When people talk about "god" they are talking about themselves.

[Person19960]

What about worship of the Egyptian gods and goddesses, such as Isis (not Daesh; not quite O Mighty Isis)? I ask because I have a friend who actively worships Bastet (I think). We've had a few chats about the translations of texts that may have been destroyed in Alexandria, that may have shown goddess worship.

Throughout my years in and out of the Secular movement and communities, I've rarely encountered threads such as these that included the Esther, Ruth, and Rahab stories; much less Lilith, much less Goddess Isis.

The religions listed so far all seem to have decidedly male deities, Jussayin... I don't know much about this topic, but I know what I don't know.

 

[Politesse]

So when someday talks to god they are really talking to themselves, makes sense to me in terms of [psychology.

Not in terms of neuroscience, though, those are very different processes as far as the brain is concerned. You may make the case that a person is not talking to a real person when they talk to a god, but if so, their nervous system is unaware of that fact.

 

[Politesse]

What about worship of the Egyptian gods and goddesses, such as Isis (not Daesh; not quite O Mighty Isis)?

Iset! As was.

She's had quite the growing cult in the US lately; the goddess who symbolizes of the otherwise hopelessly broken has a great appeal to the modern Pagan.

We all come from the Goddess, and to her we shall return. Good luck starting a conversation about thealogy here, though! Not much interest.

 

[dbz]

...all seem to have decidedly male deities

Asherah, queen consort of . . . Yahweh (Israelite religion)...

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--"Canaanite religion §.List of deities". Wikipedia.

Deuteronomy 32:8–9] suggests that Yahweh, originally a warrior-god from Sinai / Paran / Edom / Teiman, was known separately from El at an early point in early Israel.

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--Smith, Mark S. (2002). The Early History of God: Yahweh and the other deities in ancient Israel. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. pp. 32f, n. 45. ISBN 978-0-8028-3972-5.

The Hebrew Bible frequently and graphically associates goddess worship with prostitution ("whoredom") in material written after the reforms of Josiah. Jeremiah, and Ezekiel blame the goddess religion for making Yahweh "jealous", and cite his jealousy as the reason Yahweh allowed the destruction of Jerusalem.

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--"Asherah". Wikipedia

 

[bilby]

So when someday talks to god they are really talking to themselves, makes sense to me in terms of [psychology.

Not in terms of neuroscience, though, those are very different processes as far as the brain is concerned. You may make the case that a person is not talking to a real person when they talk to a god, but if so, their nervous system is unaware of that fact.

Fictional characters are like that.

People pray to gods; They also yell at their televisions, even though they know on an intellectual level that the fictional characters on the screen can't hear them.

 

[DBT]

Perhaps a form of catharsis. Therapy taking the form of mentally generated gods.

 

[steve_bank]

Neuroscience and psychology are two different things. As a loose analogy computer hardware versus software.

When Pense contemplated running for president he said he prayed a lot and communed with god looking for guidance. He was working it out through an imaginary agent to talk to. God as a sounding board. I'd say Christians do it without being consciously aware of what they are doing.

That js what myths and religion are for at the grass roots level.

 

[Politesse]

As a loose analogy computer hardware versus software.

Yes, my software often manages to perform functions that my hardware does not support. That's why I call it my "magic computer juice".

 

[steve_bank]

Apparently modern metaphor is not your bailiwick.

It is good sometimes to close the books, come back from the bast, and experience the world as it is today.

Our brains are programmable, we can be conditioned to think one way or another. We can learn to hate or like something.

That is the software. Psychology studies how different programing, bf occurs in our brains ad how t manifests. And how to fix bugs in our programming.

 

[SIB]

Is there any other explanation that makes as much sense? Even if we discuss a particular god of a particular sect of a particular religion we find differences and different interpretations of that "god" and its behavior among individuals in that particular group of people. They may agree on a majority of alleged characteristics but are never 100% in agreement. People who talk about god appear to be merely projecting themselves onto this human archetype.

If I worship a god that commits genocide and I explain it away by saying that my god is mysterious then obviously I approve of genocide. If I worship a god that allows children to die of cancer than obviously I approve of children dying of cancer. We shouldn't be asking someone why their god allows evil but be asking why they themselves allow evil.

The difference between a good person that does bad things and a bad person that does good things is the things those persons do. Claiming that I have a god is just my attempt to put some space between my behavior and personal accountability for same.

Your fist paragraph is spot on. That's why I don't blame religion nor am I afraid of it. Now people, I am afraid of people. I don't see one trait of man that is caused by religion. I see everything in religion caused by man. Any institution of man that gets too big tends to tread on people.

The way people reject any and all gods also tends to be a projection to me. They special plead at every turn. One fundamental atheist actually told "we are not part of a system". We are part of a larger more complex system thats just a fact. It may be alive (not a fact). Key phrase "may be", I am not saying it is. Its just the best explanation I have. "Random" is not what we see. In fact, we see a predictable path. For the most part so far.

Your genocide comment is very limiting. It is actually special pleading to me. I do not have to approve of genocide to see the need for it in some cases.

You also miss one important option. "It allows it" because it can be no other way. Maybe the people are describing the thing wrong. Like my 6 yr old stunned that I didn't know everything. The poor kid, he looked at me and said "But daddy, you know everything."... welcome to the jungle son, welcome to reality my little man.

"God" is a place holder to me too. Like dark matter and dark energy. "Dark God", there is something, I just have no idea what it is. "killing in the name of god" is a red flag. Killing a very bad person is not just killing, it is helping. So they are helping in the name of a god. What is good and bad can be discussed. But killing can be done out of love.

How a person describes the god of the bible is the best ink blot test I know. An all loving/malice god description means we have a broken person. We just need to be careful, they are land mines. To me anywayz.

 

[ideologyhunter]

A subset of this phenomenon, and one that drove me crazy back when I mingled with God's elect, is the prayer to God that is actually addressed to someone in your group. (It's quite similar to 'the accidental text on purpose' from season 9 of Curb Your Enthusiasm.) How it works: the one praying aloud in the group service picks out some reprehensible behavior trait that one or more members of the group have demonstrated. He or she asks God to help "us" -- always us -- to conquer that behavior. Thus: "And, Lord, help us to find clean words to use when we are angry or upset or something isn't working. Help us always to magnify you, Lord, in our speech as well as our actions." Essentially, this pious turd is telling one or more people in the group to change their behavior, but without confronting them head-on. And since it's privileged communication with our Creator, who is going to challenge the criticism later?
At a church camp where I worked in the days before disco, we had a group leader who did this several times. No one discussed it later, not even in private, because of course it was in a prayer, and you're not supposed to parse a prayer. But once I heard him do it, I listened to all his prayers for that same bullshit move, and every time he did it, I lost more respect for him. It wasn't about talking to God, at all. It was about sneaking in a word to the wise to the group members that he thought were messing up.
What should have happened? Someone, not me but someone, should have added to the group prayer: "And O, dear Lord, help us to talk to You in our prayers and only You, and not sneak in advice and corrective messages to others in this group, for when we are talking to You, O Lord, we must do You the honor of only talking to You. And not some business about cussing. Amen."

 

[DBT]

"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do, because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

 

[ideologyhunter]

"You can safely assume you've created God in your own image when it turns out God hates all the same people you do."
-Anne Lamott

 

[Learner]

... or, "if your God insists that you love your enemies 'instead', rather than 'hating them', then it's safe to assume that the 'creator of the image/creation is the other way round."
- Chris Tian

 

[ideologyhunter]

"But when you capture cities in the land that the LORD your God is giving you, kill everyone. Completely destroy all the people: the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the LORD ordered you to do."
"Moses became angry with the officers...who had returned from the war. He asked them, "Why have you kept all the women alive?...So now, kill every boy and every woman who has had sexual intercourse, but keep alive for yourselves all the girls and all the women who are virgins."
Can everyone smell all the love in the room?

 

[Learner]

"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do, because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

...or, to alternatively put the above... If those people are doing what God wants...and you notice that selflessly what they do does NOT coincide with their own desires - then perhaps we could trust them.

 

[southernhybrid]

Most religious folks cherry pick their holy books to make up their own god. My late mother, despite being an evangelical, chose the nicer parts of the Gospel as her favorite. She donated to charity, was a good neighbor and hated violence so much, that she even refused to spank us when we were kids, despite that being the thing during my childhood. She even stopped believing that her atheist daughter was going to end up in hell as she aged and acquired a bit of wisdom. So, regardless of what a holy book says, the believer usually takes what works for them and then of course they are talking to themselves when they pray.

My father, being the very damaged man that he was, from combat, mental illness and a very harsh upbringing, sometimes seemed to enjoy the "sinners in the hands of an angry god" part of his religion. When he was in a fowl mood, he would command us to get our Bibles and meet him at the dining room table. Then he would choose one the most horrible parts of the OT and make us read it. He eventually feared that his god was going to send him to hell for killing soldiers in WWII. He also liked the spare the rod and spoil the child thing, although I learned hot to stand up to a bully at an early age, so he left me alone be the time I was about 8. My father was often very angry, and anxious so I guess he chose a god that had similar qualities to himself.

Most of my Christian friends have created a nicer god, a forgiving god who doesn't punish nonbelievers, but judges people by their character. One of my Christian friends told me he's not sure he can identify as a Christian any longer since Christians elected Trump. Not sure who his invisible friend is now.

 

[DBT]

"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do, because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

...or, to alternatively put the above... If those people are doing what God wants...and you notice that selflessly what they do does NOT coincide with their own desires - then perhaps we could trust them.

How do they know what God wants?

 

[Learner]

"But when you capture cities in the land that the LORD your God is giving you, kill everyone. Completely destroy all the people: the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the LORD ordered you to do."

...but God always has the Israelites first send envoys to other nations in peaceful terms. The nations you mention above are the nations who wanted something else. That's always the case - these nations always want to attack the Israelites. God as it's written only reacts, never starts these wars.

"Moses became angry with the officers...who had returned from the war. He asked them, "Why have you kept all the women alive?...So now, kill every boy and every woman who has had sexual intercourse, but keep alive for yourselves all the girls and all the women who are virgins."
Can everyone smell all the love in the room?

As mentioned above...there were options for these warring nations. These nations, would insist to continue with war which could lead to long generational wars - in a large number would be an ever continuation of future reprobates, like the example of the Egyptian pharaoh reprobate who was even given Ten chances to let the Israelites go, who continued to challenge God and hold the Israelites captive. Another angle from this is the future 'potential' for the damnation of so many nations of people (the descendants of the mentioned tribes/nations) who will not change from going against God. As harsh it it sounds in those harsh times. God halts it there and then, before it can happen.

 

[ideologyhunter]

"But when you capture cities in the land that the LORD your God is giving you, kill everyone. Completely destroy all the people: the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the LORD ordered you to do."

...but God always has the Israelites first send envoys to other nations in peaceful terms. The nations you mention above are the nations who wanted something else. That's always the case - these nations always want to attack the Israelites. God as it's written only reacts, never starts these wars.

"Moses became angry with the officers...who had returned from the war. He asked them, "Why have you kept all the women alive?...So now, kill every boy and every woman who has had sexual intercourse, but keep alive for yourselves all the girls and all the women who are virgins."
Can everyone smell all the love in the room?

As mentioned above...there were options for these warring nations. These nations, would continue generational wars..that for many generations, would be an ever continuation of reprobates, like the example of the Egyptian pharaoh reprobate who was even given Ten chances to let the Israelites go, who continued to challenge God and hold the Israelites captive. Another angle from this is the future 'potential' for the damnation of so many nations of people (the descendants of the mentioned tribes/nations) going against God. As harsh it it sounds in harsh times. God halts it there and then with those mentioned above nations.

Do you even hear yourself? You're justifying genocide, because that's what destroying a complete ethnic group is. You're justifying infanticide. And you're accepting the justifications written by the priesthood of the group that prided itself on conquering these peoples (not that its historicity is proven anywhere.) This stuff is primitive, plain and simple. BTW, how should a "peaceful envoy" be received, when the message is, 'you're living on land that our God has given to us'? 'If you give in, you can do forced labor for us. If you resist, we kill all of you, except for your virgins.' If being a Bible believer means that you think genocide is sometimes the solution that God presses you to carry out, then it's seriously time to rethink.