Dear Beth
I will go straight to your post as I am a bit in a hurry, and have to start work. In my previous post I said. :
I do not see as an example Islam as anywhere remotely the same. It advocates violence …………………..and you answered me.
That is because you are seeing Islam clearly as a religion at work in the world, and not looking to the content of the Koran. Their sacred book is just as beautiful in its own way as the bible. But Mohammad was just a man -- or perhaps even someones idea of a divine man -- and moreover, what Islam does and what the Koran says to do are very different things. What I meant to say, or thought I was saying, was that the teaching of Jesus as seen and understood in the New Testament, is not remotely comparable to the sayings of Muhammad in the Koran. The overall tone of the New Testament is in fact as you know non Violent. It is based on, loving your enemies, do good to those who hate you and pray for those who despite fully use and persecute you.
The content in the Koran however, actively promotes aggression towards unbelievers if they are a threat to a geographical area inhabited by Muslims, or the Muslim faith. Sharia law advocates stoning offenders etc. It is not a very difficult thing to assert. If you would like to I could find the passages for you in the Koran but I assume you read it before commenting as above.
It is however very comparable to the Old Testament. What some Islamists do, is certainly wrong in relation to the Koran, as it is the duty of every Muslim to fight when their faith is being attacked. The fundamentalists actually follow the Koran pretty strictly, and correctly I would conclude, as opposed to the multitude of Muslims who, drink steal and refrain from praying etc. Much like the masses of Christianity, the people do not follow the teachings in their sacred book. The difference is obvious to me.
While you are seeing Islam clearly as a machine of manipulation to commit violence, you are failing to see how Christianity it just as bad when it comes to manipulating the people to blindly follow their leaders in the name of their God.
America's entire government is very wrapped up in Christianity throughout the Senate and the House, as well as the Supreme Court. They are not making the decisions that they make out of a place of LOVE, rather out of a place of power, money and the establishment of "Christian and BIBLICAL morality" (not to mention in order to keep their jobs.) And--I should add--we are not talking about LOVE as a moral code either. …….This is a point you repeatedly bring up Beth, you have typed out this fact in so many ways, and every time you do I say that I agree with you. We were however not talking about the political machine, of these two different faiths, but we were talking about the two teachings. In one the teachings is to love the enemies of your faith, and in the other to kill them.
Likewise, according to the bible, the Jews killed Jesus, so the Christians (Protestant and the Vatican) did nothing to stop Hitler from slaughtering them. It took the bombing of Pearl Harbor for America to even get involved in WWII, so who knows what else Hitler would have done if the Japanese hadn't bombed America at all. Both of these cultural tragedies were successful because even though the bible says to love one another, that did not include slaves and Jews. In fact, those who held the power to stop these travesties, actually justified them by quoting the bible!!!
This is your conclusion, not a fact. I realize this may have some truth to it, and that the leaders of various parties countries and groups churches etc. likely did this, scriptures can be twisted omitted and even changed, and even the masses may have felt this way, or even been taught this way. To conclude everybody did is not correct. I recall some pretty interesting comments from Luther about the Jews, however I do not see this in the New Testament. The religious leaders in cohorts with the power that be, used their influence to incite to the atrocities we see all over the world, but as I said somewhere else, Lenin used Darwin and humanism and other tyrants used other writings. Atrocities have not only been committed by Religious people.
As I have said to you before David, I cannot tell you what the TRUTH is. I can only tell you what the TRUTH is NOT. And the bible was not historical. It was allegory for spiritual and philosophical principles.
What I meant was : what the truth is in said context. Is the Bible a historical believable book. I am sure you realize that I do not ask you to tell me what the truth is in general. I am sure that you know this Beth. I do understand your point however.
In fact, the only TRUTH that I would offer you is the one that you are already well aware of: that only through LOVE and UNDERSTANDING can any of us be saved from the evils of this world. The rest of the TRUTH only God knows. Well in that case I would say that you may be more Christian than you realize. “This is true holiness ……………” You know the verse I am sure.
Exactly.
You need not do anything different, except to know that what you are using as a power source is a universal principle that has been personified into a story about that universal principle. You may still "need" the bible for your support, but you do not need to associate yourself with Christianity to do so. You can continue to do your good works in the name of God, because Christianity does not "own the rights to God." And I certainly plan to do so. This was never my point. I think, you conclude a lot of things out of habit. You automatically think I must be like the Christians in your country. We covered that, Christians are very different world over. Most worship in their homes or in nature and Churches as such is a very American thing. Most of the Free Churches in Europe look at what is happening in the US and shake their head, except for the few who invite such ass….. as Benny Hinn, and claim to be one with their American brothers and sisters. They actually appear to support Americanism and subsequently the war and Israel’s right and all that. For the record I have not been to a church in some 20 years and don’t plan to I am far to busy to sit and listen to those guys droning on and on about principles they don’t live. As I said that dog don’t hunt. I do however believe that I need to associate myself with the Bible, since this is where this truth is written down and where the ideas seem to have originated.
But it (the N.E.V principle) doesn't work in your favor David.
The reason why you cannot use this principle to support your argument is because what you are trying to prove that something DID happen, i.e., it could have all happened, and this is a principle that supports that something DID NOT happen. This principle establishes and supports a lack of evidence.
Your application does not stand up to the same analysis. What I actually said Beth was that “in an uncanny way I use this same principle. What I meant was, that I use the name of Jesus and it has an effect. In my mind there is no doubt of that. I have uses it in exorcisms with which I have had a fair amount of experience in India, with people who by and large, do not even know who he was. The spiritual power in that name is awesome. In order for you to understand that, you would have to have seen it. There is currently a thread on the pulse about this, I think it is in the spiritual self defense threads. I use the principles in the Bible in the way it is laid out and for me this works, and I know for many others as well. This is my “uncanny way” of using it. I know it’s not historical but I was trying to let you know what happens in my mind and why I adhere to it.
There are plenty of sacred ideas and concepts from all over the world that WORK. But none of them work because they are written down in a book, or just because people believe in them. Sacred truths are universal truths and therefore TRUE regardless of whether they are ever written down by anyone at all.I agree to that, this is why I said that you actually seem more Christian than most Church people I met. Many people do. 1John 4:8 states that the people who love know God and those who do not love does not, because God is love. My conclusion is that there are millions of people on the earth who are in effect Christians. This is where Universal Reconciliation comes in. The problem is that they do not know it. Equivalent to someone using lets say esp clairvoyance and even prophecy but not knowing it. It says about the High Priest :”……this he said knowing not that he prophesied” It is a all inclusive principle. "Someone said there is nothing wrong with Christianity the only problem is so few people ever tried it."
Prophecies are interesting literary phenomena. Yes, they can certainly be written down after they have been fulfilled -- but -- the key is whether or not they were actually fulfilled. Agreed, let me work on that and send you a few examples later on.
In the case of the bible, all that was needed was access to the original texts where the prophecies were written down, and the current writer just writes the fulfillment of the prophecy into his/her story. Fulfillment is NOT necessary and it is clear that the NT writers were quoting from the Greek Old Testament. The biblical prophecies of the OT that appear to have been fulfilled in the NT is just a literary continuation of an older epic collection of stories. Simple as that. I can see your point, and that would be a way to explain it, but it would have to be a conspiracy of quite a magnitude, and would have to have been a known fact. This does seem to be a far shot Beth.
Be who you are, do what you do, but please don't feel like you have to defend or have "faith" in something that has been raped of all of its goodness. As I said Beth, I am on a pursuit for the truth in said matter. Please do me a favor, not to conclude that I am trying to defend something I “know” is rotten and false. That would make me a hypocrite or whatever,I ain't trying to defend anything. If you see me as a defender of the faith, and yourself as a pursuer of truth, it is obvious that we would have some problems, I assure you that is not the case. We are on the same shelf. It would be tantamount to me constantly telling you to stop attacking a Faith just because you were hurt by some people who preach it. After having known you for as long as I have, I have chosen to believe, that you as I, are just simply committed to figuring out what is the truth here, and drawing each others motives into question makes no sense.
OK that was the questions. Furthermore I want to explain you something else. The reason I am still going at this is this. With the Internet large amounts of information has been made available. It is however prudent to go slow, at asserting what information is true and what is a lie. Take the example of revisionism. Holocaust denial. Take a look at this link
http://www.jewwatch.com/index.htmhttp://www.revisionists.com/index.htmlThese people write about another accepted fact in the History of the world, one that has also lead and guided as well as had a untold effect on the world as we know it. It is however near impossible for me as a layman to precisely determine if his or their claims are correct. Their arguments are very strong yet there are people who oppose their line of argument. These people interpret the research differently, and conclude differently. This is my issue, although I understand all your points, and as a person believes you are very sincere, truth seeking and an expert at what you do, you are still to me and others a voice on the net. I do understand that you also build your argument on the research of others but there are different ways to see historical evidence. There are so many issues that appear to be right when you read about them from one guy and also right when they are told by others. Revisionism as defined in the Wikipedia is:
Historical revisionism (negationism)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Historical revisionism is the attempt to change commonly held ideas about the past. In its legitimate form (see historical revisionism) it is the reexamination of historical facts, with an eye towards updating historical narratives with newly discovered, more accurate, or less biased information, acknowledging that history of an event, as it has been traditionally told, may not be entirely accurate.
Historical revisionism (also but less often in English "negationism"[1]), as used in this article, describes the process that attempts to rewrite history by downgrading, denying or simply ignoring essential facts. Perpetrators of such attempts to distort the historical record often use the term because it allows them to cloak their illegitimate activities with a phrase which has a legitimate meaning.
In some countries historical revisionism (negationism) of certain historical events is a criminal offence. Examples of historical revisionism (negationism) include Holocaust denial and Soviet history. Negationism relies on a number of techniques such as logical fallacies and appeal to fear. Negationism can be found in literature, for example Nineteen Eighty-Four by George Orwell and is used by hate groups on the Internet.
(end quote)
It would seem essential that such a serious and specific claim is tested and that it is researched properly. You as a researcher would be in support of that, and I know that you have nothing against this (getting to know you) so I ask that you have some patience and that you refrain from looking at me as someone who denies the truth, just because I am a bit skeptical. I am getting around to it. I have a large Family, a job etc and cannot sit using most my time at this. Furthermore I am not an intellectual and have very little aptitude for this type of thing.
My last question to you is that if you have time, I know you are busy as well, would you read the following article and give me your opinion on it in relation to your own research and conclusions. It is written in a language I cannot hardly understand but is interesting.
WHY REVISIONISM ISN’T
Introduction
This essay describes, from a methodological perspective, some of the inherent flaws in the "revisionist" 1 approach to the history of the Holocaust. It is not intended as a polemic, nor does it attempt to ascribe motives. Rather, it seeks to explain the fundamental error in the "revisionist" approach, as well as why that approach of necessity leaves no other choice.
It concludes that "revisionism" is a misnomer because the facts do not accord with the position it puts forward and, more importantly, its methodology reverses the appropriate approach to historical investigation.
What Is the Historical Method?
History is the recorded narrative of past events, especially those concerning a particular period, nation, individual, etc. It recounts events with careful attention to their importance, their mutual relations, their causes and consequences, selecting and grouping events on the ground of their interest or importance. 2 It can be seen from this that history acknowledges the existence of events and facts and seeks to understand how they came about, what they resulted in, how they are interconnected and what they mean.
The distinctions need to be made among facts, analysis and interpretation. Facts are demonstrably empirical events whose occurrence can be proven using evidentiary methods. Analysis is the method of determining or describing the nature of a thing by resolving it into its parts. Interpretation is the attempt to give the meaning of something. It follows that facts lead to analysis which leads to interpretation. And it follows that each step in the process is more subjective than the preceding step.
In this context, history is inductive in its methodology, in that it accumulates the facts, tries to determine their nature and their connectivities and then attempts to weave them into an understandable and meaningful mosaic.
What is Legitimate Historical Revisionism?
On its basic level, revisionism is nothing more than than the advocacy of revision, which in itself is the act of revising, or modifying something that already exists. Applied to history, it means that historians challenge the accepted version of the causes or consequences of historical events. As such, it is an accepted and important part of historical endeavour for it serves the dual purpose of constantly re-examining the past while also improving our understanding of it. Indeed, if one accepts that history attempts to help us better understand today by better understanding how we got here, revisionism is essential.
Three examples of legitimate historical revisionism should suffice to illustrate this:
1. A.J.P. Taylor has applied a very new interpretation to the events leading up to the Second World War. He minimizes Hitler's role in those events - the Anschluß with Austria, the annexation of the Sudetenland, the Danzig crisis, the role of the Allies, appeasement - compared to the standard interpretation, while portraying Nazi Germany as much less centralized and monolithic than the norm. 3
2. Daniel Jonah Goldhagen has challenged virtually all the usual interpretations of the reasons for the complicity of many Germans in the perpetration of the Holocaust, and has posited that ordinary Germans willingly involved themselves because of the existence of a deep-rooted, eliminationist antisemitism in Germans of that era. He downplays, if not outright dismisses, the influence of Hitler and the Nazi Party. 4
3. German historian Christian Gerlach has interpreted a diary entry by Joseph Goebbels and a newly discovered one from Heinrich Himmler to mean that the date of the decision by Hitler to exterminate the Jews is in December 1941 rather than late spring or early summer as most have till now believed. 5
What Do "Revisionists" Do?
"Revisionists" depart from the conclusion that the Holocaust did not occur and work backwards through the facts to adapt them to that preordained conclusion. Put another way, they reverse the proper methodology described above, thus turning the proper historical method of investigation and analysis on its head. That is not to say that historians never depart from a preconceived or desired result; they often do. But in adhering rigorously to the correct methodology, they accept that the result of their investigation may not be what they envisaged at the beginning. They are prepared to adapt their theories to that reality. Indeed, they are often required to revise their conclusions based on the facts. To put it tritely, "revisionists" revise the facts based on their conclusion.
Since "revisionists" depart from the conclusion that the Holocaust did not happen, i.e., they deny its existence, they are often called "deniers". Rather than analyze historical events, facts, their causes and consequences, and their interactions with other events, they defend a conclusion, whether or not the facts support it.
Why they do this is not the subject of this piece, but a few examples of the distortions, evasions and denials that it forces on them will illustrate how intellectually dishonest it is. And it should be remembered that they are forced on them, since "revisionists" are denying a historical occurrence, then distorting the facts into accord with that denial.
The Conspiracy Theory
Since the facts are not in accord with the "revisionist" conclusion, they must find an all-encompassing way to dismiss them. This is not a simple task, since the facts converge in the result that the Nazis had a plan to exterminate European Jewry, succeeded in large part in accomplishing it, and left behind multitudinous evidence of the attempt. 6
Hence, "revisionists" must argue that there is a conspiracy to fabricate all that evidence - a conspiracy that must have begun its work before the end of the war - and one that continues to this day. "Organized Jewry" or several variants on "Zionists" are at the root of this conspiracy. The conspiracy theory manifests itself in the following contrived positions:
• survivor witnesses lied, even where their evidence is corroborated by documents, or other sources;
• perpetrator evidence was evinced through torture, fear for their families or falsified in various ways;
• documents left behind by the Nazis were falsified, don't mean what they appear to mean, or are forgeries;
• photographs were faked;
• films were faked;
• words don't mean what they appear to mean. When Himmler used the word "ausrotten" (exterminate) in respect of the Jews, he didn't really mean "exterminate". When Hitler used the word "vernichten" (annihilate) in respect of the Jews, he didn't really mean "annihilate". When the Einsatzgruppen spoke of killing Jewish women and children, they really meant partisans, even though partisans had a separate listing in the many reports they left behind;
• recorded speeches were faked. Himmler's 1943 Posen speech, which was recorded, wasn't really his voice, or parts were added later, or the technology to record didn't exist in 1943 (it did), or it disagrees with Himmler's notes for the speech (it doesn't);
• the victims were responsible for what happened to them. The Jewish women and children were partisans or were guilty of committing heinous crimes, or both;
• Jews deserved rough treatment anyway. Even though the Holocaust didn't happen, it would have nonetheless been justified because the Jews are an alien, parasitical race, hell-bent on destroying the noble Aryan, and/or defiling his blood, etc.;
• if no written Hitler order for the Holocaust can be found, there was no order at all;
• no gas chamber is currently functioning. Therefore, there never were gas chambers. But even if there were gas chambers, they were only for fumigating clothing, even if they were in morgues.
Falsus in Uno, Falsus in Omnibus
Since, as this list shows, the amount of empirical evidence for the Holocaust is so overwhelming, the "revisionists" must throw in another dismissal trick. This has been called the "falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus" condition (one thing mistaken equals all things mistaken). It means, for example, that if any single piece of survivor evidence can be shown to be wrong, all survivor evidence is wrong and is to be dismissed. If any Nazi official lied about an aspect of the Holocaust (on-topic or not), all Nazi officials lied, and anything Nazis said after the war is dismissed. If any Nazi can be shown to have been tortured or mistreated, they all were and anything they said is invalid.
Conclusion
"Revisionism" is obliged to deviate from the standard methodology of historical pursuit because it seeks to mold facts to fit a preconceived result, it denies events that have been objectively and empirically proved to have occurred, and because it works backward from the conclusion to the facts, thus necessitating the distortion and manipulation of those facts where they differ from the preordained conclusion (which they almost always do). In short, "revisionism" denies something that demonstrably happened, through methodological dishonesty.
Its ethical dishonesty and antisemitic motivation are topics for another day.
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Notes
1. The quotes around "revisionists" are not sneer quotes. They indicate that methodologically "revisionists" are not what they claim to be. This is explained in detail in the body of the essay.
2. Funk & Wagnall's Standard Dictionary of the English Language, Volume 1, New York, 1973, p. 599.
3. A.J.P. Taylor, The Origins of the Second World War, Penguin Books, Middlesex, 1964.
4. Daniel Jonah Goldhagen, Hitler's Willing Executioners: Ordinary Germans and the Holocaust, Alfred A. Knopf, New York, 1996.
5. Die Zeit, edition of January 9, 1998. His findings are reported in Zeitschrift Werkstatt Geschichte, Heft 18/1997.
6. See inter alia Hilberg, The Destruction of the European Jews; Gilbert, The Holocaust; Yahil, The Holocaust; Dawidowicz, The War Against the European Jews 1933-1945; Breitman, The Architect of Genocide; Less, Eichmann Interrogated; Fleming, Hitler and the Final Solution; Broszat et al., Anatomie des SS-Staates; and many more.
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Suggested further reading: Pierre Vidal-Naquet's A Paper Eichmann: Anatomy of a Lie, in particular part 4, On the Revisionist Method.
Sorry for the long thread dont use the computer very well and have a very slow connection.
Regards Mustardseed
