Supersoulty's Christian Theological Debate Thread

[Scam of God]

Christianity is nihilistic and life-denying, because it

A.) Condemns as sin those activities which humans engage in to further their enjoyment of life; it does this because

B.) Its followers hate and fear the temporality of the senses - and hence sensuality - and the world itself; and

C.) It has constructed an artificial metaphysics centered on the hereafter in an effort to falsify the objective world as a means of escaping the inevitability of change and death.

Prove me wrong.

[Scam of God]

Christianity is nihilistic and life-denying, because it

A.) Condemns as sin those activities which humans engage in to further their enjoyment of life; it does this because

B.) Its followers hate and fear the temporality of the senses - and hence sensuality - and the world itself; and

C.) It has constructed an artificial metaphysics centered on the hereafter in an effort to falsify the objective world as a means of escaping the inevitability of change and death.

Prove me wrong.

That does not constitute "nihilism,"

It most certainly does.

What  is Christianity's primary claim about this life? That it is of "the world, the flesh and the Devil"; that it is to be abnegated, as far as possible; and that 'the beyond' is a purer sphere of existence where "He will wipe every tear from (the Christians) eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain."

What is implied in this philosophy? Simply this: that this lesser mortal coil derives its value only in relation to the beyond; that it lacks any innate value; indeed, that it is frequently malignant. The very act of devaluing this life is in itself nihilistic, just as nihilistic and more as any atheistic existentialism; the very word 'nihility' means 'absence of value'.

Historically, of course, this is certain understandable: Christianity formed among the lower Judean classes as a means to undermine the sensualistic ethos of their Latin masters. In doing so, however, the proto-Christians undermined the value of physicality itself, a doctrine that would find ultimate expression in the ancient practice of "Mortification of the Flesh", and in Manila every Easter today.

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That's exactly the point: complete absorption of the individual (the 'soul', as it were) into a greater unity - the dissolution of the boundaries between the senses and the sensed - which leads, ultimately, to the complete obliteration of the ego is exactly the end-goal of my philosophy. And this is not some form of individualistic libertinism; to the contrary, the concept of 'individual' implies some static center to man, some kernel of truth, some... soul. Individualism is a Christian phenomenon. The intended result of Dionysian praxis is total, joyous self-obliteration.

I am also a nihilist. Just in the opposite direction, for the opposite reason.

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I know very well what Gnosticism is. That's not what I'm talking about. The Gnostics questioned the reality of the flesh (because it was evil); 'mere' Christians inquire as to its value (again because it is evil). These are different branches of the same weed.

[Scam of God]

I assume the interpretation you're going on is:

1. The meaning of Christianity is found in the afterlife.
2. There is no afterlife.
3. Thus, Christianity teaches to find meaning in nothingness, i.e., nihilism.

Isn't that a little odd when Christianity is also a moral system?  Is fruitlessness, "nihilism"?

Not quite.

Christianity, to be sure, professes an (overly stringent) moral system, but the source of these values is rooted in the spiritual realm, not in "this world of sin and sorrow", as it were. In order to do this, and against the pagans (whose deities were gods of natural elements; whose festivals were life-affirming), it was necessary for them to remove the sense of value that the pagans had found in the beauty and wonder of physical being, and Platonically abstract it to a higher source. It is this devaluation of the world upon which Christianity rests - the location of all value and meaning in a godly sphere - and, because it devalues this life so thoroughly, it can therefore be called a nihilistic religion. Heidegger called this process the "emptying out of the world".

I understand this much:

1. You believe that the "soul" is more aptly a manifestation of the individual.

I do not believe that either the concept of a soul or 'the individual' is meaningful; both are useful lies formulated by the Christian religion in the service of its metaphysics, to divide man from the 'outer world' (in the Kantian, the noumenon from the phenomenon) and isolate it, to service its concept of a purer world beyond. I believe that our oldest ancestors would not have found the notion that they were distinguishable from their surroundings intelligible. You might regard this as a form of monism. 

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See above.

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I believe that the ultimate activity in life is a sort of ritualistic self-destruction, with the end goal being to once again re-experience primal oneness with the material world. This has no spiritual meaning; only subjective. And the result, of course, would be to completely destroy the boundary between subjective and 'objective' experience. This is similar to the teachings of the Buddha, though the reasoning and the desired result are far different.

Odd thought: would a being that could 'objectively experience' something be a God?

[Scam of God]

I think that essentially leads to what I said -- it strips the worldly value and sets the value upon a non-existent entity.

I'd argue that it's largely ineffective in doing that, no matter how hard it tries -- we can get into that.  But I suppose my question is, why does this trouble you so much?  Is that really so much different than any other falsified state of consciousness?  What pisses you off, here?

I had written a rather lengthy response, but my session timed out, so I'll attempt to abbreviate it:


There is a concept in the philosophical discipline of phenomenology (the study of the relationship between thought and the external world) called intentionality: thoughts must always be directed at something. This does not simply mean, for example, that when I think of my Pekingese, I form the mental image of a dog; my thoughts must instead be directed at that dog, I must suppose some distinction between it and myself, I must set aside my knowledge that we exist on the same sphere and presume some degree of individual separation between us (forgive me if this is melodramatic, but I am not good with words). I've heard it said that thought is emotion once removed, and I agree with the sentiment.

This same dualism exists in the mind's interactions with all things. If I look at myself in the mirror, I do not see ego cogito, the thinking self, but rather a somewhat gangly contraption of skin and eyes and teeth. And while I understand that I am this body in the mirror, the thinking self, being somewhat detached from it all, sometimes struggles with this notion, owing to the artificial binary explained above. I consciously know that the mind is simply a byproduct of the very physical brain; but the ego rejects this explanation forthright, since it does not naturally know (without the aid of modern physiology) that it emanates from the brain. It has grown accustomed to inventing stories about itself.

Christianity's soul-atomism exacerbates this alienation; indeed, it thrives on it. Not only does Christianity teach that the thinking, willing, feeling self exists separately from the body, and that the body will be left to rot when the "dead in Christ are called up first", but it teaches that denial of the body and the body's impulses - forced asceticism - in favor of purity of thought and feeling somehow improves holiness. We see the final realization of this mode of thought in Francis of Assisi's self-scarification, or those ancient ascetics who would climb up on pillars in the Near East to fast and live for decades, preaching the Gospel. And so it is not Christianity's nihilism that I despise (remember, I am a nihilist "in the opposite direction"), but the effects of its nihilism: life-denial, and the resulting alienation from the self. I am diametrically, radically opposed to the Christian concept of 'selflessness' as a physical thing.

I'm sure you're sick of me asking you to elaborate, but a "sort of ritualistic self-destruction" has intrigued me, and the Buddhism bit wasn't enough to sink the idea in.

My ultimate goal is to find some method - including the use of alcohol and drugs and meditation, as well as forms of ritual which focus thought on a single externality (much as at happens in Mass) to tear down the artificial binaries imposed by Christianized Western culture and experience life as indistinguishable from this chair I sit in, or this keyboard on which I know type.

In fact, I've got a little vodka. I think I'll try now. =D