RE: Intelligence is a Curse
September 11, 2011 at 6:15 pm
(This post was last modified: September 11, 2011 at 6:16 pm by salty.)
(September 11, 2011 at 10:27 am)thesummerqueen Wrote: What of it indeed?
People who take the Bible literally - as in actually believe the world was created in six days, and that whole lot of crap - are experiencing a massive cognitive dissonance that makes me worry about their sanity. It means they are ignoring all of the information we have obtained since that book was written down - since their stories were first oral traditions from people with goats and tents! - and sticking to iron age beliefs.
In my mind it seems easier for some people to "relinquish" their control of their own judgment over to "Jesus" rather than reasoning through things. Thus they look to the Bible for inspiration, and it's a shite book to do so because of the ability to cherry pick whatever information you want in order to justify yourself. This is what happens when you take a book of stories and invest it with divine meaning. Thus those atrocities mentioned are just as apt to be used for justification as Jesus' teachings are for love. I hate to burst yours or any other Christian's bubble, but it's perfectly feasible for you to put down the book of conflicting stories and be just as wonderful a person as you are simply by having compassion and empathy. I do not need to be told what the "right" thing to do is because god or Jesus told me so. In my mind, by telling people they are inherently sinners and then saying they have to give themselves over to Christ in order to avoid that sin, you create nothing but more sinners as they lose their belief that they have the power to take their life into their own hands. It's also part and parcel with misguided societal rules that became bound up specifically in Judaism itself, passed down to Christianity - values about sex and marriage, etc, that really have no bearing on our current society.
A woman telling Alei that intelligence is a curse is struggling against her own crisis of faith as she realizes discrepancies in the Bible. Humility is not the answer, and I rather find it insulting to listen to people say they only did what they accomplished through the power of God. Even on my best days struggling with the fact that I didn't believe, I couldn't bring myself to think that an all-powerful God gave a shit about our minute struggles (especially those assholes in sports who say they won because of Jesus). Also, if we were specifically created in his/her image, how is it in any way a point of pride to continually debase yourself against these god-given gifts? Rather, it would seem more productive to me for people to be more honest with themselves about their abilities and put them to use propping up others, sharing and sharing alike. No need to be falsely humble just to make other people feel better about themselves.
I rather think a lot of generalizations are being made here. Not all Christians loathe intelligence - in fact I know a number of rather emotionally and mentally stimulating people of different faiths. The distinction you have to make is whether or not they have that ridiculous CD working against them. Some people just feel better believing that in the end there is something watching out for them, even though they continue to power through their lives under their own steam. I've got no beef with those people, unless they want to get into an argument with me. I DO have beef with anyone of any faith who wants to say that knowledge is dangerous to God. If God created the world, then he/she created the evidence that we're now finding. Isn't that reasonable? Unless you want to assume a devil, which I have to admit I never do - such a concept never entered into mainstream Jewish thought. The only thing I can suss out of this is the concept that we shouldn't seek to be like god and know all things, because only god is capable of doing so. That still doesn't make any sense - if god is an all-powerful being, more than likely we will never as a human race know all there is to know and understand, so really it's more like God were one of us making sure we as ants never progressed past our little dirt hills.
All knowledge is worth having. No one should ever be scared of intelligence, and I further suspect that Alei's friend was suffering from a sense of insecurity realizing that her friend had intelligence she lacked - or rather, had never explored. I won't be so mean as to say she's not capable of it, but I will say her insistence on clinging to the idea that she musn't explore it in order to maintain her faith is reprehensible and sickening to the extreme.
A very in depth response. Very thorough. I appreciate your view of the situation and I agree that Alei's friend probably felt insecure.
"And without faith it is impossible to please God, because anyone who comes to him must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who earnestly seek him." Hebrews 11:6