Is Christianity Polytheistic?

I have changed my name to God.Assuming that you accept that I exist how many Gods do you now believe exist?If I don't qualify - Why not? That has been my question to you throughout this thread. What do you mean by the "general definition" as used by Slevesque in the examples below? And using this "general definition" - Essentially a specific-religion-independent concept of god - tell me why Satan doesn't qualify?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

If I were writing a book titled The Gods of The Yagwai Tribe I would consider it very incomplete without covering all of the above.Which would you leave out?This is not a rhetorical question.

It is hardly a subtle distinction. I would say it was a quite obvious distinction. Are you not making any distinction at all between ascribing the word "god" to something and the term "god" being imbued with some conceptual criteria? Let's see:I have changed my name to God. I assume that you believe that I exist.So now you believe that God exists. Which makes you a theist. No?If not why not? No you have not! You have evaded it at every turn. And continue to do so.Where exactly have you set out this method? Can you quote it or at least link to the specific post where you cite this method?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

So members of the Yagwai tribe who only believe in the existence of evil gods (oh sorry I meant qaghruna) are atheists as far as you are concerned?This is not a rhetorical question. Inside my book titled "The Gods of the Yagwai Tribe" I would of course make clear their internal distinctions between different kinds of gods. I would make it clear that the evil god concepts that the Yagwai call qaghruna are in some sense comparable to the Christian specific notion of devils or demons with which we in the Western world are all familiar. You are joking?A book titled "Gods of the Yagwai Tribe" omits all the evil gods they believe in because you want to make a nominal distinction between good gods and evil gods?Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

It seems a bit unclear. Luke 4-5-7 seems to be cited as some sort of evidence by those who suggest that the answer to your question is 'yes'. But I don't see how (but maybe I am not looking at a translation that makes it clear)There are lots of sort of allusions to the idea from various sources - none of which seem very authoritative. Link

quote:

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Satan In Job, Satan is a member of the divine council who accuses Job before Yahweh. In later mythology Satan is one designation for the angels or gods who undertake a revolt against God and are punished by being confined to the underworld. In the NT, "Satan" is the ordinary term to designate the chief of the underworld deities. Most of the Hebrew Bible has no notion of Satan or any other god who is powerful enough to oppose Yahweh even unsuccessfully. flh

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No I haven't. So cheers for the link.I read 'The Moral Animal' years ago and found the way in which he related all the evo-psych theories he was advocating directly to Darwin's biography a bit forced and convuluted. But he talks about game theory a lot in that and it was interesting.I haven't read Nonzero which is his book specifically about game theory and which I am guessing is the period and subject mater your lecture links will relate to.Will check them out properly at some point soon.

Then in what sense did bog standard wooden pencils qualify as gods?

Straggler writes: ​ I have changed my name to God. I assume that you believe that I exist. ​ So now you believe that God exists. Which makes you a theist. No? ​ If not why not? ​ No, because I don't think you're a god.

Of course I am a God. Having changed my name to God I am a God in exactly the same sense that Paul McCartney (for example) is a Paul. In what sense are you saying that I am not a God?Be specific.

Straggler writes: ​ Bearing in mind that when discussing theism in a non-religion-specific context the Fates, Titans, paleolithic representations of fertility and what-not are are commonly described as "gods" how would we determine whether a newly discovered culture believed in a concept we would call a "god"?

Dr A in msg 98 writes: ​ In each religion we can recognize a top tier of supernatural beings: the most powerful ones; the ones with greatest autonomy; the best ones; the ones thought most suitable for human worship. If we want to draw a boundary between these and other kinds of supernatural beings, then we generally find that some of them are definitely in the top tier and are classified under the same nominal clause, and then we look for the other beings customarily identified by the same noun. ​ This noun we translate by the word "god". ​ So, for example, the Virgin Mary, though quite near the top of the Catholic hierarchy, is not identified by the same noun (or a feminine form thereof) as Yahweh, who is definitely in the top tier. On the other hand, Loki, though not a good guy and not generally worshiped, is nonetheless identified by the same noun as entities which are definitely in the top tier such as Odin and Thor.

So explain to me in what sense Satan fails to conceptually (i.e. nomenclature aside) qualify as the Christian god of evil?Is he not "top tier" enough for you?How about Qaghru the leader of the qaghruna in your own little scenario - He is surely "top tier" as the CEO of the evil gods?

Dr A writes: ​ Please explain how you identify gods.

By seeking evidence of belief in entities which possess the qualities that you obviously feel I am lacking.So what qualities am I, with my new name of God, lacking such that your belief in my existence fails to qualify you as a theist? Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

It has already been claimed in his thread that belief in the existence of bog standard wooden pencils can legitimately constitute theism if one is personally inclined to swap the word pencil for the word god.Now it is being claimed that one can call oneself an atheist without batting an eye whilst believing in a host of supernatural beings that do things like torture the souls of the wicked for all eternity, blight crops, inflict nightmares and induce cot death.If, as I keep being told, I am the only one who sees a problem with this then I would suggest that the lunatics have finally taken over the asylum. "god" is good

Dr A writes: ​ If they believe in qaghruna but no other supernatural entities, then they believe in demons but not gods.

Why do the good entities in your little scenario alone get translated as god? Since when was being good a necessary godly criteria? Why is helping crops grow godly but blighting crops demonic? What about those gods that have been thought to do both? Where do they stand?You seem to be letting your Christian heritage shine through. Christianity obviously believes itself to be all about ‘God is good’ (blah blah). But what would the Yagwai tribe members make of the genocidal, rape-inspiring despotic nutjob that is the Christian God of the old testament? He would seem to be conceptually closer to their qaghruna (i.e. that which you are calling "demons" and what I see as being indistinguishable from just evil gods). No?Biblical Christians have convinced themselves that they are monotheistic (despite believing in a whole host of entities which are godly in all but name) in the same way that they have convinced themselves that Yahweh is only ever capable of good (despite the fact that his actions in the OT are morally unjustifiable). It is an exercise in definitional dynamics and terminological nonsense that fails to hold up to scrutiny in both cases.The only question that remains is why you can see this in one case but not the other.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

You keep flip flopping between god as a concept and god as a label.Dave believes in the existence of the ancient Greek pantheon of gods. But he is a particular fan of Zeus. Dave thinks it is unfair that Zeus, being so obviously superior and top tier as compared to the other Greek gods, is lumped in with Apollo, Aphrodite etc. etc. in terminological terms. Dave decides to rectify this situation. Dave decides that he will from now on refer to all those members of the Greek pantheon as guds except Zeus. Zeus remains a god. In fact as far as Dave is concerned Zeus is the only god. The rest are guds.Can Dave now legitimately call himself a monotheist? A conceptual difference? Or merely a difference of arbitrary labels? But what does it actually mean to believe that something actually is a god? Can bog standard wooden pencils qualify as gods or do you have to imbue them with additional attributes? Of course I am a God. Having changed my name to God I am a God in exactly the same sense that Paul McCartney (for example) is a Paul. In what sense are you saying that I am not a God?Be specific. This is not a rhetorical question. In fact it is arguably the key question to our differences here. So according to you one cannot believe in malevolent gods because they should be labeled "demons" and those who believe exclusively in malevolent gods are thus superstitious atheists.You are playing the same semantical games that Christians do. Christians certainly label him as a god. And as good. And they certainly believe themselves to be monotheists. But according to your conceptual arguments we should label Yahweh of the OT as a demon. In which case by the terms of translation you yourself have insisted upon Yahweh of the OT is a demon rather than a god and those Christians who believe in him are thus merely superstitious rather than theistic.Go figure.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.Edited by Straggler, : No reason given.

I am well aware how Christians define their beliefs and why it is they believe themselves to be monotheists.But the term god has conceptual meaning that is independent of any one religion. To be a theist means that one believes in the existence of at least one such concept. To be a polytheist means that one believes in the existence of many (i.e. > 1) and to be a monotheist the requirement is to believe in the existence of only one such concept. Conversely atheists necessarily lack belief in the existence of any such concepts.All of this you would have thought was blindingly obvious. And yet here we find ourselves confronted with claims that belief in the existence of wooden pencils can constitute genuine theism, that the rebranding of malevolent god concepts with the term demon means that those who believe exclusively in malevolent gods can now legitimately call themselves atheists and that those who believe in a variety of godly entities but whom only use the term god for one of them can somehow call themselves monotheists.My point in this thread is that we all, whatever our beliefs may be, necessarily use the term god in a conceptual sense that is independent of the petty distinctions of nomenclature imposed by specific religions. Nomenclature that is designed to convince followers of the superiority of their own dogma by obfuscating the concepts involved with terminological trickery. When we apply this use of the term god consistently (i.e. when we look past the religious specific qualifications and internal self-justifications) we can see that those concepts which many self proclaimed monotheists believe exist would actually qualify them as polytheists in more objective terms.To demonstrate this non-religion-specific concept of god try to answer the following:I have changed my name to God. I assume that you believe that I exist. So now you believe that God exists. Which makes you a theist. No?If not why not exactly? What is it I am lacking that makes me a wally on a debate board with a silly name rather than something that is recognisably godly?Is "god" just a label that religions can define internally to prop up their self proclaimed monotheism? Or is it a term with conceptual meaning that is independent of any one religion?

So then you agree with me that whether something is godly or not is based on conceptual criteria rather than mere labels?Slevesque and others in this very thread have stated that merely ascribing the word god to something is sufficient to consider oneself a theist.Are you coming round to my way of thinking? I have changed my name to God. I assume that you believe that I exist. So now you believe that I, God, exists. Which makes you a theist. No?If not why not exactly? What is it I am lacking that makes me a wally on a debate board with a silly name rather than something that is recognisably godly?Is "god" just a label that religions can define internally to prop up their self proclaimed monotheism? Or is it a term with conceptual meaning that is independent of any one religion?

So a criteria for godliness is that one is capable of supernatural feats? OK. I have changed my name to God. I assume that you believe that I exist. So now you believe that I, God, exists. Which makes you a (poly)theist. No?If not why not exactly? What is it I am lacking that makes me a wally on a debate board with a silly name rather than something that is recognisably godly?Everybody here will agree that I am not a god because I don't meet any recognisably godly conceptual citeria. Yet simultaneously I am told that there are no specific religion independent criteria by which godliness can be determined.

What criteria or attributes am I lacking such that I am most certainly and obviously am not a god?Are there criteria by which we can recognise concepts of gods and resulting theism in other cultures? (regardless of whether we ourselves believe in those concepts or indeed any god concepts at all). Given that we have done this the answer must be - Yes.Can we recognise god concepts and theism independently of language barriers or the specific nomenclature of any given individual religion? Given that we have done this the answer must be - Yes.If we ignore the nomenclature and terminological trickery imposed by Christians and instead we apply the same religion-independent conceptual based thinking to the entities in which (many) Christians believe are they objectively monotheists? Or polytheists who consider themselves to be monotheists by means of applying different labels to concepts that are otherwise reognisably godly?Whether you agree or not is that clearer?

Firstly you still haven't explained to me how it is that regardless of naming myself God belief in my existence does not constitute a form of theism.This is true regardless of whether one is Christian, Hindu, Muslim, agnostic, atheist or anything else.Why is that? What am I lacking? Christians don't worship Christ?Can you define what you mean by "worship" for me?

Have you ever been to Lourdes?Would you agree that many (not all) Christians do indeed worship Mary?What about praying to saints? Is that worship?

From an "outside" perspective (i.e. a specific-religion-independent perspective) biblical Christians are polytheists who believe themselves to be monotheists.Of course they, by very definition, are not going to agree with that non-Christian perspective.