Commenter Randy had this to say in a comment to I’m Against Forcing Change.
Religions don’t help us answer questions. They only offer answers that can’t be questioned.
Which is not to say that religions don’t offer answers. Don’t lie. Don’t cheat. Don’t steal. Don’t be violent towards others. However, Libertarians have the same creed and many of them are irreligious or even anti-religious. (Not all of them) But when religions tell us who it is permissible to hate they are mistaken.
Comments
23 responses to “Questions”
Oh, I can find you some libertarians (or so they would call themselves) who are good for hatin on the Jews. Or those who work for the Federal Reserve. But perhaps I repeat myself.
WTP,
But perhaps you out yourself.
Just to add clarification to my earlier comment, I don’t deny that some of the moral proclamations contained in religious texts are wise and good. You know, broken clock and all. You’ve spelled out several.
What I do deny that religions teach any moral reasoning skills. The Abrahamic religions are top-down authoritarian structures where God is always right. IOW, God’s might makes right. Therefore the true believer thinks they have special insight into matters of morality because they have made God the fountain and final arbiter of morality.
I’ve heard Christians say that if God ordered them to kill a 10 year old boy, they would do so because, well, God said to do it. I’ve heard other Christians say that they would go on a rape and murder spree if they thought God didn’t exist because they think morality exists only because God exists. Therein lies the danger in thinking that morality is the exclusive purview of God and the religious.
There are numerous moral proclamations from ancient times contained in the Abrahamic holy texts that most modern believers ignore if not condemn. Why would that be if religion is truly a path to good moral reasoning skills and is from the mind of a perfect divine being? For instance, was it truly moral and approved by god to stone to death an unruly child or is that rule more likely a reflection of the barbarism and superstitions of the people of that time and place?
If religion really teaches good moral reasoning skills, why do so many religious people support the WOD? Large numbers of Christians in the US think nothing about bringing violence, the threat of violence and imprisonment against peaceful drug users via their support of existing drug laws. Their unwarranted self-assurance about when and where violence is warranted was one minor reason why I’m now an atheist.
During my own transition from Christian to atheist I concluded that most believers (myself included) have a kindergartener’s understanding of morality precisely because believers are discouraged from questioning religious proclamations. I look at what I used to accept without question as a believer versus what I do now when it comes to moral considerations over the broad panorama of human actions and I’m embarrassed by my old simplistic and authoritarian thinking.
To clarify my earlier comment about religions having answers that can’t be questioned, please recognize that many believers think that all of life’s big questions were already asked and answered in their ancient holy books. And they believe these answers didn’t come from human endeavor and reasoning but rather from a perfect divine entity directly to mankind. When one accepts these assertions, it is unsurprising that believers rarely question the overall proclamations made by their religions. When you believe there is a god, that he has revealed himself already, and that these ancient stories are a true record of god’s mind and desires, then there is no need to question anything.
My original comment was made to your post concerning homosexuality. The religious types that oppose gay rights, marriage, etc. hang their hat on 2000 to 3000+ year old bible verses that condemn homosexual activity. In their minds there is no question that god condemns homosexual relations because it is in black and white in their holy book and attributed directly to God. They reject out of hand that those verses may merely reflect one man’s opinion about the unorthodox sexual proclivities of a tiny minority of humans or that societal condemnation of this sort is from the same prejudices that have plagued mankind in other ways. If you do question the truth of the holy texts here and disagree, then you might reach similar conclusions about other things in the texts. To question the holy book can lead to a loss of faith, which, unsurprisingly, is considered a bad thing by the same holy book.
Do believers question their religious dogmas and assertions? Many do, but generally speaking they do it not to seek the truth about the claims, but rather to find reassurance that their leaps of faith are warranted concerning the extraordinary claims made by religions. Priests, pastors, and theologians are quite practiced at giving reassuring answers to these people in order to keep the faithful in the flock.
Randy,
Wow. Very nice!
Thank you, Randy, for having said so well what I think on this, but doubt I could express nearly as well.
And this too shall pass the most optimistic statement their is! Without forced change their is very little important change. Lexington green not the continental congress pleadings. John Browns raid on harpers ferry not abolutionist pleadings forced change! Gays celebrate the stonewall riots that is why gay pride is held june! Those who make peaceful change impossible make violent revolution ineveitable! When it is said nothing can be done about it. A man or woman or even a child will say If not me who? If not now when?
Thanks for the kind words folks.
And just one more thought here. While I’m highly critical of religions and religious dogmas and think that practitioners are often ill-served by these dogmas, I find most religious people to be quite agreeable and decent people, generally speaking. From what I can tell, the average believer in the West is much more moral than the God they worship. For that I am grateful.
Well Simon, I thought I was referring to Ron Paul and friends but things are getting so crazy these days I’m not quite sure.
What crap.
Simon, I’m surprised someone raised with Judaism would agree that religions don’t question themselves. There are some religionists that do not, but there are incurious atheists, too. And before you spout ignorant BS about Baptists, try arguing theology with a fundamentalist who really knows his stuff. You don’t have to agree with them to observe that they’re thinking about things.
Religion is how we ponder the questions when we don’t even know what the questions are. It’s messy, yes, but that is the purpose it serves.
By the way, atheism is a belief system, too. Its claim (which atheists do not question, I’m told) is that everything in the universe can be described in terms of our probabilistic model of the natural world. That there is no room for God in the math.
Which statement is no more provable than the statement that God does exist.
You don’t have to agree with them to observe that they’re thinking about things.
Just ask those Baptist about Pot Prohibition. Explain that chronic pot use (hell heroin too) is a response to child abuse (mostly). What will they tell you? “If we only jailed more.”
You will note in the Gallup poll I have been linking on pot prohibition that the last bastion of support is the so called conservatives.
Roughly IIRC:
Democrats – 65% against pot prohibition
Independents – 60% against
Republicans – 35% against
Generally the answer that comes back is that Jesus is the only required medicine for existential pain. i.e. if Jesus don’t fix it you are SOL. You can explain the science until your fingers hurt just from copy-paste medical journal articles. They are having none of it.
And don’t even get me started on teh gay. The Bible trumps actual knowledge.
What is the best religion on those two questions? Jews. Even the Orthodox are against medicinal pot prohibition.
And again on gays? Jews are the best. In Israel they take in Arab gays that would be hanged by the Palestinians.
Why? Well Jews don’t take the Bible literally. They come up with convoluted dodges to bypass the law. Take death for adultery. IIRC it requires 25 witnesses. And before the witnesses are believed they are cross examined.
In fact if you look at the attitudes of Jesus to the law – Jews are closer to that than most Fundamentalist Christian sects. And not just the Reforms. The Orthodox as well.
=== Some links for your amusement:
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-life-and-religion/48549/contact-high
This was my Rabbi (Reform) years back. He was in Rockford last year:
http://gma.yahoo.com/rabbi-ties-jewish-faith-medical-marijuana-101810096–abc-news-health.html
http://www.jweekly.com/article/full/70324/for-berkeley-jews-medical-cannabis-is-ethical-imperative/
http://failedmessiah.typepad.com/failed_messiahcom/2013/09/chabad-of-eastern-massachusetts-applies-for-medical-marijuana-dispensary-license-234.html
http://medireview.com/2013/10/is-medical-marijuana-kosher/
http://www.vosizneias.com/news/photos/view/624708888
================
Jews gave up Fundamentalism a very long time ago. Why? Well reason is placed above even the “word” of God. I can live with that kind of religion.
A very close Jewish friend once told me that if he wasn’t Jewish he could be a Buddhist. I’d have to agree.
The Jews have a very cute dodge – the Laws are unchanging – the regulations implementing the laws are not.
WTP,
Oh. The Pauls. Yes. I don’t fully trust them. But until we have two libertarian parties vying for electoral supremacy they will have to do.
I must say that my co-religionists do disappoint me. They earn like Episcopalians and vote like Puerto Ricans.
Of course there is Ayn Rand (Alisa Zinov’yevna Rosenbaum). And atheist Jews are not an anomaly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_atheism
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Jewish_atheists_and_agnostics
Jews are not REQUIRED to believe anything.
My religion is closest to the Jeddi from Star Wars. But I have practiced a lot of them over the years. From Orthodox Jew to Sabean Pagan.
http://sabaea.blogspot.com/2009/06/sabaea-ancient-modern-philosophy.html
Christianity (in its modern form) never appealed to me. Never felt the need for a mediator between me and the head office.
BTW Captains “A man or woman or even a child will say If not me who? If not now when?” is from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hillel_the_Elder
“If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And when I am for myself, what am ‘I’? And if not now, when?”[2] and (2) the expression of the ethic of reciprocity, or “Golden Rule”: “That which is hateful to you, do not do to your fellow. That is the whole Torah; the rest is the explanation; go and learn.”[3]
“As Hillel the Elder had stated, whosoever destroys a soul, it is considered as if he destroyed an entire world. And whosoever that saves a life, it is considered as if he saved an entire world.” [4]
A different translation I have heard is:
If I am not for myself, who will be for me? And if I am for myself only, what am ‘I’? And if not now, when?
It has been a very long time but IIRC the above is the Orthodox translation.
See: http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Quote/hillel2.html
More on my former Rabbi
http://classicalvalues.com/2013/02/rabbi-jeffrey-kahn/
He is running a med pot clinic in DC now. I just looked up
“Christian medical marijuana dispensaries” and didn’t find any on the first page of the search.
Compare that to “Jewish medical marijuana dispensaries”
Most of the first page is about Rabbi Kahn. But there is also a mention of an Orthodox dispensary in the Bay Area.
http://www.jweekly.com/article/full/70324/for-berkeley-jews-medical-cannabis-is-ethical-imperative/
==
http://www.thejewishadvocate.com/news/2013-09-20/Local_News/Chabad_Rabbi_applies_for_medical_marijuana_dispens.html
http://medireview.com/2013/10/is-medical-marijuana-kosher/
Well this amused:
In short, all of the services that benefit from drunks becoming
inebriated and drunks destroying themselves and others, are
services that are highly profitable to the Jews. So, of course,
the Jews write laws that benefit themselves. They promote alcohol
consumption and discourage the smoking of marijuana. And when
marijuana is illegal, then its price is very high so this is
beneficial to the Jews of Mexico and other pot growing locations
who get high profits from their crops and for transportation and
distribution.
http://www.bamboo-delight.com/Wu_Files/Med_Pot.txt
First Published in the Chinese Swaztika Newsletter
==
http://www.jta.org/2012/11/12/news-opinion/politics/jewish-pot-activist-mason-tvert-hits-new-high-with-marijuana-legalization-vote-in-colorado
Rabbi Kahn also gets a mention:
http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/147470/the-jewish-face-of-the-pot-movement
http://azjewishpost.com/2012/jewish-pot-activist-hits-new-high-with-marijuana-legalization-vote-in-colorado/
Say what you will about Mason Tvert, the Jewish activist behind the marijuana legalization campaign that passed in Colorado, the man clearly has a sense of humor.
Some years ago, in his efforts to persuade the public that marijuana is far less of a health menace than alcohol, Tvert famously challenged both the mayor of Denver and the heir to the Coors brewing fortune to a sort of intoxication duel: Tvert would smoke pot while the others drank, and they would see who dropped dead first.
Neither man took up Tvert on his offer.
But after Colorado voters on Nov. 6 adopted a newly permissive approach to marijuana following a campaign for which the 30-year-old was the public face and a leading strategist, Tvert’s tomfoolery is no longer just a laughing matter.
I’m nominally a Republican because they can budget and favor low taxes.
Socially I’m more of a Democrat.
But really I’m an anti-Jihad libertarian.
OK. Further digging found one:
http://www.christianpost.com/news/calif-marijuana-dispensary-owned-by-evangelical-christian-family-86409/
===
That link was found here: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2012/12/should-christians-smoke-legal-marijuana/
Mark Driscoll, a cutting-edged Reformed pastor says that Christians should stay away from marijuana…
====
http://www.gotquestions.org/medical-marijuana.html
Question: “Medical marijuana – what does the Bible say?”
Answer: There is no definitive biblical answer to the question of whether Christians should use medical marijuana, because marijuana for medicinal use is not addressed in the Bible. However, after a review of certain clear biblical principles, the answer to the question becomes clearer.
First, although many states have legalized medical marijuana, its use is still illegal according to federal law. Paul exhorts us to obey the law of the land under our government in this way: “Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves” (Romans 13:1-2).
In addition to the fact that it is illegal, smoking marijuana can be extremely harmful to one’s health. The most potent argument against the use of marijuana to treat medical disorders is that marijuana may cause the acceleration or aggravation of the very disorders it is being used to treat. Smoking marijuana regularly (a joint a day) can damage the cells in the bronchial passages which protect the body against inhaled microorganisms and decrease the ability of the immune cells in the lungs to fight off fungi, bacteria, and tumor cells. For patients with already weakened immune systems, this means an increase in the possibility of dangerous pulmonary infections, including pneumonia, which often proves fatal in AIDS patients. The use of marijuana as a medical therapy can and does have a very serious negative effect on patients with pre-existing immune deficits from AIDS, organ transplantation, or cancer chemotherapy, the very conditions for which marijuana has most often been suggested as a treatment.
==========================
I can say definitively from decades of study that the above is “Reefer Madness”. So are they mistaken about medical cannabis or are they lying?
An influence on Jews is probably the fact that the premier researcher on cannabis and medical cannabis (at least in the early stages of the work) is Dr. Raphael Mechoulam, Faculty of Medicine, Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
[…] But they are a significant force. I made a number of comments to this effect at my post Questions. I thought it might be a good idea (well it is something to write about) to turn them into a post. […]
Neil,
Judaism stopped being a revealed religion about 2,000 years ago. Now it is Hillel says this and some one else says that. And the consensus is… but X, differs in this way and Y has another interpretation.
Neil-
It’s not that the religious don’t ponder moral questions. It ‘s that they ponder them through the filter of their religion’s holy texts and interpretations and in light of things that the faithful consider long settled and unassailable (those answers that can’t be questioned). There are a number of things that are written down in black and white in their holy texts that believers can’t repudiate without risking schisms or charges of heresy and so on. They are handcuffed to the thoughts, fears, and superstitions of people long dead and if you claim they got it wrong you risk opening other ideas to scrutiny, jeopardizing the whole religious enterprise. In short, if you come to a moral conclusion that contradicts the Bible, you are claiming that God got it wrong, at least in the minds of other believers. And that is a hard rock to push uphill, as believers seem to think that God and the Bible is always right.
When I find myself differing with a religious person on issues of morality, I often get the sense that I’m not talking to them but rather different guys that lived in the Middle East 2000 to 6000 years ago. That’s how reliant on scriptures many believers seem to be when it comes to making moral assessments. As I mentioned above, many believers hold the position that all morality comes from God and is already revealed in the Bible, so they automatically defer to ancient scriptures to help them form their opinions.
The reason I find this a problem is that the people from those times didn’t know what they didn’t know. And as the Bible clearly shows, much of what they thought they knew about the world around them was completely wrong. For example, diseases were seen as punishment from God; the same for natural disasters; being bested in battle by your enemy was seen as punishment; mental illness was considered demon possession and so on. Their ideas of morality were shaped by these misperceptions and abject ignorance about the world around them. When you view everything that happens around you, good and bad, as being directed by a deity or deities, you are bound to have some funny and bad ideas about what is moral or immoral in order to keep the deity’s wrath (or the forces of nature under control of the deity) at bay. It seems unwise to me to bind ourselves to the convoluted thinking of those times, which is what religions have a tendency to do. It’s quite possible that if they had known what we know today, they may well have reached different conclusions about a host of behaviors.
IMO, we have a much better understanding of the world and ourselves as compared to the ancients and are therefore better prepared to make better, more humane moral judgments than they were. We hamstring ourselves by deferring to the thoughts of people long dead whose moral views and assessments were formed in a more superstitious and barbaric age and therefore aren’t worthy of the deference religious people tend to give them.
Cheers.