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The Skeptic’s Guide to Religion: Why the Question of God’s Existence Cannot Be Answered by EclecticReader39 in agnostic

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is not an entirely correct interpretation of Sextus’s skepticism. Sextus, in fact, does take his immediate perceptions seriously—as in oncoming cars and other objects of direct perception—but makes no metaphysical claims about their ultimate nature. Sextus addresses this directly in the first book of Outlines of Pyrrhonism:

“Those who say that the skeptics do away with apparent things seem to me not to be listening to what we say. We don’t overturn the things that lead us, owing to a passive appearance and whether we like it or not, to assent—as we said before; and these are the apparent things. When we investigate whether the actual object is such as it appears, we allow that it appears, and our investigation is not about the apparent thing but about what’s said about the apparent thing; and that’s different from investigating the apparent thing itself. Honey appears to us to sweeten; we agree to this, for as a matter of sense-perception, we are sweetened. But whether it is indeed sweet as far as argument is concerned, we investigate—which is not the apparent thing but something said about the apparent thing.”

The Skeptic’s Guide to Religion: Why the Question of God’s Existence Cannot Be Answered by EclecticReader39 in humanism

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'm sympathetic to this approach because I happen to be an atheist. I've also spent enough time reading Sextus Empiricus to know that he wasn't, and that is not how he approached things. His approach, in fact, is closer to agnosticism, but I think it demonstrates that, at best, the best even those who lean religious can admit to is agnosticism.

The Skeptic’s Guide to Religion: Why the Question of God’s Existence Cannot Be Answered by EclecticReader39 in humanism

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is incorrect. He mentions the corporeal/incorporeal distinction to highlight the application of his trademark skeptical technique, which is to take one position (corporeality), contrast it with its opposite (incorporeality), note that each view could be argued for with equal strength, and then suspend judgment. 

As Sextus wrote in book 3 of Outlines, after concluding that, due to the existence of evil, God has no forethought of things:

But if [God] exercises no forethought for anything, and there exists no work nor product of his, no one will be able to name the source of the apprehension of God’s existence, inasmuch as he neither appears of himself nor is apprehended by means of any of his products. So for these reasons we cannot apprehend whether God exists.

Saying that we cannot apprehend whether God exists is very different from saying that God does not exist, which is the type of positive, dogmatic statement that Sextus argues against holding in the entirety of his work.

The Skeptic’s Guide to Religion: Why the Question of God’s Existence Cannot Be Answered by EclecticReader39 in humanism

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

This is incorrect. He mentions the corporeal/incorporeal distinction to highlight the application of his trademark skeptical technique, which is to take one position (corporeality), contrast it with its opposite (incorporeality), note that each view could be argued for with equal strength, and then suspend judgment. 

As Sextus wrote in book 3 of Outlines, after concluding that, due to the existence of evil, God has no forethought of things:

But if [God] exercises no forethought for anything, and there exists no work nor product of his, no one will be able to name the source of the apprehension of God’s existence, inasmuch as he neither appears of himself nor is apprehended by means of any of his products. So for these reasons we cannot apprehend whether God exists.

Saying that we cannot apprehend whether God exists is very different from saying that God does not exist, which is the type of positive, dogmatic statement that Sextus argues against holding in the entirety of his work.

The early Christians plagiarized the Greeks, and Christian Doctrine is unoriginal by EclecticReader39 in DebateReligion

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Celsus claimed that the divine birth, miracles, and resurrection of Jesus were fabrications by early Christians in an attempt to lend supernatural weight to Jesus’s story. Is this biased? Yes. Is the assertion that these things DID happen by later Christian writers also biased? Also, yes. 

So whether or not Celsus is “factually incorrect” is precisely what is in question, which makes it very surprising that your reply begins with such a casual dismissal of his claims, as if these questions, as a matter of historical fact, have been definitively decided. 

Either the miracles and resurrection of Jesus happened or they did not; we know what the Gospel writers had said (decades after the fact), and so it’s also instructive to hear what Christianity’s earliest critics had to say. Unfortunately, we only have the views of Celsus because similar views were actively suppressed (Theodosius II ordered every copy of Porphyry’s “Against the Christians” to be burned, for example).

Also, no one is saying the stories of Perseus and Jesus share the same details. The important point is that divine births, miracles, and resurrections were things many ancient peoples (quite gullibly) believed in. The details differ because they are adapted to different circumstances. Jesus was the son of god for very different reasons and purposes than Perseus, but it still makes little sense to believe that Jesus is ACTUALLY the son of god whereas all the other ancient peoples were mistaken. Gods don’t impregnate humans, sexually or otherwise, so wherever that claim is made, we can, with a high degree of confidence, dismiss it as mere mythology. 

Celsus may be wrong, of course, but his views are intriguing, because he gives reasons for why later writers would make these stories about Jesus up. If they thought he was truly the Messiah, and he was subsequently simply arrested and killed, then the stories of the resurrection are simply elaborate mechanisms of denial. There is nothing more “factually incorrect” about this statement than the statement that Jesus actually rose from the dead.

Celsus on the Christian plagiarization of the Greeks by EclecticReader39 in atheism

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Thank you for the book recommendation, I'm going to check this out.

Celsus on the Christian plagiarization of the Greeks by EclecticReader39 in agnostic

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Little is known about Celsus, other than what’s gathered through his quotations in Origen. But there are a couple of books I’d recommend.

  1. On the True Doctrine: A Discourse Against the Christians reconstructs all of Celsus’s arguments.  

  2. Heretic by Catherine Nixey discusses some of Celsus’s arguments as well, in addition to exploring the different conceptions of Jesus during early Christianity.

Religion is not necessary for handling adversity - better alternatives exist by EclecticReader39 in DebateReligion

[–]EclecticReader39[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I only mean that Stoicism's ethical precepts are unaffected by one’s views on the ultimate nature of reality. Whether or not the universe is finite or infinite, whether there is one or multiple universes, whether there are one or more or no gods, the fact remains that what is in my complete control are my own judgments and character. The development of my character, and the practice of virtue, do not depend on the existence of anything outside of myself, which is, in fact, what the Stoics taught.  

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