Illuminatus on 8/4/2010 at 21:20
@ SD:
You're seriously reaching for straws here. The whole point is that you can't reduce a thousand years of social history to such simplistic logic as “Church bad!!” and expect to be taken seriously. This sort of rigid interpretation of the past is exactly what hardcore Christians are accused of, right?
So let's be serious: of course a degree of religious oppression existed during the Middle Ages, but it's only part of the picture. At one end of the spectrum, you have the Catholic Church persecuting Galileo and Da Vinci's discoveries; at the other end, you have the Islamic Caliphates laying much of the foundation of modern science. As threatening as it may be to acknowledge both the considerable highs and occasional lows that religion has contributed, the reality is that most of the immense culture we have received from that age was directly due to these institutions keeping things going. I've listed enough examples of that, so anything beyond this is just circular argument.
Epos Nix on 8/4/2010 at 22:06
Quote:
...occasionally making someone be nice for a couple of minutes hardly makes up for turning all of morality into a self serving game of interpretations.
Interesting how you started out questioning why someone would suspend rational thought for the sake of religion and then go on to make such an irrational argument. :erg:
You realize that religion can be a personal thing, yes? A person can believe in the Bible yet never step foot in a church. Likewise, a person can interpret the Bible however they so choose, even so that the more obscure ideas contained therein are given a rational, real-life basis. Not all Christians are of the thumping variety. To lump them all together is, in fact, irrational.
Nicker on 9/4/2010 at 02:01
Quote Posted by Illuminatus
@
Youwe’re seriously reaching for straws here.
Fixed that for you.
Quote Posted by Illuminatus
The whole point is that you can’t reduce a thousand years of social history to such simplistic logic as “Church bad!!” and expect to be taken seriously. This sort of rigid interpretation of the past is exactly what hardcore Christians are accused of, right?
Wrong. You can't excuse 1500 years of systematic abuse of reason (a tradition kept very much alive today, if you hadn't noticed) and expect to be taken seriously. While ecclesiastical oppression was not the only thing going on at the time and not all members of the faith endorsed such policies (as has been repeatedly agreed to ITT), the negative influence of the Church was deliberate, significant, violent and pretty much a constant force for the superstitious status quo.
Quote Posted by Illuminatus
At one end of the spectrum, you have the Catholic Church persecuting Galileo and Da Vinci's discoveries; at the other end, you have the Islamic Caliphates laying much of the foundation of modern science.
And the response of the Papal states to science, math and hygiene? The Crusades (amongst other campaigns).
Google "Alhambra".
Quote Posted by Illuminatus
As threatening as it may be to acknowledge both the considerable highs and occasional lows that religion has contributed, the reality is that most of the immense culture we have received from that age was directly due to these institutions keeping things going. I've listed enough examples of that, so anything beyond this is just circular argument.
Its not threatening just annoying. If you'd said "the occasional highs and considerable lows" I'd be more agreeable.
Again you are making a virtue of a necessity.
Oh, European society didn't dissolve into total savagery and anarchy. Yay Pope! Humans stabilise societies, not institutions.
Religious institutions and governments tell people what they already know (don't kill, don't steal, be nice, look after your family and friends...) and pretend they are themselves the fonts of human decency. What a lot of vain nonsense.
fett on 9/4/2010 at 02:33
Seriously you guys. Whether you like "The Church" or not, Illuminatus has a much more balanced and current understanding of the Middle Ages than anyone else itt. I don't dispute any of the opposing views, only the degree to which you attribute all bad things during that period to The Church. Most of the generalizations being made are outdated at best and come off a little like an angry, undereducated, high school history teacher. The Church was a necessary entity which did many, many, many bad things. But culture would not have survived the plagues, famine, and other natural catastrophes of that age without such an institution to cling to and hide in. Blame them for the violence, wars, and suppression of scientific progress, but credit the institution itself for at least propping up everything else the best they could, considering the corrupt individuals that seem to rise to the top of any institution, especially one as huge as The Church.
Turtle on 9/4/2010 at 17:08
The problem here is that some people are confusing religion with "The Church". (great band, BTW)
Religion isn't really the big problem, "The Church" is.
Rug Burn Junky on 9/4/2010 at 17:30
Quote Posted by fett
The Church was a necessary entity which did many, many, many bad things. But culture would not have survived the plagues, famine, and other natural catastrophes of that age without such an institution to cling to and hide in. Blame them for the violence, wars, and suppression of scientific progress, but credit the institution itself for at least propping up everything else the best they could, considering the corrupt individuals that seem to rise to the top of any institution, especially one as huge as The Church.
The only problem with that is that the word "necessary" is suspect. They happened to have been THE dominant cultural force during the middle ages, but it's not true that it was necessary for that to be the case. The extent to which the church was necessary for the preservation of culture and thought goes hand in hand with the extent to which the church maintained ignorance in the populace as a means of control. Granted, such ignorance could have been achieved without the marshalling of thought and culture within the walls of the monastery (losing the cultural tradition altogether), but the consolidation of knowledge within the church would not have occured but for the ignorance in the populace.
Because the church was so dominant, it is obviously the case that our modern culture is dependent upon the actions taken by the church during that time, that's a given. But it is also true that any great thinkers during this time were subject to that dominance, so saying that the church was influential is almost tautological. It doesn't help the case as to the worth of its contributions.
The problem is that it is difficult to prove the counterfactual, so we don't know what great advances could have occurred if not for the dominance of the church, but given the orthodoxy of belief and the political machinations within the church during that time, which caused a suppression of "heresy," - and especially in light of the rate of advance within society as the influence of the church has waned - it is fair to say that any of these advances and cultural high points were very much "in spite of" the church.
Phatose on 10/4/2010 at 01:18
Quote Posted by Epos Nix
Interesting how you started out questioning why someone would suspend rational thought for the sake of religion and then go on to make such an irrational argument. :erg:
You realize that religion can be a personal thing, yes? A person can believe in the Bible yet never step foot in a church. Likewise, a person can interpret the Bible however they so choose, even so that the more obscure ideas contained therein are given a rational, real-life basis. Not all Christians are of the thumping variety. To lump them all together is, in fact, irrational.
Hardly. Belief, with no testable evidence is fundamentally irrational. One cannot accept logic and nonlogic at the same time. Lumping together everyone who's accepted irrationality - which faith by it's very nature is - isn't irrational, it's basic grouping.
Fafhrd on 10/4/2010 at 02:30
Quote Posted by fett
The Church was a necessary entity which did many, many, many bad things. But culture would not have survived the plagues, famine, and other natural catastrophes of that age without such an institution to cling to and hide in. Blame them for the violence, wars, and suppression of scientific progress, but credit the institution itself for at least propping up everything else the best they could, considering the corrupt individuals that seem to rise to the top of any institution, especially one as huge as The Church.
I would contend that if it hadn't been for The Church there wouldn't have been as severe a collapse of society post-Roman Empire. Or that if it weren't for Christianity, there may not have even been a post-Roman Empire period, as the empire didn't collapse until
after Christianity became the state religion, and all 'pagan' religions and knowledge were no longer tolerated.
Illuminatus on 10/4/2010 at 06:55
Quote:
the empire didn't collapse until after Christianity became the state religion
This is possibly the most ironic, uninformed cliche in all history: the (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Roman_Empire) Eastern Roman Empire, centered on the new capital of Constantinople, outlasted the fallen West for a thousand years (during which it remained the wealthiest state in Europe). Three guesses as to what its state religion was.
st.patrick on 10/4/2010 at 09:33
Not to mention that the collapse of the Western Roman Empire can hardly be linked to Christianity becoming its major religion. Given the rate of the Roman expansion and the subsequent troubles it had sustaining itself economically and providing military defense to the conquested areas, it would have collapsed anyway, no matter what god(s) they'd worshipped.
