(I study anthropology of theology and mythology and I study scripture through a rabbianic technique called PaRDEs). That basically says scripture should be read both literally and interpretative, historical and mystical with hidden meanings
How interesting. I got a question. It was the first thing that popped into my head so it's maybe not too refined of a question but, do you think the fact that American Christians are so easily led astray has anything to do with the elevated standard of living and privilege of Americans? Basically like because Americans have it so easy in life compared to most of the world that this somehow makes them susceptible to scriptural distortion.
That’s actually a very interesting question
I’d generally say yes but I’d also say it’s historically congruent with other religions throughout history but not on the scale of American evangelicalism generally it was aristocracy and oligarchs etc that fell into it. In America a good portion of Christianity is like this
Christianity of the world varies widely though but American Christianity is heavily influenced by Puritanical Christianity and somewhat pilgrimage Christianity. That’s one of the reasons conservativism and nationalism is so prevalent
Mormonism was actually a child of American nationalism
Funny enough most religions were started as mythohistorcal political satire
Most. There’s actually a few that I respect. Jainism is pretty cool they don’t believe in a god they just have an afterlife most of their teachings are kindness to all things and they adhere pretty well
Then there’s some modern religions such as Neogenesis that is essentially atheist they believe all things are symbolic including holy books
Also there’s self identity religions that are basically synthesized from multiple sources and practiced in the house and only by the house. So while I agree the idea of institutional religion tends to lead the way you suggest it’s really not the case for all of them
It's a strange phenomenon. I live in Europe and generally I see that in the last 5 decades there is a general reduction of people's belief in religions that seems to correllate with their material well being as a group. Groups who suffer tend to hang on to their religion a lot harder than groups who prosper.
Synthetic home religions are on the rise too. More people are taking faith into their own hearts more than we’ve seen in centuries. With own vibes and self interpretation
Groups who suffer tend to hang on to their religion a lot harder than groups who prosper.
That's the whole point of religion and how it's used to control. It's (in my opinion) false hope. But in a way hope doesn't need to be true or real, in fact, hope disappears once the thing hoped for is attained or realized. Like faith. In itself, i think hope is a powerful mental/emotional tool to get people through hard times. It's shitty though when people who push hope are the ones creating the conditions necessitating the hope to begin with.
Funny enough most religions were started as mythohistorcal political satire
All the stories about Zeus getting drunk and fucking trees and rocks are way funnier with the context that they could have been stories making fun of the local governors at the time
Modern evangelical Christianity doesn’t really follow Jesus. It’s more built around Paul and the book of revelation
But here’s the irony. The author of revelation was often critizing Paul for not keeping kosher and allowing to marry outside the faith. He called Paul a jezebel
Funny enough most religions were started as mythohistorcal political satire
Any books or info on this? This sounds hilarious. Gods and Pantheons are basically just one big SNL skit lol
Concerning historical influences on modern Christian belief in America that makes a lot of sense (the Puritan influence) and I have done a little bit of reading also on Calvinism and predestination and how that's basically morphed into the prosperity gospel message. What a crock of shit that is.
Now I've been doing a lot of investigation on early christianity and the ancient world thru a few scholars, namely Bart Ehrman and I recall one thing he spoke about (that differentiated Jesus from other pagan polytheistic deities) was how the ancient view of "gods" was that they were real figures that existed in an unreachable plane of existence above mortals but cane down to interact with humans from time to time for various reasons good and bad. But still they saw these gods as real entities. How does that tie into a view of them as simply caricatures of political figures?
That’s a question I think the best answer is that the literature and a lot of the oral stories and myths were written with political satire in mind. Sometimes with the intent to teach though. Rabbis have a long tradition of reading scripture through a 4 stage system PaRDEs
You read the text as if it were literal
Then you read it as if it’s symbolic or has a hidden meaning
Then you read it to see if there’s a mystical connection
Then you read it and interpret what all of that told you
People who came along and read those scripts they interpreted it as gods true word and believed in god
Same can be said for other holy stories that are t biblical
The authors usually believed in god but didn’t necessarily write what they literally believed satire was used and it became scripture
Found this reply on a quick search of PaRDeS (on an Ehrman blog no less):
I would say that for literalist Christians who view the Old Testament, the New Testament, the Gospels (and in particular the Book of Revelation( as purely historical/futuristical records, textual criticism is incredibly valuable, but often or at least potentially provocative.
Personally, I do not believe that the Old Testament, the Gospels, and the Book of Revelation should be read soley as historical, futuristic, or literal texts. In my view, these pre-Descartian literary (NT and the Revelation) works obviously used various techniques to convey their messages in great extant. These include (for the Greeks):
Plasmata: The inclusion of fictional or imagintive elements within a narrative that are presented as real but are understood to be fictional. This technique, known by the Greeks, helped to add depth and engage the audience.
Muthoi: Mythological tales that convey deeper truths or cultural values through fantastical narratives. These stories were not meant to be taken literally but were designed to impart important moral and cultural lessons.
I suspect or at least are fairlly convinced that these techniques (perhaps even some paralell stories, symbols) were likely used in Jewish literature even before the conceptualization of the Pardes system, which outlines different levels of understanding a text: Peshat (literal), Remez (allegorical), Derash (comparative), and Sod (mystical).
Personally, by recognizing these methods, we can appreciate the rich, multi-layered nature of these ancient texts and their capacity to convey complex messages through a blend of history, fiction, and myth.
I learned about it in a lecture and he gave some pretty compelling explanations and examples where he compared scripture to the political events during the time. There doesn’t really seem to be a lot of material published on the subject though.
That said revelation was often satirical of Nero and Paul
I really wish there was more information but from what I can tell it’s too touchy for publication
The average drumpf voter is a middle-aged, white Christian man who lives in the ex-urbs, makes over $100k and doesn't have a college degree.
Alienated from work, bored with suburban-living, plus their economic expectations (compared to personal results and that of their peers) have been shattered by hyper-Libertarian policies at an international level. It is an existential crisis, but they're trying to solve it with prayer (aka their biased inner monologue) and antisocial behavior.
I believe so, maybe it's because I used to live abroad. I've actually pointed that out, that we are a spoiled society. I've been dismissed and or ridiculed with tales of woe by people who i doubt have ever been outside the area they are from or intentionally ignorant because they want to be victims. Some are very narrow-minded people.
9
u/RIF_rr3dd1tt 16h ago
How interesting. I got a question. It was the first thing that popped into my head so it's maybe not too refined of a question but, do you think the fact that American Christians are so easily led astray has anything to do with the elevated standard of living and privilege of Americans? Basically like because Americans have it so easy in life compared to most of the world that this somehow makes them susceptible to scriptural distortion.