(May 22, 2015 at 9:18 pm)Nestor Wrote:
(May 22, 2015 at 9:05 pm)Simon Moon Wrote: By the way, you do know that the original use of 'atheist' was by the Greeks to describe Christians, right?
I don't think so; maybe the Romans used it against the Christians' impiety towards the state religion but as far as I know the first accusations of "atheism" go back to 5th century Greece. Anaxagoras and Socrates were accused of atheism (the latter most definitely falsely), and then there was Theodorus the Atheist (possibly in the true sense) and Diagoras "The Atheist" of Melos, who, according to Cicero,
Quote:when Diagoras, he who is called ἄθεος, having come to Samothrace, was asked by one of his friends whether he who thought that the gods were careless of human affairs, did not perceive from so many painted tablets how many there were whose vows had enabled them to escape the fury of the storm, and to make their way safe into port, “That is so,” he replied, “because there are no pictures anywhere of those who have been shipwrecked and have perished in the sea”. Once also when he was on a voyage, and the passengers, alarmed and terrified by adverse storms, said to him that they deserved to fare as they did for having taken him on board the same ship, he pointed out to them several other ships struggling in the same course, and asked whether they believed that those also had a Diagoras on board.
ἄθεος - http://biblehub.com/greek/112.htm
You're are correct, Romans, not Greeks.
"It is ironic that in the Roman Empire, one of the accusations brought against the early Christians was that they were Atheists," Historian Dr. Augustus Neander and Historian John L. von Mosheim commented.
You'd believe if you just opened your heart" is a terrible argument for religion. It's basically saying, "If you bias yourself enough, you can convince yourself that this is true." If religion were true, people wouldn't need faith to believe it -- it would be supported by good evidence.
