Odemus

I am a fundamentalist.I have never known a fundamentalist to address anyone in this manner.


Memory does not serve you.

As if that was in any way obvious from the context?In fact it was so obvious a mod almost edited you correct?

SirenSpeak is already on to your 'literary cheat':

It's frivolous hostility, no matter what your intentions were.That was my point and it still stands.


I have no problem addressing your arguments.The point is that there is an obvious level of personal animosity in your approach which bears evidence to the fact that your life is more than likely fairly miserable.If you can't live a life which respects all people as equals don't expect to 'deprogram' anyone anytime soon.

I couldn't care less how anyone addresses me, I don't take it personally.

[ July 16, 2002: Message edited by: Odemus ]</p>

Koyaanisqatsi

THEN DO IT!

Spoken like a true "christian."



I've just posted my deconstruction of the Beatitudes. You're free to counter any observation I've made, if you're capable.

WJ

Jobar!

If you read the recent 'digression', you would see I made a very good point albeit concise, about (religious) feeling and sentient existence as a cause for much debate.

(as other's choose to ignore the impact and essential nature of such.)

Hope that helps with your concern.

Walrus

Asha'man

Have you folks noticed that Koy is from New York? By NYC standards, he is being polite.


I’m glad your experience has been so pleasant with other fundamentalists, Odemus. My experience, and apparently the experience of many others on this forum, is quite the opposite.

(WARNING: generalization to follow, don’t anybody take this personally!)

In my experience, the most bigoted and unforgiving people I know are fundamentalists. The stronger their faith, the worse they treat people who don’t believe exactly as they do. While calling a person a maggot is not something I have heard literally, I have experienced and heard about equally worse language, delivered with far more hate and venom than Koy has ever shown here. Even worse, that hate and venom is sometimes delivered from a fundamentalist parent to a questioning child.

Why is this? Shouldn’t all the teaching of love and forgiveness have some sort of positive effect on strong believers? Somehow, the way the message is taught delivers a far different effect than the message itself. The “core” belief of love and forgiveness don’t seem to have any real meaning, but all the surrounding cult programming is amazingly strong. I don’t think it is meaningful to try to analyze just the core beliefs of Christianity, since the remainder of the message seems to have the stronger overall effect.

Ahh, I knew this thought had already been brought up. I have to agree with Koy whole-heartedly on this.

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[ July 16, 2002: Message edited by: Asha'man ]</p>

Writer@Large

Must one go to seminary to be a Xian? What exactly is your point?

So ... what? You're lying for Jesus? You wouldn't be the first.

--W@L

WJ

Point is, how do *you* verify a truth? Who is or is not telling a lie? I propose you haven't a clue.

Thoughts?

Walrus

Koyaanisqatsi

MORE:

I'll set aside the trivial matter of the fact that salt cannot lose its saltiness and address instead the immediate control posturing here taken.

He's telling his sheep that they are like a certain something--"salt of the earth;" a phrase most likely more coherent to them at that time than to us--and then immediately confuses the issue with a warning that if they lose this certain something (aka, stop being a cult member), then they're worthless and will be discarded like all worthless things to be "trampled by men," an obvious reference to oppressors, if not actual soldiers.

So long as you are members of my herd, you are "special," in other words, but the minute you stop being members of my cult--the cult of Fred/Jesus--you are worthless and fit to be trampled.

Special status--members of a special club--reinforced right off the bat by fear of no longer being a member of that club.

Again, grant for the sake of argument that this is a guy named Fred talking to you to see what I'm talking about regarding cult control mechanisms.

Wow. But I was just the meek, wasn't I? Hungry for righteousness even though I will be persecuted for filling that hunger and now I am the "light of the world" and the "salt of the earth?"

But...didn't you just say...?

No, you're absolutely right, it can't be. He speaks "the Truth," doesn't he? And he called me--lowly, persecuted, oppressed, downtrodden, unjustly victimized, meek little old me (no more than a peasant, really; a face in a crowd of many, darkened by sorrow and heavy with the grief of my day) "the light of the world" and the "salt" of the earth, which I know all too well is the most precious commodity on earth at this time.

No one has ever spoken to me like this before! And, he's certainly smart, right? A city on a hill cannot be hidden, right?

No, they do not. Boy is this guy smart! He's not saying anything a thousand different people haven't said in one form or another for years, but then those poeple never called me the "salt of the earth" or the "light of the world" just after telling me its perfectly ok to be meek and frustrated and unjustly persecuted and exactly what I am, because not only will I win the big prize, but I'm blessed and the light of the world!

This Fred guy is great!

Yes! They may see my good deeds and...what was that other one? Praise my "Father" in heaven? but, my Father's alive and istting over there...ohhhhh! He means God! Right! I will be meek and remain exactly as I am because that is what will get me the big prize at the same time that I will shine to all men (though how I'll reconcile that I'm not quite sure), but the point is I will do this....why again?

Oh, right! So that all men will praise me...no, not me, right...There will be no praising of me for what I accomplished, no...That wouldn't be "meek" of me.

So I will do everything (but remember to remain exactly as I am and in my place in the social order) so that all men will join my cult! Yes!

I will be the brightest, meekest, most persecuted salty salt of the earth who do my good deeds, not for the betterment or advancement of myself out of my place in society, oh no! But so that everyone will praise Fred! YES!

ALL PRAISE FRED! So long as I remain part of the cult, that is, and not loose my saltiness to be trampled like the worthless, persecuted, meek, poor of spirit, "light" that I am, of course.

No. No control mechanisms in place there! I'm the salt who will stay in my place and do everything I do in praise of the Cult!

Ahh, one of my favorites. He hasn't come to abolish the Law but to fulfill it.

He's the Messiah--Emmanual--of the Old Testament, here to deliver the Jews; God's chosen people!

You know? The ones Paul told the Thessolonians were christkillers, hostile to all men, who reap their sins one upon the other and have incurred the wrath of God?

That kind of fulfillment...

Oh, well, so long as you attest to your own truth, who could ever question it?



Wow! That's better hyperbole than I ever came up with .

So....? Is he telling "the truth?"

"These commandments" eh? Like, "Honor your father and your mother, as the Lord your God has commanded you, so that you may live long and that it may go well with you in the land the Lord your God is giving you?"

Referencing Micah, no less, just to illustrate he's come to fulfill to Law, is that it?

Or how about:

You tell me how that is honoring his mother?

I guess that means the heaven and earth have disappeared, since this is clearly an example of more that the smallest letter, and the least stroke of a pen, disappearing from the Law, yes?

But, contradictions and hypocritical actions of Fred/Jesus aside, let's see how Fred/Jesus' declarations of fulfilling the Law play out in a cult mentality manner, yes?

He tells us this? Fred tells us this? How the hell would Fred know? And what about:

and



This is all a part of the same sermon, mind you.

Well, actually, if Fred had been God he would have known what he said "long ago," right?



And that's it, but why bother with such trivial matters when Fred is speaking, yes?

Oh, wait. What did he say before about not one line, not one pen stroke...?

Does that also apply to anyone who comes to deliberately set brother against brother?

I wonder....?

Anyone? Beuller? Beuller...?

Wow! Calling someone a fool is not just a capital offense now (good thing he's not here to change a single line of the Law, right), but it's also a capital offense for your soul in hell!

It's a damn good thing there isn't any manipulation through fear going on here and that Jesus has come only to fulfill the Law and not in any way change or augment it, right?

Though, I've checked Exodus repeatedly and I can't find the commandment: Thou shalt not call anyone a "fool" or face eternal damnation in the pits of hell. "Raca" is ok, but just barely, but "fool?" F*ckin' hell not!

What? What "gift" at the altar? You mean sacrifice? Fred is preaching and condoning the senseless murder of an innocent creature upon the altar of God, the all loving...?

What the hey nonny, nonny?

What happened to Exodus 20:13: "You shall not murder?"

This certainly seems like a whole bunch of things are being added to the Law, don't you think?

Who the hell is Fred to telling us he isn't going to change a single word while he changes all of the words and gets some of them wrong?

WHAT?

Jesus--to hell with Fred for a minute--is actually telling his followers to not seek due process of the law???



Yeah, you're right, luvluv; absolutely no cult control mechanisms in place that would prove any of my claims about submitting to authority and remaining a slave all of your life.

Not a single pen stroke...

What any of that had to do with murder, as the NIV headed it, is beyond me, but what it had to do with control and directly ordering followers to commit due process suicide is obvious to all.

Perhaps I should have chosen a more Roman name than "Fred," yes?

Just a look? A look means that you've broken one of the Ten Commandments?

Holy f*cking hellfire! Literally!

Would this be an example of the smallest letter, or the least stroke of a pen by any means disappearing from the Law or is he just using what is already reverred and followed out of inculcation to his advantage?

What do you think?

Would these be the eleventh and twelfth commandments, or just more excellent examples of a cult leader resorting to fear and terror in order to inculcate his followers in to his cult?

Well, again, let's go quickly to the actual words that God is quoting from himself, shall we?

Let's see how Fred/Jesus rewrites that one:

Hunh...

Is the earth still here, because...?

Couldn't find that one, but let's see how this represents another example of control, shall we?

Yeah, you're right again luvluv. No attempts at controlling or manipulating people in any way can be found here.

Just do exactly as you are told to do and not as you were told before to do, but as you are told now to do!

No cult indoctrination going on here!



I'd go back, but what's the point? The earth has been destroyed several times over at this point.

I beg your pardon? What was that you said, Fred/Jesus?





No commentary necessary on this one, considering of course, that I've already given it so many times before and you never addressed it then.

Suffice it to say that this is nothing but manipulation and control designed to favor the oppressors!

Where the hell is that goddamned sword he said he was bringing and not peace?

But the next one is probably my favorite of all. Just after he's told his followers to be meek and never seek to be anything more than what they are; just after he's told them all that he's just here to fulfill the Law, not change it as he changes it; just after telling them that if someone forces you to run a mile you should run two (does that mean rape victims should gvie seconds?), and that you should turn the other cheek when struck--hammering the slave mentality so far into the dirt that the even the worthless salt trampled by men is above it--he springs this crap on them, straight from the Roman Big Book of Occupation and Destabilization:

Ummm, again, not quite:

But at this point, who cares, right?

Of course! Love the very people who murder you and your family and pray for them! WHY?

Because you will be blessed by their persecution, remember?

Un f*cking believable!

None at all, of course! That's why you should all hate your father's and your mothers and your brothers and your sisters and your own life also and love the very people I have come to set you free from!

The exact, one hundred and eighty degree opposite of what it means to fulfill the Law; to be the Messiah!

Hate all those closest to you in order to be my disciple; remain in your place and suffer as you are and you will win the big, big prizes; and above all, love your oppressors who are the ones causing you to be who and what you are, because they are actually doing you a favor!

It's so in your face wrong it's no wonder Hitler (and America) learned from it!

An impossibility, contradicting every single thing he said at the beginning of the tripe, but no matter. Be meek and shine bright--but not so bright that you lose your shine and get stepped on--and remain exactly as you are, suffering in your place, even when your own oppressors come to beat you because that beating is actually the best thing that could ever happen to you!

Yeah...no pro-Roman/Authority control mechanisms in place here.



I'll get to the rest in a minute. Work interrupts.

It will be in another post.

[ July 16, 2002: Message edited by: Koyaanisqatsi ]</p>

Koyaanisqatsi

Amen to that, brother!

Some of the folks around here wouldn't last ten seconds on any street corner!

Jobar

And on that note- let's put this on II's street corner, shall we?