It's an attack on the human spirit in a way. The message is, "look, humanity IS truly awful." People walk away from it thinking, "Maybe everyone is evil." Now, does that serve a good purpose in this world? Seems a little satanic to me.
> After exactly 6 hours, as planned, I stood up and started walking toward the audience. Everyone ran away, to escape an actual confrontation.
Hard to judge from the wiki page, there are so little details, but this sounds fake and staged. I think there were less stunts back then so people were more trusting. At any rate, I get strong vibes of some kind of agenda here, and you're right that it's probably not a godly one.
But yes, there is no true morality. How can there be? In nature, there is only survival. A lion is happy to find some prey thas has had a stroke of bad luck and gotten stuck or hurt so it can't easily fight back.
And the previous paragraph is not meant to say that the lion is evil. No, the lion simply is.
That's just nature. Unless you'd argue that bonobos have "defined a moral system" because they have "constructed a society" that is built on mutual cooperation, all humans have done is find increasingly abstract ways to cause harm to one another in order to work around the natural tendency towards cooperation.
What makes human morality special is not how we support each other but how we hurt each other. And this is a fairly recent achievement even in our own species' historical timescale.
Or do you mean the reactions of the audience sound fake/staged? In either case, what gives you that idea?
> People walk away from it thinking, "Maybe everyone is evil." Now, does that serve a good purpose in this world? Seems a little satanic to me.
That's kinda weird, given that the belief that "everyone is evil" is one of the core ideas of Christianity. Well, everyone but one person, I suppose.
Huh, never heard that before.
I recognize that there are Christian doom cults that think everyone is evil but I’m surprised by how plainly you call that a “core belief”. It does not fit in any way the (moderate protestant) way I was raised, and it doesn’t match the beliefs of my catholic friends either. Every devout Christian I know (though I know only a few) is an optimist about humanity.
Raised Catholic through confirmation. Long time atheist, although I attend my wife's evangelical protestant church. So admittedly an outsider's view on all of this.
> Ideas like “love thy neighbour” don’t feel very “everybody is evil” to me.
I don't know why those would be incompatible. People can be evil, but you can love them all the same.
> I’m surprised by how plainly you call that a “core belief”.
Really? Sin and the need for Jesus's salvation are universal through the branches of Christianity I've experienced. They use different terms for it—Catholicism talks about "original sin", protestants talk about "mankind's sin nature". I know nothing about Orthodox Christianity, but I would expect them to fit in there somewhere. Catholics and Protestants argue about salvation through faith or salvation through works, but they both see it as something desirable.
There are lots of branches of Christianity, and so I don't have a full picture, but I've never heard of one that didn't share this belief, and I'm not sure I'd understand what their faith is all about at that point. But if you've got some info, I'm happy to learn more. I kinda hate to quote Wikipedia here, but it mirrors my understanding:
> The doctrine of sin is central to the Christian faith, since its basic message is about redemption in Christ. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_views_on_sin)
Maybe my outsider's take on it is off, but calling these beliefs satanic seems way out there to me.
> I kinda hate to quote Wikipedia here
I don't mind wikipedia but it has some weird branches. Recommended reading, start here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_ethics
From the top of that page:
> Christian ethics, also known as moral theology, is a multi-faceted ethical system. It is a virtue ethic, which focuses on building moral character, and a deontological ethic which emphasizes duty. It also incorporates natural law ethics, which is built on the belief that it is the very nature of humans – created in the image of God and capable of morality, cooperation, rationality, discernment and so on – that informs how life should be lived, and that awareness of sin does not require special revelation.
> awareness of sin does not require special revelation.
Then jump into https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Natural_law
The link you provided highlights the word "Hamartiology" which I just learned is the study of sin. I've never heard of this study before but I have studied some Buddhist teachings. Buddhists teach that when you steady your attention on a mental object, that object grows (for example gratitude). To me, it follows that studying sin leads to increased sin.
I think many modern Christians understand this and, therefore, sin is no longer such a central tenant to the faith.
Thanks for the explanation. I guess our mismatch is that you think sin and evil are the same thing and I think they’re very far apart. To me, stealing a cookie from mom when she’s not watching is sinful but not evil. Murdering people is evil but I don’t think that’s what your average Christian refers to when talking about sin.
I know, it was flkenosad who posted the message that I originally responded to.
> you think sin and evil are the same thing and I think they’re very far apart
Well, I am an outsider, so it's not so much what I believe, it's my understanding of what Christian theology teaches. And my understanding might be wrong! Catholics have "mortal sin" vs. "venial sin", for instance, but I'm not sure that's the same distinction.
The sooner people realise this the better, imo.