Is Christianity Polytheistic?

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.

Christianity is not polytheistic. Perhaps you are painting with a rather wide brush here. There is a huge difference between polytheistic religions and Christianity. I'll try to sum it up as efficiently as possible:Monotheism:
The worship of the one, true Supreme Being. God is one as to the divine essence or nature, Jesus Christ's "deity" is due to that direct connection to this essence/nature. He is still not a true "God" just reflection of his essence and nature in human form. The Holy Spirit is also not a "deity" just the representative manifestation of his divine will and influence.Confusing and being misleading through the representation that Virgin Mary, Satan, angels/demons, etc are deities is simply a false statement. Nowhere is it stated that they are divine in nature or action. They are simply another being created by and subject to God's will and judgement. Those that live within his spirit are "divine" through his grace, not independent authority as is common practice in polytheism. Put quite simple there is only one God, to which all are religiously and morally accountable.

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"For even though there are those who are called "gods" whether in heaven or on earth, just as there are many "gods" and many "lords", there is actually to us one God the Father, out of whom all things are, and we for him, and there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things are..." (Corinthians 8:5)

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Free will of his creations and their inherent spiritual power and gifts is where people get confused. Just because Satan, Lucifer, etc have expanded spiritual power and knowledge in no way makes the divine just supernatural in influence. The Trinity is simply three different manifestations of his being, not three different dieties to be worshiped. Even Jesus is not to be worshiped just acknowledged for his sacrifice (taken as your mortal saviour) and an example to emmulate not worship directly as stated above.Polytheism:
It attempts personify the various forces of nature (e.g., the sun, moon, stars, fire, air, water, fertility, love, death, war, etc.) worships each as a independent deity independent of judgement and subjection to a higher authority. This was/is developed from the concept of pantheism, the notion that, ultimately, everything possesses the god nature which is simply a false belief. Polytheism attempts to cling to man’s basic religious instinct, i.e., the need to believe in some higher power, but rejects the one, true deity to whom man must be religiously and morally accountable.

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Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God for the likeness of an image of corruptible man, and of birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things (Romans 1:22-23).

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The gods of the ancient pagan world were heterogeneous. They were vicious, warring beings, characterized by utter immorality. They mated and produced new gods (and demi-gods ie nephilim through breeding with humans); they brutally fought and destroyed one another. They were diverse in temperament and nature.Conclusion:
There is therefore a vast difference between the deity of the Scripturesthe one, eternal, perfect-nature being, manifested in three personsand the discordant, temporal, factious and fictitious gods that were fabricated in the digressive imaginations of a rebel humans and fallen beings.Edited by Practical Prodigy, : No reason given.Edited by Practical Prodigy, : SpellingEdited by Practical Prodigy, : another spelling error found, lolEdited by Practical Prodigy, : No reason given.

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No, only if you think that pencils actually are gods. Well yes. 'Cos then you'd just believe in demons.There's a difference between a theist and a superstitious atheist. Because their separate, completely different name for and classification of the bad entities would be better translated as "demons". They might well think so. Christians, on the other hand, would count him as a god.---See my post on "God-Spotting" for further clarification.

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?

A couple of magic tricks might help... I don't think it is a term with conceptual meaning that is independent of any one religion.

Uh, well, if you changed your name to Uranus would you be the planet Uranus or would you share the same name as a planet?

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"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from mistaken conviction." — Blaise Pascal

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.

I didn't realize you were being facetious I still don't really understand your argument that well. It doesn't make sense to me.

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"Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from mistaken conviction." — Blaise Pascal

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?

Perhaps if you read my post you would see the difference. I tried to break it down into key points where they are different.Christians worhip one God, through which everything else is manifest. To acknowledge other beings as non-human and supernatural in no way confers them Godhood. To acknowledge demons, angels, etc exist in no way is giving them deity status as you keep repeating. You are confusing awareness and acknowledgment with belief and worship respectfully.Christians are not to worship Jesus Christ, Virgin Mary, or any other being besides the one true God. Anything else is polytheism you are correct in that statement, and is where organized religion usually stick its human based ideas and other falsehoods into the matter. No where in the Bible does it say to worship Jesus or any other being so unless that changes your argument falls on that premise and is quite poor with all due respect

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For me, yes. Capability of supernatural feats. You're dealing with peoples' beliefs here. You can either stay within them, and determine whether or not they are monotheistic by what they believe. Or you can go outside of them, and have a definition of god that they're not gonna agree with.

Hi, Straggler. Obviously, the clarity in the concept of god suffers from the long evolution of human opinion on the matter, so it’s always going to be muddy waters.But, I think that there is at least one criterion beyond nomenclature for gods, but it doesn't have anything to do with the characteristics of the god him/her/itself, but with the characteristics of the believers in the god.The criterion is worship. Of course, everybody knows that "worship" is as vague and subjective a term as "god"; but it always involves acknowledgement and admiration of supernatural power and either a placation, appeasement or submissiveness to the deity in question. So, I’ll use the term worship to mean praise for, placation or appeasement of, and/or submitting to the supernatural powers of a certain being.Since Christians do not worship (i.e., praise, placate, appease or submit to the powers of) Satan, it is not appropriate to view Satan as a god.On the other hand, polytheistic religions with a rough equivalent of Satan actually do worship (i.e., appease or submit to) their equivalent of Satan. So, it is appropriate to view these beings as gods.Likewise, polytheists worship different beings for different situations (e.g., Aphrodite in matters of love and Demeter in matters of agriculture); whereas there is only one entity for Christians to worship in all cases.If you chose to placate, appease or submit to a pencil, then it would be appropriate to call the pencil your god. But, if all you do is say that pencils are your gods, then pencils do not really meet the objective criteria of godliness, and you don’t really meet the objective criteria for a theist.Some types of Christians pray to saints or angels on their own behalf, and I suppose you could make a case for this being some form of worship. But, the act in this case is actually a request for the individual being to appease or placate the actual god on one’s behalf; so this is, at best, a grey area.Edited by Bluejay, : singular for "criteria."Edited by Bluejay, : No reason given.

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-Bluejay (a.k.a. Mantis, Thylacosmilus)Darwin loves you.