20 May 21
@sonship saidNo claims First Corinthians makes related to supernatural matters can be evaluated by historians as being true. Claims about supernatural beings or phenomena are matters of faith. Historians can evaluate what people may have said about what they believed and what people claimed to "know", but they can't evaluate the truth or otherwise of things that people's faith made them believe.
Like it or not First Corinthians is a historical document.
I know to the Christian it is sacred text. But it is also a historical document which can be evaluated purely on those grounds by historians.
20 May 21
@sonship saidNobody is talking about any "unwritten rule", except you. Pretty much any activity or thought process can constitute a coping mechanism, regardless of its veracity ~ depending on the individual.
What unwritten rule holds that a "coping mechanism" must necessarily be based on fictitious imagination?
@sonship saidI agree that the Christian church has provided a coping mechanism for millions upon millions of people down through the centuries - just as other religions have done - and it has been extremely successful in doing this. You and I can agree on this. The question of whether or not one believes it is "divine", however, is a matter for each individual and their subjective appraisal and/or gut reaction in the context of their culture, geography, and stuff like events in their lives.
A divine "coping mechanism" from God experienced thousands of Jerusalem Jews as the foundation of the Christian church.
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21 May 21
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I agree that the Christian church has provided a coping mechanism for millions upon millions of people down through the centuries
To cope with the lies the truth is the best coping "mechanism". That is given that believers hold fast to the truth.
- just as other religions have done - and it has been extremely successful in doing this. You and I can agree on this.
Religion, in general provides in many cases a breaking mechanism preventing some in society from running wild.
But truth matters. And if Mohammed tells the truth then Christ is wrong. They cannot both be completely true. It is the same with Buddha and Hinduism and Mormonism. If anyone of them is speaking the whole truth then Jesus Christ cannot be the truth. Though there may be aspects of their teachings which coincide with something in the revelation of the Bible.
An agnostic person may look to a magnanimous viewpoint that all faiths are true.
I tried this for awhile - "All religions are equally true."
This is even a convenient way to be certain that no faith of any kind touches one's
life. "I sit above them all, objective, detached, nodding that all are equally effective coping mechanisms."
One could even say it doesn't matter what truth is. But only a coping mechanism is all that is important. But I believe the truth of the Christ's death and resurrection is not optional. He is in a class occupied by only one candidate - Himself as Son of God.
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21 May 21
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The question of whether or not one believes it is "divine", however, is a matter for each individual and their subjective appraisal and/or gut reaction in the context of their culture, geography, and stuff like events in their lives.
This attitude has an underlying assumption of what is subjective cannot be universal. If it is subjective and personal then it cannot be universal and truly true.
Objectively true and subjectively true is the ultimate reality of God as a Person.
You are saying that if something is "divine" that is just personal, subjective,
individual.
No, the objective Divine is universal, non-compromising, absolute, yet still arrived at subjectively and personally. As John closes his Gospel -
"Moreover indeed many other signs also Jesus did before His disciples, which are no written in this book. But these have been written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing, you may have life in His name." (John 20:20,31)
Universal and absolute that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God.
Subjective and personalized that each believe "may have life in His name."
Fortunately, the True One is gentle, respectful of your decision, and will not force Himself into your heart. But His divine life is there for that life. that Person to be imparted into you for a union of you and God. Life in His name is the ultimate coping Person against sin and death and eternal judgment.
This is the victory that overcomes the world that I want to experience and announce, Christ Himself as a living and available Person.
21 May 21
@sonship saidNope. Sorry. Your assertions about "the objective Divine" are subjective and personal. They are not objective. The same can be said about the assertions I make about your belief in supernatural things: they are subjective and not objective.
No, the objective Divine is universal, non-compromising, absolute, yet still arrived at subjectively and personally.
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21 May 21
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@FMF
That is despair and saying truth doesn't exist.
Are you saying everything is relative ?
Are you making the truthful statement that you know it is all only subjective relativism? That is self defeating.
If you say that even your evaluation is nothing more than your subjective opinion you would have to be outside of it all and objective to KNOW that.
Its better to recognize that truth became a Person and lived among us on this earth. Hence the cataclysmic impact of Jesus Christ on the world.
To say "It is all relative. It is ALL only personal." is self defeating. You couldn't know even that unless you had the vantage point of transcending objective possession of the truth.
21 May 21
@sonship saidNo, I think truth exists. What I'm saying is that your conjecture about supernatural things and my conjecture about supernatural things are both subjective and not objective. You can insist that your conjecture is "the truth" 10,000 times. It makes no difference. If that's your coping mechanism, so be it.
That is despair and saying truth doesn't exist.
Are you saying everything is relative ?
21 May 21
@fmf saidSonship does not know what faith means, and that faith without proof or evidence is actually a virtue. Faith means you have no proof otherwise it is not faith. Faith with proof is knowlege. Paul likened faith as seeing through a dirty glass, which means you cannot see or know everything, neither are you certain about many things.
It's your prerogative if you want to refer to your own religious dogma as "the truth" and to all else as "lies".
21 May 21
@sonship saidIf someone has said "truth doesn't exist", take it up wuth them. I haven't made that claim. You're either being low-integrity here, or the simple uncontroversial things I have said have simply gone over your head. Which is it?
That is despair and saying truth doesn't exist.