Archived Discussion

This is discussion archived from a time before the current discussion method was installed.

Dammerung: Lord Seth, why exactly do you keep taking down the example of the God of Abraham? It doesn't take much reading of the Old Testament to raise a throatful of bile - like when Jehova sent 2 bears to maul 40 kids for making fun of an old guy's bald head? That is fucked up.

If you're so offended by adding Jehova I think this entry should be removed entirely. After all, there are still many people who worship the old gods of Greece who might get offended by the inclusion of them in this entry. I am very offended by the inclusion of Inanna. Well, not really, I added her myself. I'm so offended my beliefs are being criticized! Waaaah!

If we can't keep Jehova in this entry then we should remove any and all gods who are still actively being worshiped by someone.

Gotta remove the Greek examples and Inanna
Must remove Saiyuki as an example - the Merciful Goddess is obviously a stand-in for Kwan Yin.
and must remove Kami-sama from Oh My Goddess
and the Norse ones - there's still people practicing the Old Religion in Iceland

Lord Seth: Hrm, you may have a point. Okay, there we go!

Long-ass argument removed

ccoa: Brought up in this forum thread.

If I may say, the purpose of examples is to help people understand the trope and how it is used. Several real world deities fit this trope to a T. Excluding them does a disservice to the site.

My suggestion as a compromise is to put all examples from Myth, Legend, and Religion at the bottom (possibly down several carriage returns) with a warning to the easily offended. Or perhaps to hide them under spoiler tags with a similar warning. And to keep them relatively unoffensive where possible. I don't think it's necessary to list every single (or even a good portion of the) Jerkass moment that the Christian God can be seen as having had.

Black Humor: Put the myth/religion examples back.

Dammerung: I agree they should be up, but I won't leave the mythology references up without a reasonably fleshed example on the Asshole of Arabia - the Heartless of the Hebrews - The Cocksucker of the Christians. Vaporizing towns for buttsecks or drowning damn near every living thing on a whim? That's no mere Values Dissonance.

Praetyre: A town in question whose entire inhabitants, on top of that (no pun intended), also intended to rape angels and men. And in which the angels could only find a single righteous man. And, it appears you didn't read that part of Genesis very well, given it specifically states that the omniscient, omnipotent and omnipresent creator of the universe couldn't find more than one righteous man on Earth (his family presumably being included, since this is the patriarchal, family oriented Ancient Near East we're talking about).

Do your research. Most of the complaints I've heard about OT God are emotionalistic rants written by people with little cultural knowledge of the Middle East at all, just taking verses out of literal, cultural and religious context and screaming to the readers like a 8 year old who found the word "booby" in an ornithology book.

Dammerung: You don't - er - actually believe that shit, do you? I mean while one tiny cult of Hebrew slaves are worshiping the second monotheistic god (the first having been invented by Akhenaten), the rest of the world has people in it too who are learning and doing shit. Chinese and Indian civilizations, for instance, are at least contemporary with the rise of empires in Egypt and Babylon. And you expect me to believe, that out of all these tens of millions of people in tribes scattered across Eurasia and on the shores of every sea - Polynesia, Bangladesh, Korea - only the Hebrews were interesting enough to get God's attention and all the other religions of mankind were just some kind of Satanic deception?

Such a view as this takes ethno-religious chavanism and turns it up to twelve.

What disturbs me the most about Yahweh, actually, is his claim to be the one and sole god. Just some tinpot Hebrew infanticide-committer daring to assume authority over the entire universe. "It is I who am God and none exist apart from me." Even many early Christians; many of whom still worshiped Egyptian or Syrian deities under other guises - found this claim remarkably ridiculous. There is for instance some very curious Hebrew where Yahweh refers to itself in the plural, El, et c.

But really it's a moral issue. It's a denial of every other faith and culture that existed contemporary with the Hebrews and that exists today. I refuse - refuse - to believe the Yahweh cult has any more inherent goodness than the cults of Krishna or the Jade Emperor. In his totalitarian announcement "It is I who am God and none exist apart from me," Yahweh echoes every dictator and tyrant who ever existed. "It is I who am God and none exist apart from me" is the mad cry of Caligula as he sends innocents to their deaths. "It is I who am God" is the inner cry of the Imam who calls for the stoning to death of a rape victim. "It is I who am God" is the cry of the inner mind struggling against the silence of meditation. It is the cry of egomania and insanity.

The truth about is even more subtle still! Our gods are our ambitions, our desires, they are who we want to be. The Gnostic Gospel of Philip cleverly observes - That is the way it is in the world - men make gods and worship their creation. It would be fitting for the gods to worship men! If you worship Yahweh, it is because you wish to emulate them. But I find nothing in them worthy of aspiration or emulation - just another oriental tyrant on a golden throne. My gods are greater than that, and my God is without a doubt the same God of the Apocryphon of John -

"The Monad is a monarchy with nothing above it. It is he who exists as God and Father of everything, the invisible One who is above everything, who exists as incorruption, which is in the pure light into which no eye can look.

"He is the invisible Spirit, of whom it is not right to think of him as a god, or something similar. For he is more than a god, since there is nothing above him, for no one lords it over him. For he does not exist in something inferior to him, since everything exists in him. For it is he who establishes himself. He is eternal, since he does not need anything. For he is total perfection. He did not lack anything, that he might be completed by it; rather he is always completely perfect in light. He is illimitable, since there is no one prior to him to set limits to him. He is unsearchable, since there exists no one prior to him to examine him. He is immeasurable, since there was no one prior to him to measure him. He is invisible, since no one saw him. He is eternal, since he exists eternally. He is ineffable, since no one was able to comprehend him to speak about him. He is unnameable, since there is no one prior to him to give him a name.

"He is immeasurable light, which is pure, holy (and) immaculate. He is ineffable, being perfect in incorruptibility. (He is) not in perfection, nor in blessedness, nor in divinity, but he is far superior. He is not corporeal nor is he incorporeal. He is neither large nor is he small. There is no way to say, 'What is his quantity?' or, 'What is his quality?', for no one can know him. He is not someone among (other) beings, rather he is far superior. Not that he is (simply) superior, but his essence does not partake in the aeons nor in time. For he who partakes in an aeon was prepared beforehand. Time was not apportioned to him, since he does not receive anything from another, for it would be received on loan. For he who precedes someone does not lack, that he may receive from him. For rather, it is the latter that looks expectantly at him in his light.

"For the perfection is majestic. He is pure, immeasurable mind. He is an aeon-giving aeon. He is life-giving life. He is a blessedness-giving blessed one. He is knowledge-giving knowledge. He is goodness-giving goodness. He is mercy and redemption-giving mercy. He is grace-giving grace, not because he possesses it, but because he gives the immeasurable, incomprehensible light.

As for doing my research, one of us took at least a half-dozen classes on Christian theology, early Christian history, and so one from Harvard Seminary graduates.

ccoa: And this is exactly why more detail isn't needed. People are too passionate on the subject and it invites natter and edit wars on the page. It is enough to say the god can be viewed this way and invite people to personally buy it or not.

Taelor: I find it a tad offensive that it's apparently okay to call the Greco-Roman and Norse Gods on their bullshit, but not okay to call the Abrahamic God on his. If were allowed to have "more detail" on one example, we should have them on all.

Archived Discussion Main / JerkAssGods