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**emjay** · (This post was last modified: January 12, 2017 at 2:19 pm by emjay.)

**Minimalist** · January 12, 2017 at 2:26 pm

Quote:nobody who actually studies Religion academically ends up believing in it

Yeah.... I wonder why that is? Angel

**vorlon13** · January 12, 2017 at 2:33 pm

And as awestruck as Joe Smith claimed to be (in every different version) when he saw God and was then given revelations and a commission to found God's One True Church, Joe ws not bashful at all about changing EVERY revelation he received, and most of them more than once.

We're being asked to believe to incompatible items there, yeppers, God Almighty Himself told me to tell you this stuff, oops, better revise and extend (or curtail) Gods words there, looks like he munged up things . . .

And with OT, oral tales, transmitted generation to generation, then scribes record and then scribes copy (and revise) (and not it was around like 300 or 400AD before the Christian church(es) started using 'professional' scribes instead of volunteers, damn, it's just lunacy to think they have even an inkling of what originally was even being told around the campfires 1500 years before.

**emjay** · January 12, 2017 at 2:48 pm

(January 12, 2017 at 2:33 pm)vorlon13 Wrote: And as awestruck as Joe Smith claimed to be (in every different version) when he saw God and was then given revelations and a commission to found God's One True Church, Joe ws not bashful at all about changing EVERY revelation he received, and most of them more than once.

We're being asked to believe to incompatible items there, yeppers, God Almighty Himself told me to tell you this stuff, oops, better revise and extend (or curtail) Gods words there, looks like he munged up things . . .

And with OT, oral tales, transmitted generation to generation, then scribes record and then scribes copy (and revise) (and not it was around like 300 or 400AD before the Christian church(es) started using 'professional' scribes instead of volunteers, damn, it's just lunacy to think they have even an inkling of what originally was even being told around the campfires 1500 years before.

Is this the Mormon stuff again? I've never considered that to be a real religion, just at best a cult along the lines of Scientology, and thus not worth even considering. But if mainstream Christianity suffers from similar flaws then I'd be very interested to know. For instance in the case of Catholicism, has the Pope ever contradicted himself? Or in Protestant Christianity has any prophet, or even Jesus himself, contradicted himself?

**The Grand Nudger** · (This post was last modified: January 12, 2017 at 3:00 pm by The Grand Nudger.)

All religions begin as cults (not always by their own choice). There's actually a system for determining what stage of development any x is at...I can't remember the name, I'll try to find it for you.

**vorlon13** · January 12, 2017 at 2:59 pm

Indeed.

Mormonism is not unique. The more Ehrman I read, the more I realize religion across time uses the same play book. Some aspects of early Judaism and Christianity don't have parallels in 1800s Mormonism, like oral legends later on being written down centuries later as the Mormons managed to get stuff logged in pretty quickly. But it didn't stop them from changing it though, LOL. And the Mormons accuse the other christer sects of changing things willy nilly, and its true enough, they just hate talking about all the instances they have changed 'sacred' writings, and LOL, even documented and published the differing versions of them.

**The Grand Nudger** · (This post was last modified: January 12, 2017 at 3:03 pm by The Grand Nudger.)

Because religion is a story about people. While the stories have changed alot over the years, people have been remarkably static. The same concerns plagued Uncle Og that plague us today....and the same cons we fall for worked on him as well. In the earliest encampment of our earliest ancestors....there was some asshole running a version of three card monte on his peers.

Wink

**emjay** · (This post was last modified: January 12, 2017 at 3:11 pm by emjay.)

(January 12, 2017 at 2:56 pm)Rhythm Wrote: All religions begin as cults (not always by their own choice). There's actually a system for determining what stage of development any x is at...I can't remember the name, I'll try to find it for you.

(January 12, 2017 at 2:59 pm)vorlon13 Wrote: Indeed.

Mormonism is not unique. The more Ehrman I read, the more I realize religion across time uses the same play book. Some aspects of early Judaism and Christianity don't have parallels in 1800s Mormonism, like oral legends later on being written down centuries later as the Mormons managed to get stuff logged in pretty quickly. But it didn't stop them from changing it though, LOL. And the Mormons accuse the other christer sects of changing things willy nilly, and its true enough, they just hate talking about all the instances they have changed 'sacred' writings, and LOL, even documented and published the differing versions of them.

That's fascinating... I'd never thought of it like that. So true... starts with a small group of people following one person... a self-proclaimed prophet... and I guess morphs from cult to religion the more widespread it gets, and thus less directly reliant on the original prophet?

(January 12, 2017 at 3:08 pm)Emjay Wrote:
(January 12, 2017 at 2:56 pm)Rhythm Wrote: All religions begin as cults (not always by their own choice). There's actually a system for determining what stage of development any x is at...I can't remember the name, I'll try to find it for you.

(January 12, 2017 at 2:59 pm)vorlon13 Wrote: Indeed.

Mormonism is not unique. The more Ehrman I read, the more I realize religion across time uses the same play book. Some aspects of early Judaism and Christianity don't have parallels in 1800s Mormonism, like oral legends later on being written down centuries later as the Mormons managed to get stuff logged in pretty quickly. But it didn't stop them from changing it though, LOL. And the Mormons accuse the other christer sects of changing things willy nilly, and its true enough, they just hate talking about all the instances they have changed 'sacred' writings, and LOL, even documented and published the differing versions of them.

That's fascinating... I'd never thought of it like that. So true... starts with a small group of people following one person... a self-proclaimed prophet... and I guess morphs from cult to religion the more widespread it gets, and thus less directly reliant on the original prophet?

So in a weird way, under that definition, cult would actually be more reliable than religion, because its founder is still around to question and/or its more direct and less based on Chinese Whispers? Wink

~~Drich~~ · January 12, 2017 at 3:26 pm

**emjay** · January 12, 2017 at 3:28 pm

@Rhythm. Just out of interest, what do you think for a course? Philosophy or Religion would be interesting vs Accounting which though boring would be useful. (This is just at A Level - pre degree). Interesting or useful is the choice, but I don't think I can get both Wink

Philosophy would be Epistemology, Ethics, Philosophy of Religion, and Philosophy of Mind; I thought that would be very handy both to test what I already know about the latter, and to learn more about the formers so I have a leg to stand on (or at least the basic ability to decipher Wink

) in the philosophy forum... you know... an education so I can understand your posts Wink

Religious Studies also has a large philosophical bent so that would be interesting too. And accounting is just boring but useful... would look better on my CV probably but would be incredibly dull to study.

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