(February 14, 2020 at 4:25 pm)Abaddon_ire Wrote:(February 14, 2020 at 2:24 am)Belacqua Wrote: It may be that you're arguing against a specific kind of naive Christian theology.
That would be most christians. Most of them have not even read their magic book cover to cover, let alone studied Plato or Aristotle or any of it. It is impossibly naive of you to even suggest that this might be the case.
Ask yourself a simple question. If an atheist wishes to counter christianity, is his/her time best spent addressing the vast bulk of christianity, or the few christian cranks who fell out of the philosophy tree hitting every branch on the way down?
I'll give you a little spoiler: it is also a useless exchange with the philosopher-wannabe's of Christianity whose study of the great thinkers in history has led him to conclude that magic is real and who tells you tell you that you are ignorant and shallow.
teachings of the Bible are so muddled and self-contradictory that it was possible for Christians to happily burn heretics alive for five long centuries. It was even possible for the most venerated patriarchs of the Church, like St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas, to conclude that heretics should be tortured (Augustine) or killed outright (Aquinas). Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches. - Sam Harris, "Letter To A Christian Nation"