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Comment by dotancohen | Hacker News Reader

I actually see many of the lessons of the Old Testament (I don't know about the sequels, didn't read them) to be as relevant today as they were when written.

You have to take the books in the context of the time in which they were written. They didn't have the same standards of Source Needed as the Wikipedia generation is used to, but attributing the requirement to love your neighbor as being the spoken word of the creator himself, was good enough to get the point across. It is still the basis of Western society today, even if it has been reencoded into more specific laws with more specific punishments for non-compliance.

Your comment is like hoping that Turing's work will one day be regarded for historical interest only, because it was not written considering the features of today's latest Javascript framework.

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One of the reasons for the Old Testament's inclusion in Bible is to put the New Testament in context. The whole point of the New Testament is that it's a (pretty profound) development from the old one.

Without going down the philosophical rabbit hole if religions steered the moral or the other way round, I always like to think that, just as simple tales help explaining and introducing children to more complicated concepts, but when you grow older you don't need those anymore, the same applies to religions and humanity. At some point in history of human societies, religions were/are a good way to move society forward (think of the strict food regulations imposed by some religions, they were for actual public safety due to the hygienic conditions of the society) but eventually they are not needed anymore as global knowledge advances and we now know what causes lightnings and thunders, we don't need a super-human explanation to grasp it or justify them.

Knowing what causes lightning has no bearing on how one should treat one's neighbor. You can use science to make a rocket, but science has no comment on whether you should point it towards the Moon, or towards a neighboring country. Assuming we're "smarter" than our ancestors because we can make nuclear bombs and iphones is a pretty simplistic take, and completely ignores the traditional worldview that brings meaning to the Bible and to ancient stories. Looking back at traditional writing from a modern viewpoint and dismissing what you read because it doesn't fit your modern expectations is really robbing you of the opportunity to participate in what it meant to be truly human for most of human history.

I think you are missing my point completely, as I said in other messages the content of the Bible on the cultural, philosophical and historical level is very important. My biggest issue, implicit in my initial comment, is that we as humanity should grow up and stop needing a mythical figure like a "God Almighty" to care about our neighbor. Also we don't need a god that tells us that, for example, homosexuality is bad or that pork or crab should not be eaten.

I neither agree nor disagree with your point. To understand your point better, in your view of neighbourly care, why should I personally care about my neighbor? If he has an X-Box and I want an X-Box, why shouldn't I just take his?

What is the axiom upon which you base your moral code?

Ancient Romans and Greeks would tell us to grow up and accept that might makes right, slavery is essential to the functioning of society, only men should vote while women supplicate local deities, and that wearing pants is barbaric. So "growing up" is not exactly a recipe for a reliable moral value system.

People are not convinced by facts, and there are infinite facts that need a hierarchy in order to be understood or interacted with. Stories and narratives and cultures provide that cultural hierarchy. Christianity was a huge shift in cultural dynamics and it spread like wildfire and quickly engulfed paganism because Christianity teaches that God is actually a Person that you can have a relationship with (instead of Aristotle's notion of God as First Mover or First Idea), and that anyone, regardless of background, wealth, education, or ethnicity, can have access to that relationship.

It turns out, people can relate to, be influenced by, and learn from participating in stories with other people a LOT more than they can by changed by propositional debates and lectures.

It's the difference between learning to fight by joining a martial arts class, or from just reading a book about martial arts.

Out of an interest in late antiquity, I've been fascinated by the change from paganism to Christianity. Under paganism, rites were carried out to secure favor for the society and if there was a personal aspect, it was transactional (if you grant me favor, I will make such-and-such a sacrifice). But this tradition also contained various mystery cults wherein secrets would be revealed to you upon initiation (the popularity of which increased in late antiquity). Early Christianity can be seen to function in this mystery cult niche, but why should it have proven to be so successful? My suspicion is that the personal aspect of religion and revelation became increasingly important. Why that might be is good fodder for speculation.

To relate this to the part of what darkwater you are responding to:

> My biggest issue, implicit in my initial comment, is that we as humanity should grow up and stop needing a mythical figure like a "God Almighty" to care about our neighbor.

And the heart of your response:

> It turns out, people can relate to, be influenced by, and learn from participating in stories with other people a LOT more than they can by changed by propositional debates and lectures.

I have the sense that there was a moment in western culture (vaguely late golden/silver age of Roman literature) when we could have stepped past religion into philosophy. Stoicism was well-regarded, its aim (like cynicism and epicureanism) was to achieve a state of ataraxia, tranquility, and a major portion of the curriculum was logic. But a mass shift in mentality towards personal divine revelation took place instead, so I (reluctantly) have to agree with you.

Stoicism put a person at the whim of the Fates. It was essentially Calvinism, where you could not affect your destiny, because you were either chosen by the gods, or you weren't. Shakespeare summed up Stoicism well when he said "as flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport." Contrast that with the proposition of Christianity, which is that the Creator of the Universe, because of His infinite love for creation, humbled Himself and condescended so low as to be a Person born in a cave to a poor family, suffered betrayal by almost all of his closest followers, suffered an ignominious death, then rose from the dead on the third day after His death, thereby conquering death by death, and you, poor, broken, sinful, incorrigible you, can have a personal relationship with the God-man who calls Himself Jesus Christ.

The stoic dicta to live in accordance with god/nature and to carefully consider what things are in your control and which not (mainly, the only things in your control are your own judgements). It has nothing to do with the doctrine of The Elect, which if I recall stems from a medieval theological catch-22 (if god is all powerful, and if you can earn your way into heaven with "good works", then the implication is that god would be less than all powerful because you, a lowly human, would have some power in the matter).

But the church both appropriated and denigrated the classical tradition. I wouldn't really expect to see an honest representation of stoicism, or Platonism, or of anything really, from the church.

> It turns out, people can relate to, be influenced by, and learn from participating in stories with other people a LOT more than they can by changed by propositional debates and lectures.

I kind of agree, but I also think that this can change over a large enough amount of time, given that we have a permanent written memory in form of books and a basic instruction for everybody. Kindness and respect of laws for example can be shown and taught as beneficial in the long run for society and you as an individual without the need of a tale or a superhuman being. That's why I'm talking about phases in the humanity journey. And beware, I'm not being judgemental here, just like an adult is not "absolutely better" than a child.

Eh... "Love your neighbor as yourself" in the context of Leviticus doesn't really have the same meaning as the modern interpretation. It's more like "Love your Israelite neighbour, such that God will continue to favor the Israelites and drive/exterminate your larger scale, non-Israelite neighbors from Canaan."

The issue is that a lot of people even today are biblical literalists and they look to the holy books for justification for whatever beliefs they hold in the first place. So you can absorb "love thy neighbor" if that's what you're looking for, but you can also absorb "hate the foreigner" if that's more your inclination. Also, the universe is 6000 years old and don't eat shellfish.

Yes, that is an issue, but people misinterpreting or misusing will always be an issue whenever you create something. That should not invalidate the goodness and wonderfulness of the thing created.

The problem with the Bible is that it's so unclear and contradictory, the reader is able to cobble vastly different theological perspectives together. Hence thousands of denominations who do not get along and historically were violent towards each other. The church up until recent history was a violent institution of power.

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