Spreading a New Philosophy - The Founding of Christianity

[George H. Smith]

In considering the success of early Christianity, we need to take into account the determination and perseverance of people who believe they are doing God's work and who look forward to eternal bliss as their reward.

This reminds me of the point I made earlier about Mormonism and Scientology being better references, since their histories are better recorded. Imagine if history were rewritten by either group, how much of the dirt would survive the revision?

Was the real St. Paul such a heroic figure? If he wasn’t, we sure wouldn’t know about it.

If courage and dedication to a cause qualify as "heroic," then Paul was certainly a heroic figure.

Since Paul was a late-comer to Christianity and a former persecutor of Christians to boot, he encountered considerable opposition from many Christians at first, especially among those Christians, such as James and Peter, who viewed themselves primarily as a reform movement within Judaism. Gentiles were welcome, but only if they first underwent the rite of circumcision.

Paul opposed this practice (for the most part), arguing instead that Christianity should be an independent religion, one that freed members from the rituals and laws of Judaism. He became known as "apostle to the Gentiles" for his efforts to expand the frontiers of Christianity, and was thus responsible for much of its success.

Imagine we are living in the first century and have decided to become Christians. We are listening to an argument between two preachers. One says, "Okay, hike up your robes so we can do a trim-job. Don't worry: the cutting stone is sharp and you won't bleed for too long."

The second guy says, "None of this will be necessary. Spiritual circumcision will do just fine. Let us pray."

I don't know about you, but I'm going with the second guy.

Ghs

[Philip Coates]

> a famous passage from I Corinthians 13.... [GHS]

Very powerful passage. It occurs to me that what he means by 'love' has some similarities (stripped of altruism or lack of discrimination) to what Kelley had in mind when he supplied the "missing virtue" of benevolence to Objectivism.

But Paul here is a much more eloquent, dramatic writer than the rather dry and less vivid Kelley. Paul apparently has the common touch. The man on the street or in the shtetl could read or hear him and be moved, whereas most Oist intellectuals would put him into a narcoleptic coma.

(Punctuated by fits of rage in moments of consciousness when he realized what was being advocated or how anyone who wasn't instantly in lockstep was being denounced.)

[Philip Coates]

"Okay, hike up your robes so we can do a trim-job."

Yeah, and also: "Put your hands on the donkey cart, and Back away slowly from that Ham and Cheese sandwich!" "No more Bacon and Eggs 'fer you, sucka."

..... Where do I sign up?

[9thdoctor]

But Paul here is a much more eloquent, dramatic writer than the rather dry and less vivid Kelley.

I saw him deliver a talk in 1997 that was as eloquent and dramatic as anyone can give.

If courage and dedication to a cause qualify as "heroic," then Paul was certainly a heroic figure.

My point is that the history is unreliable, thus, any lessons you try to take from it are equally unreliable. Sticking to what literature we do have, consider, first, that in Corinthians 1, among the subjects Paul addresses is that some members of the Christian community are visiting brothels, then coming to the meeting and bragging about their exploits. Second, in the Didache of the Apostles the Christian communities are warned against itinerant preachers. Sure, welcome them, let them speak, let them stay the night, but if they try to stay more than two nights kick them out. These two points suggest the presence of Elmer Gantry-like figures in the early church.

The history was written by the hagiographers, the critics had their books burned.

[john42t]

I think that instead of studying Christianity, it would be better to focus on how Kant tricked so many people into following him. As we all know, Kant was the most evil and influential man in mankind's history, and somehow -- no one has yet discovered how -- he managed to convert people to his evil ways without their knowing it, and in many cases he converted them despite the fact that his converts have stated that they were opposed to his ideas! That's right, evil people who explicitly say that they reject Kant's ideas were nevertheless somehow accepting and practicing his ideas even though they weren't! He caused Nazism, Communism, Modern Art, serial killers, shoplifting and all sorts of other bad things.

One potential path that we might want to follow would be to study certain Objectivists' resistance to facts and reason. Whenever I run into Objectivists like, say, Phil or Newberry or Pigero, or some of the dozens of Objecti-hatchlings over at OO, and I see that the more that they're confronted with reality, the tighter they cling to their false beliefs, I have to ask myself, "How did Kant get to them? They're totally embarrassing themselves by acting so stubbornly and irrationally. How did Kant trick them into behaving so stupidly, and to do so in the name of Objectivism?!?!"

You seem to be saying that you see Kantian deontology / idealism in the Objectivist movement, but then I sense irony in the first quotation, as if you think Kant wasn't actually that evil.

Can you clarify what exactly you mean, it sounds like an intriguing start.

[George H. Smith]

But Paul here is a much more eloquent, dramatic writer than the rather dry and less vivid Kelley.

I saw him deliver a talk in 1997 that was as eloquent and dramatic as anyone can give.

If courage and dedication to a cause qualify as "heroic," then Paul was certainly a heroic figure.

My point is that the history is unreliable, thus, any lessons you try to take from it are equally unreliable. Sticking to what literature we do have, consider, first, that in Corinthians 1, among the subjects Paul addresses is that some members of the Christian community are visiting brothels, then coming to the meeting and bragging about their exploits. Second, in the Didache of the Apostles the Christian communities are warned against itinerant preachers. Sure, welcome them, let them speak, let them stay the night, but if they try to stay more than two nights kick them out. These two points suggest the presence of Elmer Gantry-like figures in the early church. The history was written by the hagiographers, the critics had their books burned.

I don't quite understand your point. Are you saying that none of the Pauline Epistles were actually written by Paul? Or are you saying that they cannot be trusted, even if Paul did write them (or some of them)?

Ghs

[George H. Smith]

> a famous passage from I Corinthians 13.... [GHS]

Very powerful passage. It occurs to me that what he means by 'love' has some similarities (stripped of altruism or lack of discrimination) to what Kelley had in mind when he supplied the "missing virtue" of benevolence to Objectivism.

But Paul here is a much more eloquent, dramatic writer than the rather dry and less vivid Kelley. Paul apparently has the common touch. The man on the street or in the shtetl could read or hear him and be moved, whereas most Oist intellectuals would put him into a narcoleptic coma.

(Punctuated by fits of rage in moments of consciousness when he realized what was being advocated or how anyone who wasn't instantly in lockstep was being denounced.)

Paul used the Greek "agape," not "eros." See the Wiki article on Agape, which is sometimes translated as "charity." I don't know whether a word like "benevolence" would work, but I doubt it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agape

Ghs

[9thdoctor]

I don't quite understand your point. Are you saying that none of the Pauline Epistles were actually written by Paul? Or are you saying that they cannot be trusted, even if Paul did write them (or some of them)?

I’m saying they may have been written by the 1^st century equivalent of Joseph Smith or L. Ron Hubbard. Needless to say I consider both of them to be conscious charlatans.

Can Paul’s epistles be trusted? Of course not. But can we read selectively and try to come up with a speculative portrait of Paul qua historical figure? I think so, yes. Just strip out the hocus pocus and you end up with an itinerant preacher who keeps getting into trouble. There’s no way of knowing if that portrait is accurate or in any sense complete. BTW there are bible scholars who have gone to the trouble of comparing what Paul says about Paul with what Acts of the Apostles says about Paul. They jibe about as well as the four Gospels do on the life of Jesus. That is, not particularly well.

[caroljane]

Seriously, though, that was a powerful and moving passage: Someone who would not give up. Ad astra per aspera. Unbending resolve like tempered steel is always impressive. Reminded me of a snippet on the runway strip, when the plane carrying the Vietnam War prisoners who had been savagely tortured in POW camps came home after those long years of captivity. The senior officer, Jeremiah Denton, who had led their years-long resistance had a very short stoically euphemistic answer to the blizzard of questions asking for details: "We are honored to have had the opportunity to serve our country under difficult circumstances."

In The Rise of Christianity (1984), W.H.C. Frend writes:

Paul's strength lay in an ability to dictate immensely powerful letters which could not fail to impress their recipients....His letters tell us us a great deal about the man. He was vigorous, direct, and confident, sometimes arrogant and self-centered. He wrote for the occasion as he felt, not in the carefully studied literary style of the Letter of Aristeas or the Letter to Diognetus, and he could be biting and sarcastic as well as humble and pleading; but he was always genuine and utterly devoted to the task in hand which he believed was entrusted to him personally by God. The letters to the Corinthians show him ranging from indignation and angry denunciation to personal reminiscence and judicial pronouncements and then -- at the end of I Corinthians -- poetry of great beauty.

Ghs

For those OLers who have neglected their daily Bible readings, here is a famous passage from I Corinthians 13 to which Frend was doubtless referring:

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.²And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.³If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast,^* but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant⁵or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;⁶it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.⁷It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end.⁹For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part;¹⁰but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end.¹¹When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.¹²For now we see in a mirror, dimly,^* but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.¹³And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

Ghs

That is an awful translation, losing the poetry.

T

[caroljane]

Seriously, though, that was a powerful and moving passage: Someone who would not give up. Ad astra per aspera. Unbending resolve like tempered steel is always impressive. Reminded me of a snippet on the runway strip, when the plane carrying the Vietnam War prisoners who had been savagely tortured in POW camps came home after those long years of captivity. The senior officer, Jeremiah Denton, who had led their years-long resistance had a very short stoically euphemistic answer to the blizzard of questions asking for details: "We are honored to have had the opportunity to serve our country under difficult circumstances."

In The Rise of Christianity (1984), W.H.C. Frend writes:

Paul's strength lay in an ability to dictate immensely powerful letters which could not fail to impress their recipients....His letters tell us us a great deal about the man. He was vigorous, direct, and confident, sometimes arrogant and self-centered. He wrote for the occasion as he felt, not in the carefully studied literary style of the Letter of Aristeas or the Letter to Diognetus, and he could be biting and sarcastic as well as humble and pleading; but he was always genuine and utterly devoted to the task in hand which he believed was entrusted to him personally by God. The letters to the Corinthians show him ranging from indignation and angry denunciation to personal reminiscence and judicial pronouncements and then -- at the end of I Corinthians -- poetry of great beauty.

Ghs

For those OLers who have neglected their daily Bible readings, here is a famous passage from I Corinthians 13 to which Frend was doubtless referring:

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.²And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.³If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast,^* but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant⁵or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful;⁶it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth.⁷It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Love never ends. But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end.⁹For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part;¹⁰but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end.¹¹When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways.¹²For now we see in a mirror, dimly,^* but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.¹³And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

Ghs

That is an awful translation, losing the poetry.

T

Please provide the King James version.

Carol (Jane Elizabeth) Stuart

Monarchy, what can I say. the wisest fool in Christendom, stuffed with education from infancy entirely by Scots religious types, a total buffoon, repulsive to everybody who ever met or even saw him but unlucky for them he was bisexual and like, you know, the King.Hobby: witch burning.

He gave us this book. Well, he gave it to me, and when our just claim is established and we reascend the throne, we will re-establish his reputation. It wasn't all that good in the first place, but an interesting challenge on the witch burning thing to a modern readership.

[George H. Smith]

[

Please provide the King James version.

Carol (Jane Elizabeth) Stuart

Should I also quote some of the love letters that King James I wrote to the Duke of Buckingham? I recall that he signed some of them as "your wife," which gives us an idea of the role that James played in that relationship. That should get your monarchical blood boiling.

Anyway, here is the "New" KJV translation, which closely follows the original KJV (which is sometimes inaccurate):

¹ Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I have become sounding brass or a clanging cymbal. ² And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. ³ And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned,^[a] but have not love, it profits me nothing.

⁴ Love suffers long and is kind; love does not envy; love does not parade itself, is not puffed up; ⁵ does not behave rudely, does not seek its own, is not provoked, thinks no evil; ⁶ does not rejoice in iniquity, but rejoices in the truth; ⁷ bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

⁸ Love never fails. But whether there are prophecies, they will fail; whether there are tongues, they will cease; whether there is knowledge, it will vanish away. ⁹ For we know in part and we prophesy in part. ¹⁰ But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away.

¹¹ When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. ¹² For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.

¹³ And now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love.

Here is a handy source for various translations:

http://www.biblegateway.com/

Ghs

[George H. Smith]

Monarchy, what can I say. the wisest fool in Christendom, stuffed with education from infancy entirely by Scots religious types, a total buffoon, repulsive to everybody who ever met or even saw him but unlucky for them he was bisexual and like, you know, the King.Hobby: witch burning.

He gave us this book. Well, he gave it to me, and when our just claim is established and we reascend the throne, we will re-establish his reputation. It wasn't all that good in the first place, but an interesting challenge on the witch burning thing to a modern readership.

The bottom of the Stuart barrel was James II, a real dolt. Though a Catholic, James seems to have had a thing for Protestant mistresses, and homely ones at that. I don't recall her name offhand, but one of his mistresses speculated on why James liked her so much: "It cannot be my beauty, because I haven't any. And it cannot be my wit, because he hasn't enough of it himself to know that I have any."

After James II fled, nosebleed and all, to France during the Glorious Revolution of 1688, a French lady said of him: "James is a good man, but an extremely pious one. Piety makes people outrageously stupid."

(I quoted these from memory, but they are pretty close.)

Ghs

[George H. Smith]

Here, from the Wiki article on "The Wicked Bible," is a description of my favorite version of the Bible. When I first heard of this nearly 40 years ago, it was called "The Adulterers' Bible." This is probably the most famous -- and notorious -- error in the history of printing.

The Wicked Bible, sometimes called The Adulterous Bible or The Sinners' Bible, is a term referring to the Bible published in 1631 by Robert Barker and Martin Lucas, the royal printers in London, which was meant to be a reprint of the King James Bible. The name is derived from the compositors' mistake: in the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:14) the word not in the sentence "Thou shalt not commit adultery" was omitted, thus changing the sentence into "Thou shalt commit adultery". This blunder was spread in a number of copies. About a year later, the publishers of the Wicked Bible were fined £300 (roughly equivalent to 33,800 pounds today) and were deprived of their printer's license.^{[citation needed]} The fact that this edition of the Bible contained such a flagrant mistake outraged Charles I of England and George Abbot, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who said then:

I knew the tyme when great care was had about printing, the Bibles especially, good compositors and the best correctors were gotten being grave and learned men, the paper and the letter rare, and faire every way of the beste, but now the paper is nought, the composers boyes, and the correctors unlearned.

[1]

By order of the king, the authors were called to the Star Chamber, where, upon the fact being proved, the whole impression was called in, and they were fined.

The majority of the Wicked Bible's copies were immediately cancelled and burned, and the number of extant copies remaining today, which are considered highly valuable by collectors, is thought to be relatively low.^[2] One copy is in the collection of rare books in the New York Public Library and is very rarely made accessible; another can be seen in the Bible Museum in Branson, Missouri, USA. The British Library in London had a copy on display, opened to the misprinted commandment, in a free exhibition until September 2009.^[3] The Wicked Bible also appeared on display for a limited time at the Ink and Blood Exhibit in Gadsden, Alabama from August 15 to September 1, 2009. Another copy is on display at Houston Baptist University's Bible Museum. A copy was also displayed until June 18, 2011 at the Cambridge University Library exhibition in England, in for the 400 year anniversary of the KJV.

Ghs

[caroljane]

Monarchy, what can I say. the wisest fool in Christendom, stuffed with education from infancy entirely by Scots religious types, a total buffoon, repulsive to everybody who ever met or even saw him but unlucky for them he was bisexual and like, you know, the King.Hobby: witch burning.

He gave us this book. Well, he gave it to me, and when our just claim is established and we reascend the throne, we will re-establish his reputation. It wasn't all that good in the first place, but an interesting challenge on the witch burning thing to a modern readership.

The bottom of the Stuart barrel was James II, a real dolt. Though a Catholic, James seems to have had a thing for Protestant mistresses, and homely ones at that. I don't recall her name offhand, but one of his mistresses speculated on why James liked her so much: "It cannot be my beauty, because I haven't any. And it cannot be my wit, because he hasn't enough of it himself to know that I have any."

After James II fled, nosebleed and all, to France during the Glorious Revolution of 1688, a French lady said of him: "James is a good man, but an extremely pious one. Piety makes people outrageously stupid."

(I quoted these from memory, but they are pretty close.)

Ghs

I think the original quote was from Arabella Stuart, a cousin. I have been told by unkind persons that I resemble them both. No wonder I use an avatar.

Poor Charles II was well aware of his brother's total hopelessness, but blood loyalty trumped all - loyalty itself, really, for him. He refused to divorce his barren wife although he could easily have prevented the revolution, which he knew would happen the minute James tromped foot on the throne.\, by divorcing her. He refused to take away one bit, anything, of his wife's honour and position in the world. He was fascinated by real science...you know all that. He was deeply cynical and fatalistic, and lazy. On his deathbed he said, "Let not poor Nelly starve", but he never bothered beforehand to make sure she wouldn't. And she did.

[Brant Gaede]

Here, from the Wiki article on "The Wicked Bible," is a description of my favorite version of the Bible. When I first heard of this nearly 40 years ago, it was called "The Adulterers' Bible." This is probably the most famous -- and notorious -- error in the history of printing.

The Wicked Bible, sometimes called The Adulterous Bible or The Sinners' Bible, is a term referring to the Bible published in 1631 by Robert Barker and Martin Lucas, the royal printers in London, which was meant to be a reprint of the King James Bible. The name is derived from the compositors' mistake: in the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:14) the word not in the sentence "Thou shalt not commit adultery" was omitted, thus changing the sentence into "Thou shalt commit adultery". This blunder was spread in a number of copies. About a year later, the publishers of the Wicked Bible were fined £300 (roughly equivalent to 33,800 pounds today) and were deprived of their printer's license.^{[citation needed]} The fact that this edition of the Bible contained such a flagrant mistake outraged Charles I of England and George Abbot, the Archbishop of Canterbury, who said then:

I knew the tyme when great care was had about printing, the Bibles especially, good compositors and the best correctors were gotten being grave and learned men, the paper and the letter rare, and faire every way of the beste, but now the paper is nought, the composers boyes, and the correctors unlearned.

[1]

By order of the king, the authors were called to the Star Chamber, where, upon the fact being proved, the whole impression was called in, and they were fined.

The majority of the Wicked Bible's copies were immediately cancelled and burned, and the number of extant copies remaining today, which are considered highly valuable by collectors, is thought to be relatively low.^[2] One copy is in the collection of rare books in the New York Public Library and is very rarely made accessible; another can be seen in the Bible Museum in Branson, Missouri, USA. The British Library in London had a copy on display, opened to the misprinted commandment, in a free exhibition until September 2009.^[3] The Wicked Bible also appeared on display for a limited time at the Ink and Blood Exhibit in Gadsden, Alabama from August 15 to September 1, 2009. Another copy is on display at Houston Baptist University's Bible Museum. A copy was also displayed until June 18, 2011 at the Cambridge University Library exhibition in England, in for the 400 year anniversary of the KJV.

Ghs

They should have sent out a corrected page for insert.

Thou shalt NOT commit adultry

--Brant

they call this O'Cam's razor, don't they?

[9thdoctor]

Here, from the Wiki article on "The Wicked Bible," is a description of my favorite version of the Bible.

Not to be confused with The Amusing Bible.

[caroljane]

Finally, a subject on which I can presume equal knowledge with George H. Smith. Stupid English monarchs. No offence, I can't help it what dynasts named their children, but pick a George, any George. Not fair on George III was merely crazy and otherwise conscientious and a doting father, but he did manage to lose half of an entire continent with relatively little help. Up next we have George !V who thought nobody would ever notice that he was married to a Catholic, which was legal for everybody else in the country but illegal for exactly one person, him. He also thought that Jane Austen would be flattered when he invited her to dedicate her next novel to him.

James II at least was a great naval commander, shrewd, brave and beloved of the sailors, and savvy on the finance side as Pepys reported. If Charles had taken the trouble to keep him permanently afloat as far from British shores as possible, I would be peeling grapes in my tastefully decorated grace and favour apartment at Kensington palace right now

[caroljane]

And spare a thought for the subcategory, Mothers of Stupid English monarchs. Sophia of Hanover, tied with Prince Rupert for Brightest Stuart, would have made an excellent queen but was doomed to overseeing the upbringing of sons so dense and loutish that it is a testament to her fortitude that they actually lived to grow up.

Queen Matilda's son William Rufus was a gay atheist in the eleventh freaking century and he didn't care who knew it. It never occurred to him that anybody might, oh I don't know, disagree with his opinions or lifestyle or assassinate him or anything.Matilda must have sat around wondering, where does he get it? Not from my side of the family, pure English through and through. It's those Norman devils..my father-in-law, that bastard....

Queen Charlotte had to give birth nineteen times,,, that did not make George 4 stupid but there must be a connection somewhere.

Edward VIII inherited a certain animal cunning from his mother May "I'll marry whichever heir to the throne lives the longest" of Teck. She loved jewellery but was cheap so she developed a good system of "borrowing", expropriating or outright stealing it. Even when she could afford to pay she seldom would , because she didn't want to.

E8 didn't want the hassle of being king and doing a lot of stuff he didn't feel like doing, although he liked the wardrobe. Loving Wallis got him out of it. He didn't inherit any brains from anybody.

[George H. Smith]

Poor Charles II was well aware of his brother's total hopelessness, but blood loyalty trumped all - loyalty itself, really, for him. He refused to divorce his barren wife although he could easily have prevented the revolution, which he knew would happen the minute James tromped foot on the throne.\, by divorcing her. He refused to take away one bit, anything, of his wife's honour and position in the world. He was fascinated by real science...you know all that. He was deeply cynical and fatalistic, and lazy. On his deathbed he said, "Let not poor Nelly starve", but he never bothered beforehand to make sure she wouldn't. And she did.

Following in the footsteps of the philosopher Brand Blanshard, who said he preferred reading biographies over fiction when he wanted to relax, a few days ago I happened to finish reading a bio of Charles II by Ronald Hutton, Charles II: King of England, Scotland and Ireland (Oxford, 1989), In his Conclusion (p. 453), Hutton writes: "It would be utterly misguided to term [Charles] lazy. As has been said above, he was hyperactive by nature."

Hutton says that Charles fulfilled his royal duties more diligently than most English monarchs, and he even took on some additional responsibilities, such as attending meetings of the House of Lords (a custom that had been dormant for over a century). The lazy legend apparently originated with Halifax, who said that Charles had to be offered work like medicine, coated in something pleasant to persuade him to swallow it. Hutton claims that this pertained only to reading and writing, both of which Charles disliked: "To this King, any letter of more than five hundred words was a long one."

Ghs

[Philip Coates]

WhyNot:

> My small doubt is that Objectivism might be "a bridge too far", for the majority of people, the masses, actually...it runs counter to too many people's fundamental belief system

> one picks up echoes of O'ist political-economical theory wherever one is in the world, A tide seems to be rising in opposition to failed theories of the past

> should not the energy be better spent at promoting Libertarianism, initially and primarily?

GHS:

> O'ism will never be a mass philosophy

> this is not cause for pessimism. There are many examples throughout history of minority movements whose influence has been far greater than their numbers might suggest. ...the need for a "theory of leverage." This consists of figuring out how to exert the most influence with very limited resources, including a small minority among a large population.

I agree with GHS that Objectivism does not need to convert everyone to alter the direction of our culture. And I'd be happy if libertarianism and a basic respect for reason were to win out, but Objectivism only be understood or advocated by a minority.

(As for spreading Oism or libertarianism, it doesn't have to be either/or. Any major inroads by one would be helpful to the other. Participate in whichever one wants to, if one wants to help try to change things.)

But if neither of them (through slow spread, through 'leverage', etc.) eventually comes to become the viewpoint of the cultural leaders and the intellectuals - educators, writers, journalists, etc. - our freedoms will continue to erode, Islam and other dark ideas will continue to have a field day, mysticism may come back with a 'religious takeover'. It's hard to say which may acquire inertia of motion or sustained momentum. And it's complex. There are cross-currents: Religion has been making a comeback in recent decades in the U.S., but not in Europe.

One of the reasons for my trying to flesh out the issue of "inertia" is that there are massive cultural currents running in the opposite direction of Objectivism...and they are centuries old. The whole point of inertia is that once a huge rock starts rolling across the landscape and the most powerful cultural forces are pushing it, it will continue to make progress in the direction it was going.

George's point about 'leverage' and my point about studying lessons of history about how inertia (of rest or of motion) was changed is that there -are- ways to alter inertia. There are ways to win. Even against great odds. The early Chrisitians did so, the Renaissance followed by the Enlightenment broke through the medieval-feudal-deeply religious consensus, the Aristotelian revival....many examples exist.

Tiny, determined minorities move history.

BUT: they can't constantly fracture into bickering impotent factions directing all their fire internally, they have to present admirable role models, they have to have persuasive skills, they have to be -smart- about how they market, who they reach out to, what leverage points, how they avoid getting swept away by indifference or determined adversaries resolved to crush them.

Hence the purpose of looking at other movements and what they did facing similar problems. He who does not study history....and so on.

[PDS]

I don't quite understand your point. Are you saying that none of the Pauline Epistles were actually written by Paul? Or are you saying that they cannot be trusted, even if Paul did write them (or some of them)?

I’m saying they may have been written by the 1^st century equivalent of Joseph Smith or L. Ron Hubbard. Needless to say I consider both of them to be conscious charlatans.

Can Paul’s epistles be trusted? Of course not. But can we read selectively and try to come up with a speculative portrait of Paul qua historical figure? I think so, yes. Just strip out the hocus pocus and you end up with an itinerant preacher who keeps getting into trouble. There’s no way of knowing if that portrait is accurate or in any sense complete. BTW there are bible scholars who have gone to the trouble of comparing what Paul says about Paul with what Acts of the Apostles says about Paul. They jibe about as well as the four Gospels do on the life of Jesus. That is, not particularly well.

Paul's epistles, and his obsession with Jesus, make more historic sense when one considers the not-so-slight possibility that Paul was one of those was present at Jesus' trial and execution, thus paving the psychological path for his road to Damascus experience. Wouldn't it be ironic if a very serious case of Jewish guilt led to what we now know as Christianity?

[Jonathan]

I think that instead of studying Christianity, it would be better to focus on how Kant tricked so many people into following him. As we all know, Kant was the most evil and influential man in mankind's history, and somehow -- no one has yet discovered how -- he managed to convert people to his evil ways without their knowing it, and in many cases he converted them despite the fact that his converts have stated that they were opposed to his ideas! That's right, evil people who explicitly say that they reject Kant's ideas were nevertheless somehow accepting and practicing his ideas even though they weren't! He caused Nazism, Communism, Modern Art, serial killers, shoplifting and all sorts of other bad things.

One potential path that we might want to follow would be to study certain Objectivists' resistance to facts and reason. Whenever I run into Objectivists like, say, Phil or Newberry or Pigero, or some of the dozens of Objecti-hatchlings over at OO, and I see that the more that they're confronted with reality, the tighter they cling to their false beliefs, I have to ask myself, "How did Kant get to them? They're totally embarrassing themselves by acting so stubbornly and irrationally. How did Kant trick them into behaving so stupidly, and to do so in the name of Objectivism?!?!"

You seem to be saying that you see Kantian deontology / idealism in the Objectivist movement, but then I sense irony in the first quotation, as if you think Kant wasn't actually that evil.

Can you clarify what exactly you mean, it sounds like an intriguing start.

What I'm saying is that most Objectivists (especially the loudmouthed evangelists/guru-wannabes) don't understand Kant, or anyone else, because they've never studied anything other than Objectivism (one might say that outside of Objectivism, they are intellectual "degenerates"). And on the rare occasions when they make an attempt to study anything else, they view it through their ObjectiGoggles™ (which, btw, is a potential facet of an iPhone app that I'm exploring developing), and then go to absurd, embarrassing lengths to defend their ridiculously distorted misinterpretations. You can bludgeon them with reality, yet they idiotically practice Phil's "impressive" virtue of "unbending resolve."

In short, my point is that it is a hoot to watch people who are so resistant to reality expecting that others aren't going to idiotically practice the "impressive" virtue of "unbending resolve," but that they'll be more easily swayed by reality than Objectivism's crusaders are.

J

[Jonathan]

I just spent a little time looking through the archives here. I went to Phil's profile page, clicked the "Find content" button, and then the "Only posts" category.

Doing so got me wondering: Did the Christians (or any other movement in history) successfully spread their ideas and beliefs by spending almost all of their time avoiding discussing their ideas and beliefs, and instead spending almost all of their time discussing how to study how best to study studying how to study spreading their ideas and beliefs?

J

[9thdoctor]

Paul's epistles, and his obsession with Jesus, make more historic sense when one considers the not-so-slight possibility that Paul was one of those was present at Jesus' trial and execution, thus paving the psychological path for his road to Damascus experience. Wouldn't it be ironic if a very serious case of Jewish guilt led to what we now know as Christianity?

There’s no textual basis for thinking Paul ever set eyes on Jesus. It's just not part of the story.

One point I like to bring up with biblical literalists (or even run of the mill believers) is this, and it has to be carefully phrased: Did Jesus, Mary, Peter, Paul, the whole bunch, become fictional characters? If so, when? When did the inventing of fiction based on them begin? If they’re not aware of the non-biblical literature, things like the Gospel of Peter with its sky high walking talking cross, and the Acts of Peter, with it’s public magic contest in Rome between Peter and Simon Magus, all the better. Point out the dates of these creations (some have reliable, early, definitely before year X dates), then point out the dates of the earliest, highly variable manuscripts of the official canon. Guaranteed to make them squirm.

[john42t]

Wouldn't it be ironic if a very serious case of Jewish guilt led to what we now know as Christianity?

Paul was the first self-hating Jew. Quite possible.

I believe this to be the second cause for anti-semitism after the primary cause of them being apart/wealthy/selfish.

They also generate a lot of leftists.

Hitler surely hated Jews for both reasons.

So you have

Jew -invents-> Christianity -acolytes of which hated-> Jews (EDIT: Protestantism is different and doesn't apply)

and

Jew -invents-> Communism -acolytes of which hate-> Jews

and

Jew -invents-> Shock Doctrine -acolytes of which hate-> Jews

I already was about to make a video about this but I need to refine this theory first.