Aquinas attempted to resolve the tension between reason and revelation and inadvertently began the process that lead to the collapse of Western ChristianityAlso, most apologists don't know that Aquinas had a direct experience of God and was basically slapped silent, said that his writings were little more than fire fuel and never wrote again, and yet nobody else learned the lesson God tried to teach
>most apologists don't know that Aquinas had a direct experience of God and was basically slapped silent, said that his writings were little more than fire fuel and never wrote again, and yet nobody else learned the lesson God tried to teachPost source please, sounds interesting. I’ve not read Aquinas first hand, nor have I heard this mentioned.
Hope aristotleanon shows up and BTFO aquinasfags like he always does.
>>25620797>On 6 December 1273, another mystical experience reportedly took place. While Thomas was celebrating mass, he is said to have experienced an unusually long ecstasy.[71] Because of what he saw, he abandoned his routine and later refused to dictate to his socius Reginald of Piperno. When Reginald begged him to get back to work, Thomas replied: "Reginald, I cannot, because all that I have written seems like straw to me."[72][73] As a result, the Summa Theologica would remain uncompleted.[74] What exactly triggered Thomas's change in behaviour is believed by some to have been some kind of supernatural experience of God.[75]Aquinas definitely got the message but most apologists I've met who do know this story say stuff like "Yeah bro but straw is super useful so that's what he actually meant"
>>25620820That's Fichteanon, and he might be on a break after his break with reality the last few days
>>25621025Yea can you actually give me a book/essay source please.
>>25621025>>25621611Nvm, it's from Wikipedia. Thanks anyway.
>>25621025If Aquinas really thought what he'd written was worthless he'd have had it all burned. He's merely saying that theology is good but it's vastly surpassed by a direct encounter with God. Which of course is true. As St. Paul says, we see "through a glass darkly" but eventually will see "face to face." Aquinas got a glimpse of that.
>>25621743Mega cope
>>25621751It never happened to Augustine. Hell, it didn't happen to Aquinas' contemporary, Bonaventure, either. It wasn't a "slapping down," it was God rewarding Aquinas for his good work.
>>25621776Because Augustine was an evil psychopath. Aquinas was a good guy but simply misguided
>>25621784Why is he evil?
>>25621784Ah, you're an orthobro, this explains so much.
>>25621806Firstly his theology on original sin and sexuality lead to centuries of Catholic guilt, repression and forcing the idea onto people from childhood that they are evil and need to accept mother church otherwise they will burn in Hell because they are inherently wicked. Secondly, his just war theory was used and continues to be used to justify war, conquest and murder in the name of Christ. Thirdly, he believed and helped establish the doctrine that unbaptised infants were sent to Hell. He was disgusting person and it's no surprise the church loved him so much as his ideas proved extremely useful for them>>25621807I'm not. I come from a Catholic background
>>25621025>>25621743yeah he didn't say anything about burning. He said "my work's a bit shit innit
>>25621839True but him calling it straw just reminds me of Matthew 3:12
>>25621832Let me guess, you don't like Paul either?
>>25621864Why should I? The man had nothing to do with Jesus. He never quotes Jesus teachings, he seems to have known nothing about Jesus' life or ministry, he never met Jesus when he was alive and he doesn't even believe in Jesus own teachings on salvation. I don't think he was a liar or a scammer. I think he genuinely believed what he preached. The problem is that it was all bullshit
>>25621832>Augustine conceives of Catholic doctrine>future generations misunderstand or willfully pervert their understanding of said doctrine>that is somehow the Church Father’s faultYou’re being an unreasonable apostate.
>>25621871They didn't need to pervert anything. It was all their from the start. A good tree does not bare bad fruit>You’re being an unreasonable apostate.Go fuck yourself
>>25621867Catholics don't actually read the Bible proof 9000
>>25621884I'm not a Catholic and you've proven that you don't read the Bible with any intelligence or critical thinking
>>25621879>A good tree does not bare bad fruitYou’re getting your trees and fruit (wheat and chaff) confused, numbskull.
>>25622416
>>25621867Anon, you are not the first person to say "Paul ruined Jesus" and you won't be the last. And just like all the rest of them, you're wrong.
>>25621832>that they are evil>because they are inherently wickedthis is correct
>>25621867I actually follow a form of hyper-Pauline Christianity in opposition to most people disliking him.
>>25623667You have no clue about what you're talking about. You're just a blind dogmatist. Jesus taught that if you repent and ask for forgiveness then God will forgive you. Paul taught that in order to be forgiven of your sins you have to believe in Jesus death as an atonement for sins. These are two completely different things. Or are you too blind to see it? Find me 3 times where Paul quotes Jesus parables, teachings, or references his miracles or any events in his life. There aren't any. You just blindly believe whatever an authority figure tells you because you are a blind follower and would absolutely have been among the crowd crying "Crucify him!">>25623670You are scum and I pray for your annihilation when the material world is dissolved
>>25623682>You have no clue about what you're talking about. You're just a blind dogmatist.>You are scum and I pray for your annihilation when the material world is dissolvedLol
>>25623682>You are scum and I pray for your annihilation when the material world is dissolvedI'm fine with annihilation. There are fates worse than that.
>>25623688Funny how despite multiple replies you haven't engaged with any of my points and just make reddit tier replies
>>25623682>10 To the married I give this command (not I, but the Lord): A wife must not separate from her husband.This is in 1 Cor 7:10. Had Paul not mentioned the teachings of Christ, then why and how were they mentioned in the gospel? Do you not think some would have asked, *why* the man was crucified and what he was teaching? In my opinion, the letters have to be understood as Paul trying to explain the life and death of Christ, not a retelling of what he did or preached. Probably, there were sources for it in the hands of the early churches in Greece and Jerusalem.
>>25623703It was partly a trick question asking for 3 instances cause there literally are only 3 instances: the one you mentioned, the last supper and paying your taxes. That's literally it. Mentions zero of his core teachings and there isn't really any evidence that he even knew any of Jesus' core teachings>the letters have to be understood as Paul trying to explain the life and death of Christ, not a retelling of what he did or preachedThis is the problem. Paul is trying to make sense of Jesus' death and resurrection. That's absolutely true. He had some kind of an experience of what he thought was the risen Jesus and so he's converting to Christianity and trying to make sense of it all. But he never knew or encountered Jesus when he was alive, he definitely never read our 4 gospels (as they were most likely all composed well after he was dead) and he only had relatively minor interactions with Peter and James. What we have is a man who basically knows nothing about Jesus at all and is trying to make sense of how this crucified criminal can be the son of God. I don't think he invented the atonement theology but that's what he latches onto and elaborates on endlessly but it's got nothing to do with Jesus, his message or even what his death and resurrection actually meant
>>25623728I doubt it. I mean, put yourself in the shoes of Paul, when he comes to Corinth and Athens. Of course, the curious, philosophically minded Greeks would ask him, who was the man from Nazareth. Why was he executed? What did he teach? And, from Galatians, we know that Paul must've been in contact with those, who knew Jesus. In fact, 1 Cor 7:10 is a clue that he was aware of the Jesus' teachings in his sermon on the Mount. And then there's the context of the baptism of John, who he must've been aware of. I do believe, it is most likely, he was trying to theologically explain, why Christ died. After all, this was the most pressing question to be answered at the time. Why was the Messiah killed? Why was he nailed to the cross? And Paul, very ingeniously, combined Greek philosophy and his Jewish heritage to devise this theology that we have in Romans. But I am with you, when you say he might've gotten it wrong. The interpretation might have to be refined, reworked. I do believe there's a case to be made. But I do not subscribe to the "he usurp it and was unaware of all of it" theory that very popular at the moment. Does not seem very likely, when you're aware of the circumstances and do not only rely on the gospels and Paul's letters.
>>25623697No, it's not good to cling to that. We need to be helpful, not destructive.
>>25621806He stole some pears
>>25623756>1 Cor 7:10 is a clue that he was aware of the Jesus' teachings in his sermon on the MountIt certainly doesn't oppose it but that chapter is also filled with a variety of teachings on marriage, celibacy and divorce that we have no record of Jesus ever saying so it's not the strongest evidence. I'm sure he was aware of some of Jesus teachings but we don't have much to go on>And, from Galatians, we know that Paul must've been in contact with those, who knew JesusAs I said we know he had contact with Peter and some minor contact with James but we know very little about their relationship. I personally find Acts quite unreliable when it comes to many of the details of Paul's life and the early Christian movement. We really know very little about what was happening in those early years.>I do not subscribe to the "he usurp it and was unaware of all of it" I don't believe that Paul was a conman or attempting to hijack the movement or anything like that. I think he genuinely believed the things he said and preached. I'm sure he was a very convincing speaker, a talented orator and of course he was filled with conviction absolutely as seen by his frantic travelling around the ancient world, which I think are the 3 main reasons that he was able to garner so many followers, but just because someone is popular doesn't mean they're right. That's just common sense. But I would say it's unlikely the Christianity would have spread as quickly if it weren't for him. Paul is really the central figure in Christianity as a religion, more than Jesus, because the majority of the central Christian doctrines and beliefs come from Paul. It's one of the reasons that I don't identify as a Christian because it's the religion ABOUT Jesus, not the religion OF Jesus
>>25623796How do you want to convincingly speak, if you do not have a content for the speech? Ask yourself: Why do you like the NT? For me, it is not the letters, but the gospels and glimpses of Christ I see in them. Personally, I've always regarded the letters to be for "nerds". I doubt anybody would have been convinced by them. They're meant to systematize, who the Messiah was and what it meant. It is done for "nerds", who want it to be logically embedded in the Jewish canon, not for converts.Moreover: How could the converts have imitated Christ, live in the way of Christ, if they did not have the teachings and biography from the gospels? In my opinion, it must've been pivotal for the movement to not only be theory in your mind but a way of life. If had only been a theory, it would not have lasted. There's must've been a "Christian" way of life, for which the teachings are, of course, necessary. I mean it is a clue, yes. There is no evidence that is *definitive*. I believe your POV is legitimate, but mine is, too.
>>25623851Paul wasn't converting people with the letters. The letters were actually only ever meant to address specific churches and the issues they were having there. I don't think Paul would have ever anticipated that his letters would be made scripture like Exodus or Isaiah> How could the converts have imitated Christ, live in the way of Christ, if they did not have the teachings and biography from the gospels?The Gospels were not the key thing in the spread of Jesus' story and message. Firstly, the vast majority of people were illiterate so they couldn't have read them if they wanted to. Secondly, we don't know how widely proliferated the gospels were. The oldest "copy" we have is a fragment of John from the second century. The idea that every Christian or church even had a copy of any of the Gospels is highly unlikely. Christianity spread by people telling stories. Some of the storytellers were people who were actually there, some were people who lived in the region, some were disciples of earlier followers, some were people who joined on much later (like Paul) and some were bullshitters. The history of early Christianity is very messy and it's a perfect storm of conditions for the result to be we only know a select things for sure about Jesus and the early christian movement. That being said I am still a believer but I accept that faith is a major part of that (but not blind faith either)
>>25620786Translation>He tried to make sense of it, but realized that was self defeating, so finally shut the fuck up with mortification Volumes and volumes of stupidity. But, he was not working with the whole gospels.
>>25623887I mean the letters as a stand-in for the theology of the letters, of course. What do you believe was the content of Paul's speeches in Greece? What did it mean to live a "Christian" life in the Greek churches that Paul founded and was supervising?
>>25623902>What do you believe was the content of Paul's speeches in Greece?I'm sure it was the theology in the letters of course. Although he was preaching for several decades and it's entirely possible that what he preached evolved over time>What did it mean to live a "Christian" life in the Greek churches that Paul founded and was supervising?We really don't know. Like at all. We don't know what kind of ceremonies they had, if there was any traces of the origins of liturgy, we don't know what prayers they said, we don't know what scripture they read. For example, in some of these churches they may have had gospels that were read out that are no lost. We basically have very little idea of what was going on in the early church in the first century
>>25623919*now lost
>>25623919And the Sermon on the Mount, the symbolism, the Olivet discourse, all of it was hallucinated into existence 40 years, after the man had died, anon? And, up to that point, all it had been, was the very heady theory explained in the letters? And the unknown prayers, the unknown "gospels", distinct from the gospels we have, were replaced? And nobody recorded it, or cared, even though thousands of people must've been members of the churches?
>>25623919Do you not think it is more likely that there's continuity between what we have and what they had? Even if not perfect, that the core of the teachings must've existed to form a "Christian" identity. A core that, admittedly, very likely was expanded and added to, as time passed.
>>25623938No you're completely misunderstanding what I'm saying. The vast majority of what is in the synoptic gospels was being spread as stories throughout the early church definitely. Mark, Matthew and Luke crafted narratives, each drawing on their own sources and each other, and with their own agendas. My point, is that for Paul in particular the evidence does not seem to suggest that he knew much about Jesus at all. Remember, we have more writings of Paul than anyone else in early Christianity. And yet when we compare his writings with what are contained in the gospels there appears not only an absence of knowledge but worse flat out contradictions. If we take the gospels to be reliable then how Jesus taught a person is saved and how Paul taught a person is saved are completely at odds with each other. That's my point>>25623944Of course. Teachings on non-violence, helping the poor and love for all, not just fellow Jews, clearly were present throughout the different forms of Christianity, even the groups that were labelled heretics maintained these basic principles
>>25623670Good way to get people onside man. And you wonder why Catholicism is dying everywhere other than turd world shitholes were nobody can read
>>25620786Fun fact Aquinas didn't look like that he was so fat they had to saw a hole out of his desk for him to be able to sit down
>>25623682finish this sentence> this is the work of God:
>>25624023It's not numbers game, anyway. You do not "win" as a religion, if you officially have the most members. It's more valuable to have only few, who are convinced of it, than many, who barely care, at all. And, let's be frank, yes, none of humanity is going to live up to the ethics of Christ. At the end of the day, we are driven by baser instincts, desires and we are weak and, given the opportunity, the circumstances, we'd fail. This is the truth. Of course, normalfaggots do not want to hear that. They want to be told they're righteousness and that the world is fair. It is comforting to them and easy. But, when you are honest with yourself, it is all nonsense and it is harmful, too.For, small is the gate and narrow is the road that leads to life, and only few find it.
>>25623969I do not believe our disagreement is that great. Perhaps, in the future, evidence is going to be discovered to resolve the disagreement once and for all. Until then, I'll leave it that.
>conan the barbarian steppegroids were defeated by bronze age redditors and decided to worship the reddit version of jesus and disciples when all the OG christians that died off were either bronze age YNs or terry davis level suicide schizophrenicsmhmm aquinas was totally a real person bro
>>25624023>>25624439The anon claiming this isn't a numbers game for Aquinas is correct at the most direct level. Aquinas's arguments for unity of the Church can be made ridiculously simple, the Catholic Church is the only true Church, the Pope is the guy in charge of it, being a member is a requisite for true faith, heretical sects are not a part of it. It's that simple, there aren't any requirements for how many people have to be in it. He was also writing before the reformation so all these other competing parties weren't around. At the indirect level he anticipated these sorts of arguments, what qualifies the difference between 2 churches with the same root book? Are all evangelicals just mimicking Aquinas? >I would be shocked if any evangelicals could directly deny this claim.>I wouldn't be shocked if evangelicals had a difficult time incorporating Aquinas.Aquinas compared theologians to musicians making music with numbers (a bunch of idiots). He also had an absolute (there is only one virtuoso). If any evangelical wants to claim Aquinas then you have a long road ahead of you metaphysically, and the end is you're going to convert to Catholicism and crying about Catholic gibberish won't cut it. You can always mimick him and use a similar argument for your church. The same root book issue forces this into subscription service membership territory. The McChurch wars will continue, eventually churches will shed theologians and the virtuoso will find ways to make sure the Church is a good steward to the people.
>>25621743>ornamental statue of jesusIdol worship
>>25624518catholicism is absolutely retarded and those parts of the summa are the parts where aquinas got tendentious and stupid. read tyndales response to more
>>25621776Augustine describes a mystical experience that shared with his mother Monica at the Ostia port while preparing to leave Italy in his Confessions.
>>25621867We don't know whether he quotes Jesus' teachings because we have a fraction of his letters. He admits to not meeting Jesus while he was alive, denigrating himself as the least of the apostles and called himself an "abortion" or "miscarriage" and that his whole life was "excrement." He had a direct relationship with several of the disciples, and was in a working relationship with Peter. The disciples in Jerusalem permitted him to preach to Gentiles. Clearly they didn't think he was bullshitting even if there were tensions regarding circumcision, etc.
>>25625172>Hi I'm Paul my whole life is excrement let me tell you how to get to heaven
>>25624518Palamas mogs Aquinas
>>25620786He was not the one responsible for liberal Christiantiy who caused the ccollapse. Those people dont exactly follow Scholasticism.
>>25621867Paul had a mystical experience and learned theology via revelation. You dont understand Jesus' message better than he did.
>>25625604>Paul of Tarsus, what is the source for what you say?>"It was revealed to me in a dream"You're actually playing this card?
>>25621025Yeah if you read Aquinas its like totally unconvincing from standpoint of today. Kind of absurd
>>25625611It was a vision, not a dream.
>>25625829Pardon me
