Update: Geri Allen - Lush Life
Geri Allen --Piano;
Dave Holland --Bass;
Jack Dejohnette --Drums;
Saturday, June 6, 2015
Betty Carter Dave Holland - All or Nothing at All
Update: Geri Allen - Lush Life
Geri Allen --Piano;
Dave Holland --Bass;
Jack Dejohnette --Drums;
Hate Mail - Atheism Corrodes Morality.
I notice none of those people you quote bothered to answer my question, nor do I think could that they could, asking what atheist proposed substitute for religious morality wouldn't fall to the atheist means of rejecting religion, most relevantly, "Who's going to make me?".
If you and they can't do it, wouldn't it be easier to just admit that atheism is fatal to any effective assertion of morality, no matter how basic that is and that, therefore, atheists criticizing other people for their moral lapses don't stand on atheism to do that but, for the most part, they depend on ideas promoted as truth by the very religions they reject.
If you want to blame someone for making me come to these conclusions, I got them from listening to and reading what atheists said, not from any religious criticism of atheism. Atheism means anything goes as long as you can get away with it, in the end. That's not a new observation, as RMJ pointed out the other day, Nietzsche and Sartre are among those who admitted as much, not to mention other sciency atheists such as Francis Galton and Ernst Haeckel*, and, as I've pointed out, that masterful atheist judge of moral conduct, Steven Weinberg, for those who hold that philosophy is dead and has been replaced by science.
Christians who kill are violating the teachings of Jesus, they aren't violating your faith, atheism. I could ask that other question I did over at Religion Dispatches, where in atheism do atheists get the moral positions they use against religious folk?
* Haeckel's "Moral Materialism" included murdering a whole list of those he considered to have lives not worth continuing, the sick, the disabled (including the deaf) children, entire named races of people.... It also was an aristocratic system, opposed to democracy and socialism. His great work of science, the History of Creation, begins with a systematic attack on religious morality, rather odd for a book which was promoted as a great work of science by Charles Darwin. I doubt most sane people reading it in which everything must be reducible to a single characteristic essence, and what his monist system proposes as "morality" would be willing to consider it moral in any real sense of the word.
Update: "bitter blogging loser" Oddly I'm known as being remarkably cheerful by people who know me. Do I have to get out my theme song again? How about my other theme song.
If you and they can't do it, wouldn't it be easier to just admit that atheism is fatal to any effective assertion of morality, no matter how basic that is and that, therefore, atheists criticizing other people for their moral lapses don't stand on atheism to do that but, for the most part, they depend on ideas promoted as truth by the very religions they reject.
If you want to blame someone for making me come to these conclusions, I got them from listening to and reading what atheists said, not from any religious criticism of atheism. Atheism means anything goes as long as you can get away with it, in the end. That's not a new observation, as RMJ pointed out the other day, Nietzsche and Sartre are among those who admitted as much, not to mention other sciency atheists such as Francis Galton and Ernst Haeckel*, and, as I've pointed out, that masterful atheist judge of moral conduct, Steven Weinberg, for those who hold that philosophy is dead and has been replaced by science.
Christians who kill are violating the teachings of Jesus, they aren't violating your faith, atheism. I could ask that other question I did over at Religion Dispatches, where in atheism do atheists get the moral positions they use against religious folk?
* Haeckel's "Moral Materialism" included murdering a whole list of those he considered to have lives not worth continuing, the sick, the disabled (including the deaf) children, entire named races of people.... It also was an aristocratic system, opposed to democracy and socialism. His great work of science, the History of Creation, begins with a systematic attack on religious morality, rather odd for a book which was promoted as a great work of science by Charles Darwin. I doubt most sane people reading it in which everything must be reducible to a single characteristic essence, and what his monist system proposes as "morality" would be willing to consider it moral in any real sense of the word.
Update: "bitter blogging loser" Oddly I'm known as being remarkably cheerful by people who know me. Do I have to get out my theme song again? How about my other theme song.
George Lakey - Why Quakers are Pacifists
The book he mentions sounds interesting, if I have time I'll try to find it and read it. That chart about the varying success rates of regime change struggles, between the peaceful means being successful and the violent ones being unsuccessful match what I read of the history of revolutions to make governments that aren't at least as bad as those which were replaced. Revolution isn't an especially successful means of making better governments.
I do believe the adage that peace is the fruit of justice, including economic justice. That the recent Egyptian revolution led to an election that put the Muslim Brotherhood in power, a group that, while not being anything like advocates of gender equality, had been one of the main venues of economic aid to poor Egyptians as the government serviced the rich. As its overthrow and the installation of a pseudo-democratic military despotism shows, partial "equality" doesn't produce a peaceful, democratic government. I think the conditions that make peaceful revolution possible might account for the statistical results claiming that success for it. Just being non-violent isn't enough, it has to include struggle for real, effective, experienced economic and social equality and equality in gender, racial, ethnic and other relevant identities.
"The effect of righteousness will be peace, and the result of righteousness will be quietness and confidence forever." Isaiah 32:17
Still, with that reservation, I agree with what he says in the video.
Update: NTodd has provided a link to a paper which is related to the book. I will read it sometime the coming week.
Short Demonstration of My Contention That Atheism Can't Generate Morality
Atheists can refuse to believe any assertion of morality made by atheists by exactly the same means they use to refuse to believe in God "prove it", "why should I," "so what," which all boils down to the crux of your dilemma if you want to create those atheist substitutes for the real thing, "Who's going to make me?"
Tell me how any atheist substitute for religious morality wouldn't be vulnerable to rejection on the basis of that atheist question, "Who's going to make me?"
Tell me how any atheist substitute for religious morality wouldn't be vulnerable to rejection on the basis of that atheist question, "Who's going to make me?"
Friday, June 5, 2015
Kajto - La Soldato Kiu Marŝas - The Soldier Who Marches
I came across this today. It's a protest song. I heard some idiot talking about wanting to send soldiers back into Iraq. Yeah. That worked out so well the last time.
Here's a translation from the internet.
The Soldier who Marches
Original Esperanto by Claude Piron
The soldier who marches
in the wind
in silence
upon the road which is a marsh
feeling his body no more.
His mind indeed dulls
only the fatigue
and the irritation1
of the rain which drips,
tormenting him without compassion.
And he goes on without blessing
in the mud
in boots
which are always heavy in a bothersome manner
and makes the way rough.
While suffering exclusively
the rhythm
in the mind
rules over everything bad
and ties up the ability to think
And he marches in the line
uniform2
uniform3
in the weather's malice
and the mockery of the sergeant.
He already is awake for a long time
and a yawn
with an obsession
in jaw forming himself
for an irresistible temptation.
If he could even in a begging way
begin to receive
a right to dream
and a minute only to rest
to stop upon the travel path.
But he doesn't hope for that
because the dream,
due to the duty
in a soldier, doesn't appear:
here is the military service's fate.
Already the gun weighs too much
and the helmet
and the bag
and the gruel from clay
stuck to the shoe.
But the far away horizon
most faithfully
leisurely
a meeting
always runs more far away.
The soldier who is tired
continuously goes
he yearns
for a restful, peaceful life
without an additional everlasting drive.
But he feels with disgust
that the life
in asset
goes on continuously and without a pause
to an unachievable purpose.
And likewise in army
the reasoning
about a command
doesn't exist due to obedience
with no exception.
Thus the realization is missing
about the reason
of life
and only rules each attitude
another course and acceptance.
1. is more accurately defined as "the setting of one's teeth on edge (by some kind of irritation)"
2. literally means "union"+"form"
3. literally means "one"+"form"
As you can hear, the original with it more flexible inflection does it easier than English in that meter.
Hate Mail
It would seem that, once again, I have spoken truth to impotence.
Update: It was mentioning the impotence that got to you, i'n it.
Update: It was mentioning the impotence that got to you, i'n it.
Beethoven - Piano trio op.70 no.1
David Oistrakh - violin
Sviatoslav Knushevitsky - cello
Lev Oborin - piano
Fr. Richard McBrien on Fridays - Prayer
Since I came out of the closet as a many times a day pray-er this week, here is Fr. Richard McBrien on prayer.
(This week's column is dedicated to the memory of John F. Whealon, Archbishop of Hartford from 1969 to 1991, for reasons which only he and I would know.)
One of the most notable developments in post-conciliar Catholicism is the broadened interest in prayer.
Before the Second Vatican Council, many Catholics regarded prayer as something done primarily by priests, nuns, and a few pious lay persons. Today, an increasing number of lay Catholics want to know how to pray and they seek out those who might help them, either directly or through their books and tapes.
Although there is a lot more talk these days about prayer, many Catholics still have a vague understanding of its meaning.
The traditional definition of prayer is the raising of the mind and the heart to God. It is the act by which an individual or a community enters into conscious, loving communion with God.
Prayer is differentiated by reason of its purpose. Thus, there is the prayer of adoration, whose immediate end is the praise and glory of God; the prayer of contrition, which expresses sorrow for sin; the prayer of thanksgiving, which gives gratitude to God for blessings received (the Eucharist is the prayer of thanksgiving par excellence); and the prayer of supplication, or petition, which asks God for blessings upon oneself or others.
Older Catholics will recall the mnemonic which the nuns taught them: A-C-T-S (adoration, contrition, thanksgiving, supplication).
Prayer is also differentiated by reason of method. Mental prayer may or may not use words, but if it does use words, they do not follow a pre-set formula. Vocal prayer does use a given formula, that may be spoken or sung. There is also the prayer of bodily gesture, such as expressed in dance.
There is another methodological distinction between discursive and affective prayer. In discursive prayer reason, or thinking, dominates. In affective prayer the feelings dominate (trust, surrender, gratitude, love). The normal development in the life of prayer is from discursive to affective prayer.
Meditation, which is a form of mental prayer, involves an extended reflection on the presence and activity of God. When the awareness of God's presence is not apprehended by thought but by love, it is called contemplation.
Meditation (sometimes called "active meditation" to distinguish it more clearly from contemplation) is generally understood to involve discursive reasoning, while contemplation is affective. It is simple awareness of, and focus upon, the presence of God.
It is important to note that contemplation is not a method of prayer to be chosen at will, like meditation. It is a gift into which one is drawn. The most intense form of contemplation is attained when there is ecstatic union between the one praying and God so that the human senses can no longer communicate with the outside world. This is sometimes known as absorption, or rapture.
Centering prayer is a special method of contemplation in which the person simply attends to the presence of God within, that is, at the center of one's being. A mantra or short phrase is sometimes repeated to keep one's attention centered.
Mystical prayer is also a form of contemplation in which the mind and heart are directly and powerfully influenced by God to operate in a way that is beyond the capacity of human effort, unaided by grace. This method of prayer has many forms and stages. Lectio divina ("divine [or holy] reading"), originally a monastic term, refers to the prayerful reading of, and meditative reflection upon, Sacred Scripture, the Christian classics, or other types of spiritual writing.
A final, practically important distinction may be made between intensive and extensive prayer. The former occurs at particular periods and is done either communally or privately. The latter permeates one's whole day; indeed, one's whole life.
One lives in the presence of God (extensive prayer), but one's direct attention is focused on God only at particular moments and under particular circumstances (intensive).
For most of us, most of the time, our prayer is extensive rather than intensive. And it is utterly crucial to remember that extensive prayer is as much a form of prayer as is intensive prayer. In other words, we don't have to be engaged in formal prayer to be praying at all.
Truly Christian prayer is at once trinitarian, Christological, ecclesial, pneumatological, and eschatological.
In simpler English, this means that Christian prayer seeks union with the triune God, is centered on Jesus Christ, occurs within and by the Church, is empowered by the Holy Spirit, and is oriented to final and complete union with God at the end of human history.
As such, it is a vital and indispensable part of the Christian life.
(This week's column is dedicated to the memory of John F. Whealon, Archbishop of Hartford from 1969 to 1991, for reasons which only he and I would know.)
One of the most notable developments in post-conciliar Catholicism is the broadened interest in prayer.
Before the Second Vatican Council, many Catholics regarded prayer as something done primarily by priests, nuns, and a few pious lay persons. Today, an increasing number of lay Catholics want to know how to pray and they seek out those who might help them, either directly or through their books and tapes.
Although there is a lot more talk these days about prayer, many Catholics still have a vague understanding of its meaning.
The traditional definition of prayer is the raising of the mind and the heart to God. It is the act by which an individual or a community enters into conscious, loving communion with God.
Prayer is differentiated by reason of its purpose. Thus, there is the prayer of adoration, whose immediate end is the praise and glory of God; the prayer of contrition, which expresses sorrow for sin; the prayer of thanksgiving, which gives gratitude to God for blessings received (the Eucharist is the prayer of thanksgiving par excellence); and the prayer of supplication, or petition, which asks God for blessings upon oneself or others.
Older Catholics will recall the mnemonic which the nuns taught them: A-C-T-S (adoration, contrition, thanksgiving, supplication).
Prayer is also differentiated by reason of method. Mental prayer may or may not use words, but if it does use words, they do not follow a pre-set formula. Vocal prayer does use a given formula, that may be spoken or sung. There is also the prayer of bodily gesture, such as expressed in dance.
There is another methodological distinction between discursive and affective prayer. In discursive prayer reason, or thinking, dominates. In affective prayer the feelings dominate (trust, surrender, gratitude, love). The normal development in the life of prayer is from discursive to affective prayer.
Meditation, which is a form of mental prayer, involves an extended reflection on the presence and activity of God. When the awareness of God's presence is not apprehended by thought but by love, it is called contemplation.
Meditation (sometimes called "active meditation" to distinguish it more clearly from contemplation) is generally understood to involve discursive reasoning, while contemplation is affective. It is simple awareness of, and focus upon, the presence of God.
It is important to note that contemplation is not a method of prayer to be chosen at will, like meditation. It is a gift into which one is drawn. The most intense form of contemplation is attained when there is ecstatic union between the one praying and God so that the human senses can no longer communicate with the outside world. This is sometimes known as absorption, or rapture.
Centering prayer is a special method of contemplation in which the person simply attends to the presence of God within, that is, at the center of one's being. A mantra or short phrase is sometimes repeated to keep one's attention centered.
Mystical prayer is also a form of contemplation in which the mind and heart are directly and powerfully influenced by God to operate in a way that is beyond the capacity of human effort, unaided by grace. This method of prayer has many forms and stages. Lectio divina ("divine [or holy] reading"), originally a monastic term, refers to the prayerful reading of, and meditative reflection upon, Sacred Scripture, the Christian classics, or other types of spiritual writing.
A final, practically important distinction may be made between intensive and extensive prayer. The former occurs at particular periods and is done either communally or privately. The latter permeates one's whole day; indeed, one's whole life.
One lives in the presence of God (extensive prayer), but one's direct attention is focused on God only at particular moments and under particular circumstances (intensive).
For most of us, most of the time, our prayer is extensive rather than intensive. And it is utterly crucial to remember that extensive prayer is as much a form of prayer as is intensive prayer. In other words, we don't have to be engaged in formal prayer to be praying at all.
Truly Christian prayer is at once trinitarian, Christological, ecclesial, pneumatological, and eschatological.
In simpler English, this means that Christian prayer seeks union with the triune God, is centered on Jesus Christ, occurs within and by the Church, is empowered by the Holy Spirit, and is oriented to final and complete union with God at the end of human history.
As such, it is a vital and indispensable part of the Christian life.
7 / 2 / 1993
About The Only Thing I Learned During My Arguments at Religion Dispatches
I was tempted to post more of that exchange with Matthew Berry posted yesterday. It went on but, as Marilynne Robinson said, it tended to accumulate instead of develop. One point of interest began as the typical dismissal of the story in the Gospel of John, the woman caught in adultery, though, as atheists will do, Berry moved the date of its alleged insertion into John to the 9th century.
The date that the woman caught in adultery was very first added is incredibly easy to establish, which is why I said "at least as late as 800 AD". I can explain why if you'd really like to know.
I welcomed his condescending pose because it made me especially glad to be able to point out that would make its presence in the Codex Bezae, a fifth-century manuscript rather a mystery. I did look up the date to confirm my memory on that point and was interested to find out that no other than the atheists' favorite New Testament scholar, Bart Ehrman, has located it in non-canonical books. While I'm not competent to judge the arguments, in detail, those show that the blog atheist assertions about that story are anything from uninformed to outright fabrication. From a blog by the New Testament Scholar and sometimes debating opponent of Ehrman, Daniel B. Wallace
The great majority of scholars hold that the so-called pericope adulterae or “PA” (the story of Jesus and the adulteress found in John 7.53–8.11) is not original to John’s Gospel. The first manuscript of John to include this story is Codex Bezae (D), which dates to the fifth century, and on internal grounds these verses interrupt the narrative of John’s Gospel and feature non-Johannine vocabulary and grammar. But if the PA is not from the hand of the Fourth Evangelist, where did it come from?
Many scholars have noted that these verses contain distinctively Lukan grammar, vocabulary, and themes, but the lack of early manuscript evidence associating PA with Luke’s Gospel has made this a dead-end. Bart D. Ehrman, however, made a groundbreaking contribution several years ago (“Jesus and the Adulteress,” New Testament Studies 34 [1988]: 24–44) by demonstrating the likelihood that PA as we have it in John’s Gospel is in fact a conflation of two earlier stories, one found in Papias and the Didascalia, and the other found in Didymus and the Gospel of the Hebrews. Erhman noted that all of the Lukan features of PA John are found in the former of these (what I’ve termed “PA East” = John 8.2-7a, 10-11).
My article builds on Ehrman’s contribution by arguing that PA East and the Lukan special material (the so-called “L” source, which is that material unique to Luke’s Gospel) have remarkable similarities in their style, form, and content. Citing distinctive parallels in each category, I conclude in my article that “in terms of style, form, and content, PA East so closely resembles the L material that PA East almost surely would have been part of an original L source” (p. 247). Given a shared Syro-Palestinian provenance, I contend that a single line of transmission from L to the Didascalia is in fact quite plausible.
From all this, I draw several conclusions. Perhaps the most interesting is that “we can affirm the essential historicity of the event recorded in PA to the extent that it is preserved in the Didascalia, since identifying the account with the L source places it into the middle of the first century” (p. 247). Much of this beloved story rings true to what else we know of Jesus’ life and would almost certainly not have been the kind of account the early church would have invented.
As for why Luke left this story out of his Gospel, there’s no reason to think that he included every story he heard, and the non-conflated PA East is a bit of a bore compared to the form that appears in Codex Bezae. Nevertheless, it continued to circulate (likely orally) in Palestine, made its way into the Didascalia, and was ultimately conflated with a similar story and inserted into John’s Gospel. Why? At this point, I’ll simply refer interested parties to the work of Chris Keith, whose proposal I find quite satisfying.
Of course, most ancient texts that come down to us aren't the uhrtext directly from the pen of the author, I doubt any of them are. Pointing that out about the New Testament was what made Ehrman famous with people who didn't know that already and who believed it debunked Christianity. And it's lucky for Ehrman's field that it didn't or they wouldn't have much to make a career out of and he'd never have become famous and gain fans among atheists and get on Fresh Air.
I believe the story and my belief in it works if it is an anachronistic example of modern reportage, which so few atheists would realize was an anachronistic expectation, or if it is an allegory because the result is of a piece with the rest of the teachings of Jesus. As I've recently used the story in an argument against capital punishment, I thought I'd share one of the few things I learned during my arguments at Religion Dispatches this week. Not from an atheist, I had to come across it while looking up a citation for the date of that manuscript.
The date that the woman caught in adultery was very first added is incredibly easy to establish, which is why I said "at least as late as 800 AD". I can explain why if you'd really like to know.
I welcomed his condescending pose because it made me especially glad to be able to point out that would make its presence in the Codex Bezae, a fifth-century manuscript rather a mystery. I did look up the date to confirm my memory on that point and was interested to find out that no other than the atheists' favorite New Testament scholar, Bart Ehrman, has located it in non-canonical books. While I'm not competent to judge the arguments, in detail, those show that the blog atheist assertions about that story are anything from uninformed to outright fabrication. From a blog by the New Testament Scholar and sometimes debating opponent of Ehrman, Daniel B. Wallace
The great majority of scholars hold that the so-called pericope adulterae or “PA” (the story of Jesus and the adulteress found in John 7.53–8.11) is not original to John’s Gospel. The first manuscript of John to include this story is Codex Bezae (D), which dates to the fifth century, and on internal grounds these verses interrupt the narrative of John’s Gospel and feature non-Johannine vocabulary and grammar. But if the PA is not from the hand of the Fourth Evangelist, where did it come from?
Many scholars have noted that these verses contain distinctively Lukan grammar, vocabulary, and themes, but the lack of early manuscript evidence associating PA with Luke’s Gospel has made this a dead-end. Bart D. Ehrman, however, made a groundbreaking contribution several years ago (“Jesus and the Adulteress,” New Testament Studies 34 [1988]: 24–44) by demonstrating the likelihood that PA as we have it in John’s Gospel is in fact a conflation of two earlier stories, one found in Papias and the Didascalia, and the other found in Didymus and the Gospel of the Hebrews. Erhman noted that all of the Lukan features of PA John are found in the former of these (what I’ve termed “PA East” = John 8.2-7a, 10-11).
My article builds on Ehrman’s contribution by arguing that PA East and the Lukan special material (the so-called “L” source, which is that material unique to Luke’s Gospel) have remarkable similarities in their style, form, and content. Citing distinctive parallels in each category, I conclude in my article that “in terms of style, form, and content, PA East so closely resembles the L material that PA East almost surely would have been part of an original L source” (p. 247). Given a shared Syro-Palestinian provenance, I contend that a single line of transmission from L to the Didascalia is in fact quite plausible.
From all this, I draw several conclusions. Perhaps the most interesting is that “we can affirm the essential historicity of the event recorded in PA to the extent that it is preserved in the Didascalia, since identifying the account with the L source places it into the middle of the first century” (p. 247). Much of this beloved story rings true to what else we know of Jesus’ life and would almost certainly not have been the kind of account the early church would have invented.
As for why Luke left this story out of his Gospel, there’s no reason to think that he included every story he heard, and the non-conflated PA East is a bit of a bore compared to the form that appears in Codex Bezae. Nevertheless, it continued to circulate (likely orally) in Palestine, made its way into the Didascalia, and was ultimately conflated with a similar story and inserted into John’s Gospel. Why? At this point, I’ll simply refer interested parties to the work of Chris Keith, whose proposal I find quite satisfying.
Of course, most ancient texts that come down to us aren't the uhrtext directly from the pen of the author, I doubt any of them are. Pointing that out about the New Testament was what made Ehrman famous with people who didn't know that already and who believed it debunked Christianity. And it's lucky for Ehrman's field that it didn't or they wouldn't have much to make a career out of and he'd never have become famous and gain fans among atheists and get on Fresh Air.
I believe the story and my belief in it works if it is an anachronistic example of modern reportage, which so few atheists would realize was an anachronistic expectation, or if it is an allegory because the result is of a piece with the rest of the teachings of Jesus. As I've recently used the story in an argument against capital punishment, I thought I'd share one of the few things I learned during my arguments at Religion Dispatches this week. Not from an atheist, I had to come across it while looking up a citation for the date of that manuscript.
Thursday, June 4, 2015
Crowded Omnibus Post
I have a very busy schedule the next two days, I hope to post some videos or podcasts which are hopefully of interest and a column from Fr. Richard McBrien's archive.
In lieu of anything which requires research I don't have time to do this week, here's an unedited excerpt from the brawl I got into with several atheists at Religion Dispatch which, I must say, seems to have about as many atheist trolls as Media Matters gets Republican trolls. It is long but that's in the nature of blog brawls. I don't want to be accused of "cherry picking" and "quote mining". "Camera Obscura" is me.
In lieu of anything which requires research I don't have time to do this week, here's an unedited excerpt from the brawl I got into with several atheists at Religion Dispatch which, I must say, seems to have about as many atheist trolls as Media Matters gets Republican trolls. It is long but that's in the nature of blog brawls. I don't want to be accused of "cherry picking" and "quote mining". "Camera Obscura" is me.
