Christianity & Evil - A Matter Of Perspective?

[Scott_In_Michigan]

I occasionally go through phases where I spend quite a bit of time reading another forum that delves into topics like the paranormal, conspiracy theories, alternative news, and religion as well. One thing that struck me last time I was on there, as I read through some of the chatter about religion and evil, was that it is possible that the God of Christianity is actually the evil one and that Satan, and his buds are not evil. Granted, this assumes that you actually believe in those entities, but I still find myself curious about what others think of this idea.

 

Another piece that added fuel to this line of thought was a program I saw on the Discovery channel (I think) a few months ago. It was an examination of Satanism. I really was in the dark about it prior to then, and while the program was more of a nutshell view, it did inform me of some things that I wasn't aware prior to that. Nothing I saw made me feel like Satanism is some intentionally evil or destructive religion. In fact I got the feeling that it was more like an open-minded type of thing that acknowledged that it was an opposite of Christianity.

 

So back to my point. Christianity takes a leap and assumes that the Bible is the word of a non-evil God. But what if this God is actually evil, using the Bible as a means to convince believers that he is good. With the way that all of the rules and laws are enforced by a fear of going to hell, and now with an ex-Christian perspective, it's really hard to look at the religion and think of it as being a positive influence on a person's life.

 

I do have more thoughts on this, but they're sort of jumbled at the moment, therefore I'll wrap this up. I'm curious what others think. And if this is the wrong forum for this post, I apologize. Please move it accordingly if necessary.

[par4dcourse]

Sorry Scott, I see this post as asking whether the imaginary orange tastes better than the imaginary apple.

[Scott_In_Michigan]

Sorry Scott, I see this post as asking whether the imaginary orange tastes better than the imaginary apple.

 

Yes, that is a very legit point. Actually I was going to mention how one would be required to believe in the whole pile of crap in the first place, but figured that as this is an ex-Christian forum, that that point shouldn't be necessary.

 

By the way, it's not an orange, it's banana!

[par4dcourse]

My bad. And the apple is better anyway.

[Thurisaz]

Well, if we are to believe da wholly babble then saaataaan was not the one who lied to Adam and Eve in that garden, no?

[Ouroboros]

Scott,

 

Read a little about Gnosticism.

 

Oh, some interesting stuff. Read about Valentinus, one of the early Gnostic Christians. Almost became a bishop of Rome (pope - before Catholic Church) and he is considered the inventor of the three natures (hypostases) of God (= trinity?): God the Father, Mother Sophia, and the Son Logos. Very cool. But that was considered heresy. And later it was not, but only with the change that the mother was replaced with the Holy Spirit (and Mary).

[R. S. Martin]

If I'd been allowed to be Gnostic, I might actually be Christian today. But when you're moving from ultra-conservative Christian to something that makes sense people discourage you from looking at anything out of the ordinary. They don't expect you to actually end up "not believing in anything."

 

I read quite a bit of the Nag Hammadi Library (batch of Gnostic documents discovered in mid-20th century, English translation) and some of it actually made sense. Some parts were such a "strange" language that I couldn't begin to understand. But if you start with the Gnostic readings in Bart Ehrman's "After the New Testament," I think you will find some of the better ones. Okay, I'm looking at my copy. I needed it for a course. Chapter 6 contains Gnostic-Christian Texts that were later considered heretic. If I remember correctly, influencial books in that chapter were "On the Origins of the World" and "Gospel of Truth." However, some secondary reading was necessary for me to really make sense. Some well-known authors are Pheme Perkins, Elaine Pagels and James M. Robinson. I'm checking Amazon for these authors and I see very few gnostic titles under Robinson's name....Okay, now I searched Amazon for "Nag Hammadi Library" because I know it is catalogued under his name, and it comes up. Dead Sea Scrolls are also supposed to be really good. I haven't read them but others say so.

 

I definitely agree with Hans that you should look at the ancient Gnostic literature if you want ideas along the lines of the evil god being the one worshiped by Christians today. Some of the Gnostics thought he was the illegitimate off-spring of some young woman, and maybe the third-generation of gods. You can be sure he wasn't top dog in heaven but he thought he was. As illegitimate bastards tended to be kept in those days, he was kept isolated from polite society so he thought he was the one and only god of the universe. All kinds of weird things happened as a consequence. That's one story.

 

In another story, Laughing Saviour (?), Jesus (not sure what he was called) fights his was from heaven to earth. There are many different levels or spheres between God and earth and at each level there are enemies to keep him from passing through. He has to fight and overcome the enemies because they know he is going to take away the humans from out of their grasp. He overcomes, does his thing on earth. I think he inhabits the body of a man who had been born esp. for his spirit. When he is crucified he leaves him and hovers above the cross laughing (at the enemies, I think, because they think they have finally vanquished him but they really haven't).

 

There is also a story about a cross that reaches from the pit of the earth all the way up to heaven like a ladder for souls to ascend. I think that goes with the Laughing Saviour story but memory is a bit muddled here. Elaine Pagels writes about that one.

 

There is also one document where a young person is admonished (chastized?) for thinking all the stories are literal when in fact they are allegorical and not at all to be taken literally. A certain level of maturity and insight seems to be expected of initiates before they are expected to understand/see into this. I should mention that these documents probably were not all held sacred by the same community.

 

What I liked about the Gnostic teachings was that they believed Jesus' death accomplished change on the cosmic level, far beyond anything orthodox Christianity professes. But when I talked to my professor about it he just point blank disagreed. Wouldn't listen to my problems, wouldn't hear me out. Just told me that he disagreed. That guy is one of my least loved teachers.

 

I understand there are Gnostics today but I don't know a thing about them. I don't know if I would agree with them or not.

[ShackledNoMore]

Well par4dacourse already gave the short answer, although nobody has ever really agreed as to whether it is an imaginary apple, orange, or banana, and in sometimes people kill each other based on their choice of fruit!

 

I might add that man made god in his own image. While people doublethink that he embodies virtue, like the tribe who invented him in the context of a primitive warlike conditions thousands of years ago, god inherited all the petty frailties of those who invented him, personified to an exaggerated, grander scale, especially a nasty temper, a cruel streak a mile wide, fickleness, and a sense of control that was through the roof.

 

Now satan also was invented or borrowed from other mythologies and developed into an xian version. He was supposed to be the embodiment of evil. It's a common motif and plays right into the dualistic, black and white thinking of the Western world.

 

But when we look at god for how he was really invented, what has satan done? One way of looking at is is that he quite understandably stood up to a cruel tyrant who had satan under his thumb. Pretend this story is more real, and not just a fable, and we might conclude that satan just got a bad rap in the writeup. Not that the satan figure ever showed any real virtue in any of this, but he couldn't--that's how he was invented by early religionists. THATs the imaginary avocado we inherited.

[SWIM]

In response to the OP:

 

http://www.ex-christian.net/index.php?showtopic=20483

 

Over 32 Million murdered by god...

No deaths attributed to satan...

 

So, if we use a "death toll" to decide which is good and which is evil, where do these numbers lead us?

[Ouroboros]

Oh, in the course of topic Michael suggested: who in the Bible did actually demand blood sacrifices? Not Satan. But YWHW wanted first animal sacrifice and blood, and supposedly in the end even a human blood sacrifice.