The General Religion, Mythology, and Theology Thread

Authority or entitlement may be a better term.

I think that is different. Authority and entitlement might have been its societal purpose back then (Tribesu nite under me so we can conquer this land!), but at least philosophically they can definitely provide more "meaning" to life with the concept of an "After Death".

After all, the earliest evidence (I bold it because it is a key word in my point) of abstract thought in humankind, is that of the first ritual burial. So one of the earliest concerns of humankind seems to have been...what happens after death? I do not think science can give a precise answer on what happens to consciousness after death. But religion does.

The problem is that it conditions this afterlife to a certain pattern of behaviors that can conflict with others, but at least the idea of "you know maybe we can be chill after we die" is pretty ok with me.

Technically, neither do most English speakers. They just go with the alternate anglicisation "Joshua".

And though its more of a linguistic question than a religious one, you've got to wonder how on Earth that happened and exactly when and where it happened that the names of the New Testament messiah and the Old Testament patriarch started being written differently (in English at least. Jesus as a given name is Spanish suggests that it wasn't in the initial translations into Latin).

I wear a cross. For one thing, it's kind of a universally recognised symbol of my religion, so if you wear it people are going to know what you mean.

As far as symbolism goes - that is kind of the point, that it remembers a horrific torture. It's a symbol of, A) defeating the horrible death you were given, and B) the sacrifice that was made for you.

Mostly though, it is just a recognisable symbol. I also have a piece of jewellery with the stylised fish on it - whether that makes more or less sense as a symbol, I don't know.

IIRC, the cross as a religious symbol existed before Christianity, much in the same way Christians borrow various other things from different religions.

Well, yes, the cross is present in a lot of really old religions, (usually looking more like a + than anything) but that doesn't mean Christianity intentionally borrowed it. We know what the inspiration was, and it's not really something that can be disputed.

edited 19th Nov '14 3:34:56 PM by Zendervai

Not everything has to have only two or three mutual exclusive, one-dimensional explanations.

Of course. But let's be real here. When most people see a cross, they think Christ, not the Maltese cross, the Yourba symbol of Ogun, the sun, the Matthew Cross altered, the Eye, or even the Nazis. (Boy those Nazis really ruined the graphic design industry for a few centuries).

To me, the cross is something of a multi-purpose thing. It serves as a reminder of the sacrifice of Jesus Christ (and thus as a ideal to strive towards, of ultimate self-sacrifice), but it also serves as a reminder of sorts that Humans Are Bastards, as in we crucified him. It's both a symbol of hope (for an ideal to strive towards) and penitence (a reminder of man's nature) to me. In fact, hope and penitence contrasts seem to be a running theme of Christianism.

I frequently walk around with a Cross Patté (better known as the design of the Iron Cross. Though admittedly calling it an "Iron Cross" sounds a lot cooler) with a skull in it (which is incidentally a biker symbol). Besides the entire simbology of the actual cross symbol to me, it also looks Hella cool so it's a win-win.

Side note, a winged skull is a symbol of the Hell's Angels with the different colored wings meaning different crimes.

@Knight i think its because for most of its history, the Mass was practiced in Latin, so Yeshua was Latinized into Jesus- people never learned to associate any other name with him

you know its kinda funny; a kid in my senior class was named 'Joshua Carpenter'

edited 19th Nov '14 8:07:46 PM by Xopher001

It's not the point that the Anglicisation of the Latin form is standard in English, the question is why does English use two different form of the name for different individuals with the same name and when did that change occur? Especially since the use of Jesus (I can't get the accent to work properly) is used as a given name by Spanish speakers which suggests to my limited knowledge, that the distinction didn't exist in the Latin versions.

Capable, yes, but it seems someone isn't familiar with the kinds of stuff societies of antiquity actually institutionalized on a frequent basis. Not treating foreigners, prisoners, or other "undesirables" like shit was a pretty novel idea in many places (and in many places today still is). The Romans had a certain amount of rules against that, but they were very often ignored outright when they were far enough from authority to not get caught. And pretty much everyone had death penalties for things we'd today consider very minor if criminal at all.

edited 20th Nov '14 8:55:20 AM by Pykrete

I recall hearing of one Roman judge who admitted that yes, it was a tad unfair that small crimes got the same punishment as large ones, but that unfortunately he wasn't allowed to give sentences of a Fate Worse than Death for the serious ones.

EDIT: My mistake, he was Greek.

edited 20th Nov '14 9:06:43 AM by Elfive

You are applying modern values to past times. Without technology that is nowadays available, social cohesion and knowledge of the past, ancient times were no less horrible but a lot more justified back then. When famine was dependent on crops (there is famine nowadays because of bad administration, not bad crops) desperate protection of these assets proved to be essential to survival.

When there was no political stability of nations or kingdoms or empires that were stable enough, safety of you and your family had to be deeply ensconced within certain frames that provided horrible things.

Without immediate lines of communication or fast methods of travel that resulted in year long trade routes, or hell, even refrigeration, there was not the luxury of traveling long distances as frequently as began to be made in the later times. The laws of religion and the laws of the kingdoms (call it Hammurabi code, Justinian Code, Charlemagne etc) were not extended as far or as uniformly (schism or not) across large swathes of population due to the lack of stability. So they were easier to use as the excuse to do horrible shit whereas the codes of law were far more oriented towards actual necesities that were pretty much horrible to us now and even then, but still necesary to the small nation they represented.

Easily visible in Feudalism.

It's not just Jesus, and it's not just English. Other Biblical figures with the same name, but with different names in English translation, include Jacob/James (Ya`aqov), Jude/Judah/Judas (Yehuda), Simeon/Simon (Shim`on), and Miriam/Mary (Miryam). And there are several non-English Bibles where the same thing happens to various figures (not always the same ones as in English).

edited 20th Nov '14 10:55:42 AM by Jhimmibhob

You're basically saying religion provided a message they didn't need because society already knew how to be nice to each other, then outlined several reasons why they weren't or even couldn't be nice to each other.

Except, you know. You completely ignored the differential spread. Religion was used to manipulate large masses the way law could not. Law was necesary to regulate. Religion was necesary to control.

Hmm, really? Not every religion was as intolerant of different beliefs as Medieval Christianity.

Actually, I believe the norm with polytheist religions was acceptance of other gods as a another aspect of their gods.

The tenents and unity were not to be challenged, however. Sexuality, finances, and education (some for god, some for bad) were controled strictly by religious dogmas despite differences in the law, if not outright modified by it.

No, it wasn't. There have been plenty of horrifically oppressive regimes that have been either secular or explicitly anti-religious. Soviet Russia, Maoist China, early-1900's Mexico, post-revolution France (which started many of the lines of thought that produced state-atheist Communism)...hell, Genghis Khan welcomed most religions because he was a huge culture geek, but he still wiped out some 11% of the world's population.

Religion has been used as a tool for control, but it's never remotely been necessary for that, and the worst stuff usually happens in the name of nationalism.

edited 20th Nov '14 3:58:00 PM by Pykrete

Not disagreeing with your overall point, but all those examples there were from the same time period, more or less.

As far as I know, it's a relatively recent thing.

Partly because large-scale atheism or secularity is a relatively recent thing.

You had pockets of it in early Europe, especially among the Mediterranean philosophers — but it didn't really matter much. Greek and Roman religion weren't really moralistic, and for the most part they exercised control via nationalism. Romans had a bit of leader worship and the aristocracy claiming divine heritage going on, but that's really just the same extreme of nationalism that we've seen in plenty of modern despot states.

edited 20th Nov '14 4:20:11 PM by Pykrete

Hence why I specified ancient times, not modern times when religion became far more contested. We were discussing ancient times, not modern.

Well, in ancient times control was mostly by force. The Romans didnt impose particularly stringent religious controls on the people they conquered, with the exception of the Emperor cult, otherwise they could worship as they saw fit.

edited 21st Nov '14 8:31:52 AM by demarquis