Okinrus - a couple of notes
Also just about none of the numbers in revelation
should be taken literally.
Whereas you and I might agree on that, and, as it stands, many atheists can agree with that exact sentence, we run into a problem in the observable
fact that many Christians of varying persuasions actually
do believe in the Revelation numbers literally.
Seventh-Day Adventists, for instance; part of their predecessors, the Millerites, have already seen their apocalypse come and go; I don't think there are any more Millerites these days - such is the price of literalism.
The entire millenarian idea that just expired was based on direct interpretation of the Revelations; such is the price of literalism.
And some people still do believe in those numbers; there are other ways to interpret them, and I'm not sure when the next "Apocalypse" is due, but it's not too far in the future.
Interestingly enough, I once asked a post-Catholic millenarian apocalyptic why she chose to reproduce; the answer didn't make any sense to me; it had something to do with sharing love until the child died in the Apocalypse at age 7.
Some questions just shouldn't be asked under the circumstances. That was one of them.
But I wanted to spend a couple of minutes on Divine Providence as well.
-
The Testimony of Universal Belief
This is a persuasive argument by the Church implying that the reality of Divine Providence can be found by examining the (nearly) universal human belief in some form of Providence. Yet they go too far when speaking of a "superhuman being"; this is a Christocentric notion, as Christians tend to imagine some form of interactive, perfect version of a human (for we are made in His image). Elsewhere in religions, the Ultimate Reality defies description. And that's important, because while even atheists have a sense of Providence, they're (generally) aware that it's a psychological parlor trick for considering circumstances and probability while justifying hope; I know an atheist who still insists that gamblers can manufacture "hot streaks" at games like craps, who still insists that he has a "system" that works on slot machines at any casino. His sense of Providence has nothing to do with a superhuman being; it is merely a sense of interaction, of influence, amid a coldly amoral reality.
And if we accept the Testimony of Universal Belief as any reinforcement of the notion of Divine Providence, we are left with
a belief in some over-ruling power, divine or quasi-divine in character, which general description may require closer scrutiny under some circumstances.
And what of the "Testimony of Universal Belief" when applied functionally? Anyone who looks knows there's something going on in Iraq, but people tend to disagree on what the facts actually inform. Does any of it bring us the missing weapons of mass destruction?
In the meantime, it looks as if such arguments as the "Testimony of Universal Belief", which is also the nearest thing to a factual consideration appearing in the Catholic Encyclopedia entry on Divine Providence, are meant to support one of the most convoluted and useless theological ideas I've ever read:
Providence in general, or foresight, is a function of the virtue of prudence, and may be defined as the practical reason, adapting means to an end. As applied to God , Providence is God Himself considered in that act by which in His wisdom He so orders all events within the universe that the end for which it was created may be realized. That end is that all creatures should manifest the glory of God , and in particular that man should glorify Him, recognizing in nature the work of His hand, serving Him in obedience and love, and thereby attaining to the full development of his nature and to eternal happiness in God . The universe is a system of real beings created by God and directed by Him to this supreme end, the concurrence of God being necessary for all natural operations, whether of things animate or inanimate, and still more so for operations of the supernatural order. God preserves the universe in being; He acts in and with every creature in each and all its activities. In spite of sin, which is due to the wilful perversion of human liberty, acting with the concurrence, but contrary to the purpose and intention of God and in spite of evil which is the consequence of sin, He directs all, even evil and sin itself, to the final end for which the universe was created. All these operations on God's part, with the exception of creation, are attributed in Catholic theology to Divine Providence.
I mean, they really, really tried to cover everything there, but this gets back to a fundamental notion I've argued at Sciforums before that
religions are dogmatic manifestations of
human ignorance. The whole Universe, the nature and meaning of Life itself--presuming there is a fundamental nature of or purpose to Life, a stretch of a presumption, but one which is adequately argued for by the Testimony of Universal Belief ... er ... oh, well. At any rate, the whole Universe, the nature and meaning of Life--these are great mysteries upon which human beings have a tendency to dwell in their thoughts. And it seems that in those considerations, people tend to anthropomorphize what they fear; they tend to fear because they don't know or understand something. Critics of redemptionist religion (e.g. Christianity) tend to use such notions to assert that religions are crutches against fear, and while it is true to a certain demonstrable extent (see Psalm 23,
New American Bible.
Revised Standard Version, or its most familiar form,
King James Version) such criticism does not go far enough in its examination of the nature of religion.
Lysander Spooner notes that a people cannot award to a government any rights or powers that the people themselves do not hold at the outset. It is not a deep philosophical argument, but a simple observation of nature.
In a similar fashion, people, in concocting their gods, create them in the human image, in response to human concerns, and endow the deities with all the power of the mysteries of the Universe--that is, the power of the unknown. People anthropomorphize their ignorance and then put their trust in it; this does not seem a practically efficient state of affairs, I admit.
Think about it: what we understand with science is "natural" to people. What people have not devised testing methods for remains somehow "super"-natural.
Humans govern by fear; why should their gods be any different?
We govern by fear, we sell by fear, we love by fear. And, in religion, we worship our fear which is spawned by our ignorance, the true source of our gods.
:m:,
Tiassa
