By His Nails and Blood, etc.

[saltpoint]

In order for there to be redemptive blood, must there be nails driven through innocents' limbs?

Do some contemporary fundamentalist Christians hope that recent escalation of tensions in the Middle East signals the onset of end times, and can their fundamentalist vision only be realized through violent aggression among Middle Eastern peoples?

POLL QUESTION:

Does merciful redemption require violent sacrifice?

[MADem]

1. That's some sick and violent crap masquerading as religion, IMO NT

[saltpoint]

3. They have the same range available to them as anyone else and yet

they like it reduced to a neat equation.

[kenny blankenship]

6. I'd agree about everything but the masquerade

Most religion is pretty sick and violent. But then again, life is pretty sick and violent--especially at its beginnings and endings. The middle parts are arguably sick and violent as well, but we have more effective defense mechanisms in place for repressing our awareness of the constant sickness and daily violence during the middle bits.

[MADem]

10. Well, they suck the little kids in with the songs and hand clapping

It's all JESUS LOVES ME, and BABY JESUS, and lambs and whatnot, until they grow up.

Then, it's YER A DIRTY FILTHY DAWG AN' YER A-GONNA DIEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!

I dunno, I can't picture the Buddhists doing that kind of shit. It just seems so...mean.

[longship]

2. There is no such thing as redemption of the soul.

The only redemption one can achieve in this life is by acting such that ones life is redeemed through ones good deeds. In other words, ones soul lives on solely through the deeds of ones life. Let that be our bond. Nothing else matters.

[saltpoint]

4. I follow. But the fundamentalists in my post might find grounds to

dicker with you.

You can see them parting company with your wide-ranging view, and snuggling into a much smaller frame of reference.

[longship]

5. I know, but this is their problem, not mine.

They are the ones who are responsible for their own delusions. They choose their own irrationality. If any of their teachings has even a smidgeon of validity one can only conclude something like the conclusions in my previous post. By denying anything like that, they are putting themselves outside their own teachings. In other words, they are the rankest of hypocrites. This, too, is their problem, and their legacy.

This is part of the reason why I choose atheism and always have.

[saltpoint]

7. I'm definitely not counting you among their ranks. What I'm aiming at

in the thread is to invite observation to their method, or strategy -- or whatever they are calling it -- that reduces a grand and mysterious world to a watered-down formula of violence and redemption.

You're well in the clear, longship. Not to worry.

[longship]

8. Thanks, friend.

Just spewing a bit of my own homespun philosophy.
;-)

[saltpoint]

9. - - -

:thumbsup:

[xchrom]

11. are you christian?

i ask because i find that the crusifiction seems to symie many people.

a little like the image of the lion lying down with the lamb.

the image of the christ's sacrifise is to speak to two things.

one: that god cares enough about god's creation to share, experience, participate in the suffring that is this world
it also harkens back to images of the sacrifise of food animals that feed us -- i.e. the sacrifise of christ feeds belivers in spirit.
these are prechristian and pre monotheistic images but they are archetypal to the human spirit.

the second is a message to christians only -- that is to embrace the new life that the sacrifise of christ creates.
christ's sacrifise should cause the old life to pass away and new attachments to take root.
those are described in the sermon on the mount.

which to you question makes fundies wrong.

but fundies -- not unlike savanorola -- are first cousins to sexual perverts.
they are obsessed with the flesh in a negative way.
they curse creation with their every breath -- taking no joy in what should be ''good news''.

[saltpoint]

12. Good point, xchrom. Actually, several good points. Thank you.

No. I'm not a Christian as a contemporary Christian would be defined. But having said that, I'm familiar with it and with Buddhism, and spend some time reading in those areas.

I was baptized in a hoot-n-holler Lutheran Church, which is still standing and still hooting and hollering.

Much later I spent considerable time with the Episcopalians and the Catholics.

These days I'm kind of a non-aligned free agent, but interested in the philosophy and history of religious movements. Sometimes because they intersect with politics, and other times just for the questions themselves.

If we're talkin' Jim Dobson, hell no, I'm not a Christian. If we're talkin' St. Francis or Bill Moyers, I'm more within zone. Not inside yet, but much closer.

Thank you for mentioning Savanorola. He made an extraordinarily negative impression on me with his assault on Michelangelo. I'm going to take the creative artist over the bridge-burning psychotic any day of the week. You hit on the perfect hinge for my personal, religious, and political philosophy, xchrom. The duel between Savanorola and Michelangelo -- the moralist scold vs. the creative universalist. Damn. Can I buy you a beer?

[xchrom]

14. sure!

:toast:

[TallahasseeGrannie]

13. Christ was the sacrifical lamb

and His blood has already been shed.

[saltpoint]

15. I understand the allusion to Jesus of Galilee, TG, but I'm not asking

whether he is the sole embodiment of that construction. There were Christs before Jesus of Galilee, and to their believers and followers, they also were lone embodiments.

They can't all be right.

My question is about sacrifice, and whether it is an irreplaceable component in the process of redemption.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

16. My point, OC

is that if these Christians truly honored the Bible they would see that Christ fulfilled the old covenant and therefore not even lambs need have their blood sacrificed. Certainly humans do not. If they believe more blood is needed, then they are heretics. Maybe Christ predicted this when he said he did not come to bring peace.

Anyway, the wholel process is skewed and not at all what it should be.

[saltpoint]

17. Skewed indeed. Certainly I will not grant the fundamentalists their

self-important monopoly on New Testament theology. Most of them don't get that far anyway. Sometimes I see that bumpersticker, "If it ain't the King James, it ain't the Bible."

For God's sake. That isn't even close to being correct. Even after the grammar is fixed, the whole thing's still wrong.

I hear you on your points. And yet the narrative of the New Testament, whether or not one accepts that it fulfills covenants from the Hebrew texts, remains a narrative of blood sacrifice, one in which an innocent man and his retinue suffer at the hands of local authorities. The emphasis in the NT resonates especially strongly in the notion that the blood is redemptive, that "Christ died for your sins." That's hard to mistake.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

18. Yes, it is a faith based on blood

no mistaking that. Perhaps thinking that Christ died for our sins is desensitizing. But if we followed the plan, he'd be the last one to die.

But that flies in the face of millions of years of evolution and tribalism, etc.

[saltpoint]

19. The hinge seems to be different for everyone, but it seems also to

involve universal parts. If redemption is powerful, what is its cost? If forgiveness is Good, and hard-heartedness Bad, must there not be a transgression that prompts someone to grant forgiveness?

And too, with redemption and sacrifice. Does redemption as idea or act require the martyrdom of innocence?

It seems to me it does. And that is a difficult, troubling paradox.

[nealmhughes]

20. I chose other, because in my theology, it is the willingness of one to go

to the utmost for another whom he/she does not even know that is the true sacrifice. All the animal and Christ cruxifiction is actually secondary to the act itself: the true sacrifice was the willingness of people to depart with a dear living part of their wealth in animal sacrifice, and in the example of Jesus, it was when he realized in the Garden of Gethsemene all the hidden sin of the world, its shallowness, its hypocricy, that the crowd which had cheered him as the rightful heir of David and Solomon only days earlier would be jeering for his death and cheering his humiliation, it was then that he "took on the sin of the world", substituting his will for theirs, to be an example for the whole world for eternity. His death was really secondary -- it was his willingness to be what the people thought the world needed, a scapegoat out of his love for them, even though they collectively killed him and humiliated him.

In other words, the willingness to be the victim is more important than the sacrifice itself.

[saltpoint]

21. A breath-taking angle, nealmhughes. It opens all the doors and

windows and I think everyone can find a place in that dwelling to look in or out, as they choose.

I think you've presented a very agile consideration -- well, several of them in fact -- on the nature of sacrifice and the possibilities involved.

Thank you for that.

[Bolo Boffin]

22. No, but it makes sense.

It sounds good, doesn't it? We were born, we will die. What goes up must come down. You violate the law, and the law demand you sacrifice something, and the more violent the transgression, the more violent the sacrifice must be.

Anyway, the idea of violent sacrifice has made sure that priests have gotten the most tender parts of the community barbeque for over ten thousand years. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

[saltpoint]

23. Another interesting angle, boloboffin. It puts me on the trail

of the role of Authority in the process.

And that is definitely worth a closer examination than I've given it in this thread.

Thank you.

[NAO]

24. The Bible is very clear - GOD WANTS BLOOD

"Without the shedding of blood, there is NO remission of sins."

The entire sacrificial system of the Hebrew Bible (Old Testament to Christians) and the atonement doctrine of the New Testament are entirely based on this simple idea: God is pissed, and he wants blood.

Read Leviticus chapter 1. http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/lev/1.html You will think you are reading a description of a satanic ritual. They talk about chopping up animals, splattering the blood all around, separating the entrails into neat little piles, etc. And this is supposed to be god's instructions on how to put a "band-aid" on his wrath over sin until he can come as a human and have himself mutilated and spill infinate blood for everyone's sins.

Christians speak of being "washed in the blood of Jesus".

The idea that God wants blood is just barbaric, and that myths and superstitions based on this idea have survived into modernity is a sad comment on the credulity of humans.

[saltpoint]

25. Yes. I'm clawing away at the hinge between the two. The Old

Testament vs. the New Testament -- many scholars take your position and mark distinctions -- and some similarities, too.

And not just in the Judeo-Christian tradition.

Sacrifice/Redemption is a very complex and often tragic formula.

[saltpoint]

26. By extension, I wonder if, in the circumstance where redemption is

purchased by violent sacrifice, is redemption as a goal thereby considered unethical -- that is, the means to its realization and accomplishment unethical.

Is it possible at all without painful sacrifice? Does the sacrifice in question need to be "religious"?

Or is this a classic paradox that drives whole cultures, or defines them whether they acknowledge it or not?

[westerebus]

27. Redemption as forgiveness.

If you consider genocide as the starting point, what more painful sacrifice could be committed within a culture? Germany stands out as a fair example of state driven murder on an industrial scale. Was it "religious" in nature? Where they sacrificed? Man can be murdered though not sacrificed; which is within the power of the state/culture. It is the power of the state/culture to control and use violence that provides the state's sovereigenty
within the culture. Were the Jews sacrificed for a religious purpose? I don't think so.
Was the second world war fought to save them? I don't think so. After the war and Germany's defeat what was the Allies response to the Holocaust? Denial they knew it was happening. The Germans themselves claimed ignorance with the exception of those directly involved. So cultures/states will deny their violence and that of others at least historically. History is written by the victors.
Trials held and guilt assessed. A few who were in power were killed for crimes against humanity. Compared to the millions who were systematically destroyed how do you balance that scale? Ethically? I don't think you can.
Which brings me to redemption as forgiveness. What alternative was there? In the tradition of the new testament, was is not the "turning of the other cheek"? Would the "eye for an eye" of the old testament compensate? You tell me.

[saltpoint]

28. Was the destruction of human lives on a mass scale, as in Germany in

WWII, "religious" ?

Well, of course that dependson who is asked. I would say certainly not. But I am not back-handing the idea that there may have been some very few who may have been religiously motivated. If I find that unethical, all I'm asserting is my own personal approach and value system. Also, I do not know how else it could have been stopped, religious or not, except to work in the Underground to undermine it, to sabotage the Nazis' efforts to exterminate human beings.

You ask a very good question regarding what other choice there might be. I don't think the Holocaust makes the right starting point, because we can resolve to determine the components of religious Redemption or secular redemption, and both have enormous power and precedent. But as to what choice cultures have in the wake of overwhelmingly violent acts against innocent people, I think your question is exactly right.

[westerebus]

29. Micro and macro redemption in a cultural setting is

where I thought you were going. Reading the tread again, I thought you departed into the broad scale of cultural paradox and denial. I took that as a starting point. The last references to new and old testament in my reply reflect two competing views; yes, it's a subjective view on my part to a very broad question. The interface of moral teachings and ethics in the testaments is a paradox well beyond my range. So,I choose a historical event in the twentieth century to pose some questions and views. Can more death redeem those already dead? This is on a huge scale of humanity killed by state authority. I'm holding to human life in this instance. To broaden this into a "life of the soul" pushes this past ethics into morality,again my opinion. I'm looking at the ethics of power of the state and not the morality of the religious in this case. Placed in counterbalance to the death of the individual by another that scale vanishes for some. It becomes the norm to take the life of the individual transgressor. Capital punishment may be morally unjust,yet we find it ethically acceptable as a culture.The authority of the state comes from it's use of this power to inflict capital punishment.We grant the state that power in a democracy. It differs with kings and dictators who's authority comes from being the ultimate transgressor and above the law. As a matter of ethics, the christ was offered clemency by the roman state but rejected by the culture. That wasn't a moral issues for the romans. How all this poses in modern times is a paradox of culture on a large scale. I think they choose wisely on the fate of germany. The pity is it came so late for so many. Thanks for your time.

[Evoman]

30. dupe

dupe

[Evoman]

31. I just don't understand the whole sacrifice thing in religion.

Goats, lambs, virgins, first borns, etc. What is it about blood that appeases gods? Why would the being that chose those rules (because if you believe in god, you can't get away with the fact that he DESIGNED the universe in a way that only the death of innocents would absolve you of your sins) do so unless he was a monster?

I can't answer your question, because I do not believe in redemption. I do not believe in sin. I believe that if there was a Jesus, his death meant nothing. I SERIOUSLY don't get the whole "paying for our sins" concept....to a person outside of christianity or a similar religion, it makes no sense that a god who can do anything would NEED a sacrifice in order to forgive. I implore Christians here to temporarily separate themseves from their religion and look at it objectively...tell me, if outside the framework of Christianity, it makes sense that an omniscient and omnipotent god needs blood.

[saltpoint]

32. Believe me, Evoman -- I can't answer the question either. I'm posing it

to ask it and not even hinting that I have the answer, or even "an" answer.

It's a big stone in the path for me. Always was.

And made more complex by there having been sacrificial rites long before Christianity. In one way, Jesus comes to represent the opportunity for the ending of human sacrifice. "Stop killing innocents for your gods -- we have a metaphoric sacrificial lamb who covers you on all counts." Save not only the humans, but also the goats and bulls and so forth.

There is some quantitative gain in bringing a sacrificial killing of innocents to a halt and replacing it with metaphoric sacrifice. The wine and wafers are not literally the body of Jesus, but metaphorical substitutes.

I'm with you all the way on Sin. I don't buy it. I don't buy the notion that we are born "sinful." Babies cry a lot and throw food and so forth, but for all that they aren't "sinful." A stronger case could be made for Karl Rove!

[cyborg_jim]

33. It seems fairly simple to me - it's a transaction

The goal of a sacrifice is to curry favour with a god - this is an idea that is widely seen in belief systems, be it the aforementioned blood sacrifices or burning money as in Chinese superstition.

And of course if the sacrifice is bigger then the value of the transaction is greater (why did Yahweh get pissed off by Cain's offering of veggies? Because they were of a lesser value than the blood sacrifice). So logically Jesus, being a really big sacrifice, would provide an adequate transactional size in order to appease Yahweh of the transgressions of man - in this case the idea is to pay off a debt rather than to attain credit.

So in the end it's all about trying to get some sort of control over things people assume were in the control of great powers. That the great powers aren't there doesn't stop this from being a powerful and pervasive idea to this day.

[Evoman]

34. Well, that seems simple enough but....

why is it a wide belief? Why do people think that a sacrifice is necessary? Why would somebody worship a being who demanded such sacrafices, for benefits that seem questionable (its not like your getting a new mercedes out of it...your being "absolved" of sins that the creator had a hand in creating).

On a superficial level it makes a sort of sense, but I find it hard to accept that anybody would THANK god for sending Jesus to be sacrificed. Shouldn't it be anger that god demanded Jesus be killed in the first place?

[cyborg_jim]

35. Well, I suspect it is a wide belief because mmany civilisations start with farming

Farming leads to an increase in free time and excess production, an increase in free time and excess production leads to the production of non-survival related goods and services and specialisation, the beginnings of an economic system is formed and trade is developed as excess food production is traded for the developed goods and services of those specialising in non-food related production.

With trade comes the concept of bargaining, from that the idea of bargaining with higher powers cannot be far behind - exchange goods for services. It's perfectly logical when these beings are real to you.

Why do people think that a sacrifice is necessary?

One has got to remember just how tough survival was for these people. From our comfortable perspectives sure, sacrifice seems silly.

Why would somebody worship a being who demanded such sacrafices, for benefits that seem questionable (its not like your getting a new mercedes out of it...your being "absolved" of sins that the creator had a hand in creating).

Again, the benefits seem questionable but once the idea that the reason for human hardships is human behaviour, in that you can pay off the gods with good human behaviour, then the idea that bad human behaviour was responsible in the first place cannot be far behind.

From our perspective again, it is ludicrous, but ideas are persistent little buggers.

On a superficial level it makes a sort of sense, but I find it hard to accept that anybody would THANK god for sending Jesus to be sacrificed. Shouldn't it be anger that god demanded Jesus be killed in the first place?

Our attitudes towards death are shaped by medical advancement that has allowed the general populace to have unprecedented longevity, unprecedented successful birthrates and unprecedented ability to cure and heal. Death really is a distant thought for us, a reality we rarely really comprehend on a basis these people would have - not even when we are involved in wars as we are.

We have the rather lucky benefit of living in a very sanitised world and that shapes our perspective on these issues. It is ludicrous when you have the benefit of this perspective, but it is not hard to see why such ideas would have evolved.

[Evoman]

36. You keep alluding to the past, but the fact is that we no longer live in those times.

You make an excellent case for the evolution of that sort of thinking, but why have we not evolved PAST that thinking, when we live our "comfortable" lives?

[cyborg_jim]

37. Because that would assume that each generation merely starts afresh as if the last had no influence

The reality is that our ancestors shape every aspect of our lives - there are so many numerous examples of pervasive cultural idioms.

The mechanism for teaching useful things to the next generation, such as how to make fire, makes no discernment for useless things, such as fire came from the gods, unless believing in the idea is going to wipe you out, like believing being consumed in fire makes you a god.

As such we get a whole load of ostensibly useless cultural baggage because humans are simply very poor in general at getting rid of these things.

Give it time.

[Evoman]

43. You make a good argument.

And I agree with you, but not having internalized that part of religion (i.e. I don't believe it, nor have I ever believed it), I suppose I just find it hard to believe it ACTUALLY makes sense to people (and they don't just see it, like you and I, as a historical construct of sorts).

[saltpoint]

38. I make no claim to its not being a powerful process today.

I ask into its motivation and its context. Then I ask into its practice OUT of context, since Judeo-Christian context predominates Western thought.

I'm also interested in the notion that redemption can be with a lower case or an upper case 'R/r' and so I'm trying to keep it out of a specific "religious" context, while at the same time acknowledging that it occurs pervasively in some religions. I'm trying not to gang up on anybody or on any culture, but to ask into the practice and whether the R/redemption can occur without the S/sacrifice.

There is an added complexity, again in my opinion only: When God asks Abraham to kill his son, what kind of R/redemption are we asked to buy there? Isaac is a baby, or a young child, or a teenager -- whatever the hell he is -- and the Creator wants him out of the picture. I'm not understanding the cruelty of that example, no matter the redemptive payoff.

[cyborg_jim]

39. Well I think I have covered the motivation and context ground

I'm also interested in the notion that redemption can be with a lower case or an upper case 'R/r' and so I'm trying to keep it out of a specific "religious" context, while at the same time acknowledging that it occurs pervasively in some religions. I'm trying not to gang up on anybody or on any culture, but to ask into the practice and whether the R/redemption can occur without the S/sacrifice.

The problem is, Christianity being what it is, has already had a massive cultural influence on us, whether or not we subscribe to the belief.

When God asks Abraham to kill his son, what kind of R/redemption are we asked to buy there?

I don't think that story is about redemption, it seems more like it is saying you should always do what Yahweh tells you to even if he says to sacrifice your son - Abraham did and it panned out okay in the end because his loyalty was rewarded and his son spared. It seems more like it's espousing the virtue of 'blind faith'.

[saltpoint]

40. I believe the Abraham/Isaac/Jehovah story is about sacrifice,

not only blind faith.

Faith as an element of R/redemption, yes. But not the sole or primary context.

This is just my take, I understand. But we have a patriarchal God demanding blood sacrifice.

That qualifies as a sacrifice, I think. When there's a knife at someone's throat, and a God is off-stage calling the shots, the variable is set, and the context is established, especially when the one being sacrificed is powerless.

If the process itself contains "power" it does so in part because the one sacrificed has no power.

[cyborg_jim]

41. There's no actual sacrifice though

You can't look at this through the later established themes - the sacrifice seems to be incidental. I don't think the power of the sacrificed is important at all - what is more important is the worth to the sacrificer, Isaac, being Abraham's first son, having the utmost importance in that culture. It is showing the importance of loyalty to Yahweh above all else.

[saltpoint]

42. That's one path to the context, but again, not the only one.

Whether the main one, is open for further worry.

I don't say for debate, but for worry.

As one film character put it once, "What kind of father are we dealing with here?" Or, "Who wants a father like that anyway?"

With the upper case letters, What kind of Father makes that sort of demand in the first place? Who wants a Father like that anyway?

And so forth.

A threatened life, spared at the last minute or not, to me is less the point than the urgency and readily-available ritual of killing an innocent human being.

I do not admire Abraham's loyalty after the last-minute rescue of Isaac. I hate Jehovah, though, and that is what I take from that tale.

[westerebus]

44. You need to go out side of christianity for an answer.

Please bear with me, christians are the followers of a hebrew/jewish sect that followed the "Christ". That's were they got the name from. From the beginning hebrews/jews were not monotheistic in their beliefs. In the ancient world, blood sacrifice was common among pagans and believers in multiple deities. Greek, Roman, Sumerian ,Egyptian; what ever the gods or rite, blood sacrifice was that common.The first exposure to a mono deity may have been as a result of the hebrew/jewish captivity in Babylon. That was prior to their captivity in Egypt. The Moses of the old testament was up the mountain getting the ten commandments while the just freed hebrews/jews were back to their old pagan rituals.
So on to Abram, which was his name until the mono deity of the jews gave him a new name: Abraham, the father of nations. He had a son before Issac,so Issac wasn't his first born. The catch, Issac was the first child of Abraham and his wife Sarah, the first son from which the children of the chosen people descend. Muslims consider Ishmael, Abraham's first son to be their predecessor.
BTW the pact made with Abraham that would make him the father of all nations required all males in his "house" be circumcised. That's why all direct descendent's i.e. jewish men are. Talk about ancient ritual and blood sacrifice. This the old testament of the bible as a history. Not a profession of faith.
As to the story of Abraham and Issac, how could someone convince you to be circumcised if they weren't willing to sacrifice their own son? I know it still doesn't make sense.

[varkam]

45. What the hell is "redemptive blood"?

Just asking.

[saltpoint]

46. Blood spilled from sacrifice, considered by some to prompt

redemption correspondent to or greater than that sacrifice.

The Holy Grail is a feminine symbol, a vestige of the earthen bowl or jar of far antiquity. Does it become holy in Christian iconography after it becomes the bearer of Christ's blood? Or holy because it is the mythic symbol of that role? In either case, a man dies, is martyred for a cause, no matter the interpretation of that man or cause, and followers by the hundreds of thousands over time have regarded the quest for that Grail as holy, or redemptive.

Catholics, for example, drink the wine from a chalice, a cup which is blessed in ritual, a grail if you will.

Joni Mitchell, by no means a Catholic, sings:

"You are in my blood like holy wine
You taste so bitter and so sweet..."

From Irish history:

____

Sean Farrell Moran. Patrick Pearse and the Politics of Redemption: The Mind of the Easter Rising, 1916. Washington, D.C.: Catholic University of America Press, 1994.

Reviewed by: Thomas P. Maloney, University of Wisconsin at Madison.
Published by: H-Albion (April, 1995)

( Re Pearse's role in the Easter Uprising...)

"The milieu in which Pearse was to eventually find himself was one characteristic of all would be European revolutionaries at the time--the struggle for the rights of small nations, and a revolt against modernity. The struggle for the workers of the world was on as well, but Pearse was able to convince none other than James Connolly to put socialism on hold. For Pearse, the former of these movements was easily buttressed by the power of Irish myth and legend. If as some claimed, cultural nationalism in general was atavistic, for Pearse it provided the true fruits of freedom--selfless blood sacrifice for the nation...."
_____

There are more ancient equivalents, of course, and also contemporary models. But they tend to be linked by some kind of sacrifice or other, whether sacred or secular, and R/redemption is often the sought-for outcome.

[MistressOverdone]

47. This is an old post

but I'll jump in.

I think that the crucifixion of Christ put an end to this.