One of the signs of the end times in the Bible is people having too much knowledge. I don't think that makes any sence. What, is their God afraid of us knowing to much?
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The only knowledge that theist are afraid of is the truth, which is the fact that there is no god!
g-od has form for going out of his way to punish those acquiring knowledge.. He planted the Tree of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden and sent a talking serpant down to make sure his creation ate from it. Knowledge is bad in the eyes of the psychotic lord. The Christian deity prefers his creatures to grovel, not challenge or engage. So the Church seeks to infantalise it's "flock" by peddling ignorance and discouraging or even punishing independent thought. The Xtrian God is quite creepy in this respect.
When the Holy Roman Empire began to crumble and the Latin language fell into disuse, the catholic church kept the mass and the bible isolated to Latin. It did not want the common man to read the bible. And, so it was for a few centuries on. People flocked to mass but had no idea what was being said or read. Crazy. It was the church's way of keeping people from knowing the conflicts within the bible that could, and would, begin the dissent of doubt and eventual dilution of the catholic faith. Then, along came a fellow of great courage who translated the bible. The church pursued him across Europe in a vain attempt to prevent him from completing his quest. He did produce an interpretation of the Latin bible but the church finally caught up with him and killed him. His bible was instrumental in Protestant reform. His name was William Tyndale.
The point is the church jailed him, convicted him of heresy for translating the bible to English, tied him to a stake on a pyre, strangled him to death and then set him afire. This is the church doing this to a man who simply wanted to bring the bible to the people so they could read it for themselves. Heresy? In a sense, yes. It was the church's brand of heresy and the church channeled god to the people. If the church said a man was a heretic, the people considered it god's decree. But, the man did accomplish his goal and we owe much to William Tyndale for his courage in bringing to us the spark of doubt at a time when such an act could, and in this case did, bring upon a person the ultimate sacrifice. His selfless act also put the catholic church on display for the evil history would ascribe to it.
Anyway, yes, you can know too much and it's all there in the bible William Tyndale sacrificed himself to bring to you.
But the Bible is not knowledge. Rather, it is quite the opposite.
It can be considered knowledge, but it is mainly propaganda during the roman period after the first Jewish war and later.
This fits well to describe what knowledge it is referring to.
John 8:32
"And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free."
Once you understand that it is all allegory, you shall be free of the deception.
It is constantly insulting the believer for being a believer.
Hilarious if you think about it.
This is indeed good literature, where the authors are hired to make a prophet's life to the Romans liking, while given a free hand to make it as funny as they can without letting the common people of the time realize it.
May I ask how people fell for it if Romans just wrote it in form of people (John, for example)? If they said something like "God told me this or told me to do that" then that's more believable than if they wrote it in person form.
The answer to your question is generational institutional conditioning. In Roman times people were superstitious. Religions and cults spring up were the norm and accepted. The Romans didn't care as long as those cults accepted Roman gods and Roman rule as authority. i.e. making sacrifices to Roman gods.
"May I ask how people fell for it"
Good question.
Well, would you believe it if I tell you that I am god or I was sent by god and you should do what i say?
It is much more likely that you believe it if I said:
"Look!! the all wise "John" reported the events about the prophet that his prophecies everyone knows came to pass. This is how you should live according to the true prophet..."
This is how we do propaganda in our politics to this day.
The politician does not tell you he is the best, he attacks his opponent so that indirectly you are accepting he is better.
That is exactly what the gospels do, they attack the Pharisee (the most intellectual Jewish people)(they are the guys who crucify their own prophet) so indirectly you are bound to think that what the prophet was saying is the right path since his opponents were always wrong.
It is easy to say:
Give everything to the poor when Jesus owns nothing and thus can give nothing.
But no one even thinks about that fact, they are all focused on the tax collectors or the Jews which were rich and worked hard for that, they have to give everything they have according to Jesus.
This tactic works nearly always and that is why politicians use it to this day.
This method is used and overused in politics to the point that people don't know they are using it.
The Romans had a huge problem of the Jews convincing the slaves and the peasants to revolt against the Romans using their religion. This method was very effective since nearly every roman city had around 60% slaves or more.
The usual methods of torture did not work to kill this theology against roman rule, so they focused on putting forward an alternative to it, a religion more to the roman liking where the slaves and peasants would have a reason to accept their current state and not rebel against them.
The promise of eternal life and the idea that the more you suffer on this world the more you would be rewarded in heaven were some of the few options the Romans had for this task.
Try to put yourself in their place and try to find a solution to their problem, you will come to realize that they had very few options to save an empire based on slaves from this ideology.
The funny part is that it worked only until the change of dynasty, when Christianity fell from power, without the financial support of the emperors, the rebellions started again, two more roman Jewish wars had to be fought before Christianity was again in control since the Jewish rebels were mostly dead.
Whoever thinks that a religion can actually spread without money is a certified idiot.
"I don't think that makes any sense."
The bible is riddled in allegory and dark sens of humor jokes to make fun of the believers or the defeated messianic Jews.
One could say it is satire taken to the extreme and effectively hidden for people who read only the literal meaning and ignore the sub-text meaning.
To give you a fine example;
-Literal meaning for the slaves and peasants preached in Greek:
Jesus turns water into wine at a wedding displaying miraculous powers similar to other popular ancient roman gods, but Jesus was better since he did it at the age of 12. The Jews were impressed how better was the wine Jesus produced.
-Sub-text meaning for the Romans reading it in Greek:
A boy asks to be left alone with the Jewish ceremonial jars filled with water, and after he is done, they are turned to wine.
Why Ceremonial jars and not the now empty wine jars?
Why the phrase "turn water into wine" instead of explaining what Jesus did in detail?
The gospels were written after the Romans defeated the Jews in a religious messianic war that destroyed the Jewish temple.
So the Romans were shooting insults and Jokes at the defeated Jews on a daily basis.
For the Romans "turn water into wine" meant pissing.
Meaning:
A boy pissing in the Jewish ceremonial jars and the Jews drank it and liked the piss more.
Yea, a nice joke that would have made most Romans laugh when reading it.
A joke you would not understand unless you had the proper context.
Slaves and peasants could never get it because the key hints are not well explained to them.
The fact that ceremonial jars are used in the story, is usually omitted during mass to this day.
Thank you mykcbob, that does make sense, and thank you Jeff so much for these long answers.
So although you guys have answered my question, I still have the question because of the "creating religions back in the day was accepted and the norm." So then, that should lead anybody to think "how the heck could somebody fall for a religion back then?" Thank you :D
"thank you Jeff so much for these long answers."
you are welcome.
"creating religions back in the day was accepted and the norm."
Well the answer is quite simple as I already hinted at.
The leaders supported them with money and power.
If you dig in any ancient religion, you will find that at some point in time, it was supported by a leader financially or politically else it never kick starts.
Religion was always a unifying power, a way to control the masses to do your bidding without taking responsibility.
The only difference was that before it was centralized, say 1 town promoted 1 particular god the most with financial support to have preachers and build temples in their name.
When Judaism literary kick started monotheism, which is the idea of having the entire country(people) following 1 god instead of many.(originally they had multiple gods too)
The first Commandment is because of this reason.
You can have only one god, Yahweh, which automatically implies they were worshiping other gods too, thus now he wants all the worship to go to him only.
The roman empire was big, with many cultures, so the Romans did not truly care which god you worship as long as you acknowledge that one of the gods was the emperor himself.(brilliant idea of Julius Caesar)
Christianity was their version of monotheism proposed to the entire roman empire, but not enforced.
It only gets enforced much later in history during the time of Constantine and after.
All good points, as usual, Jeff.
What a great little history lesson. I found that first commandment thing pretty freakin interesting!
Now ONE last question. If "religion was used to control the poor" and "for kings to have power over those under them", then how would this make sense if the people were the ones to make these things up? Was it like they were trapping themselves without knowing or something?
"then how would this make sense if the people were the ones to make these things up?"
What do you mean by "people"?
You mean the elite?
"Was it like they were trapping themselves without knowing or something?"
"they" who?
One of the main reasons was to control the people(not just the poor), but there are other reasons.
Example:
-The roman gods copied from the Greek gods serve to integrate and assimilate the Greeks with the Romans.
-Some religions actually serve to indicate the next ruler of countries/people chosen by the makers or administrators of the religion.
Christianity focuses specifically on the poor but other religions usually give equal focus on everyone.
**You may want to read my edit at the bottom first, then the "body" of this post if what I've said in my edit was wrong"**
Ok, let me try and put this in a different way, and tell me if we are on the same page. I'm going to try to put myself in the position citizens were in. Tell me if/where I am wrong.
"I live in a city surrounded by all these different religions popping up right before my eyes. The governments are supporting multiple of these, and there are many religions to choose from"
Now IF that is the case, that that was what a, say, Roman or Greek has lived in, then I sadly still fail to see how people could fall for it. I know people are stupid, but not THAT stupid. I have to be missing something simple here...
**EDIT** So after rereading what you have said, what happened was over time, religions started slowly shifting into more, totalitarian monotheistic religions? Which would make sense as it would be easier to keep everybody under one rule and, having more control. If thats the case, then that makes sense :D
i see what you mean.
"was over time, religions started slowly shifting into more, totalitarian monotheistic religions?"
"Which would make sense as it would be easier to keep everybody under one rule and, having more control. If thats the case, then that makes sense :D"
Yep you answered your question.
Adding something to it.
In those times the people believed in multiple gods for multiple purposes.
A pantheon of gods.
God of war , the god of love, etc....
It was not a monotheistic god where it created division among the people of different beliefs, but it gave less control for the elite.
Having 1 god was better for a fascist empire since now through religion the empire (leaders) could control their subjects just by saying that this god wants this and everybody follows.
Before they could not do this, because if they said the god of war wants this, the people would say the god of something else says otherwise.
Before religion were MORE to see if the gods where on your side in your decisions rather then deciding for you.
God of Abraham changed that.
Another piece of the puzzle is that every emperor after Julius Caesar had his own religion, called the CAESAR's CULT.
It was the most influential religion in the roman empire, it had preachers in every town, annual games and feasts.(it had money)
A religion dedicated to promote the emperor as a god and citizens that wanted to succeed in society would join it.
When the Flavians came along(change of dynasty), they just changed the name of the Caesars cult (a pagan cult) to Christianity,
That is why a lot of pagan rituals are still celebrated to this day in Christianity like Christmas, Easter, etc.
Those are well known pagan feasts celebrated by the Caesar's cult.
The pope title itself Pontifix Maximus is the title of the chief pagan priest of the Caesar's cult.
The same title that emperor Vespasian Flavius held.
What biblical reference are you using?
check the story yourself.
the bible is quite easy to access on the net.
Find the passage and check what i said.
if you know literature, and how metaphor and allegory works, you should be able to decode it too.
You just have to forget the idea of a biography(bullshit) and read it as if you are reading a poem.
BTW there is no biography without the author, it never existed and never will it exist.
It is just a lie the church put forward to gain some credibility in history.
Im failing to understand how you are interpreting the reference from John as pointing to contemporary times and a negative view of knowledge.
Well propaganda is "a negative view of knowledge."
It distorts knowledge in favor of the reasons of the persons spreading it.
A totalitarian belief system is the propaganda inserted in theistic (monotheistic) religions.
The Romans being a totalitarian system benefited from this and copied the Jewish monotheistic religion to promote their own (emperor) as the true god.
Jesus prophecies predict Titus Flavius(emperor) as the son of man or Jesus's second coming.
The church destroyed most references to this through history but some remain.
Human knowledge is given a bad image by theists because they are totalitarians. No thing is acceptable unless the data matches Genesis or the Koran or (fill in the blank). No matter how ignorant. The terms secular humanism , man-made science , man's laws , etc. are tossed around as if they are something to be ashamed of instead of proud. The theist argument against human progress is deep and wide. I expect the fight to rage on until the gaps close in on them and they go the way of T-Rex and the Giant Sloth.
Yep so true.
Most tend to forget that Christianity and theism is promoting a totalitarian belief system which is just evil.
It is the main reason why I became an anti-theist in the first place.
(In the near future)THE MARCH OF WAR! THE TOTALITARIAN RELIGIOUS REGIMES HAVE TAKEN OVER LARGE AREAS OF THE EARTH! IN RESPONCE TO THIS GRAVE THREAT TO FREE THINKING AND SECULARISTIC GOALS, L.O.G.I.C(LEGION OF GENRAL INTELLECTUAL COMMAND) HAS INITIATED OPERATION THINC(THOUSAND HIGHLY INDEPENDENT NAMELESS COMANDERS) THIS OPERATION CALLS FOR THE VOULUNTEER ACTION OF SEVERAL THOUSAND FREE THINKING INTELLECTUALS TO TAKE ACTIONS TO REDUCE RELIGIOUS PRESENSE. AS THIS PLAN GOES INTO ITS INITALIZING PHASES, ALL OUT KNOWLEDGE WAR LOOMS ON THE HORIZON........
HURRY!! HIT THEIR SUPPLY LINES...............
NOOOO!!! I did not mean close their churches......
I meant make brainwashing children illegal. :)
Darn, U.S decided to bomb the churches with Rockwell B-1's.
Any governmental system would seek to connect their leader to a prophesy by religious group. While singularly if the verse is taken out of context a case could be made for such in the whole of John or the greater story of the New Testament of bible a case for an allegorical reference to Titus Flavius does not equate. To address human knowledge specifically, from all biblical references knowledge is not posed negatively other then the tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil in Genesis 1 due to its implications in terms of moral codes (sin). Human progress and intelligence can more often be equated to references of scripture referring to humans being made in the image of God or other such positive affirmations.
Their is no context but that which it is written in. Going beyind that causes you to begine falling into religious apologetics, which garners no respect here. Unless your saying the Bible is either a joke or extreme sarcasum.
Are you even addressing the issues at hand?
I am not claiming that "Any governmental system would seek to connect their leader to a prophesy by religious group."
I am saying that that particular fascist empire and that particular dynasty is being prophetized by Jesus to destroy the Jewish temple in a generation(around 40 years).
Unless the temple was reconstructed again after someone time travels back in around 40 years after 30 ad, the only possible person to fulfill that prophecy could only be Titus Flavius.
This is not a case of trying to fulfill a prophecy for propaganda purposes.
This is a case of someone deliberately creating a prophet and his prophecies knowing already the outcome of the events since they already occurred, for propaganda purposes.
Someone who deliberately killed all the historians of this time period except his own, someone who has complete control over the literature of this period and the roman roads(the mass media).
The current emperor Titus Flavius is the most likely candidate, with the support of his Jewish elite friends that supported him and his father financially to become emperors in the first place.
.
Absolutely CORRECT....NAILED IT!
Hey, you stole my line.
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