Were other European religions better than Christianity?

[The Grand Nudger]

What pagan re-constructionists or neo-pagans do today is not exactly an accurate representation of what paganism was. Those pagans alive today have the benefit of at least a thousand years of moral and scientific development. They are engaging in a sort of paganism that appeals to their very modern cultures and sensibilities.

[Epimethean]

Some very interesting work has come out on possible early causes and uses for structures such as Stonehenge, and they are far from happy stargazers all singing hymns to Dagda.

[kılıç_mehmet]

I think so. The Pagan religions of Greco Roman Civilization, the Anglo Saxons and the Vikings were in essence far more tolerant to other cultures and didn't have the dogma of Christianity had that all people of other religions should be killed or converted to that religion.

The Roman Empire was a relatively tolerant place religiously until Christianity took hold, and pagans didn't start wars in the name of their religion.

It may be true that they all have the problem of believing in fictional myths but still Paganism >> Christianity and encourages a far better standard of morality.

I think not. I think christianity did do good in putting an end to the violent gladiatorial fights, which were a means of sacrifice to roman gods.
The ancient greeks, gauls and germanic people often sacrificed humans, and suicide was seen by the germanic peoples as a shortcut to Valhalla.

Paganism, is not even a religion. It's a collective name for other religions beside today's world religions.
Not that I do not respect the ancient faiths, and also praise the recon movements for their accuracy and devotion.
However, things like...Wicca and Ecclecticism ring all "fluff" and "teen angst" to me.

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"Better"? Of course not.


Religions have always been invented by men for men.They always reflect the culture ,times and mores of those who invent them.Christianity, a thoroughly derivative religion,is no better or worse than most other religions in human history. It the emphasis believers give their religion which sets its tone. Christians (and theists generally) have always been able to use their religion to justify being dead cunts .Many fundamentalists still do.

Christianity's bloody history says otherwise

But I think that you're simply taking the part of history that you want to suit yourself, and leave the other parts out.
Don't worry. This is a common feature that you share with other anti-theists.
If we, for example, look at the christianisation of Lithuania, we see a crusade. But if we take a look at Ireland, we see a more peaceful conversion.

What exactly do you have to gain by spreading such misinformation?
What, really? Do you feel better about yourself? I think this is young people's stuff. I've known atheists with whom I can have a conversation on religion without that person bringing up the inquisition card, or "bloody history" card. Like, people know how to be bloody without showing any religious reasons.
But most people simply disregard the secular reasons behind the inquisition and cite "they did it fo' jewsus". No, I do not think that it is as simple as that.

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Also, we actually criticize Spaniards who colonized the Americas as brutal, when they destroyed the Aztec empire.
Although it certainly is sad that colonisation has brought destruction upon the people, and later along with slave labor, allowed them to be constantly exploited, it certainly has brought an end to the constant warfare-sacrificial cycle, where the Aztecs went to war with other less powerful tribes or confederacies, brought in trophies in forms of slaves, and later on, sacrificed them on the altars of their pyramids.
This not to say about the general lifestyle of aztecs, as they were, in one form or the other, a near perfectly moral society. Thievery, murder(other than the sacrifices) and most petty crimes were not known to the aztec people.
They were also blessed with plenty in terms of crops, and knew no hunger. They used the gold that is of immense worth to us, as nothing more than decorative ornaments, and did away with the materialistic lifestyles that we share.

[Rokcet Scientist]

[...] gladiatorial fights, which were a means of sacrifice to roman gods.

No.
Gladiatorial fights were first and foremost the football, soccer, or baseball of their time. A way to keep the crowds entertained, happy, and preoccupied with anything except the affairs of state. The classic misdirection m.o. of the elites.
The 'sacrifice to the Roman gods' thing, while another snippet of misdirection functioning as a fig leaf for the gladiator fights, wasn't any more important than the BS Santa story about good and bad kids, while it really is about presents and avarice.

Christianity, a thoroughly derivative religion,is no better or worse than most other religions in human history.

No?
What other religions mounted, first, the genocide of 'others', non-Xtians (the crusades), and then the genocide of their own non-catholics (the Inquisition) on a similar industrial scale?

[kılıç_mehmet]

[...] gladiatorial fights, which were a means of sacrifice to roman gods.

No.
Gladiatorial fights were first and foremost the football, soccer, or baseball of their time. A way to keep the crowds entertained, happy, and preoccupied with anything except the affairs of state. The classic misdirection m.o. of the elites.
The 'sacrifice to the Roman gods' thing, while another snippet of misdirection functioning as a fig leaf for the gladiator fights, wasn't any more important than the BS Santa story about good and bad kids, while it really is about presents and avarice.

Surely they were, but they also held a religious value.
Certainly, the roman religion was just a bastardisation of the Greek religion, with the Greeks, notably lacking such practices, but having other things to boost their egos.

[Epimethean]

You're off on both counts, KM. Bread and circuses, not lions and christians, and Roman religion was much more than a bastardization of Greek religion. What the lay person knows is simply the state cult. The private worship was much more like what we see in Shinto if anything.

[kılıç_mehmet]

You're off on both counts, KM. Bread and circuses, not lions and christians, and Roman religion was much more than a bastardization of Greek religion. What the lay person knows is simply the state cult. The private worship was much more like what we see in Shinto if anything.

Oh truly. And gladiatorial fights were actually nothing more than charity events, I presume.
It certainly was a bastardisation of the greek religion, as the romans themselves proclaimed to be descendants of greeks, although the greeks still regarded the romans(latins) as below them on the greek-barbarian scale.
And just like the greeks, they made offerings to their gods in terms of sacrifices, used divination and oracles and everything that their little latin hearts desired.

Christianity, along with the shrinking of the empire had actually positive effects on the abolition of the gladiatorial events, as the newer emperors saw fit to abolish these pagan rituals...

[Epimethean]

A. Gladiatorial spectacles were political and social in nature. The dollop of "religion" on them was a mere formality-a nod to the by-then not very sacred state cult.
B. You are stuck thinking only of Zeus/Jupiter and his ilk, which shows that you no nothing about the familial cult.
C. The Romans did not portray themselves to be descendants of the Greeks, save in poetic ways and tropes, nor were they. Re-read the Aeneid, and reconsider the meaning of the Trojan War in it. The Romans considered themselves very "other" than Greek. They absorbed the Greek state cult because it preserved a tradition of learning they found engaging, and it made for good showmanship.

You should put "pagan" in quotes there, as the contests were not ritualistic.

[kılıç_mehmet]

A. Gladiatorial spectacles were political and social in nature. The dollop of "religion" on them was a mere formality-a nod to the by-then not very sacred state cult.
B. You are stuck thinking only of Zeus/Jupiter and his ilk, which shows that you no nothing about the familial cult.
C. The Romans did not portray themselves to be descendants of the Greeks, save in poetic ways and tropes, nor were they. Re-read the Aeneid, and reconsider the meaning of the Trojan War in it. The Romans considered themselves very "other" than Greek. They absorbed the Greek state cult because it preserved a tradition of learning they found engaging, and it made for good showmanship.

You should put "pagan" in quotes there, as the contests were not ritualistic.

a.Still does not explain how they were abolished after christianity became the dominant religion in the empire.
b. Familial cult? You mean like ancestor worship?
c.True. I know most of that already. They also knew that the greeks didn't consider them amongst their own, and called them pussies because they spent the whole day doing nothing while thinking about the nature of the universe or something. Romans were, in most ways, quite practical.

And well, the spectacles were far from simple fights to the death. They often were staged to depict historical battles, or even myths of the roman religion.

[Epimethean]

To answer your first question, simply because "christian" emperors removed the gladiatorial combats due to their "pagan" nature is probably not the best leg to stand on-unless you want to say that Hitler was right when he declared Jews to be the enemy ...

As for your last contention, have you noticed how similar those themes are to modern day motion pictures? I don't watch Clash of the Titans because I am pagan-nor do all christians avoid them because they are such.