From: hartigan@ac.dal.ca
Newsgroups: talk.religion.misc
Subject: Re: And over to you, Sean...
Date: 29 Dec 92 22:47:12 -0400
Organization: Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

In article <adams.725656027@spssig>, adams@spss.com (Steve Adams) writes:
> 
> Re: accepting Jesus (ie "stop saying 'no'")
> 
>>...can you believe in Ahura Mazda? No? You can't make
>>yourself, can you?
>
> Correct.  Mazdaism is not 'true' in my belief.  Therefore, I cannot make
> myself believe.  Now if Ahura Mazda would show up, that's different.  "The
> unrepentant generation looks for a sign."

Ok...hold this thought. One can't believe in something that seems to be
false and still retain one's intellectual integrity. 
 
> Ya know, I realize exactly where non-believers or other-believers are
> coming from..."just show me"...sort of a "Doubting Thomas", eh?

That's part of it, sure. I mean, why _should_ we believe in some doctrine
other people tell us is true?  As Thomas Paine said, you may have 
had a revelation, but to me, your report is hearsay. There are so many
competing ideologies. 

[...deletions...]

>>step 3. Therefore, belief is not an act of will! One cannot accept Jesus
>>in the way you mean as an act of will.  Your doctrine _precludes_ free will.
>
> I disagree in this case...we went through this back in Septmber, eh?  I
> think that one can commit an act of will to accept the evidence and believe
> that evidence as true.

Could you make an effort of will and reject the evidence? You said that
you couldn't will yourself to accept Ahura Mazda -- could you
will yourself to accept atheism? And if you could, wouldn't you _know_
deep down that you were lying to yourself?
 
> In fear of trying to predict response, I suspect you'll say that the
> 'ability' to decide to accept the evidence is really a factor of past
> encouters and experiences, and as such is not truly free.

You know, you _conceded_ back then that free will was a myth. Have you
changed your mind?
 
>>Therefore, the doctrine that we must freely choose to accept Jesus
>>is _false_ unless the kind of despairing acceptance I offered is good 
>>enough.   
>
> If the above statments were true, this conclusion would follow...I don't
> accept them as true, for the reasons given above.

As Drake has pointed out, it _is_ possible to will yourself to believe
something that appears false to you. Sartre called this "bad faith,"
meaning that one violates one's own sense of integrity in order to maintain a
mental position that offers other attractions. 

For me to accept Jesus wholeheartedly, I would have to act in "bad faith,"
in effect, deny and repress my intellectual integrity and accept a doctrine
that does not appear to me to be true.

That is what would be required. If you tell me that this is what God wants,
that will be just one more reason I can't buy that doctrine. 

>>1. God chooses whom to save and whom to damn and human actions are 
>>irrelevant. Predestination.
>
> Calvin.  Luther.  Augustin at the end.  This to me makes absolutely no
> sense.  Perhaps that's the point behind 'my ways are higher than your ways'
> etc.  For in this case, we are all simply actors in a play that God has set
> up for his own amusement and enjoyment.  I would have a hard time believing
> in that God.

We did this one before...you conceded that there was no free will. If you
want to maintain a belief in God and Paulist salvation, you're stuck
with this one?
 
>>2. The Xian doctrine of salvation does not accurately reflect God's plan.
>
> Could well be.  We've been through this one a bit, too.  Of course, there
> is no single 'Christian doctrine' on salvation...there are many.  And there
> have been since the beginning.

Fair enough. I don't mean to challenge you, but the question that occurs
to me is: why does this guy believe?  You acknowledge(d?) that free will
is a myth, but you reject predestination as too harsh. 

What is it exactly, if I may ask, that you are holding on to so tightly?
You freely admit (and I admire this) that you have no idea what 
Christianity is about, metaphysically. We've trashed Paul over and
over, yet you resolutely cling to a Paulist outlook, even as you
reject both possible interpretations of his doctrine. Obviously
it's none of my business what you think or don't think, but cases like
yours fascinate and puzzle me. 

I think one is close to understanding something important about
humans when one looks at people who tenaciously hang on to a belief that
crumbles into contradiction and irrationality at every touch. 
Especially if one meets a person who acknowledges this irrationality,
but STILL believes. Fascinating!

>>3. God does not exist. 
>
> This is a non-sequiter that doesn't follow from the above.

Well, the contradiction(?) in your dogma forces one to revise it or reject it.
This is the rejection option.
 
>Re: Bible stories fictional?
>
>>Hmm...so it seems reasonable to regard the OT as legend, then?
> 
> If I ever came to the conclusion of non-inspiration, this would be my
> position on the OT.  As for the NT, I'd take the Gospels as a similar
> record of the man Jesus Christ, and go from there.

Why do you think the Bible is inspired, knowing what you know? Is this
another _a priori_ thing that one has to accept wholeheartedly?
 

Re: The delusional nature of sincere belief
  
>>Probably you will regard everything I'm saying as just another theory. 
> Correct...

heh heh...:)   (to heck with it...I'm going to use smileys)

>>>Staring into the abyss, as it were?  Most certainly I wouldn't feel
>>>comfortable with being face to face with such a void.
>> 
>>You're face to face with that void right now. At this moment you can
>>remove your blindfold and see, if you want to. 
> 
> Of course, at this point, I don't want to, as I'm sure you realize.
> Someday, perhaps, but I don't know that I AM wearing a blindfold...

Understood. This is the hard part. But I'm getting the feeling that
you don't feel unduly constricted by your imaginative world, so hey...

>>I think so. Don't you find your beliefs reassuring when the universe seems 
>>indifferent to you and your life? Don't you find it scary when death or
>
> The only thing that is certain is that I will die.  At that point, I
> *believe* I will have eternal, spiritual life.  Every single thing that I
> value : wife, kids, posessions, friends, etc, *will* disappear at that
> point (if not before).  All that will be left is God.
> 
> This sort of confirms your point, eh?  One tangible thing to hold on to in
> the face of the loss of everything else.

Sure, yup. This is exactly what I mean. It's comforting, isn't it?
 
>>Look at your wife, or someone or something you love. If things go as they
>>have for the last 4.5 billion years, that person or thing will be destroyed
>>before very long. If you really love them, that should scare you. 
>>Isn't it nice to then think: Oh, but I'll meet her/him/it again in Heaven?
>
> 'Course I don't see it that way.  I have a really different view of heaven
> than most, I think.  I don't believe that I'll be particularly aware of any
> other individual person...just God...in all his persons.
> 
>>Whew...saved! Maybe.
> ?Who?  You or me?

I was thinking you...:)
 
>>>>Belief (of any kind) is a folding screen we set up to curtain off death. 
>>>Well, death doesn't scare me, particuarly...but then again, since I'm
>>>assured of eternal life, there is no threat!
>> 
>>Death _will_ scare you when you're looking at it face to face. No one is
>>scared of death when they aren't threatened. Everyone gets scared
>>when the wolf suddenly shows up at the door.
> I yield on this point....past experience shows that you are correct.
> 
> Same kind of thing when I've jumped out of an airplane and things haven't
> gone 100% correctly...seconds from death, as it were.  It does wake you up.

I bet! Plenty of Here and Now. They say there are no atheists in foxholes...
and we are all in foxholes, waiting for the shell to land. 

>>Letting go of belief means looking at the situation -- I may be closer
>>to death now then I was then. I don't know if I'll see the people I love
>>again tomorrow. This may be my last night of existence. There is no
>>certainty. Only a person who sees that the darkness is waiting, and the days
>>thereof will be many, can appreciate the light. 
> This reminds me of the parable of the man who tore down his barns to build
> bigger ones..."Fool, don't you know that your life will be demanded of you
> tonite."  Jesus made the same point...hmm...

I'll come back to my original point -- maybe Xianity is true, maybe it isn't.
But there is no way to know. Personally, I can't stand living in an
ideological box. It is too much of a narrowing of experience...I hate it.
And one doesn't have to do it! Hurray! So I'll play out here for now...
It makes no difference to me at all if Xianity is true or not -- the 
Mystery remains. The Salvation/Hell business is so shot with 
contradiction and nonsense that I can't take it seriously. Whee...I'll
live out my days, and die when the time comes. 

You want to live inside the box, hey, no skin off my nose. And methinks
you do, comrade...:)

    Clov (imploringly): Let's stop playing!
    Hamm: Never!
 
                               - Samuel Beckett, _Endgame_

Sean Hartigan
hartigan@ac.dal.ca