Robert said
She would not give me the definite answer I was looking for but said something to the effect that everyone would be judged by God based on how they treated other people. 

So beautifully expressed by Leigh Hunt in his poem Abou Ben Adhem. Thanks Robert!

Robert said
Had to look up that poem.

Abou ben Adhem (may his tribe increase)

Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace

And saw amid the moonlight in his room

Making it rich like a lily in bloom,

An angel writing in a book of gold.

Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold,

And to the presence in the room he said,

‘What writest thou?’ The vision raised its head,

And with a look made of all sweet accord

Answered ‘The names of those who love the Lord.’

‘And is mine one?’ asked Abou. ‘Nay, not so,’

Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low,

But cheerly still. He said ‘I pray thee then,

Write me as one who loves his fellow men.’

The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night

He came back with a great awakening light,

Showing the names whom love of God had blest.

And lo! Ben Adhem’s name led all the rest.

nikko said
My wife and I have been married for almost 20 years and we have been in therapy off and on for the last 10 of those years. She has Asperger’s, hence the need for therapy. What I have learned from our therapy is that we all have 2 brains, a right brain (emotional center) and a left brain (cognitive center) and an interface between them. The way I choose to understand this is that the left brain sees the world as it is; the right brain sees it as we want it to be. My wife lives in her right brain. Her brain scan shows a dark left side and a right side that looks like a Christmas tree. I have always said that she doesn’t form opinions, she forms facts. She forms opinions in her right brain and she is certain about them, as certain to her as 2 and 2 is 4. She doesn’t want (doesn’t know how???) to take those opinions to her left brain to fact check them. I fully believe that this is a right brain/left brain thing and not an autism thing. I believe we are all capable of this when we need to be.

When I read the original question, I immediately thought about my wife. That’s how she thinks and not simply about religious matters.  

Coming back to this thread after a while. First of all, congratulations Nikko for staying married for 20 years! My late wife who died in 2012 thought I had Asperger’s syndrome because I often say what I think without consideration for the feelings of others. She may have been right, I don’t know. The point is that like Greta Thunberg who does say what she thinks without prior consideration for the feelings of others, an Asperger’s person is motivated by objective facts. Socrates, Newton, Lincoln and Einstein are reckoned to have had Asperger’s. Probably Saint Paul. Probably even Jesus too! Saying what you think is right, if it’s right, is more important than worrying about what reaction you might provoke. If that’s Asperger’s then I would be proud to be in that exalted company along with Greta Thunberg and your wife.

john76 said

Hey Dirk. You might find this interesting on the topic of Secularism and Belief.  I recently had this article pass peer review on belief in the Gospel of John.  Maybe you could check it out and let me know what you think! ** you do not have permission to see this link **  

Great piece, detailed and scholarly. Beyond my competence to respond adequately! I’ll just give you my rambling train of thought for what it’s worth.

Yep, lots of instances of deception in the bible and in classical literature. You could even go so far as to say that all fiction is a form of deception (as you mention Seneca said about history). Fairy tales, myths and religious stories included. You then have to explain as in your Socrates quote that it’s the psychological truth, not the literal truth, that matters, and this would be the Christian apologist position in many cases I imagine.

‘a lie that makes faith possible’

When President Trump accuses everyone who disagrees with him of lying and being horrible, the whole issue becomes not about truth but about belief, who you want to believe and who’s horrible. The facts take second place. And it was ever thus. People have manipulated each other with lies since the beginning of recorded time, some subtlely, others more crudely. Goebbels said ‘The bigger the lie, and the more often repeated, the more likely it is to be believed’ – Trump’s tactic also. Science and maths are the only disciplines which by means of themselves eliminate falsehood. You can’t lie in maths but in spiritual matters and certainly in politics you can, and sometimes – apparently – must.

Idries Shah relates the story, I think it’s in The Commanding Self (I no longer have a copy), that goes something like this: A man approached a Sufi and said ‘Will you not admit that Sufis practise deception?’ The Sufi replied, ‘I will, and I will do more, explaining why this must be so. People are attracted to things according to their perceived benefit. The invitation to Sufism must be couched initially in terms that appeal to your commanding self (nafs-i-ammarah). When that self is assigned its proper place, the ideas which led it, and which led you, are superseded.’

Jesus as special being to whom the norms of ordinary behaviour seem not to apply: this is also a familiar trope in Sufi tradition, probably other traditions too. Rasputin comes to mind.

As to whether the whole corpus of Christian material is invented, that’s straying into mythicist territory and Bart has I think conclusively pulled that rug out. The tools of textual criticism allow the scholar to distinguish authentic from invented text with a fair amount of accuracy. Then you have the question of what purpose the invention serves, and as Bart has demonstrated in Misquoting Jesus and elsewhere, it serves an a priori belief. The story that doesn’t square with generally held beliefs as they developed over time is likely to be older and more genuine, as you point out with ouk and oupo.