Hacker News Reader

Comment by abrenuntio | Hacker News Reader

I would say LXX and Hebrew versions share a common theological vision. None of the examples mentioned in this article convince me otherwise.

Example: bringing the Law to the nations and bringing fear of the Lord to the nations refers to the exact same future, because fearing the Lord is a positive thing in Scripture. Israel itself was to be a spiritual sign of mankind fearing the Lord. And that future came to pass. God is bringing fear to the nations. Not the trembling fear for a dangerous oppressive army, but wholehearted conversion. By the time Messiah arrived, Jerusalem was already visited by eager "phoboumenoi": pagan "God-fearers" who had understood that the creator God of Israel was not like any of the pagan "gods".

An example of a translation truly deviating is for instance that made by Jehovah's Witnesses. An example: they translate ruach as "active force", not as a one-off choice because some human translator on some particular day in his own cultural context thought it just sounded better, but because JWs reject trinitarianism. You will not find a single actual Christian (or Jew!) accepting this as a (systematic) translation choice.

In fact, it's a testament to the divine inspiration of Scripture that Christians and Jews have never relied on an absolutely letter-for-letter standardized text to know the voice of their Shepherd.

View on HN

>> wholehearted conversion

I'm not sure if you've looked around recently, but neither the Law nor fear of the Lord are exactly dominant features of 21st Century global civilization.

I'm not speaking against the concept. But you could make a strong case that the groups most bound to that vision of the future are the extremists from the three Abrahamic religions, to whom life is to some greater or lesser extent disposable in service of "wholehearted conversion".

One brought Law, one brought Salvation, and one brought Submission. The notion of monotheism was to destroy the old pagan gods and the wickedness that came wrapped in "superstition". We're back in the superstitious era. And in a superstitious era, conversion takes on the form conquest and in many cases murder and dehumanization. One has to be a zealot to believe that there is a God who wants humanity to follow certain mandates and rituals. The question you leave open is whether zealotry is justified, and I don't think you sufficiently answered that.

As a non extremist believer, in the sense of believing extremely but not passionate about influencing others’ decisions, life is not disposable in service, “in service” is an available disposition for life. Take what you want of my statement, as I did of yours.

I get that. I'm Jewish. While I'm not an extreme believer, I believe in the framework for human life and dignity that the Torah creates. That Law isn't simply reducible to a "fear of God"; it's a living thing and a toolkit that teaches one generation after another methods to take wisdom and grounding from it and to seek something more, including the paths of rebels like Jesus and agnostics like Einstein.

We don't try to convert people, or even get them to understand. What other people think isn't our responsibility. It's generally not "you must use these tools this way or you're wrong". It's "here's what we got from this".

However, there is a fluctuating source of zealotry and revivalism in our own community that has parallels in Islam and in Christianity. The idea is a very ancient Israelite one, a desert religion tribal idea: There's one God and He's on Your Side. Everyone else is apostate, pagan. This took root way before there were Christian or Muslim concepts of Hell or Heaven. You don't even need those things to condemn other people. There is judgment in Judaism, it's just not generally on the level of converting or killing people who disagree with the beliefs.

I'd submit that more people should be bothered by it if they have the idea that their belief is the only right one.

> a toolkit that teaches one generation after another methods to take wisdom and grounding from it and to seek something more

Its full of superstition from a couple thousand years ago.

Sure, but what's nice about it is that you don't have to take it all literally. You can take the metaphors, and some of the prescriptions as to how to behave or to best deal with some situations.

That's sort of what a lot of other religions are missing. The idea that it's not literal.

> You can take the metaphors, and some of the prescriptions as to how to behave or to best deal with some situations.

Then I've got better ideas. You kind of need the man in the sky or it's pointless noise.... Ie just a list of personal preferences invented by someone, followed by a bunch more. That's the number one reason god was invented.... To make it so peasants can't argue against the rules

It looks like with religion not in the picture as predominantly as in the past, peasants still don’t argue against the rules. If religion is not needed for control, then your argument is weakened. It also looks like religion has been around before peasants and is present even in relatively flat hierarchy communities and proto-societies where control was less relevant or hard. Historically, power structures co-opt rather than invent religion.

> It looks like with religion not in the picture as predominantly as in the past, peasants still don’t argue against the rules.

The priestly class has become less relevant, yes. I never said it was the only game in town, or the only way to justify force

> It also looks like religion has been around before peasants and is present even in relatively flat hierarchy communities and proto-societies where control was less relevant or hard.

I wouldn't equate that to today's religion. Pagan beliefs about the sun chasing the moon aren't what I'm talking about, I can forgive true misunderstandings about physics and astronomy etc... I'm talking about prohibitive moral codes originating from a ruling class concerning the domestic and mundane

> Historically, power structures co-opt rather than invent religion.

Couldn't have put it better myself.

To amplify cgio's point, the historical secret of Judaism's survival, as well as the reason it has been hunted and attacked by empires for millennia, is that it chooses a commitment to a cultural belief system over fitting into the dominant empire culture of its day, and over blind loyalty to a Caesar. Which isn't to say that it also can't be loyal. But it presents an easy target for Caesars, because it is essentially non-conformism bottles as a religion.

Neither Christianity nor Islam, nor any other religion I'm aware of, elevates non-conformism and individual identity and personal responsibility in a similar way. It requires developing a moral or ethical framework that is internal rather than dictated by the group, and that is the nature of Jewish education. God could simply cease to exist - morality is asking questions.

To your point, that includes an acceptance to non-conforming within the religion itself, which is why a large number of people identify as nonreligious. It's a fairly common misconception among Christians and Muslims and atheists who grew up in those religions that

>> You kind of need the man in the sky or it's pointless noise.

That is true if you grew up in a religion that delineates its morality based on what God says to do, or based on a fear of Hell, where the religion or the culture doesn't provide any other reason for acting morally. In that case, once you decide that religion is bunk and God doesn't exist, what is there to keep you from acting like a beast? That's a problem with those religions.

I've struggled to explain the difference with Judaism to Christians I know. What I found was an effective way of saying it was to avoid the word "morality" completely, and use the word "ethics". Maybe you do need the man in the sky to have morals the way Christians conceive of those, but don't lose your ethics just because you find out God is Dead, do you?

It is more than that

https://meru.org/

Zealots will zealot. That is less of a religion issue and more a societal one. People will find something to be fanatical about and religion is the perfect candidate for that, the distance between belief and fanaticism is the easiest to cross. While it’s worth the while to fight extremism, this is more of a maintenance than a completion exercise. With the challenges of our times, as different as we may perceive them, this may be a tough exercise and not necessarily one where focusing on “fixing”religion is the most promising path. The happy times of prosperity and atheism were also the best times to be in a religion. I think the most promising path is to help people not need a God that saves them from the challenges of their day to day lives.

> But you could make a strong case that the groups most bound to that vision of the future are the extremists from the three Abrahamic religions, to whom life is to some greater or lesser extent disposable in service of "wholehearted conversion".

I'm not a religious person but your message is very misleading and unfair to christians. Seriously: in the last 100 years how many terror attacks have been committed in the name of the christian god?

Even if, in the past, we've had stuff like the crusades and the dark ages it's hard to deny that Jesus brings a message of peace and forgiveness.

Save from a very few incidents with rare extremist christians fighting against abortion, the worst we've seen from christians are basically "people praying in their head in front of abortion clinics" (and the UK arrested christians for doing so btw: you're not free to "pray in your head" in front of an abortion clinic in the UK anymore).

While we could talk about tens of thousands of deaths in terror attacks from religious cracknuts who love to kill as many non-believers as possible.

"extremists from the three Abrahamic religions" doesn't hold up to scrutiny when christianity today has something like 0.01% of extremists while another religion, according to the latest published World FactBook from the CIA, has as many as 30% of its followers worldwide approving sharia laws.

I'm cushioning my statements as much as possible, if you read my other post here.

I'm aware of where most of the zealotry comes from at the moment.

I'm not trying to be unfair to Christians or to Christianity, which in large part has renounced violence as a means of converting people.

Most Christians from before the early-20th century, would consider your interpretation of Christianity as mostly heretical. They very willingly forced Christianity into anyone who wasn't, as well as into anyone who wasn't of their particular branch.

The text is the same, as is, presumably, the Jesus, so either they had understood it all wrong and current Christians understand it correctly, or the other way around. Which is it?

IMHO, those are two distinct religions. Actual Christianity is the old one. The modern one isn't Christianity, but European Enlightenment in Christian clothing. And yes, the later is much better than the original.

EE also provides Judaism clothing, Buddhist clothing, and other such clothings, which is why it works so well. In fact, it also has a relatively recently developed Islamic clothing, though adoption is still limited. Hopefully it'll expand over time.

> Most Christians from before the early-20th century, would consider your interpretation of Christianity as mostly heretical.

No they would not. Mainstream Christian belief has not changed in a very long time.

Tell me of any belief the Catholic Church (which more than half of all Christians belong to) currently holds that would have been considered heretical a thousand years ago?

Well, I am pretty sure they would not have made such a statement 1000 years or even 100 years ago

"The Catechism of the Catholic Church emphasizes that all homosexual individuals must "be accepted and treated with respect, compassion, and sensitivity," and that all forms of unjust discrimination should be discouraged and avoided at all cost"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_and_homosexual...

Such a statement could not be made a thousand years ago as it would be utterly anachronistic. The concept of "homosexual individuals" only exists as part of the modern concept of sexual orientation. A thousand years ago people thought in terms of acts, not orientation.

I think it unlikely that they would have regarded treating anyone with compassion as heretical. Most of the early condemnation of homosexuality was specifically of pederasty which was accepted in pre-Christian times https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Catholic_Church... They might have disagreed strongly, but it would definitely not be heresy. Many historians believe homosexuality was tolerated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Christianity_and_ho...

Ecumenism, for one. The Second Vatican Council was very divisive among Catholics, and to this day the Church has to keep pressing it upon and against the will of old-school Catholics. Some felt so offended by it they left the Catholic Church altogether so as to stick with what it used to believe in before the 1970s.

Great post.

Once the EE got going and separated church from state, it also provided the emancipation of Jews[0], on the thesis that individuals transcend groups and have inalienable rights.

From the perspective of a 17th Century Jew or Christian, that project worked to reform and soften both Christianity and Judaism in Europe because both people were prepared to reject extremist beliefs in favor of economic, worldly, material wellbeing. Protestantism and Judaism in particular share certain traits in prioritizing work, science, individualism and success in the corporeal life.

It might be an unpopular idea, but the softening of Christianity was in some way its reunion with Judaism, from being a religion adapted by the Romans to war to a realignment with the more temperate biblical Judaism that Christ was actually teaching. But Christian scripture did have a gentle interpretation inherent to it.

Every European movement which sought to destroy the Enlightenment tried first to roll Jewish emancipation back and then to destroy the Churches, to supplant enlightened Christianity with extremist state religion.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_emancipation

Be honest, please; the arrests were not for "praying in your head" they were for repeatedly breaching a buffer zone and actively refusing a request to move on.

eg: https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4g9kp7r00vo (and one or two others)

You have not covered anything like all cases these, and the article makes it clear "breaching a buffer zone" was standing silently while praying.

> Poole Magistrates' Court heard the former serviceman had his head bowed and hands clasped outside the British Pregnancy Advisory Service in Ophir Road.

> The court was told he had been praying for his unborn son, who he said died from abortion 22 years ago.

In a declared buffer zone, after announcing he intended to this, and after an hour or more of refusing to move on.

It was deliberate disregard of a buffer zone that applied to all that had no business within the abortion centre, whether he was praying in his head or not we'll never know and it's immaterial to the reason for the arrest.

Noneheless all he did was stand silently. There is no way it is right to criminalise standing and saying nothing.

It's not right to do so and it's not criminalised.

Again, he was arrested for entering an exclusion zone and refusing to leave for an hour.

There are many no trespass areas for a variety of reasons, and, as the saying goes, trespassers can and will be prosecuted - whether they are praying or not.

The War on Iraq may not fit the definition of terrorism, being government actions, but it killed a shit load of people and was driven by religious convictions with flimsy or non-existent evidence:

https://san.com/cc/george-w-bush-saw-iraq-war-as-crusade-dec...

https://www.thirteen.org/worldfocus/blog/2009/05/27/religiou...

"in the last 100 years how many terror attacks have been committed in the name of the christian god?"

Depends how you count, the war on terror, that in reality mostly just brought terror to blow up weddings etc. was and is justified as a crusade by certain christian politicians. And quite some other wars had those elements as well, even the Nazis claimed they officially fought in the name of god against the atheist communists (and many did believe that, viewed Hitler as doing god's will).

Apart from that, check out The Lord's Resistance Army

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord%27s_Resistance_Army

Or just https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_terrorism

> the Nazis claimed they officially fought in the name of god against the atheist communists.

Not the Christian God. The aim of the Nazis was to replace the Christian ethos. Himmler said they aimed to get rid of the 10 commandments. They invented two religions (neo-paganism and Positive Christianity) as replacements for Christianity. They regarded Christianity as Jewish plot that overthrew the Roman Empire. Their ideal was to return to a pre-Christian European society, and Hitler said Sparta was the historical society closest to Nazi ideals.

> and is justified as a crusade by certain christian politicians

While they might be influential politicians, they are almost all also at odds with mainstream Christianity. There are similar problems with the wikipedia page about Christian terrorists. Most were anti-Catholic (so their enemies included most Christians). Others are "cultural Christians" rather than believers.

The nazis were not a homogeneous block and neo paganism was not invented by them. They also made use of it, but actual neo pagans among the nazis were rare, it was rather marginal and the mainstream was still very christian. Their main believe uniting them was about blood and race.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_Christians_movement

And they did try to ignore/change the fact that Jesus was jewish and other stuff to help it establish a german identity religion. But I am pretty sure, that the many non nazis in germany fighting for germany did motivate themself by fighting against atheists and for god.

While they did not invent neo-paganism per se, they invented a particular form of it that fit their ideology. They also invented "positive Christianity".

The Nazi leadership and their core followers were very much committed to getting rid of Christianity. Certainly the heretical movement you refer to existed, but mainstream Christianity was not compatible with Nazi ideology . The Catholic church condemned the Nazi ideology as contrary to Christianity (in Mit brennender Sorge) and large numbers of protestants took the risk of condemning the "German Christian movement as heretical (e.g. those who joined the Confessing Church). I do not think the claim that they were "very Christian" is plausible.

"I do not think the claim that they were "very Christian" is plausible."

I do claim the mainstream of people fighting for Hitler were very christian (of those who had any religion). Not that the hardcore inner Nazi circle was christian (probably none of them were).

"The Catholic church condemned the Nazi ideology as contrary to Christianity (in Mit brennender Sorge)"

But they only did so, after Hitler attacked their organisation, not before or after the Nazis rose to power. Hitler did not liked them, but had respect for the catholic church, as a old power institution. But he did not had them under control as the pope was elsewhere, so they started to attack their base. So not so much a question of morality or religion, but mere power in my view. But surely there were also quite a few Kräuterbein's (if you happen to know that book). Who did not went into open resistance, but did what they could to keep things sane and humane.

"and large numbers of protestants took the risk of condemning the "German Christian movement as heretical (e.g. those who joined the Confessing Church)"

I have a huge respect for those who did. But I don't believe their number was that large all in all. The majority marched in line.

How many of the majority were scared? Subject to propaganda? Is there evidence they were "very Christian" rather than nominally so? Were people fighting because they supported the Nazis or because they were fighting for their country?

The Catholic Church also had to worry about what would happen to German Catholics. I do not think it was about power, it is the logical result of Christian thought. It is well known that Catholic areas of Germany voted against the Nazis and it is fairly obvious that the Nazi ideology was intrinsically opposed to Christianity.

Well, I am not a historian, but born as a german catholic and my 99 year old grandmother is still alive and of clear mind and I engaged with the topic a lot, so I probably do have some insights - but no, I don't know any absolute numbers here.

But I do know, that the church was also very anti communist and that antisemitism was basically a christian tradition. As well as strict authorian rule with going after anyone who thinks different. So that was a common base.

> Even if, in the past, we've had stuff like the crusades and the dark ages i

It is interesting that both those examples (which are the "obvious" ones people pick") was really anything like what people imagine then to be like. The "dark ages" were dark in terms of a lack of records in western Europe as the Roman Empire collapsed and the imperial systems disappeared. Many historians argue that life mostly improved for ordinary people, the status of women improved, slavery was replaced by serfdom etc. The crusades started in response to a call for help from people who were being invaded, and were at least partly defensive: at the time they started the Arab Empires had occupied most Spain, most Mediterranean islands, parts of southern Italy, had invaded France etc. While they were not entirely virtuous they were not without reason either.

> While we could talk about tens of thousands of deaths in terror attacks from religious cracknuts who love to kill as many non-believers as possible.

A pretty small proportion of Muslims support religious violence. The extremists exist and are powerful or widely supported in some countries, but its no usual.

> while another religion, according to the latest published World FactBook from the CIA, has as many as 30% of its followers worldwide approving sharia laws.

What do they mean by that? It varies. Survey wording can mean it can even include following rules of personal conduct. It often means religious rulings over religious matters - not very different from Catholic marriage tribunals. Even where people want it to have the force of law, they may want that only for Muslims. While the extremists exist, they are far fewer than 30%. Most of that 30% is concentrated in a few countries, although the fact that some of those countries are very wealthy has meant they can fund the spread of those ideas.

I agree with most of your reply, but I'd disagree on dark ages and crusades.

The dark ages were indeed a time of cultural collapse: science largely stopped, state capacity was cut massively (one indicator being that the Romans used to field armies of hundreds of thousands and the successor states in Europe would wage war with a few thousand men), large public infrastructure projects disappeared, religion started wielding a stifling influence on all aspects of life and society. Depending on who you ask, people will tell you that things improved for the ordinary people or very much worsened.

History, like other fields in academia, undergoes cyclical periods of rejection of dogma, as new researchers try to make a name for themselves by turning on their predecessors: I see the rejection of Dark Ages in the last decades as largely that, and recently there is more of a reversal, with new Middle Ages researchers turning on those previous researchers.

For crusades: this was not an answer to conquest. Byzantium had lost its crown jewel, modern Turkey, to Turks and then Arabs (a region, by the way, that had been reconquered and lost for centuries). The emperor at the time, Alexios, wanted a few hundred Western knights, to help him reconquer a few cities in the region (Jerusalem was not part of his plans, or at least priorities, religion was very much not a variable in his calculations), but the pope at the time saw a way to increase his own power and stirred up a religious hysteria: when the Western armies arrived to Constantinople, the Byzantines were surprised by the size and the goals of them, conflicts happened immediately, and the entire story of the first crusade is the emperor trying to conquer some revenue-generating lands and distrusting the Westerners, while the Western princes wanted to generate revenue for themselves (on my phone, simplified). Over further crusades, the Byzantines started to hate the 'Franks' (Westerners), as did the 'liberated' cities, for the many crimes and massacres they committed. Religion, and helping the fellow Christians, was simply a weapon wielded by the pope, the emperor, and the princes.

I think the rest of that previous comment is bigotry, but the poster is right about Crusades being a shameful event in the history of Christianity.

Why focus only on big, showy acts of violence? Christian-influenced violence happens countless of times everyday, such as a gay kid getting beat up because some other kids hear their pastor maligning him every week. Christian violence happens every day.

>One has to be a zealot to believe that there is a God who wants humanity to follow certain mandates and rituals.

There's a selection bias: the religions that survive today are the ones that had a reproductive advantage relative to other cultures. Natural selection applies to culture just like it does to genes. The same will hold in future as currently only the zealots have birthrates above replacement; the more secular people are, the fewer children they have, so the future belongs to the ones who believe God mandates they marry and multiply.

You're right, but the religious retort to that would be that secular people are miserable and therefore less likely to marry and reproduce. Whereas I'm not sure why that should be true. Sure, secular people don't have a command to reproduce, so maybe taking away the command structure just reduces the likelihood; and I guess that's the selection bias you're talking about. But prior to organized religion, people were reproducing like rabbits, so there's got to be something else.

> The religious retort to that…

_A_ religious retort. Also it’s not a binary “lots of kids or no kids” spectrum.

In many countries now, "over the replacement rate" or "under the replacement rate" is indeed a binary that closely tracks with religious observance. I would rather not out where I am, but here a couple having even a second child will cause some observers to at least ask if the family is part of a sect.

Okay, _a_ religious retort. I feel like you focused on a nit instead of addressing my point?

I wasn’t addressing your point, correct. Just helping you be more accurate.

> the religions that survive today

Didn't most religions allow slavery? Islam, Christians, Jews, Hindus... All had rules on how to treat your slave but never printed slavery should be abolished. Funny how no major religion allows slavery any more isn't it

Christianity has no rules on how to treat slaves other than one or two sentences in the epistles of Paul telling people to be kind, and another encouraging freeing slaves.

This is far form endorsing slavery. it was regarded as a necessity for society to function at the time. It is rather like how Christians now often accept the accumulation of wealth that is inevitable in a capitalist society as better than the alternatives. St Paul also said slaves (and women, and people of different races) were equal before God ( Galatians 3:28 ).

The Bible has rules about how to treat slaves, but from a Christian point of view these did not apply - they are Jewish law similar to not eating pork or requiring circumcision etc.

Christianity was the main motivation behind abolishing slavery and we have written records of Christians calling for slavery to be abolished going back to the 4th century.

> Christianity has no rules on how to treat slaves other than one or two sentences in the epistles of Paul telling people to be kind, and another encouraging freeing slaves.

That's what I told you lol... Some moral code, huh? Slavery permissible

> This is far form endorsing slavery

It's right next to it. Rules for slaves would permit slavery wouldnt they? Absolutely delusional chain of thought to say the bible was against slavery.

> . it was regarded as a necessity for society to function at the time.

This weak excuse again... What changed? Why would god change his mind like that? Are we to believe every Christian prior to now was stupid but YOU have a truthful understanding? Or might it be people made up the bible and that's why it contains such mundane domestic concerns like what hat you can wear at what time?

While we're at it, what else from this ancient religion is no longer relevant? It's many passages on how to treat each other would probably be good to delete, times have changed.

I assume you don't stone adulterers either, or any of the other things god has changed his mind about over the years.

Disobedience to the Law and defiance of the Lord, in contrast to God's own faithfulness, are not just features of the 21st century, but of human history in its entirety. It is the theme of the Bible, right from the first pages.

It ranges from simple stupidity and willfulness, "knuckleheaded" attempts to bring about God's promises on our own schedule using our own worldly means; to full-blown apostasy, idol worship and open rebellion; to the particularly sinister theme of a "counterfeit religion". All of it leads to bad outcomes, sometimes determining the rest of history, and none of it ever derails God's good promises coming to full fruition in their own time.

To answer your question: in my understanding, Scripture sees a good-natured, obedient kind of zealotry in a positive light. But this zealotry rarely makes the headlines.

> One has to be a zealot to believe that there is a God who wants humanity to follow certain mandates and rituals.

Why does one 'have to be a zealot' to believe this?

Judaism evolved out of earlier Canaanite polytheistic beliefs with a pantheon of deities, some of whom had malevolent or destructive aspects. As the Israelites transitioned to monotheism, Yahweh - previously one of many gods - took dominance and absorbed personas and aspects of the other gods. The written texts continued to refer to other deities ("El" and "Elohim") but reframed them as other names for the same god. That feels to me a more satisfying explanation for the "fear" of god in the Torah.

> it's a testament to the divine inspiration of Scripture that Christians and Jews have never relied on an absolutely letter-for-letter standardized text to know the voice of their Shepherd.

LOL.

your argument is that two cults using a common religious reference is evidence that it's valid?

That is not logical.

We possess hand-copied manuscripts originating from a wide range of ages, cultures, languages and personal tastes. They are far from word-by-word accurate literal copies, yet all these copies are fundamentally sound to the ears of modern day devout Jews and Christians.

My claim is that, by grace, both cults have successfully, over the course of many millennia, sniffed out loose but sound translations (even if they don't like the style or certain choices) from deliberately deviant translations.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com