Amos

Witches were always given a chance to rethink their position. For them, or for many, salvation was as real as it is for protestants today and without any real protestant heritage most could be convinced to see the error of their ways. Some, out of many, actually "did see the light" and probably could not be persuaded that they had been given a scorpion instead of a fish ("no one shall see the face of God and live" as juxtaposed with "when we meet face to face all will be made clear").

The Mennonites have a large history volume on this subject.

Perchance

Amos,

I'm sorry, I just really don't understand you.

I think I don't have a belief in magic because I was raised without magical thinking. Maybe I'm wrong and haven't seen or learned enough. On the other hand, I haven't seen this evidence yet, and the things people have showed me have not been convincing, and there are a lot of good explanations (often rooted in human psychology) for believing in magic even if it doesn't exist, so I remain athaumist.

I almost thought for a moment you were accusing me of being a witch... I assure you, I don't eat frogs. Or newts. Those things are just nasty .

-Perchance.

Anti-Creedance Front

Well, I have to say that at some point, witches must have existed, or else the Inquisition wouldn't have had this clearly defined image of one. I think that the amount of actual witches and the amount of Christians "mistakenly burned" were probably about the same. One couldn't say that the victims were all witches or all non-witches.

Perchance

Hi ACF,

I don't think that something has to exist to gather legendary details. We have lots of details about unicorns and dragons, after all, and most people don't think they exist. There may have been a core- perhaps a secret heretic cult, or something- that the legend of the witch formed around, but I don't think there were really groups of women having orgies with the devil, eating children, and flying.

There is evidence (as noted by others above) that a lot of the accusations of "witch" were made on people who had property (especially landed widows) that others coveted, or that other people distrusted and hated, such as outcasts from the village. Fear played its part, but I think greed and hatred were there right along with the other unsavory emotions.

-Perchance.

jess

they can stuff it. Fucking imbeciles. See rant.

[rant] OT, but... pet peeve. 6 million Jews were killed OUT OF A TOTAL OF 13 Million people killed.

It pisses me off that people only seem to remember the 6 million Jews. We need to remember all of them.

<a href="http://www.holocaustchronicle.org/HolocaustAppendices.html" target="_blank">totals</a>
[/rant]

Amos

Why should we remember any of it if history only repeats itself if we study it?

Perchance

Jess,

Thank you for reminding me of that. Too often, I've been around people who have no idea that other minorities than Jews died, and I'm afraid I've gotten in the habit of referring to it myself.

Amos, that ranks up there as one of the strangest questions I've ever heard.

-Perchance.

Amos

Maybe so, but the only thing we can learn from history is that it repeats itself while we study it. Is this maybe true because we study it? Surely, if we were infallibly in charge of our own destiny that would not happen.

Perchance

All right, Amos, I'll bite.

How do we repeat history merely by studying it? I would be inclined to say that we create history. After all, if we didn't study the past, there wouldn't be what we think of as "history." There would just be a bunch of damn things happening one after another.

As for the idea that history is inevitably going to repeat itself because of destiny or magic or something else, I'm inclined to think that much more of the "problem" comes from people looking back, seeking out similar recorded incidents, and saying, "Look! Look! Incident X three hundred years ago is just like Incident Y! IT MUST BE A SIGN!" Then they exaggerate the similarities, and the way it's written down convinces everyone that history repeats in exactly the same way.

If anything controls the repetition of history, it's the human brain and the human determination to see things in cycles, as well as the human desire for similar things- wealth and power among them- that tends to start wars for the same motives.

And I'm still not sure what you're saying about the witches. Do witches cause wars, too, along with all the other various things you were talking about? How do they get any sleep?

-Perchance.

[ November 02, 2002: Message edited by: Perchance ]</p>

Amos

The above is the wrong attitude. I am not here to slam-dunk but to discuss and point at things the way I see it.

History repeats itself because Christians are mesmerized by the OT writings who therefore can be prophetic in nature = the Conservative perspective.

To break free from this Catholicism defined the "infallible" Liberal point of view (this will get me in trouble).

You wrote:
[b]And I'm still not sure what you're saying about the witches. Do witches cause wars, too, along with all the other various things you were talking about? How do they get any sleep?[/qb]

Rev.14:11 states that "there shall be no relief by day or by night." Who are those? Verse 12, they are those who follow the laws of God AND their faith in Jesus. In other words, they are Christians who are torn between their promise of salvation and obedience to the law.

Now you can see what "infallible" means because to be in charge of your own destiny is to be set free from the law and religion after we have obtained the mind of Christ. Hence, any religion that does not preach "infallibility" as its end does not have an end but has a new form of slavery as its end and therefore must look back on history for direction and guidance. Hence the repeat of history. Evidenc of this is that bible Christians are identical to the children of Israel.

[ November 02, 2002: Message edited by: Amos ]</p>