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The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

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Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#601

Post by lo_zamoyski »

mullingitover wrote: post #384
lo_zamoyski wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To be clear, it isn’t wealth per se that is taught is evil, but attachment to it and pining for it. The prosperity gospel demonstrates this perverse and unhealthy lust for riches. Many don’t pay attention to the fuller context. And Jesus said to his disciples, “Truly, I say to you, only with difficulty will a rich person enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of…

It's clear that that proper practice for a wealthy person would be to immediately jettison the wealth. Matt 19:21 NIV: "Jesus answered, “If you want to be perfect, go, sell your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me.” So if you're wealthy and poor people exist , you're in a state of sin. Christianity is an apocalyptic religion, you're to assume the world could en…

I've already explained why this interpretation is wrong. Your interpretation is only "clear" if you ignore context and prooftext. The rich man's response to Jesus's challenge reveals his attachment to wealth, even as he stands before God Himself who has the rich man's best interest in mind. (Consider also John 12:1-50.)

The message is that spiritual goods are superior to material goods, and that the former should be prioritized over the latter, or that the latter ultimately exist in service of the former. The wealth of the rich man is not the source of his obstacle to spiritual good; it is his attachment to his wealth that stands in the way.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#602

Post by krapp »

atoav wrote: post #573
paulryanrogers wrote: post #34

[flagged]

Not to be that guy, but I always wondered how "reign a 1000 years" square with the Jesus as he was in fact depicted in the bible. Didn't exactly strike me as the guy who would be interested in reigning, more like a guy who the people who acrually like to reign would get rid off because he's an uppity socialist that gives common folks ideas that make them demand more of their lives.

Jesus is like any other "mythological" figure[0] in that the narratives presented about him reflect the specific cultural and political biases of the authors, and serve to frame their particular agenda. It doesn't surprise me at all that the motif of "Jesus as conquering king" would make it into a Biblical canon commissioned by a king in part to solidify their claim of authority through divine right, while others might fall by the wayside and be declared heresies.

[0] not in the sense of being purely fictional - it's likely there was an actual "Jesus," supernatural claims aside - but in the sense of being mythologized and having stories written about oneself which may or may not be true but tend to form some cultural canon.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#603

Post by HexDecOctBin »

recursivedoubts wrote: post #586
HexDecOctBin wrote: post #577

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And Hinduism is a so-called pagan religion. Thus, there was no need to pretend that only Abrahamic faiths have a sense of morality.

Did I say anything about abrahamic religions?

No, but you did talk about pagans in a demeaning fashion.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#604

Post by aspenmayer »

dragonwriter wrote: post #467
AngryData wrote: post #396

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a side note, tankie doesn't mean socialist, tankie is a slur against authoritarians that was invented by socialists to call people out for abandoning socialist principles in favor of authoritarian control.

Yeah, I think people outside of the socialist sphere whose understanding of ideology is limited to a one-dimensional spectrum see it as a slur by moderate socialists against more extreme socialists but that's not how it is seen by those using it.

I liken the concept of tankie to that of jumping the shark by Fonzie on Happy Days. I wonder if there's some kind of portmanteau going on there in the etmology? Maybe a (now-discontinued SAT test style) analogy will help show how I think this might have occurred, or a least provide a potentially helpful backronymic mnemonic device? I think I have made my relations clear conceptually, and I think the analogy works and the wordplay seems like it could be intentional, but I can't say what was going through the mind of whoever first used the word tankie to refer to socialists who essentially backslide into fascism after some kind of failed revolution, if I understand the proper usage as understood by modern leftists correctly.

Tankie (authoritarianism with little red flags (after precipitating incident)) is to Tank Man (precipitating incident) in relation to China (socialist status quo (before precipitating incident)), is as Fonzie is to jumping the shark in relation to Happy Days.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#605

Post by munksbeer »

DevKoala wrote: post #408
paulryanrogers wrote: post #34

[flagged]

What is the cognitive dissonance true believers learn to live with?

That prayer works.

(Many) true believers believe that prayer has the power to heal people. So if you pray for someone with cancer, and they get better, then it shows the power of prayer.

If you pray for someone with cancer, and they don't get better, then it was all part of God's plan.

This may not strictly meet the definition of cognitive dissonance, but it is close enough for me.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#606

Post by 1718627440 »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #459
freedomben wrote: post #433

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is amazing how rapidly the whole thing shimmies apart once the first domino starts to fall. For me it was Theodicy, and the backbending required to explain whose "free will" is to blame for hurricanes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters that kill hordes of innocent people (including children) every year.

It gets worse. Spend any time reading about psychology and it becomes obvious that the OT god ticks all the boxes for grandiose narcissistic personality disorder. The OT god is an abuser who demands unconditional and unquestioning love and admiration and threatens disobedience with eternal torture. It's textbook. The NT is more complex, but huge swathes of Christianity are still hypnotised by the OT. They like the id…

Maybe a grandiose narcissistic personality is what makes people do things? Where is the problem with that?

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#607

Post by kelseyfrog »

recursivedoubts wrote: post #571
kelseyfrog wrote: post #570

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're a Therapeutae, yes. Sadly they were the only one's to get it right.

i don't know what that means, but I still think the strong shouldn't take advantage of the weak, and I think all humans know that's true

I can see how that's appealing. One of the most common human behaviors is creating rules or in this case moral rules, and then doing a mental switcheroo where they forget that they made the rules and attribute them to universal principles, reality, truth, etc.

In general, the process of believing concepts are real objects - simply observations of reality - is called reification. Every society does it and the result is that human constructs feel as if they are inalienable truths about how reality works. The only problem is that it's culturally specific and as we know, each culture works differently and yet feels as if they've gotten it right - their concept of how things works happens to match reality.

One of the downsides to this is that we often project our own ideas of reality onto strangers especially from other societies. "Of course they protect the weak," we tell ourselves, when in fact, they're operating on a completely different set of moral relations. When our projects override objectivity, we deny ourselves the beauty of seeing the world in a new way. We rob ourselves of appreciating the magnificence of the diversity of human experience.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#608

Post by ZoomZoomZoom »

MonkeyClub wrote: post #581
ZoomZoomZoom wrote: post #546

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Only if you're good at it.

Even if you're bad at it, you still get what you asked for. It just may be more distant from what you wanted the worse you are.

Yeah, that's one way of looking at it. The other is: the whole stack is full of bugs, ambiguities, UB, wrong docs, non-covered edge cases, etc.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#609

Post by Zigurd »

freedomben wrote: post #432
hinkley wrote: post #386

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Throwing down moneylenders tables in the temple is pretty unambiguous. How many times did Jesus show violence or aggression? That’s the only one I can think of really. Though he did throw out some wicked burns a time or two.

> How many times did Jesus show violence or aggression? That’s the only one I can think of really. I think you might be forgetting about the bulk of the Old Testament

Holy continuity problem, Batman! That character only shows up in the sequel.

Re: The Polymarket users betting on when Jesus will return

#610

Post by Zigurd »

plorg wrote: post #230
guywithahat wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes you, presumably someone who is not a christian and has never read the bible, know better than billions of christians and the millions of people who've actually read the bible. I'm not religious, but this is a bad take.

>Yes you, presumably someone who is not a christian and has never read the bible... > I'm not religious, but this is a bad take. ???

"I didn't vote for..." "I'm apolitical..."
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