep on keeping on👍
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Truck! Truck! Truck!
https://www.google.com/aclk?sa=l&ai=DChcSEwi64taO9K6CAxXWCK0GHe2VCuIYABAHGgJwdg&ae=2&gclid=Cj0KCQiAuqKqBhDxARIsAFZELmJVzOYqv9QXtQ0dZHMw769o60iUwFAa3bv7vJVBV_wWhLUjgwFCsqYaAr77EALw_wcB&sph=&sig=AOD64_3dLhv5rrd-5ZHRajJrvv0hXqVb2w&ctype=5&q=&ved=2ahUKEwj0iNCO9K6CAxVoHjQIHaJIC_8Qwg8oAHoECAMQDg&adurl=
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Right on!
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Never heard this before. A”keeper!”
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I had their two albums, lost in the Great Upheaval of ’73.
I might well purchase again.
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Yep.
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This: ‘‘What God Meant Was….’ (Which is one heck of a thing, saying that God’s Word was imperfectly phrased by….. God?)’ Thank you. If there is a god, he gave up on us a long time ago.
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In my mind, God never gave up, because God never existed, a He or a She or an It. The more I see, the ONLY thing I see is Life, and ever since I wrote unexpectedly in a Science Fiction story that the most unexpected thing ever encountered in space was a total lack of life — anywhere {which had never crossed my mind} — I’ve always wondered. The tning is, while we may be slone in our universe, as weird as that may seem, we are not alone in the cosmos. In order for my philisophy to work there must be other planes of existence, or nothing makes sense — to me.
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I totally agree with your reverence for Life. My personal belief system I owe to Plato and the concept of Eudaimon. In a nutshell, you live a good life if, as you lie on your death bed, you look back over that life and have no regrets.
That’s a very personal concept, and I ‘good life’ to mean living up to one’s potential – being the best person one is capable of being.
For me, immortality exists only in how much or how little we are remembered. Shakespeare is immortal. Sadly, so is Hitler. :(
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Immortality refers to a known identity the way you are using it, I think. One has to have been mortal to be immortal. Is that a fair statement?
I don’t believe in immortality, though you might be surprised if I ever get my shit together and get my book published . It is about an immortal man.
But from studying myself in all the ways I possibly can, I have come to the conclusion I have a spirit that does not die. And if I have one, so do all living beings. It is a form of reincarnation, not of the ego, not of the mind, but of the spirit. Possibly you will say like many other Atheists have said to me, I cannot be an Atheist if I believe that life persists after death, but that’s okay. All Atheist really means is a belief there is no God, or gods, or other superior beings. And that is my belief. But experience tells me something lives on, and that is what allows us to evolve spiritually (not rrligiously) as well as physically. If we had no spirits, in my understanding, we would still be running around nsked living from meal to meal and sexual encounter to sexual encounter. And while some people do want to live that way, most don’t. Something is driving us to try to be better people — as you say, you want to be the best person you can be. My question would be “Why?” When I asked myself that question it changed my life. I do not need financial success. I do not need to be famous. I do not need a lot of things other people think they need. I do need to be able to say I intentionally caused as few people as possible to suffer physically, mentally, or spiritually. I need to say I treated everyone as equally as possible. And I need to say I gave help to those I could help, without ever asking anything in return. And I need to respect everyone I meet, and take responsibility for each deed or action I take or do not take. If I can do all those things, I can say my life was a success. What other people think neans nothing. How I judge myself will determine if I lived a good life or not.
Wow, how did I get here? Obviously something you said set he off on a tangent, and I love following tangents. They can be paths to unexpected discoveries. This one wasn’t, but it did help me refocus myself, so I hope you don’t mind. Time to go back and proofread… Well, if you find any typos, my apologies. I did my best.
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-grin- tangents are wonderful! And I agree with everything you said, well except for the spirit part. The important thing to me, however, is that people ask exactly those kinds of questions and reach an answer that fits /them/.
I truly believe that once you find your own answers, you almost /have/ to live them.
And yes, only we can determine if we’ve lived good lives. High Five!
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High five! (I’m not really a “high five” kind of guy, but if it works for you I can do it.)
If “spirit” doesn’t work for you, that’s you. Be you. It only works that way for me. I’m me. As long as we can live with that we can get along. I’m all about getting along…
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I won’t high five you again, but I will nod vigorously! I respect everyone’s beliefs…so long as they are ‘real’, and to be real they have to be questioned. My guess is that you’ve done a lot of questioning in your life. We’ll get along just fine. :D
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If you know that, you have questioned a lot of things in your life. Feel free to tell be about any you are willing to share…
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Still more questions than answers. :)
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Now there’s the thing about ‘Faith’ y’see.
To believe that God has not given up on Us in the entirety. And also not to lose Faith despite all the physical evidence which might indicate, ‘It don’t work’.
Having Faith is never easy; be it a theistic or whatever a person holds to as a tenet.
And without going into my own long theological personal explanation I shall simply use words attributed to (but might not have literally been said) at the end of his speech to the Catholic Hierarchy at Worms 1521.
“Here I stand. I cannot do otherwise”*
*Not an exact fan of Luther as a whole
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I’m a committed atheist, so I see ‘faith’ in a very different light. That said, I love the parables of Jesus of Nazareth because they /do/ make sense, if one is capable of empathy. Sadly, they’ve mostly been lost in the quagmire of dogma created by those who think they know what their god wants.
What I admire in Luther is not his philosophy, but his courage. :)
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Whoops sorry for the delay. My fault for missing (I can’t even blame WP this time).
The parables are timeless, and don’t seem to get quoted that often by the Religious Right (not the loud populist ones anyway).
There was a time in my youth when we lived under the shadow of Nuclear War at the behest two very secular forces. By good fortune they both worshipped at the altar of Realpolitik (OK not the cleanest of religions…but…..)
Now we live under the threat of those who by reading what they want to read, claim to be acting at the Behest of ‘A’ god. And are all in a hurry to get to those ‘End Times’ or Martyrdom by Slaughter.
Y’know what? I preferred the old system, at least every lived in fear of using it.
Luther was an interesting fellow. It says much about religion that whereas he was a devoted Catholic there is now a non-catholic branch of Christianity bearing his name. Ah well.
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lol – that’s okay. Happens to me too. :)
I grew up in the same era, and fear of those end times was one reason I didn’t have the Offspring until /after/ the fear dissipated. For a decade or so there was real hope, at least in my mind, of a better world, but things have been spiralling downwards instead.
Oddly enough I kind of agree with you about the ‘A’ god era. Once upon a time, those with little to no empathy or care for the ‘common good’ were at least kept in line by the religions of the times. Now those same people have found religions that suit them far too well.
Yes, Luther was a /reformer/ in the true sense of the word. He believed and so was appalled at the sale of dispensations by a Church that had lost its way. Brave man.
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Starting from Catholicism, then Lutherism, et al, the scary thing is that the time was ripe for any fool with an idea to come along and challenge the so-called Word of God according to the Popes.
Starting with the advent of television, the same kind of men decided to challenge the “village” churches whereby they took on millions of viewers/followers/believers/donaters/suckers who were willing to be led by greed and bluster. Now those TV Evangelists are the ones leading the war on God and Atheism both. They are the ones who bought those politicians “willing to be bought”!
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-sigh- I’ve never understood the lure of those televangelists. Or any evangelists for that matter. Was invited to the christening of a niece’s baby many years ago. Was horrified to discover the service was one of those singing and talking in tongues type of thing. I tried to be polite but I had to walk out half way through. :(
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Hard to believe people fall for them, but they do. It makes me wonder if we are really smarter than the apes.
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Smarter? Who knows. Definitely more easily led. Maybe there’s a gene that hardwires some people to be followers. You only have to look at all the cults out there to see that something weird is at play. :(
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Most likely they have a laziness gene. It is easier to listen to someone else than try to discover what you think and want. But that is s recipe for disaster.
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Must affect a lot of people then. :(
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Most of us share the same genes, just in some of us they are recessive. Fortunately for us!
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lol – amen to that.
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Luther was an interesting mix, in addition to being a reformer of courage and conviction, he was very much a man of his times.
In common with many of his times he would be by our standards strongly antisemitic. (Which theologically from a New Testament viewpoint means in my opinion ‘You an’t reading the gospels right).
His stance against the corrupt wing of the church establishment was something of one spark that gave rise to the Peasant’s War of 1524-1525 in Germany. Whereas he did criticise the injustices he also condemned the peasants for their act of violent uprising. The latter seemed to bring about quite a few later ‘conversations’ by the nobility (who were busy slaughtering approximately 200,000 peasants and found this ideal for getting the best of both worlds – opposing the Officious Church and putting down their own peasants – all ‘In the Name of God’).
One other interesting snippet being that he became romantically involved with a nun and was complicit in her being smuggled out of her convent in a herring barrel (that part really should be in any film about him). They married.
Basically it seems like a large number of notable folk out of history there a parts which indicate uncomfortable reading by modern standards, which themselves are always changing anyway.
As for these days, once more we can quote Thomas Paine for these do test our souls (or spirits, or consciences, or resolves or faiths or whatever we feel motivates us deep within).
It might just be me in my latter crusty years but Hypocrisy matched with Blatant -‘isms’ of prejudices seem to be the common currency. On both sides of the political divide (I long since parted with my supposed political home ground of the UK far-left for those reasons)
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I started a comment to both you and Meeka (above) but it froze halfway through writing and I could not finish my thought — just so you know to look.
So Luther rebelled because he wanted the nun? Typical male reasoning.
What I don’t get about modern times is why the Evangelicals want to bring about armageddon, and why they even think they have the power to make it happen. How egotitistical can they get? I’m pretty sure Christ already has it on his calendar when he intends to return — if he still has a mind to do so. I sure as hell wouldn’t if these were the assholes who would be singing me Hosannas for the rest of Eternity. They would all be sent down to see Satan.
This is a sick, sick world we live in, and it is the religious right who are the sickest of all. I would not be able to maintain my faith if I still believed. For a God to leave such ahepherds in charge of his flock would strain my faith sorely.
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Musical interlude: https://youtu.be/GR5J3WbWRvc?feature=shared
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Just to put you right there good friend. Luther met the lady after he had started his stance. It’s interesting and telling that in the midst of all the turbulence he had created he was still smitten by that age old attraction.
On the End Time mentality, the gospels are quite clear; it’s when God says so; never mind what it says in the Book of Revelations, whose purpose and motivation is still up for debate amongst theologians. So the Evangelicals are assuming a heck of a lot when they infer ‘they’ ‘know’.
And they can chirp, shout, threat and make as much fuss as they like. I’ll go so far as to say they are wrong, not in charge. Actually when it comes to faith, at the end of the day no one can truly claim to be in charge- that’s at a higher level and these folk chasing votes and spreading intolerance don’t have the final say, they only serve to strengthen my belief I am going in a less flawed way than they are.
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I wasn’t saying they “know,” but that they are trying to create the conditions that are supposedly supposed to precede the Rapture. Literally, they are trying to entice Christ to return. No, they can’t and won’t do that, but they are destroying the world trying.
Either way, they are still crazy as loons, my apologiies to the beautiful birds with the haunting voices.
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The scary thing is they ‘ know’, because it is what they have chosen to believe to a fearful extent.
When you face that it can be sobering.
I once worked with a really nice guy we could joke and laugh over all things but his expression over religion so did his logic.
At that time he could calmly excuse and justify the words of the Old Testament which recorded genocide.
It’s been a long time since we last spoke, maybe he changed over the years.
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One csn hope…
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Hope. At the end of the day, we must always believe in Hope. Even when to all evidence before us there appears to be no use in Hoping, We Hope.
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lol – I forgot about the nun, and yes, wouldn’t that make a great scene in a movie?
Democracy is supposed to balance the needs of society with the needs of the individual, and I guess in a statistical sense it does, but…I feel a little jaded about democracy at the moment. The majority here in Australia were right royally played, and I, as an individual, think they got it horribly, horribly wrong. I think in this case I would not have sided with the peasants brandishing pitchforks. :(
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Wouldn’t it just?
The term ‘Democracy’ like the words ‘Freedom’ and ‘Truth’ is over used and much abused these days.
For years and years I tended to the idea that a socialist based government with a tendency to authoritarianism was a good idea. Then after a similar span reading histories and the accounts how any authoritarian government is far from firm but fair, my conclusion was Democracy is the least worst alternative.
The important thing is to vote, whether you support a party of whether you are so against one you’d rather another.
Then after your vote hope you made the right choice.
And be prepared at some stage to be disappointed, hopefully not very badly.
It is a far from perfect scheme but considering the track record of Humanity down the ages, might be as good as any other.*
I do steer clear of parties and movements which do bandy those words ‘Freedom’ and ‘Truth’ as that normally means the preceding word ‘Our’ has been left out.
And I never trust ‘popular’ movements and only measure large demonstrations by the over dignity displayed and evidence of real knowledge of the cause they claim to support.
*Being over 70 I reserve my hard-won and inalienable right to call them all lacking and choose the least incompetent.
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I was hoping about a year sgo, Roger, we could work on creating something better than democracy, because while it might be the best we have, it is still a poor form of government, one I refuse to take part in personally, though I try my best to help others when I can.
Why does socialism have to be authoritarian? That sounds terrifying to me. Socislicm is by far the best ism we have come up with yet, but a majority of “everyone” has to buy into it willingly. Capitalism is still dominant right now because its purveyors can afford to buy people’s votes, and that is one of the downsides of democracy: Cheating is allowed, and rignt now is encouraged and rewarded.
In my mind, anyone who casts a vote in a democracy is preventing the finding of a better way, which we badly need.
Vote, and you can change the government, but you will never change the system. It is the system that needs changing!
Down with democracy! Up with Social Responsibility!
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I’m just 70 but I agree with you 100%. I used to think that compulsory voting, as we have here in Australia, was the answer, but our recent appalling referendum result has shown that the majority do not always ‘get it right’. Especially in this age of algorithms. It’s now far too easy to play upon people’s fear and ignorance. What effect this will have on democracy long term I don’t know, but I fear it won’t be good.
Many years ago now, I jokingly came up with the idea that the only way representational democracy would work was if candidates for election were chosen by lottery – like jury duty. The emphasis being on ‘duty’. No one in their right mind would want to do it, so they might be incompetent, but at least they’d be less egotistical. Or that’s the theory. :)
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Wouldn’t be any worse than what we have now. My own belief is no one who is intelligent to run a government would want to run for government becsuse it is such a thsnkless job. Who needs the hassle? So if instezd of being “elected” csndidstes chould be a appointed. Political parties should be outlawed. Give voters five or so people to choose from. Then let them makeca choice.
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YES! Except I’d make the nominees part of a lottery as appointments are far too easy to rig. :)
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(TO MEEKA and ROGER)
If we made “government” a university course with prerequisites from high school we would know who would be good governers (as opposed to Governors) abd who wouldn’t. Then a lottery would not be necessary. And we could get rid of political parties. The chosen ones would be taught to govern for the common good, without catering to any special interest group.
Think about that as a starting point, and tell me what you think, please. You too, Roger, if you see this.
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I like the idea in principle, rawgod, except that here in Australia, we already have something like that. You staffers come up through the ranks of the /parties/ and then some – who? why? – are chosen to stand as candidates. This, in my not so humble opinion, is precisely what’s wrong with party politics in this day and age. We have professional politicians who have absolutely no life experience outside the bubble of their political aspirations. :(
Plus…who would do the choosing in your scenario? Even if parties were cancelled, de facto power factions would rise up based on time spent ‘in the system’. :( We have those too.
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That’s why I said my idea is only a start. The idea/purpise is to teach people who show an aptitude in grade school how to govern without personal power or agenda. Everything must be done to help all citizens live a good life. I don’t even know that it is possible, but it should be. Maybe call it the Science of Government (without Politics).
You mention a good concern, that of people without a broad background (Ivory Towerists) so maybe they would need to follow other interests for 10 or 20 years, and then when they feel they are ready and experienced governers sgree, they can take up the path. They possibly would have to be screened for certain personslity traits that would not be conducive to governing, but I am sure with good training and an understanding of how to work for the needs of others first (Would they all have to be women?), maybe we could avoid the pitdslls that democracy shows us exist.
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Not all women are like Mother Theresa! That said, we do seem to be higher on the nurturing scale than men [in general]. There are always outliers so who knows?
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I think the one problem is that people don’t keep their Sceptical Radar tuned in all of the time. They turn it on governments, but when some Yahoo comes on ranting about changing the system or that it’s a ‘Konspiracee’ (at present) fat too many folk go ‘Yeah right!’ without a pause for thought. I tend to work in the opposite direction accept that I WILL be disappointed but at least it’s support for a flawed, sort of working system.
We’ll never find a perfect system, all we can do is keep our Idiot and Snake Oil Merchant Radars tuned up high. And do what we can.
Y’know I think that Lottery system might be worth try-out in a small town or community level. 😀Could work. I’ve heard worse- seen worse. Much worse.
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Yup. I think some people just /want/ to believe. :(
As with democracy itself, the Lottery would sometimes deliver a perfect storm of psychopaths hell bent on destruction, but most of the time, I think ordinary people would rise to the occasion. At the very least, their mistakes would be genuine instead of egotistical. :)
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Quite on all accounts.
National using a Lottery would be a Media Hysterical Reaction.
Small town / Community, it would get a more sympathetic response, interest even.
Of course there are always the fringe folk, I think at a local level they would be more likely to be coped with.
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lol – maybe as with jury duty you could be disqualified if you were diagnosed as a sociopath or something. :D
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It’s worth a try. 🙂
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Always. :D
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Roger, plesse see note above directed to you and Meeka.
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The religions are, self-righteous in their claims of, killing those who aren’t, a part of them, those whom they can’t, convert, they get, rid of, like, a cleansing of the, races, and, that defeats the, whole purpose of, what religions are, about, loving all we are, in contact with, because, these, individual religions think, that they should be the only religion in, existence, and, that does not fit, to the, diversities of the, world thatbwe are, living in right now ..
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You are very correct, tig. The best way to “love thy neighbour” is to not ask him or her if they are even religious, let alone which religion, if any, they follow. “Live and let live.
?”
I don’t know if you ever read my 3 Expressions of Spirituality? I discovered them many years ago and defined them thusly: group exclusive, group inclusive, and non-gro
up individual inclusive. The first describes religion, where it is important to be a member of a partifular group to the exclusion of all other groups. The next it is still impirtant to be a member of a group, but it is okay to let other groups exist and even fraternize with people from other groups. The last is to not be a member of any group, but to exist outside all groups and co-exist equally with everyone and anyone.
I once called them “Stages” but that sounded heirarchial. “Expressions” I think is preferrable to stages as it is horizontal, not vertical. No one is any better than anyone else — they all serve different needs!
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Well said. :(
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Thanks. I tried. And I stuck to a libe that did not involve my Atheism. That wasn’t so easy…
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lol – as a fellow atheist, I salute you. :D
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I have said this many times, but I’ll say it yet again “religion has killed more people than it has ever saved”.
It is about time the atheist of our world united and banned all Gods and that includes money.
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Money and gods are two of our worst inventions, but some people need them. We cannot arbitrarily ban them. If we could prove theur uselessness I would agree– i usually agree. Banning them, government snd guns. But I am feeling magnanimous today, people csn have their gods and their money, but they must learn to control themselves, and show responsibility for all their actions.
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Rawgod, your use of the word “inventions” is correct. Humans created the ‘Gods’ and we have many of them.
Some worship Power, or Money, Control, there are those who see themselves as God like (usually politicians).
I’m inclined to believe in the power of the human mind, although there are times mine lets me down.
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The human mind can be good or bad. I think our hearts/spirits are our best chance at fulfilling our potential.
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Ah, but don’t forget, there are enough of us that follow this mantra “do not kill” to make it work just perfectly.
Btw, a literal more accurate translation would be “do not murder” which is technically what’s going on by deception.
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I prefer the “kill” over the “murder.” Murder requires intentionality, I think. Killing is just that, taking life, including accidentally. When animals kill for food, they are not murdering by definition. There is no moral imperative there, no personal animosity. But even they are still ending a life prematurely.
No living being wants its life ended prematurely. No living being deserves to have its life ended prematurely. This is why I respect carrion eaters most. They wait until their food is dead before they eat it, and then they feast.
Getting back to humans, we kill for food too, just most of the time we don’t partake in the killing process. But lives are being ended on our behalf.
And then there is war. War is murder! What is going on in Palestine and the Ukraine right now, as well as other places, that is murder. And it is leaders like Putin and Netanyahu and HAMAS who are the real murderers, but they also turn their soldiers into murderers and killers.
There is altogether too much taking of life in this world. Every life deserves to live a full lifetime…
No, I haven’t been very clear-thinking here, but murdering is just a form of killing. I think all killing is wrong.
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Well the alternative to not eating / killing is non existence.
The situation in the Middle East is as natural a phenomenon as a hurricane. Could they be any different, right now, than they are?
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I would hope they could be very different. When people refuse to negotiate people and other living beings die needlessly. There is always room for negotiation unless at least one side wants to obliterate the other. The Big Mistake was creating Israel in 1947. Who knew the Israelis would be do war-like?
As for survival, the technology is there to grow food through a form of cloning to feed people without killing living brings, and it would probably be a hekkuva lot cheaper to produce without harming the Earth, but we beed everyone to getmon board with that. Good foes not have to come from living beings anymore!
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If I have to eat from that kind of trough I’d rather be dead. There are indigenous cultures that laugh at us for getting food at a grocery store. I don’t think this sedentary life is much good for anything but medication sales.
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Each to their own, Jim. I could eat without killing anything, plant or animal — nuts, fruits, berries, grains — but my partner loves meat. I wish we could wait till an aninal died before we ate its body, but nobody else seens to care.
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And it has nothing to do with gods or religion!
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No but that is the nature we live in.
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Islam is nothing but a cheap ripoff of the Christian religion. With its concepts of the “House of Islam” (territories ruled by the Caliphate), jihad, and apostate killings, it is hardly a “religion of peace” — more like a slaughterhouse of bad dreams.
Come visit my blog and argue with me, leaving some comments for me to work against
When you leave comments, make them fat and juicy
http://www.catxman.wordpress.com
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A year ago I might have taken you up on your invitation, but now no thanks. I’m not going to argue one religion against another, or any religion vs. atheism. Right now no religion impresses me, not one of them can stop the killing. Only hunans can stop themselves from killing, but a hekkuva lot of people can’t bother to have an individual morality.
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