Tu Shan says that it is natural to die yet people have become immortal. He asks:
"'Should that be? Will it in the end cost the race its soul?'" (p. 504)
What does it profit a man if he gains the whole world but loses his own soul?
Biblical influence again?
I am now rushing to get out the door, across town and up a hill so maybe back here tomoz?
Have a good night. Happy Tuesday.
11 comments:
I'd be perfectly content to be eternally young until something killed me. Oh, yes indeed.
Kaor, Paul and Mr. Stirling!
Paul: It is the belief and teaching of the Church that death was not part of the will and original plan of God for mankind. Death is one of the consequences we suffer due to Original Sin.
Mr. Stirling: As would I, I admit!
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
That Church teaching is expressed in CS Lewis' PERELANDRA. It contradicts science. Death is built into all organisms.
The Church teaches that God instituted monogamy. I think that we are not naturally monogamous. When property accumulated, patriarchal monogamy was imposed so that there would be identifiable male heirs of herds and slaves. Before that, men and women freely entered into and terminated marital relationships. That was our earlier state.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
First, Lewis was not speaking as a Catholic, he was an Anglican. He wrote things that Catholics would not entirely agree with. Second, you are speaking who disbelieves the supernatural. If the first man had not fallen, sanctifying grace would have transformed him and his descendants in many ways, including bodily immortality. Third, original sin made all the passions natural to mankind far more difficult to master.
No, the actual evidence we have from ancient times, before settled societies, does not support what you say about marital relations. Dominant males, such as chiefs and warriors, monopolized women. Women were often booty of war, slaves seized from other clans and tribes.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
Can we discuss different views without just saying "No" all the time? I was about to reply in kind but deleted what I had typed and started again.
My understanding from some reading is this:
first, unrestricted sexuality within a tribe;
then, increasing incest taboos for sound (in fact genetic) reasons;
then the free and equal pairing marriage, revocable by either side at any time;
then the acquisition of property by male herders, formerly hunters;
then the imposition of patriarchal monogamy so that a male property owner had an identifiable male heir;
then herds, slaves, wife and concubines were reduced to property.
Different things happened in different places. There are different interpretations of what happened. There is some evidence from primitive, tribal societies surviving into modern times. All of this can be discussed.
I read Lewis while I was attending a Catholic school and did not find anything to disagree with in his account of the Fall.
Of course I do not believe in the supernatural and would need sufficient evidence before I accepted it. Are we supposed to discuss human origins already believing in the supernatural? Of course someone who starts out believing in the supernatural winds up believing in the supernatural.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Apologies about "No". I probably had in mind Christ's injunction that we should be upfront about our yeses and nos.
I believe the actual, known evidence favors my argument. Primitive humans, and pre-human hominins, did not live as you think. Dominant males got first pick with the females. Other males had to wait till they were allowed to mate. And I don't believe the females had much say in the matter. Except they would tend to favor males best able to support them and their children.
The social elaborations you described came later. And it's because of the rise of settled societies and states that women finally started getting some protection and recognition of their rights as centuries passed.
For Catholic beliefs, Catholic sources are better, IMO. Such as the CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.
I find more evidence for the existence of the supernatural than I do for disbelieving materialism. I've seen atheists denying they don't have to give reasoned arguments for the non existence of God. But many theistic philosophers have done exactly that down to our times. At the least the latter group tries!
I believe the resurrection of Christ the supreme proof for the truth of Christianity, with the Church surviving despite the never ending follies of Christians. Also, the miracles reported from time to time and certified as having no known natural/scientific causes by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints should shake the confidence of disbelievers.
Ad astra! Sean
We do not have to prove a negative. You have to prove a positive.
We seem to have very different sources about human origins.
If I see no reason to accept belief X, I am under no obligation to disprove X whereas, if someone asserts X, then he is obliged to offer some evidence or argument for X. This is a basic logical difference which we seem not to have resolved yet.
Do hunting and gathering societies that have survived into modern times display the pattern of male violence, aggression, dominance etc that you describe? - which sounds like a stereotype to me.
Kaor, Paul!
If someone dogmatically denies God is real I have a right to ask him for a reasoned explanation for that belief. If disbelievers are unable/unwilling to do so then I am no obligation to take them seriously.
Yes, to some extent, what you said about hunting/herding societies surviving into modern times. Women had a lesser status than chiefs, warriors, hunters. Of course this was not always as harshly expressed as it could have been. And women who were from other tribes could be and often were booty of war. Which we see happening as late as that chapter of THE BOAT OF A MILLION YEARS set in the great plains of America in the 1870's.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
We keep talking past each other. Someone who merely sees no reason to accept a theistic hypothesis does not dogmatically deny that God exists and therefore does not subscribe to a "belief" that God does not exist and therefore finally does not have to present any reasoned explanation for such a belief.
As a matter of fact, I can present an argument that monotheism is incoherent. I have argued several times before that the creator before the creation would be a self without an other which would be like a square without sides. Thus, the theist affirms an existence but also denies the conditions necessary for such an existence.
But this is far from being a dogmatic denial of God's existence! (You will have to have that discussion with someone else.) It is simply a philosophical analysis and argument which I would present to a theologian, expecting him to formulate a reply. This debate is on-going. It is not an exchange of dogmatic denials with either side refusing to take the other seriously.
Paul.
Sean,
I feel that you are always not just discussing an issue but defending a position with what seems like a death grip. This skews everything. Your opponents, if that is how they seem to you, no doubt include some dogmatic atheists but they also include a lot of people with more positive views who are genuinely interested in an open discussion.
Paul.
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