So why did you stop being a Christian ?
When I decided to become a woman
The whole "wizard war over Rome" thing
>>18760488I'm Hindu
>>18760488Wanted to be Jewish
>>18760523based but only if you observe all the 600+ commandments
>>18760488I accidentally read the bible
I realized that it didn't really matter
I realized that Christianity is dressed up pagan idol worship for the modern day and all its justifications for said idol worship is nonsensical
I'm a guy, why would I love Jesus? Sounds gay if you ask me?And it's not like I can love Mary that way
Maybe when I realized it was a big part of what got us into this mess, societally. Suicidal empathy and all that. Or maybe it was when the level of cruel absurdity became too much to justify. You're telling me the abrahamic god thought of shitting dick nipples and that nigger said let'er rip? No. Get the fuck out. And that's on the comedic end.
Never was one. It always felt too misanthropic for my liking.
I decided to start asking if things were actually true before believing them.
>>18760622You're overthinking it.>>18760624How do you know what's true?
>>18760630>How do you know what's true?By looking at the available evidence and being aware of what makes a bad assessment (cognitive biases) or argument (logical fallacies).
>>18760632And what has that led you to believe about the setting of which these mechanics operate within?
I was raised as one. I used to go to church. Always had problems I struggled with. I spent years of my life begging the Christian god to help me with them and he never did. He never cared. Then I came to /his/ and watched them BTFO the entire Old Testament and most of the NT. I came to realize it’s all a bunch of horseshit. Basic archeology disproves most of it. I still believe in god but I’m done with Abrahamic religion. Some kind of higher power exists but its so far beyond Bronze Age sandnigger schizo babble it’s not even funny.
>>18760488I applied critical thinking to the bible
>>18760639I know that came off pretentious as hell but I am genuinely curious what you have to say.>>18760644>Some kind of higher power exists but its so far beyond Bronze Age sandnigger schizo babble it’s not even funny.That's about where I'm at.
>>18760639For years now I haven't blindly trusted people and ignored red flags for months only to find out they were dangerous charlatans, so I'd say it works. Can't really say the same about the mechanics that made faith "healing."
>>18760488Became a Hindu. Krishna is much more logical.
Zeus mogs Jewish prophets. It's really that simple. Christianity is a religion based around the ministry of a dead Jewish prophet, who preached spiritual bondage to the god of Israel. Becoming spiritually Jewish has never been appealing to me, no matter how many white mutt golems larp in the name of Jesus.Zeus is part of a religion which inspires spiritual decency. The ancient philosophies inspired by Zeus are the bedrock of western civilization, before Christianity ever entered the picture.
>>18760669Right, cool, trust no bitch, I'm happy for you, but what about the higher order of things? Do you have any thoughts on why things operate the way they do?
>>18760680Why would I? My method yields results. No need to believe in iron-age fairytales.
>>18760673Sounds kind of Daoist.>>18760691That's not what I'm saying, holy shit. You really were in that cuckery deep.
>>18760488Realized it's gay to worship a male god
The moment I thought “why would an all loving God create a world where babies can be born and die with cancer” Then I read the Bible and that made me even more atheist
>>18760673I'm not a Hindu, but out of curiosity, what are your scriptures? Bhagavad Gita only? No Rigveda?
>>18760707Bhagavad Gita + Upanishads, Eknath translate
>>18760739What about Khilani?
>>18760742Is it good? I feel like Krishnaic philosophy is self-complete for me on its own and take the Upanishads as supplement
The Ministry of Jesus and what followed were heavily influenced by the Mystery Cults that were all the rage in the Roman East at the time. Jesus was just one of the more prominent “miracle workers” who was active in his own lifetime.
>>18760760*who were active
I'm a typical example, because I'm a modern man and it just "seemed obvious." I didn't have any strong philosophical grounding for my belief in God's nonexistence, but everything in my world seemed mundane and non-magickal, so it was hard to see where God fit into things.Then I got into UFOlogy and discovered there were mountains of evidence for things that are "impossible," and the world was actually quite full of magick. It was a pretty straight path back to God from there.
>>18760488when I was like, six? And could tell it didn't add up, just like the easter bunny or santa.I would still be christian if they just preached that their god was A. not omnipotent, just very strong and B. not all good, or even mostly good. Actively evil would in fact be the most convincing.
>>18760756I don't know? Khilani, as I understand, is something like apocrypha in Christianity. But I don't really know how can you have apocrypha without centralized orthodoxy. Historically Khilani was composed at the same time as Vedas, but they didn't enter the canon.
>>18760763I'm not sure what you people see in these johnny-come-lately gods.If there's a true divine originator, then it would lie in ancient history, long before man.
>>18760770How many millions of intelligent alien civilizations are out there? Did god send a “Jesus” to every single one of them? Are they all damned to hell if not? What if the real religion is on some planet 100 million light years from here?
>>18760770Deism is impossible
>>18760698Yeah, I tell you. Christianity was one hell of a cuckery, and I'm so glad I'm out.
>>18760784Why?
>>18760760It's very interesting history and it raises questions about the historicity of Jesus himself, since he allegedly never wrote anything during his lifetime. Nobody during the years of his life ever recorded seeing him in writing either. Jesus makes more sense in context of occult philosophical metaphor, rather than as a real living person. His apostles gave Jesus a character reformation & overhaul, elevating him with Mystery Cult concepts, decades after he was rotting in the ground as a corpse. They had access to Greco-Roman material which they relied on to re-brand Jesus into something more appealing to Roman non-Jewish citizens. The original Jesus would have been a hard sell lol being so insanely Jewish and all.
>>18760839Nāgārjuna shows that nothing has independent causal power. Deism requires creation to operate independently after God creates it. Theism allows causality to remain continuously dependent on God.
>>18760846I actually wonder if Jesus was a doctor. Before the ministry, he had been in the para-Essene sect of John the Baptist. The Essenes collected medical knowledge, since they literally considered medicine to be a gift from God. So, Jesus unironically could heal people, but he wouldn't distinguish medicine and religion. So, he would give you some healing herbs and then read a prayer or something. On the other hand, there is no mention of any medicines in the Gospel. The closest thing was dirt and saliva. But even the critics (like Mandaeans or Jews) agreed he healed people. Maybe "healed" only meant exorcism, though.>>18760854It assumes the transcendent God is bound by logic and causality.
>>18760488When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
>>18760846Richard Carrier and his crackpottery isn't taken seriously by real biblical scholars.
>>18760488Never was a Christian but some of my extended family are. One of the most braindead naive people who can’t think for themselves, when they need a simple answer they say it’s god’s plan rather than sifting for the answer or if there even is an answer. Also their ways of attempting to convert people are a bit insidious
>>18760488I'm actually a cradle atheist. So I was never a very religious person.
>>18760488I found my real white gods. Dont worship jews, its bad for you
>>18760488When I realized it's all a bunch of utter nonsense.
>>18760778You are assuming we are not the most evolved life form in the universe. We very well may be
>>18761185The universe is so vast that anything even with such small chances of happening such as advanced multicellular organisms on life-rearing planets, it is almost certain they are there but with no way of us to contact
>>18760488The whole religion is founded on Abraham hearing voices in a bush and sacrificing his son, and something about genital mutilation. No matter how much fancy medieval theology, beautiful cathedrals and music you write, it will never erase that the foundation is absurd bullshit that does not pass as being moral or coherent in any way.If you read the New Testament only, you could almost convince yourself there's something to it. That is, if you completely ignore the scholarship, the forgeries, the interpolations, the massive time between they were written and gospels being based off each other and half of Paul's epistles aren't even written by him. Cheers.
>>18761298>picwhy are americans like this
>>18761115Who cares? I never made an appeal to Richard Carrier in my post.
>>18761236I think you are underestimating how impossible life is
>>18761298Don't wasting your time beating a dead horse.
>>18760488once you notice how bad of a retcon the new testament is you cant really unsee it.
>>18761509Half of the New Testament is not even a retcon, but Paul does a really slop job.
In the West, we need to somehow separate Christianity from Traditionalism and Conservative values because it has co-opted them and is pretty much the only reason it has any legitimacy or relevance. If Christianity isn't the definition of based and trad, then it's useless schizobabble.
>>18761339You obviously stole the theory from Carrier.
>>18761949>You obviously stole the theory from Carrier.You're just trying to assign guilt-by-association on to me because of your personal feelings about some biblical scholar who I don't even care about. Richard Carrier didn't invent mystery cults, anon. I genuinely don't know what the fuck you're talking about
>>18760488I never really was.
>>18760488I didn't believe in it. Just that simple.
>>18761298>If you read the New Testament only, you could almost convince yourself there's something to it. That is, if you completely ignore the scholarship, the forgeries, the interpolations, the massive time between they were written and gospels being based off each other and half of Paul's epistles aren't even written by him.Everything salvagable in christianity was already present in the soteriological milleu of the eastern mediterranean during the roman empire. The good bits are all copied anyway. The only reason christianity came out on top was because greeks had been having a hard time believing in zeus for about 500 years, but also rejected the notion that religion could be new.
>>18760488When my parents did. I grew up going to Church but my parents never really believed in any of it, and I remember them taking it all with a grain of salt. By the time I was 16 my family just didn't go anymore, my parents just thought the Church was best for us when we were growing up because it helped them cope when they were little, but as far as my parents are concerned, Christianity is literally for children. Bible stories are something you tell kids so they sleep better at night etc
>>18761969Yeah right, you're not impressing me with this act you're putting on now.
>So why did you stop being a Christian ?I would consider myself a Christian. However, more so in a boarder cultural sense and with some kind of rest doubt.The argument that it is unlikely that an infinitely benevolent being would reveal themself to only a tiny fraction of people on Earth is a good one.When I look at the different cultures and eras of history, I see very different kinds of belief and worship, different approaches to ethics. For instance, the Aztecs practiced human sacrifice, while the ancient Chinese had a nearly secular form of Confucianism.In light of this, I can only conclude two things: first, different peoples and eras have different access to the numinous; second, there seems to be a desire for something like religion.If you look at religion from a philosophical perspective, guided solely by reason, it appears to have a very weak case.Taking human desire into consideration, however, you'll quickly notice that rituals, wish-fulfilling ideas, and so forth seem to have some legitimacy. Why should the desire for religion be any less legitimate than, say, the desire for entertainment?
>>18761298>If you read the New Testament only, you could almost convince yourself there's something to it.The New Testament, on its own, doesn't speak clearly. It contains parables and things like that. Other foundational texts are much clearer.If you take the Sermon on the Mount as a kind of "philosophy of life", you will quickly be fooled and robbed by malicious people. There are plenty of them out there. In addition, many of its moral teachings depend on belief in divine judgment. Denying that belief, you undermine the foundation of that ethical system.>That is, if you completely ignore the scholarship, the forgeries, the interpolations, the massive time between they were written and gospels being based off each other and half of Paul's epistles aren't even written by him.The scholarship has something good and legit to it. It adjust the divine teachings to the reality of Euroean life. Without it, you need to develop such scholarship again, from stretch.>>18761974Thats way too easy.Because of the sheer size of the Roman Empire, there was room for a "religious marketplace" for the first time. Similar things had already happened in the ancient Middle East under the Persian Empire and the Hellenistic Greeks.Before the Roman Empire, most people more or less adhered to the belief system that had developed where they were born. These belief systems provided various things, such as a sense of community (Athens was the city of Athena; Babylon, the city of Ishtar), comfort in the face of fate, and even answers to childlike questions such as “Why does the world exist?”In the Roman Empire, for some reason, it becames possible to be a inhabit of the British islands and worship a Egyption mother goddess like Isis or a near eastern astral-god like Sol Invictus..... (1 of 2)
>>187620072 of 2It turns out that, in such an environment, religious exclusivity was a killer feature. While an adherent of the cult of Isis could worship their family ancestors at home or sacrifice something to Caesar, Christians refused to do so. They saw it as a betrayal of God (with a capital "G", eventually).According to some contemporary sources, at least some early Christians left the Church and looked for a spiritual home elsewhere. Some took Christian teachings with them.Yet, because official Christian doctrine strictly forbade other forms of religion, Christianity eventually became dominant.
>>18760760>>18760846>>18761115Christianity definitely began as a mystery cult, the bible itself attests to it (Mark 4:11, Matthew 13:11, Luke 8:10, 1 Corinthians 2:7, etc). Biblical scholars claim Jesus existed as a fact only because other biblical scholars have to claim he existed, not because the evidence is incontestable. It's a circlejerk funded by Christian academic institutions, private seminaries, and denominational colleges, most of which contractually require employed scholars to sign binding statements of faith.
>>18762030People like Bart Ehrman have also pointed out that we have little firsthand references for most historical figures of this era during their lifetime as most people were illiterate, and Jesus' followers absolutely would've been illiterate. He's also argued that since Christianity started off as an apocalyptic cult, that his followers would've had little reason to write anything about him down during his lifetime anyways. For all they know, the world was about to end. In my opinion, a strong piece of evidence for Jesus comes from Pontius Pilate, as he was also believed to have never been referenced during his own lifetime until records with his name were re-discovered in the 1960s, thus confirming his historiography after thousands of years. I'd find it strange if he were a real person but Jesus wasn't, considering how significant Jesus' execution was seen, even to early Christians, and it's unlikely they'd attribute Jesus' crucifixion to what was otherwise just another random Roman executioner if it never happened.
>>18762037But then again Pilate's historiography is mainly Josephus' Jewish War and Antiquities of the Jews, the latter of which is incidentally also the best evidence for mythicism. Not simply because Christians edited it, but why they edited it. Josephus would spend pages and pages talking about people far less relevant than Jesus (like the Nameless Egyptian) and then limit his account of him to footnotes in John the Baptist and James's narratives? We're talking about a man who, according to the Christian interpolation, had "won over many Jews and many of the Greeks," yet there was no source either Greek or Jewish in the following six decades to inform Josephus about any basic facts of his life. It's pretty fucking clear that there was never any mention of Jesus in Antiquities, not even an "authentic core" as historicists call it.
>>18761982You haven't said a convincing thing yet. All you've done is say Richard Carrier is a crackpot and then you decided that I was copying him. >Yeah right, you're not impressing me with this act you're putting on now.There's no act. Speak plainly, retard. What is Richard Carrier wrong about specifically? What work of his am I being accused of "copying" exactly?
>>18760639Snakes don't talk and Jews don't fly.
>>18761982Are you implying that Richard Carrier is the only person that made the claim of Christianity starting as a mystery cult?
>>18762030>Mark 4:11, Matthew 13:11, Luke 8:10, 1 Corinthians 2:7They were a mystery cult because they used the word mystery 4 times in 4 texts? That's a weak argument.
>>18762271>A mystery cult (or mystery religion) was a secret religious school in the Greco-Roman world where participation was strictly limited to chosen initiates. Unlike public state religion, which focused on civic duty and community-wide rituals, mystery cults offered personal, emotional, and spiritual salvation, secret knowledge, and a promise of a better afterlife.
>>18762195Proof?
i used to be a /pol/ atheist, but now my love for history lead me to christianity
>>18760488actually I looped around and became one again.
>>18761306its the female population. our women hate us which is why so many men go overseas to raise kids. our women are a genetic mistake.
>>18763470doubt.jpg
Bump
>>18763605Freedom improves men but destroys women
