Can you tell me what you mean by "organically and intrinsically related", please?
lol. if you can understand this answer you will understand this debate, as well as what precisely is wrong with proselytysation, and why girrafs should remain girrafs.
here goes -
i am not a hindu cos of what i believe in, do or practice. i am a hindu, as is a hopi indian a hopi indian, cos of what he is born as.
meanwhile an irish person (for example), though is a celtic, is a christian/muslim/buddhist etc cos of what he/she beliefs in or does.
my religion is what i am. his religion is what he believes in or chooses to believe in (which in no waytakes away the fact that he is a celtic still).
on the other hand, a celtic person, who isnt christian or buddhist or muslim or any other religion, but is a celtic by religion (ie. follows the irish belief system and culture and velues and tradions, and believes in Teleisin, and other irish gods), IS his religion, by virtue of being what he is, not by virtue of believing in any alien belief system, (like say christianity) whcih in no way sprang from the irish way of life.
such an irish person thus becomes intrinsically and organically connected to his religion, cos his religion now is what he is and not what he believes in.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
First of all, religion never caused anything. People cause things. If there weren't religion, they would have found something else to fight over.
I agree with know1... He has, you and I have caused more death than anything in history... Natural disasters don't take as many lives as humans do. Whatever ideology we choose to hide behind, we make decisions that cost the lives of others, and these decisions are made for the same reason, pride.
I think CS Lewis put it pretty well:
Pride, us wanting to be the center, us wanting to be like gods, us wanting to set up on our own as if we had created ourselves--be our own masters--invent some sort of happiness for ourselves outside of God, apart from God. "Out of this hopeless attempt has come nearly all that we call human history--money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery-- the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy."
What I am talking about is that you are the one who now does not accept the chosen Native beliefs.
whereas it would be wrong to state that the hopi indian isn't free to start believing in any religion he pleases, its fair and correct to say that if he takes to any other belief system other than the one that sprang from the hopi indian way of life (ie. te one to which he is organically connected), then he is a girraf trying to be an elephant.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
Weren't you meaning that as one-time giraffes, they have now become elephants?
i hope you realise the hopi indians dont become germanic even though they may take to the germanic dawn godess called Eoster and start celebrating the feast of the invincible sun, in the garb/guise of "christmas", on the day when the roman god Mitras was supposed to have been born.
ie.try as a girraf might, he dont become an elephant. he is free to try though, or in the case of proselytised conversion, free to fall for the carrots the missionaries dangle.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
lol. if you can understand this answer you will understand this debate, as well as what precisely is wrong with proselytysation, and why girrafs should remain girrafs.
here goes -
i am not a hindu cos of what i believe in, do or practice. i am a hindu, as is a hopi indian a hopi indian, cos of what he is born as.
meanwhile an irish person (for example), though is a celtic, is a christian/muslim/buddhist etc cos of what he/she beliefs in or does.
my religion is what i am. his religion is what he believes in or chooses to believe in (which in no waytakes away the fact that he is a celtic still).
on the other hand, a celtic person, who isnt christian or buddhist or muslim or any other religion, but is a celtic by religion (ie. follows the irish belief system and culture and velues and tradions, and believes in Teleisin, and other irish gods), IS his religion, by virtue of being what he is, not by virtue of believing in any alien belief system, (like say christianity) whcih in no way sprang from the irish way of life.
such an irish person thus becomes intrinsically and organically connected to his religion, cos his religion now is what he is and not what he believes in.
The organic facts are we are born with our genetic predispositions. Our environment then contructs/molds, physically, our brain, and our "organic, intrinsic" nature. This is done by ingraining beliefs, philosophies, cultural attitudes, teaching/education, etc. This happens as our brain quadruples in size from birth. Each of us are born as a member of the human family. We feel sadness, pain, happiness, and Love. We have a potential for ugliness, and a potential for greatness. We have a potential to find our spiritual ideal, our Centre--how such an ideal unfolds depends on the tools we are given as we unfold. The spiritual capacity to know our own Spirits, exists uniformly, deep within us all.
If you minimise the validity of what is "organically, intrinsically" ingrained in a Native person, in this day and age, it's the same as minimising what is ingrained in yourself. As you diminish any person, you diminish yourself.
"The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth." ~ Niels Bohr
As you diminish any person, you diminish yourself.
i am diminishing no one, i just said and continue to say that people are not organically related to any other religion apart from the one that comes from his or her ethnicity. and i stand by it.
and also that whenever someone proselytises he
1) is basically intolerant and disrespectful of the other's religion and beliefs
2) is making a consumer good/product of his own religion
3) causing socio-cultural genocide, since for every "conversion", there is left one less person holding the flame of the way of life at the receiving end (of the conversion) alive. and that makes missionaries social criminals, identically. they are simply and deliberatly depleting the heritage of the earth and trying to blanket the world with the sole belief system they consider right/correct (ie their own). and for good. thats intolerant and narrowminded from head to toe.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
i am diminishing no one, i just said and continue to say that people are not organically related to any other religion apart from the one that comes from his or her ethnicity. and i stand by it.
and also that whenever someone proselytises he
1) is basically intolerant and disrespectful of the other's religion and beliefs
2) is making a consumer good/product of his own religion
3) causing socio-cultural genocide, since for every "conversion", there is left one less person holding the flame of the way of life at the receiving end (of the conversion) alive. and that makes missionaries social criminals, identically. they are simply and deliberatly depleting the heritage of the earth and trying to blanket the world with the sole belief system they consider right/correct (ie their own). and for good. thats intolerant and narrowminded from head to toe.
What I see is that you claim to defend the Native people, and you wonder why we do not do the same. And yet, it is you who is now giving yourself permission to diminish and denegrate that Native view in the NOW, because it does not align with your view of what is right.
In the end, Nature is the Law and I respect that.
"The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth." ~ Niels Bohr
What I see is that you claim to defend the Native people,
and you wonder why we do not do the same.
And yet, it is you who is now giving yourself permission to diminish and denegrate that Native view in the NOW,
because it does not align with your view of what is right.
In the end, Nature is the Law and I respect that.
ER lets see....
i do not claim defend the native people. its for them to keep their way of life alive. i do attack the missionaraies and all proselytisers.
i do not wonder why others dont do the same. most of them have already done the same mistake (eg - most of the germanic people on this board are clready christian forgetting asatru, the irish are already christian forgetting wicca/druidism and all thats irish etc) and taken to a belief system to which they are in no way organically connected.
i am not denigrating the natives who convert. they had little choice. i am attacking the missionaries who dangle the carrots.
its not my view. its natures view dear. that girrafs should be girrafs. not horses. if nature wanted another horse, then the girraf would have been born a horse.
and yes, where as you respect that, the missionaries dont. they want to artificially bring about a change that nature never ordained.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
they want to artificially bring about a change that nature never ordained.
and getting he thread back on topic, its in an effort to bring about this artificially induced change in beliefs, values and traditions, that all crusades, inquisitions, and most genocides in the new world have taken place.
so yes religion or at least peoples desire to shove their religion further has caused the maximum damage to the world.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
i am diminishing no one, i just said and continue to say that people are not organically related to any other religion apart from the one that comes from his or her ethnicity. and i stand by it.
and also that whenever someone proselytises he
1) is basically intolerant and disrespectful of the other's religion and beliefs
2) is making a consumer good/product of his own religion
3) causing socio-cultural genocide, since for every "conversion", there is left one less person holding the flame of the way of life at the receiving end (of the conversion) alive. and that makes missionaries social criminals, identically. they are simply and deliberatly depleting the heritage of the earth and trying to blanket the world with the sole belief system they consider right/correct (ie their own). and for good. thats intolerant and narrowminded from head to toe.
You cannot FORCE an adult to believe anything. You may try to convince me that your way is the better way, the one true way, but it is up to me whether or not I accept that. If I am starving and you are offering food, I might very well pretend to accept what you say, I may make a show of observing your rituals, but whether or not I actually adopt your belief will depend on whether I find any truth in it.
What you are saying is that native Americans are like children, unable to make conscious decisions and to form their own belief system. Instead, they simply accept what was "forced" upon them. Is it not possible that some native Americans (to name just one example) have given the matter a great deal of thought and find that they PREFER Christianity or some other belief system over the native system? I have rejected the system that was taught to me as a child and see no reason why others can't do the same.
Can you tell me WHY it would be wrong for a native American to choose Christianity, or for a descendant of African slaves to choose Buddhism? Should people be slaves to their heritage, unable to decide for themselves what they do and don't believe?
"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." ~ MLK, 1963
You cannot FORCE an adult to believe anything. You may try to convince me that your way is the better way, the one true way, but it is up to me whether or not I accept that. If I am starving and you are offering food, I might very well pretend to accept what you say, I may make a show of observing your rituals, but whether or not I actually adopt your belief will depend on whether I find any truth in it.
What you are saying is that native Americans are like children, unable to make conscious decisions and to form their own belief system. Instead, they simply accept what was "forced" upon them. Is it not possible that some native Americans (to name just one example) have given the matter a great deal of thought and find that they PREFER Christianity or some other belief system over the native system? I have rejected the system that was taught to me as a child and see no reason why others can't do the same.
Can you tell me WHY it would be wrong for a native American to choose Christianity, or for a descendant of African slaves to choose Buddhism? Should people be slaves to their heritage, unable to decide for themselves what they do and don't believe?
where as you cant force, you can always induce. the inducing becomes that much easier, when you have your back against the wall.
yes its perfectly ok for them to choose any religion they want ON THEIR OWN. not with proselytysation. fact remains though, that just cos they choose a different belief system they dont become germanic or indian (assuming they convert to buddhism).
people ARE slaves to their heritage. they can choose to believe in what ever they like, or get induced to believe, but they cant run away from their ethnicity, as much as a horse cant become an elephant just because he wants to/was induced to.
finally, given that the populations of the natives (and some non natives as wel - take for example people of the ba'hai faith - about 2 million of them) are dwindling fast, it becomes a social crime to try and uproot their heritage permanently instead of trying to perserve and revive whats left of it. a loss to the world.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
i do not claim defend the native people. its for them to keep their way of life alive. i do attack the missionaraies and all proselytisers.
i do not wonder why others dont do the same. most of them have already done the same mistake (eg - most of the germanic people on this board are clready christian forgetting asatru, the irish are already christian forgetting wicca/druidism and all thats irish etc) and taken to a belief system to which they are in no way organically connected.
i am not denigrating the natives who convert. they had little choice. i am attacking the missionaries who dangle the carrots.
its not my view. its natures view dear. that girrafs should be girrafs. not horses. if nature wanted another horse, then the girraf would have been born a horse.
and yes, where as you respect that, the missionaries dont. they want to artificially bring about a change that nature never ordained.
Okay. It looks like you've got your human laws all figured out. I see that as different than the laws of nature, though.
Humans are humans and they operate amazingly and miraculously, within the laws of nature, and independant of the ways we carve them up, analyse them and think they "should" behave.
"The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth." ~ Niels Bohr
where as you cant force, you can always induce. the inducing becomes that much easier, when you have your back against the wall.
yes its perfectly ok for them to choose any religion they want ON THEIR OWN. not with proselytysation. fact remains though, that just cos they choose a different belief system they dont become germanic or indian (assuming they convert to buddhism).
people ARE slaves to their heritage. they can choose to believe in what ever they like, or get induced to believe, but they cant run away from their ethnicity, as much as a horse cant become an elephant just because he wants to/was induced to.
finally, given that the populations of the natives (and some non natives as wel - take for example people of the ba'hai faith - about 2 million of them) are dwindling fast, it becomes a social crime to try and uproot their heritage permanently instead of trying to perserve and revive whats left of it. a loss to the world.
What are people of mixed ethnicity to do? Or is it also a social crime to marry someone of a different ethnic background?
"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." ~ MLK, 1963
What are people of mixed ethnicity to do? Or is it also a social crime to marry someone of a different ethnic background?
no it isnt.
i'll give you an example. in india we have a religion called zorastrianism. you may have heard of it, thats the original religion of the people of iran, and when iran fell to islam, a few thousand of zorastrians fled and came to india and have been living here ever since. they are now about 2 million if that. queen's vocalist was a zorastrian.
it would be a drop in the ocean (for either party) if one christian married a hindu or a buddhist, but every single time a zorastrian marries someone else, his religion comes one more step closer to oblivion.
i therefore think its morally wrong for the member of a depleting ethnicity/religion to marry another (or vice versa), unless the latter sort of agrees to take to the religion/belief system in danger.
more than one native tribe throughout north and south america has been depleted because their women got married to europeans.
otherwise i dont see whats objectionable.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
If you follow religion you are strictly told not to kill anyone but if you follow your country you are asked to kill people.Yet people call religion evil...
You are kidding right?
PEACE
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Dublin 08/06
Katowice 06/07 London 06/07 Dusseldorf 06/07 Nijgemen 06/07
i'll give you an example. in india we have a religion called zorastrianism. you may have heard of it, thats the original religion of the people of iran, and when iran fell to islam, a few thousand of zorastrians fled and came to india and have been living here ever since. they are now about 2 million if that. queen's vocalist was a zorastrian.
it would be a drop in the ocean (for either party) if one christian married a hindu or a buddhist, but every single time a zorastrian marries someone else, his religion comes one more step closer to oblivion.
i therefore think its morally wrong for the member of a depleting ethnicity/religion to marry another (or vice versa), unless the latter sort of agrees to take to the religion/belief system in danger.
more than one native tribe throughout north and south america has been depleted because their women got married to europeans.
otherwise i dont see whats objectionable.
If there is truth in this religion, there will always be those who follow it by choice. If there isn't, I see no harm in it's dying out. If a belief system can't attract and keep followers on it's own merit, good riddance to it.
"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." ~ MLK, 1963
If there is truth in this religion, there will always be those who follow it by choice. If there isn't, I see no harm in it's dying out. If a belief system can't attract and keep followers on it's own merit, good riddance to it.
I agree. It's the natural evolution.
"The opposite of a fact is falsehood, but the opposite of one profound truth may very well be another profound truth." ~ Niels Bohr
If there is truth in this religion, there will always be those who follow it by choice. If there isn't, I see no harm in it's dying out. If a belief system can't attract and keep followers on it's own merit, good riddance to it.
My thoughts exactly. It seems to me that man has endured many hardships throughout history when it comes to following their particular religion, whether its Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or whatever. I believe as long as people continue to see the 'Truth' in their religion, the religion will survive.
The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance,
but the illusion of knowledge.
~Daniel Boorstin
Only a life lived for others is worth living.
~Albert Einstein
If there is truth in this religion, there will always be those who follow it
by choice.
If there isn't, I see no harm in it's dying out.
If a belief system can't attract
and keep followers on it's own merit,
good riddance to it.
haha, i am assuming you know little about zorastrianism or its unfortunate history. i have broken your posts into many lines. the paraghaphs in the rest of my answer adresses e seperate line in your post.
if there is truth - monotheism came from zorastrianism. also its the first "delivered" religion.
by choice - yes there were loads of followers, and by choice too. what if the choice is denied?? what if you are located next to the epicentre of islam - ie iran is next to arabia, with only iraq in between and what if you are overrun by blod thirsty cut-throats trying to kill all those who dont chuck zorastrianism and take to islam?? why do you think they fled to india??
if there isnt.... no hard = agreed. but you assume that there isnt any truth. btw, please by no means assume that zorastrianism hasnbt had an influence on world religions - no one religion has influenced other religions more.
if a belief system cant attract - they dont believe in "attracting" or converting. you are born a zorastrian with the blod of cyrus flowing in your veins or not. "attracting" is limited to christianity, buddhism and islam.
keep followers on their own merit - so if tommorow turks and chinese (for example) forced all christians to convert to some of their religions, would u be right in assuming that christianity cant keep followers in its own merit?? truth be told, they dont seem to be able to keep many on their own merit (in europe at least) in any case, without any turkic or chinese attacks.
good riddance - a fine way to achieve "good riddance" isnt it?? converting iran to islam by the sword. just like asatru and wicca were given the "good riddance" treatment by the many inquisitions etc.
anyway now i suddenly see why most of you have no problems condonign religions persecution, and proselytysing be it by the sword or by carrot. you just assume things have come to the shape they have "naturally" and not thanks to a tragic history.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
My thoughts exactly. It seems to me that man has endured many hardships throughout history when it comes to following their particular religion, whether its Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or whatever. I believe as long as people continue to see the 'Truth' in their religion, the religion will survive.
you knwo jews were still seeing a lot of truth in their religion back in 1940. and yet by some expert "natural evolution" carried out by the waffen ss, they came very close to the "good riddance" fate.
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
Secondly, here's a unique concept for you - EVERYONE DIES. Religion did not cause them to die. They were going to die anyway.
Hahahahaha! That's hilarious. What a spin job!!!
Going by your way of thinking, you shouldn't mind at all if some lunatic invades your home, today, and slaugthers you and your family, right? I mean, hell, you were all going to die, anyway:rolleyes:
Religion for the most part is about peace, love, life after death and a higher being.. its the underlaying brainwashing, nationalism, misunderstanding that makes it back fire.
you knwo jews were still seeing a lot of truth in their religion back in 1940. and yet by some expert "natural evolution" carried out by the waffen ss, they came very close to the "good riddance" fate.
uh, I believe you just proved my point.
The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance,
but the illusion of knowledge.
~Daniel Boorstin
Only a life lived for others is worth living.
~Albert Einstein
if a belief system cant attract - they dont believe in "attracting" or converting. you are born a zorastrian with the blod of cyrus flowing in your veins or not. "attracting" is limited to christianity, buddhism and islam.
While I'll agree that some get a bit zealous with converting others, I believe the true foundation of the 'attracting' religions you mentioned is the fact they are inclusive, ie, you don't have to be of a particular blood-line to be accepted in the faith.
The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance,
but the illusion of knowledge.
~Daniel Boorstin
Only a life lived for others is worth living.
~Albert Einstein
haha, i am assuming you know little about zorastrianism or its unfortunate history. i have broken your posts into many lines. the paraghaphs in the rest of my answer adresses e seperate line in your post.
if there is truth - monotheism came from zorastrianism. also its the first "delivered" religion.
Thanks ... thanks a lot Zorathustra. If this religion disappears, will the other monotheist religions follow? One can only hope.
by choice - yes there were loads of followers, and by choice too. what if the choice is denied?? what if you are located next to the epicentre of islam - ie iran is next to arabia, with only iraq in between and what if you are overrun by blod thirsty cut-throats trying to kill all those who dont chuck zorastrianism and take to islam?? why do you think they fled to india??
As I said, you can't force adults to believe anything. You may be able to force them to put on a show for a while, observing Islamic customs and whatnot, but if they truly BELIEVE in their religion, they will continue to believe it until such time as they are free to practice it. Christians suffered horrific persecution, and yet the religion survived.
if there isnt.... no hard = agreed. but you assume that there isnt any truth. btw, please by no means assume that zorastrianism hasnbt had an influence on world religions - no one religion has influenced other religions more.
I don't assume that there isn't any truth to it. I don't know enough about it to make any assumptions. Their influence on other religions is beside the point. Many things contribute to the formation of other things, then vanish themselves.
if a belief system cant attract - they dont believe in "attracting" or converting. you are born a zorastrian with the blod of cyrus flowing in your veins or not. "attracting" is limited to christianity, buddhism and islam.
They don't accept converts? Jews and pagans don't proselytize either, but they do accept those who seek them out and adopt their beliefs.
I will admit that I'm predisposed to dislike any religion that bases itself predominantly on bloodlines. I'm not a fan of any system that discourages people from thinking for themselves. Regardless of where we were born, we all have the ability to decide for ourselves what we believe and how we wish to live our lives.
keep followers on their own merit - so if tommorow turks and chinese (for example) forced all christians to convert to some of their religions, would u be right in assuming that christianity cant keep followers in its own merit?? truth be told, they dont seem to be able to keep many on their own merit (in europe at least) in any case, without any turkic or chinese attacks.
Again ... you could force many Christians to BEHAVE like Muslims, but there's really no way to know how many of them would actually BECOME Muslims, is there? I may be on my knees facing east, but it's between me and god what's running through my head while I'm down there.
good riddance - a fine way to achieve "good riddance" isnt it?? converting iran to islam by the sword.
Believe me, I am no fan of the Muslim faith either, at least not in it's fundamentalist form. Any religion that has to be forced on people at point of gun can't really have much going for it in the first place, or people would be flocking to sign up all on their own.
anyway now i suddenly see why most of you have no problems condonign religions persecution, and proselytysing be it by the sword or by carrot. you just assume things have come to the shape they have "naturally" and not thanks to a tragic history.
No one is condoning religious persecution. You started discussing native Americans, who have certainly been persecuted in the past, but no one is stopping those of native descent from choosing their own faith RIGHT NOW. They are free to follow to the beliefs of their ancestors, and many have done so. Others have, of their own free choice, chosen a different path. You seem to feel that only one of those choices is legitimate, whereas I think that any freely chosen path is legitimate.
"Nothing in the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity." ~ MLK, 1963
While I'll agree that some get a bit zealous with converting others, I believe the true foundation of the 'attracting' religions you mentioned is the fact they are inclusive, ie, you don't have to be of a particular blood-line to be accepted in the faith.
er,,, "bolld of cyrus" dont refer to a particular blood line, but to an ethnicity. ie the iranian ethnicity.
btw just how did i prove ur point?? waffen ss killing jews and almost exterminating them = natural evolution??
I have faced it, A life wasted...
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
Fictional writings of imaginary friends in the sky who will reward you for your loyalty, after your physical death. That's quite a prose.
Thousand's of years old fictional books and scrolls written by twisted men, become non-fiction through intimidation, fear tactics, discrimination, bullying and flat out murder.
Spreading the word of fictional characters is wonderful if the message is of love and peace.
But imaginary friends in the sky are never there to correct the situation, when the imaginary friend's words are used for invasion, stealing, torture and murder.
Old Testament....New Testament.........Not into sequels.
Will there be a another updated Testament? Will they call it..... " The Newer Than The New Testament " ? Or maybe ....."The New Testament Part III : God's Weekend With Bernie" ?
Will god do a book signing tour? Will there be a movie version? Mel Gibson? Oliver Stone? George Lucas?
If I peer into a dog's ass will I see man's fictional god staring back at me?
Or will I only see shit?
Shall we argue, fight and kill over what Spiderman and Batman said? Which one was right? Which one is worth dying for?
Oh religion, it's such a confusing concept. As are most bullshit creations by man.
Thanks ... thanks a lot Zorathustra. If this religion disappears, will the other monotheist religions follow? One can only hope.
As I said, you can't force adults to believe anything.
They don't accept converts?
I will admit that I'm predisposed to dislike any religion that bases itself predominantly on bloodlines.
Any religion that has to be forced on people at point of gun can't really have much going for it in the first place, or people would be flocking to sign up all on their own.
And yet they still have believers today, don't they?
You seem to feel that only one of those choices is legitimate, whereas I think that any freely chosen path is legitimate.
again each para is for a seperate line in ur post.
interestingly the first 2 of the monotheistic religions (this one and judaism) have alomost invariably on the receiving end of stick and sword, while its the latter two that have been behind jihads, crusades, inquisitions and beheading.
you CAN force anyone to do anything BY THE SWORD. if you were zorastrian, living in iran in year 750 ad and had a sword to your throat held by one of Ibn Batua's men, then zorastrianism would go out the window. same reason in latin america, the people who came up with the brilliant inca, maya and aztec civilizations are today christians.
they do accept converts in fact. they dont proselytise is wjhat i meant. sorry if it came across as otherwise. but in all the cases you mentioned (judaism, paganism and also hinduism) conversion is somewhat meaningless. thats because these religions are also a people. i mean jews are both a religion and a people. i could convert to judaism, but it wouldnt make me a descandant of the hebrew tribe. i could convert to asatru but it wouldnt make me germanic by blood. the religions which dont proselytise are almost always ethnicity based religions. you could become zorastrianism, but your ethnicity wouldnt become iranian (if you are interested - iran's name comes from "aryan", a sort of "f" word in these days. but iran's real name was persia - cos they are the descendants of "parasu". thats how they are persians). the best thing that could happen to zorastrianism today is if all the muslims in iran went back to zorastrianism, but fat chance.
like i said, its not bloodline. its ethnicity.
yes. the incas didnt flock to sighn up for christianity either, nor did the zorastrians sign up for islam.
yes they do. the main reason why asatru is making a comeback, is that people in germanic countries like scandinavia and iceland are going back to to their germanic roots. but the zorastrians have no such luck and the shias of iran wont convert back anytime soon.
i too believe any freely chosen path is legitimate. tell me, how many cases of natives freely choosing chriatianity do you know of in places where missionaries have not proselytised.??
I have faced it, A life wasted...
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lol. if you can understand this answer you will understand this debate, as well as what precisely is wrong with proselytysation, and why girrafs should remain girrafs.
here goes -
i am not a hindu cos of what i believe in, do or practice. i am a hindu, as is a hopi indian a hopi indian, cos of what he is born as.
meanwhile an irish person (for example), though is a celtic, is a christian/muslim/buddhist etc cos of what he/she beliefs in or does.
my religion is what i am. his religion is what he believes in or chooses to believe in (which in no waytakes away the fact that he is a celtic still).
on the other hand, a celtic person, who isnt christian or buddhist or muslim or any other religion, but is a celtic by religion (ie. follows the irish belief system and culture and velues and tradions, and believes in Teleisin, and other irish gods), IS his religion, by virtue of being what he is, not by virtue of believing in any alien belief system, (like say christianity) whcih in no way sprang from the irish way of life.
such an irish person thus becomes intrinsically and organically connected to his religion, cos his religion now is what he is and not what he believes in.
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I agree with know1... He has, you and I have caused more death than anything in history... Natural disasters don't take as many lives as humans do. Whatever ideology we choose to hide behind, we make decisions that cost the lives of others, and these decisions are made for the same reason, pride.
I think CS Lewis put it pretty well:
Pride, us wanting to be the center, us wanting to be like gods, us wanting to set up on our own as if we had created ourselves--be our own masters--invent some sort of happiness for ourselves outside of God, apart from God. "Out of this hopeless attempt has come nearly all that we call human history--money, poverty, ambition, war, prostitution, classes, empires, slavery-- the long terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy."
whereas it would be wrong to state that the hopi indian isn't free to start believing in any religion he pleases, its fair and correct to say that if he takes to any other belief system other than the one that sprang from the hopi indian way of life (ie. te one to which he is organically connected), then he is a girraf trying to be an elephant.
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ie.try as a girraf might, he dont become an elephant. he is free to try though, or in the case of proselytised conversion, free to fall for the carrots the missionaries dangle.
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If you minimise the validity of what is "organically, intrinsically" ingrained in a Native person, in this day and age, it's the same as minimising what is ingrained in yourself. As you diminish any person, you diminish yourself.
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and also that whenever someone proselytises he
1) is basically intolerant and disrespectful of the other's religion and beliefs
2) is making a consumer good/product of his own religion
3) causing socio-cultural genocide, since for every "conversion", there is left one less person holding the flame of the way of life at the receiving end (of the conversion) alive. and that makes missionaries social criminals, identically. they are simply and deliberatly depleting the heritage of the earth and trying to blanket the world with the sole belief system they consider right/correct (ie their own). and for good. thats intolerant and narrowminded from head to toe.
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Swim the magic ocean,
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In the end, Nature is the Law and I respect that.
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ER lets see....
i do not claim defend the native people. its for them to keep their way of life alive. i do attack the missionaraies and all proselytisers.
i do not wonder why others dont do the same. most of them have already done the same mistake (eg - most of the germanic people on this board are clready christian forgetting asatru, the irish are already christian forgetting wicca/druidism and all thats irish etc) and taken to a belief system to which they are in no way organically connected.
i am not denigrating the natives who convert. they had little choice. i am attacking the missionaries who dangle the carrots.
its not my view. its natures view dear. that girrafs should be girrafs. not horses. if nature wanted another horse, then the girraf would have been born a horse.
and yes, where as you respect that, the missionaries dont. they want to artificially bring about a change that nature never ordained.
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and getting he thread back on topic, its in an effort to bring about this artificially induced change in beliefs, values and traditions, that all crusades, inquisitions, and most genocides in the new world have taken place.
so yes religion or at least peoples desire to shove their religion further has caused the maximum damage to the world.
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Swim the magic ocean,
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What you are saying is that native Americans are like children, unable to make conscious decisions and to form their own belief system. Instead, they simply accept what was "forced" upon them. Is it not possible that some native Americans (to name just one example) have given the matter a great deal of thought and find that they PREFER Christianity or some other belief system over the native system? I have rejected the system that was taught to me as a child and see no reason why others can't do the same.
Can you tell me WHY it would be wrong for a native American to choose Christianity, or for a descendant of African slaves to choose Buddhism? Should people be slaves to their heritage, unable to decide for themselves what they do and don't believe?
where as you cant force, you can always induce. the inducing becomes that much easier, when you have your back against the wall.
yes its perfectly ok for them to choose any religion they want ON THEIR OWN. not with proselytysation. fact remains though, that just cos they choose a different belief system they dont become germanic or indian (assuming they convert to buddhism).
people ARE slaves to their heritage. they can choose to believe in what ever they like, or get induced to believe, but they cant run away from their ethnicity, as much as a horse cant become an elephant just because he wants to/was induced to.
finally, given that the populations of the natives (and some non natives as wel - take for example people of the ba'hai faith - about 2 million of them) are dwindling fast, it becomes a social crime to try and uproot their heritage permanently instead of trying to perserve and revive whats left of it. a loss to the world.
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Swim the magic ocean,
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Humans are humans and they operate amazingly and miraculously, within the laws of nature, and independant of the ways we carve them up, analyse them and think they "should" behave.
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i'll give you an example. in india we have a religion called zorastrianism. you may have heard of it, thats the original religion of the people of iran, and when iran fell to islam, a few thousand of zorastrians fled and came to india and have been living here ever since. they are now about 2 million if that. queen's vocalist was a zorastrian.
it would be a drop in the ocean (for either party) if one christian married a hindu or a buddhist, but every single time a zorastrian marries someone else, his religion comes one more step closer to oblivion.
i therefore think its morally wrong for the member of a depleting ethnicity/religion to marry another (or vice versa), unless the latter sort of agrees to take to the religion/belief system in danger.
more than one native tribe throughout north and south america has been depleted because their women got married to europeans.
otherwise i dont see whats objectionable.
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You are kidding right?
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My thoughts exactly. It seems to me that man has endured many hardships throughout history when it comes to following their particular religion, whether its Christianity, Islam, Judaism, or whatever. I believe as long as people continue to see the 'Truth' in their religion, the religion will survive.
but the illusion of knowledge.
~Daniel Boorstin
Only a life lived for others is worth living.
~Albert Einstein
haha, i am assuming you know little about zorastrianism or its unfortunate history. i have broken your posts into many lines. the paraghaphs in the rest of my answer adresses e seperate line in your post.
if there is truth - monotheism came from zorastrianism. also its the first "delivered" religion.
by choice - yes there were loads of followers, and by choice too. what if the choice is denied?? what if you are located next to the epicentre of islam - ie iran is next to arabia, with only iraq in between and what if you are overrun by blod thirsty cut-throats trying to kill all those who dont chuck zorastrianism and take to islam?? why do you think they fled to india??
if there isnt.... no hard = agreed. but you assume that there isnt any truth. btw, please by no means assume that zorastrianism hasnbt had an influence on world religions - no one religion has influenced other religions more.
if a belief system cant attract - they dont believe in "attracting" or converting. you are born a zorastrian with the blod of cyrus flowing in your veins or not. "attracting" is limited to christianity, buddhism and islam.
keep followers on their own merit - so if tommorow turks and chinese (for example) forced all christians to convert to some of their religions, would u be right in assuming that christianity cant keep followers in its own merit?? truth be told, they dont seem to be able to keep many on their own merit (in europe at least) in any case, without any turkic or chinese attacks.
good riddance - a fine way to achieve "good riddance" isnt it?? converting iran to islam by the sword. just like asatru and wicca were given the "good riddance" treatment by the many inquisitions etc.
anyway now i suddenly see why most of you have no problems condonign religions persecution, and proselytysing be it by the sword or by carrot. you just assume things have come to the shape they have "naturally" and not thanks to a tragic history.
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
Hahahahaha! That's hilarious. What a spin job!!!
Going by your way of thinking, you shouldn't mind at all if some lunatic invades your home, today, and slaugthers you and your family, right? I mean, hell, you were all going to die, anyway:rolleyes:
uh, I believe you just proved my point.
but the illusion of knowledge.
~Daniel Boorstin
Only a life lived for others is worth living.
~Albert Einstein
While I'll agree that some get a bit zealous with converting others, I believe the true foundation of the 'attracting' religions you mentioned is the fact they are inclusive, ie, you don't have to be of a particular blood-line to be accepted in the faith.
but the illusion of knowledge.
~Daniel Boorstin
Only a life lived for others is worth living.
~Albert Einstein
As I said, you can't force adults to believe anything. You may be able to force them to put on a show for a while, observing Islamic customs and whatnot, but if they truly BELIEVE in their religion, they will continue to believe it until such time as they are free to practice it. Christians suffered horrific persecution, and yet the religion survived.
I don't assume that there isn't any truth to it. I don't know enough about it to make any assumptions. Their influence on other religions is beside the point. Many things contribute to the formation of other things, then vanish themselves.
They don't accept converts? Jews and pagans don't proselytize either, but they do accept those who seek them out and adopt their beliefs.
I will admit that I'm predisposed to dislike any religion that bases itself predominantly on bloodlines. I'm not a fan of any system that discourages people from thinking for themselves. Regardless of where we were born, we all have the ability to decide for ourselves what we believe and how we wish to live our lives.
Again ... you could force many Christians to BEHAVE like Muslims, but there's really no way to know how many of them would actually BECOME Muslims, is there? I may be on my knees facing east, but it's between me and god what's running through my head while I'm down there.
Believe me, I am no fan of the Muslim faith either, at least not in it's fundamentalist form. Any religion that has to be forced on people at point of gun can't really have much going for it in the first place, or people would be flocking to sign up all on their own.
And yet they still have believers today, don't they?
No one is condoning religious persecution. You started discussing native Americans, who have certainly been persecuted in the past, but no one is stopping those of native descent from choosing their own faith RIGHT NOW. They are free to follow to the beliefs of their ancestors, and many have done so. Others have, of their own free choice, chosen a different path. You seem to feel that only one of those choices is legitimate, whereas I think that any freely chosen path is legitimate.
btw just how did i prove ur point?? waffen ss killing jews and almost exterminating them = natural evolution??
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years
Thousand's of years old fictional books and scrolls written by twisted men, become non-fiction through intimidation, fear tactics, discrimination, bullying and flat out murder.
Spreading the word of fictional characters is wonderful if the message is of love and peace.
But imaginary friends in the sky are never there to correct the situation, when the imaginary friend's words are used for invasion, stealing, torture and murder.
Old Testament....New Testament.........Not into sequels.
Will there be a another updated Testament? Will they call it..... " The Newer Than The New Testament " ? Or maybe ....."The New Testament Part III : God's Weekend With Bernie" ?
Will god do a book signing tour? Will there be a movie version? Mel Gibson? Oliver Stone? George Lucas?
If I peer into a dog's ass will I see man's fictional god staring back at me?
Or will I only see shit?
Shall we argue, fight and kill over what Spiderman and Batman said? Which one was right? Which one is worth dying for?
Oh religion, it's such a confusing concept. As are most bullshit creations by man.
again each para is for a seperate line in ur post.
interestingly the first 2 of the monotheistic religions (this one and judaism) have alomost invariably on the receiving end of stick and sword, while its the latter two that have been behind jihads, crusades, inquisitions and beheading.
you CAN force anyone to do anything BY THE SWORD. if you were zorastrian, living in iran in year 750 ad and had a sword to your throat held by one of Ibn Batua's men, then zorastrianism would go out the window. same reason in latin america, the people who came up with the brilliant inca, maya and aztec civilizations are today christians.
they do accept converts in fact. they dont proselytise is wjhat i meant. sorry if it came across as otherwise. but in all the cases you mentioned (judaism, paganism and also hinduism) conversion is somewhat meaningless. thats because these religions are also a people. i mean jews are both a religion and a people. i could convert to judaism, but it wouldnt make me a descandant of the hebrew tribe. i could convert to asatru but it wouldnt make me germanic by blood. the religions which dont proselytise are almost always ethnicity based religions. you could become zorastrianism, but your ethnicity wouldnt become iranian (if you are interested - iran's name comes from "aryan", a sort of "f" word in these days. but iran's real name was persia - cos they are the descendants of "parasu". thats how they are persians). the best thing that could happen to zorastrianism today is if all the muslims in iran went back to zorastrianism, but fat chance.
like i said, its not bloodline. its ethnicity.
yes. the incas didnt flock to sighn up for christianity either, nor did the zorastrians sign up for islam.
yes they do. the main reason why asatru is making a comeback, is that people in germanic countries like scandinavia and iceland are going back to to their germanic roots. but the zorastrians have no such luck and the shias of iran wont convert back anytime soon.
i too believe any freely chosen path is legitimate. tell me, how many cases of natives freely choosing chriatianity do you know of in places where missionaries have not proselytised.??
Take my hand, my child of love
Come step inside my tears
Swim the magic ocean,
I've been crying all these years