Why does science always upstage God?

[ayost]

A process of selection of canonical books for the NT that occured from the second century onwards.  There was some bickering and burning at the stake that went on for a while before one sect/interpretation finally prevailed. Gnostics, Nonpaulines, Arians, others were suppressed by political victories. It's quite accidental that one set of texts prevailed. There were some core texts upon which all Christians agreed. But there were also disputed texts.

I know that as time went on in later centuries the church and the state became intertwined in a way that was destructive for the church. And the Church (as in the big organization, not local believers) failed immensely to fulfill Christ's mission. No argument there.

However, the idea that the canon or the body of orthodox beliefs was just the result of political bickering is too simple. First, there's evidence that 22 of the 27 books of the NT were considered core writings by the mid second century. Second, early on as these texts were circulated there was no controlling body forcing people to only read certain things. The NT spread organically through multiple lines that couldn't be controlled. You couldn't suppress writings, they were very where and their transmission uncontrolled. Also, you aren't telling the whole story. Some doctrines survived and won out despite political victories by the opposition, like Arianism and Constantius II. I don't think accidental is a good description. I think there was much more happening than that.

(By the way, welcome to the forums. Pleasure to meet you.)

Thank you, truly. And likewise.

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Do I?  Strange.  It's a good thing you came along to tell me what I think.  I'd have never known otherwise.  

From your response above, you appear to understand perfectly well why your stated view is self referentially false.  You see thousands of years worth of explanations, and competing explanations.  It's almost as if people do have moral systems and explanations for their moral systems.  It's almost as if "because christ" isn't an answer to the question of why or whether it's wrong to curbstomp the neighbors kid..but fuck me if you could think of any reason besides that, eh?  Obviously, if you're that ignorant, then other people must also be.



Get your shit together.  Don't want people to treat you like a dumb asshole, stop putting in the work.

And what happens when one person's moral system collides with another person's moral system and we all start explaining our moral systems?

You act like people have never thought torture was "not wrong", or slavery, or genocide, or rape, or burning babies alive, or sacrificing children. Way worse things than curbstomping a kid have been considered "not wrong".