Why did we stop inventing gods?

I suppose that technically you have a point...though I wish you would learn how to format. [qs ]insert message here [/ qs]You and jar think similarly...even though jar claims to be a believer and you ...well...you believe that God is a creation of the human mind. Am I close?

PhatThanks for the point.I tried that [qs ] and ended with [qs ] and no quote.Perhaps an update on the programming would be handy."you believe that God is a creation of the human mind. Am I close?"Yes.That is not a new idea.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vJ1PDxeUynAIf a god created mankind, and most people are in god's mental image, theists have to explain why they think mankind is so flawed that we had to kill a Jesus type form of god to save us from our creators wrath, when scriptures say the god created us all perfect.Deuteronomy 32:4 He is the Rock,If the supernatural and fantasy gods are not real then there is only one other source that could create the concept of god and that is man.Quite easy to understand given Jung and Freud's Father Complex. Our instinctive guide to becoming the fittest of our species.Regards
DLEdited by Greatest I am, : No reason given.

the ending quote tag needs a slash - /qs in between the brackets (no spaces) dBCodes Help

Thanks. But it did not pick up your name.Regards
DLEdited by Greatest I am, : No reason given.Edited by Greatest I am, : No reason given.Edited by Greatest I am, : No reason given.

[qs=GIA]Thanks. But it did not pick up your name.[/qs]It does if you do it right.

Thanks.What a pain in the rump though.Regards
DL

I believe He saw himself as Gods son. I believe he knew his Father intimately. I know what you have said. You emphasize Jesus humanity because you feel that a God dying is no big deal and is not a sacrifice. The "was made man" part of the creed supports your position--but does not answer the question as to what the relationship was between the Creator of all seen and unseen and His one and only son. Yes, it is true that we all can follow Jesus in that we all can go and do for the least of these...you never seem to have had a problem with the second part of the greatest commandment. Where you stumble is in not being able to conceive of the Creator of all seen and unseen having a personal relationship with you---in that He listens to your prayers and will help you with whatever you ask---provided it conforms communion-wise with His will. A Father listens to the needs of His son(or daughter) and may not always buy them ice cream or fix their problems but will give them the strength to make it. Again, here is where we disagree. You guys will say that I have an idea of God the father as a disneyland dad...one who magically makes my challenges in life easier. This all stems from our differing ideas concerning the role of a Father.GOD is not simply some unknowable complete abstract.I doubt we will ever agree because you do not respect the Gospel of John, in my opinion. Granted you can provide some evidence as to its authorship but I feel that when it comes right down to where the rubber meets the road, you go with human evidence over the Creed.I go with the Creed.Granted I want the truth to be the way I felt that my own Father was towards me.Perhaps your whole responsibility kick and unknowable God stem from the fact that your Father was somewhat distant and would not rescue you. I dunno...thats personal.

One side wants a Father who rescues us from our problems.The other side wants us to tough it up as we are all spiritual orphans who need to grow and fix our own problems.And you still never get past the idea of a "genocidal son murdering God."The whole point is that you would have been the victim otherwise. Does that make you angry at God?My whole abstract is based on several preconceptions.Both you and jar preach to the atheists in that jar says we are responsible for the future rather than Godand you say that the God in us---(who you believe is us...) can make a better future. Both of you agree that the way God is portrayed in traditional Christianity is harmful.

You can believe whatever you like. Is there some evidence for that belief; can you explain how it might be possible to have an intimate relationship with God? I will go further and state I cannot even figure out what that word salad means. Great. So how do you actually test to see if what you believe really is fact? The Gospel of John and the various Creeds are entirely different critters and as such must be treated differently; just as the Gospel of John is an entirely different critter than the Synoptic Gospels and so must be treated differently. And that really is the difference in our opinions. I have no desire for the truth to be what I want, rather I want to know what the truth is regardless of my personal desires. And there you go just making shit up again in the hope it meets your needs.

The OTHER other side wants a Father to rescue us from our problems but doesn't want to sit by the side of the road indefinitely waiting for Him to come and fix our flat tire.

How can a son know his father intimately when that father is a deadbeat dad that abandoned him before birth?Or is that not the way you see dads that disappear out of their son's lives?Regards
DL

If there is a Father with his famous plan, then he creates the problem.Which side are you on? Because that view has yet to be refuted.Are you up to trying to do so? Your first point is unqualified and un-knowable and I see it as a lie.If true, then sure I would be angry with your creator god as being a created entity, all I could ever do is follow the nature he put into me.To punish anyone for being exactly as he created would make your god and immoral prick.Regards
DL

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[Greatest I am]
Gnostic Christians always saw those invented gods, specifically Yahweh, Jesus and Allah, as immoral and not worthy of us and that is why they named those gods as immoral and vile demiurges

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[LamarkNewAge]
Gnostic Christianity had a negative view of Jesus?

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Try that one again.

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[Greatest I am]
This does take a bit of explaining as my view is the modern one that was developed after Christianity merged Yahweh and Jesus into one.

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FTPOV, the morality of Jesus and Yahweh are tied as well as all the foul actions attributed to Yahweh/Jesus.

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There is more than one Jesus in scriptures. You have the Rome created one who is a kind and gentle pacifist who kowtows to Rome.
That Jesus is quite immoral if you look at his no-divorce and substitutionary atonement policies, as well as others.

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There is the older esoteric Jesus that Gnostic Christianity has some respect for but to us he is just an esoteric teacher and archetypal good man.

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Then

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[LamarkNewAge]
Do you know something we don't?

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[Greatest I am]

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I don't know what you know but the above may show a modern twist to Gnostic Christianity that you did not know. We have to evolve or will end in stagnation and idol worship the way Christianity and Islam have.

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As to my Gnostic Christian origins, I see us as first being a group of Jews, pagans and gentiles who called themselves Chrestians.

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Christianity then usurped that name in their efforts to wipe us off the earth. We may never know though as the sands of time and Christianity's burning of our scriptures when they decimated us may have hidden the tracks.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=r...

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Regards
DL

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How do you deal with Islamic Gnostics like the Alawites of Syria then?GoogleGoogleThey hold that Jesus is divine (i.e. God).I don't see any evidence to back up your claims. That is true of both modern day gnostics and the older (dead) ones in the historical reports and archaeology.(Also, when do you think gnosticism started? How did it get started? What was the flame that flickered it? What king of gnosis/Gnosis was the forger of the Pastoral Epistles referring to?)

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Gnostic Christians always saw those invented gods, specifically Yahweh, Jesus and Allah, as immoral and not worthy of us and that is why they named those gods as immoral and vile demiurges

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But what about this evidence?

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Light Against Darkness: Dualism in Ancient Mediterranean Religion and the Contemporary World (Journal of Ancient Judaism. Supplements (JAJ.S)) Hardcover — January 3, 2011
by Armin Lange (Editor), Eric M Meyers (Editor),
Series: Journal of Ancient Judaism. Supplements (JAJ.S) (Book 2)
Hardcover: 368 pages
Publisher: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht (January 3, 2011)
Bennie H Reynolds III (Editor), Randall Styers (Editor)

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The Gnostic supreme divinity bears all kinds of names: the Great Boundless Power, the First Power, ... The central figure of orthodox Christianity is Jesus of Nazareth, Jesus Christ. ... There is still an Islamic-Gnostic sect, the Nusairi-Alawites.

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Light Against Darkness: Dualism in Ancient Mediterranean Religion and the ... - Google Books

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That was a scholarly work that described Alawites as modern day gnostics.Here is a Reuters piece. There is also a good New York Times piece. Here is the link.
Syria's Ruling Alawite Sect - The New York TimesBut here is Reuters journalism, which I will quote.

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But several beliefs differ sharply from traditional Islam. Named after Ali, Alawites believe he was divine, one of many manifestations of God in a line with Adam, Jesus, Mohammad, Socrates, Plato and some pre-Islamic sages from ancient Persia.

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To orthodox Muslims, this eclectic synthesis of Christian, Gnostic, Neoplatonic and Zoroastrian thought violates Islam's key tenet that "there is no God but God."
Syria's Alawites are secretive, unorthodox sect | Reuters

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You would have to demonstrate that the early Christian Gnostic sects were originally of a view that Jesus was not divine. But look at the modern day gnostics and their views.

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John the Baptist and the Last Gnostics: The Secret History of the Mandaeans
By Andrew Philip Smith
The Alawites believe in reincarnation, as do the Druze and the Yazidis, but not the Mandaeans. Like Christians, Alawites believe in a kind of trinity, but theirs has three divine beings who most recntly incarnated as Ali, Muhammad and Salman the Persian. They also hold a form of communion using wine.

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John the Baptist and the Last Gnostics: The Secret History of the Mandaeans - Andrew Phillip Smith - Google Books

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The 1st century gnostic Jewish Christians (Elkesaites) held views similar to these. They said Melchizedek was reincarnated as Jesus. Did they see Jesus as divine? I think so, but perhaps not. The Ebionites/Nazarenes (Jewish Christian followers of James the brother of Jesus, who fundamentalist protestant Paul Maier jr. admits that Jesus appointed to be the head of the apostles before his death. A & E had a documentary on Christianity and said both scripture and tradition agree that James was made the head of the church and Peter was only the leader of the apostles during Jesus' lifetime, but James was the appointed head by Jesus and was after his death.) did seem to have a Gospel of Matthew that lacked the first 2 chapters, so perhaps they rejected the divinity? (Side note, I have had some real interesting conversations with multiple Yazidis (refugees from Syria and Iraq) here in Lincoln on many of these issues, but they are an OLD religion, not to be confused with Gnostics of any type)Do you have any evidence for your claims?

Here is link to documentary showing James is leader of church. A&E describes it as a fact and Paul Maier is interesting as he points out that the leader of the early church was not Simon Peter as you "might expect".https://www.amazon.com/...First-1000-Years-New/dp/B00069IAMUIt can be viewed on YouTube actually.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LKOoPcHxPhUThe first 20 minutes or so will get around to talking about James. It drops off rather abruptly, however, and the documentary would better be called a history of European Christianity. No coverage of the Nazarenes/Ebionites, Persian Christians, Semitic Christians. etc. (except persecution of Syrians and Palestiniants around the time of the Council of Chalcedon in around 451 A.D.)But the James issue could be important as to early views that came to be called gnostic.There were pure European authored letters that made their way into today's Bibles (1 Timothy, 2 Timothy, Titus, Hebrews, Gospel of John) and claimed to be authored by famous Jewish Christians. Scholars claim they can't identify the opponents of "Paul" that are criticized in the Pastoral Epistles (1 Timothy,2 Timothy, Titus). I might post my theories if you are interested.Roman Catholics made up the Peter/Pope/Bishop issue to counter (and smother) the Nazarenes/Ebionites and James the Just issue.Protestants (like Maier) only mention the James issue as a convenient way to attack Catholics IMO. Then they drop the implications quickly. No mention of the Ebionites/Nararense/Elkesaites.The Elkesaites are the earliest recorded gnostic group btw.Also, here is some stuff from Maier when I put his name and Jame Just into googles engine.GoogleEdited by LamarkNewAge, : No reason given.