On the Abuse and Misappropriation of Symbols

[StormTrek]

Hi Randy,

Some would say the New Testament writers were preaching the fulfillment of Jewish eschatology through the incarnation and resurrection. In which case, Christianity is not new, it is fulfillment of the promises of the Jewish God. This view resulted in my abandonment of Calvinism because I think it results in a more resilient - internally consistent - theology. The resulting Christianity is not focused on personal salvation or damnation.

[LazySundayClub]

I'd estimate your analysis here to be at least 99 times more deep than most Christian theology, but the best part is that you've probably out-theologized Jack by a factor of at least a thousand. This may be the worst pwnage he's experienced yet. Whether he gets it is another matter, of course. By the way, you may have stirred up the fondest, most uplifting recollection of the Christian experience I've felt in *many* years.

[ProfMTH]

Excellent! With the exception of the bit about the Passover lambs being a substitute for the firstborn males in the Hebrew dwellings, I agree with everything you said. You're exactly right to say that the better, indeed the *correct* response is that Christianity was a new thing.

Of course, the early Christians, the writers of the NT, lived in a Roman world where new religions got treated badly and old religions, e.g., Judaism, were tolerated and even given some special privileges. ...

[ProfMTH]

(con't) Therefore they were quite eager to link their new religion about Jesus to the religious heritage of Judaism. Indeed, they were eager to portray their new religion as the only legitimate heir of Judaism's ancient religious patrimony. Jeffrey Siker does a very nice job explicating this in his 1995(?) book "Disinheriting the Jews: Abraham in Early Christian Controversy." So we see, e.g., Paul calling Christians "the Israel of God" (Galatians 6:16).

Great stuff here, Randy.

[randyhelzerman]

@ProfMTH Thanks prof! And thanks for the book pointer. One wonders whether contemporary christians also have residual insecurities in this direction. Would offering an answer like this threaten the legitimizing connection with Judaism too much? I guess you'd only have to point out that upwards of 70% of boys are circumcised in the US to prove that most christians have a freudian suspicion that Judaism is the real deal...

[ProfMTH]

@randyhelzerman lol That's an interesting observation about circumcision.

I suspect that most Christians would have a very difficult time giving up what they perceive to be the legitimizing connection with Judaism (in much the same way Muslims would have a difficult time giving up their religion's legitimizing connections to Christianity and Judaism). Novelty in religion creates suspicion and resistance among potential followers, so the obviously new is almost always connected in some...

[ProfMTH]

(con't) @randyhelzerman ...older thing. Even in my former religious home, the Catholic Church, when new teachings have come along the Church has always cast them as resulting from better, fuller understanding of the previously existing "revelation" going back to the apostles. And, of course, Mormonism is a nice example of a new religion basically doing what Christianity did with Judaism. It's a "ever thus" phenomenon. :-)

[randyhelzerman]

@ProfMTH hmmm.....The Ministry of Truth comes to mind......

[Lbbhecht]

Your video reminds me of this quote from Stephen Gould: "Our mind works largely by metaphor and comparison, not always (or often) by relentless logic. When we are caught in conceptual traps, the best exit is often a change in metaphor—not because the new guideline will be truer to nature (for neither the old nor the new metaphor lies “out there” in the woods), but because we need a shift to more fruitful perspectives, and metaphor is often the best agent of conceptual transition."

[heyalun]

You fell for the old bait-and-switch in MTH's video. Jesus is NOT the antitypical passover lamb because he's a ransom for mankind.

Num 8:17, 18 "On the day of my striking every firstborn in the land of Egypt I sanctified them to myself. And I shall take the Levites in place of all the firstborn among the sons of Israel."

Rev 5:9, 10 "with your blood you bought persons for God out of every tribe and tongue and people and nation, and you made them to be a kingdom and priests to our God"

[randyhelzerman]

Heyalun!! Its nice to hear from you again! Good to know you are still out there :-)

[SirAxiom]

Great vid as usual - frighteningly enough, after so many vids you have not gone a degree beneath greatness. I believe that the prof is going on the notion that the only way to secure a truth claim for the biblical stories is by a coherentist account of truth claims. The thing about that is you don't need an actual referent in reality to account for the truth - only that the account is internally consistent. Obviously the amalgam of an ancient book would fail that (cont.)

[SirAxiom]

@SirAxiom

However, what fails precisely is the symbols referring to a specific core meaning, which seems to be an echo of the referential account. It always seemed peculiar to me that Prof. (according to his own testamony) held on to a literalist belief so late in life, and then struck back against it with such vituperative force. It smells fishy.

[GottliebBurckhardt]

And Aaron shall present the goat on which the lot fell for the Lord, and offer it as a sin offering

So what? David Koresh never knew his father, had a troubled childhood, memorized the New Testament by the time he was eleven, said he was a Christ, founded the Branch Davidians, created a whole new theology for Doyle, his followers testified he was the son of God and that he preformed miracles. How many cults were in Rome? It doesn't matter. They will only see what they want to.

[JunkmanJim]

Great video Randy. I find most critiques of religious practices by non-believers tend to be slanted towards their own agenda rather than an accurate account of what was going on at the time and how it has evolved to the present. When people I agree with philosophically, stretch the truth just to make their point, it makes me cringe. I love a good honest discussion, keep up the good work.

[johncrwarner]

Excellent point - I watched the ProfMTH video and went - so what - the imagery is exactly that it is the imagery not the reality of anything - it is a way of describing it.

[ProfMTH]

@johncrwarner Quite right. But Christians--most of them, anyway--want to say it's fulfillment. Randy's absolutely right: the correct answer is that Christianity was a new thing and the earliest Christians were borrowing and misappropriating existing categories and symbols for a number of reasons, including in order to explain their new thing.

[johncrwarner]

@ProfMTH

The prefiguring has a heavy emphasis in the Orthodox Church, I bow to your knowledge of the catholic church but I think a lot of the right-wing evangelical inerrantist churches with origins in the US tend to go for this prefiguring malarkey.

[StevenErnest]

Good video, Randy. You are always interesting.

[bubonicnate]

Howdy Randy - hope you have been well.

[FatGermanBastard]

This is very true. I have often seen people using old words to describe a new concept but then treating this concept as if it was the old thing.

[StormTrek]

@FatGermanBastard Interesting. I thought and thought about what you said and I can't think of one example where I've heard people use old words to describe a new concept and then treat the concept as though it was an old thing. It seems unnecessarily confusing to communicate in such a way and in my experience *most* people put a good deal of effort into trying to clearly communicate their ideas. 

[FatGermanBastard]

@StormTrek

Ok let me give you a few examples:

1) Morality

Once used to describe some type of magical divine karma it is now used by many merely to refer to social interaction, natural disposition or rational thinking. However, many of these people still treat it as if it was obligatory. I.e. they say rape is irrational therefore you are obligated not to do it which is a non sequitur. If you want to be irrational and run against a wall for hours until you drop dead feel free to do so.

[FatGermanBastard]

2) Free will: Once used to refer to some sort of divine ability to be the uncaused cause of one's desires compatibilists are now using it merely to refer to the ability to make decisions and they define decisions as a process in the brain. Now that they have admitted that humans work by the same principle as a computer they go ahead calling this process in the brain thing "consciousness" and conclude responsibility from it which is ridiculously and utterly retarded.

[StormTrek]

@FatGermanBastard Thanks, FGB. Do you find that if someone starts using an old word like "morality" to describe a new concept it is accompanied by an active attempt to redefine? In other words, when they use the old word they make an effort to be clear they are redefining the word. Otherwise, how would you know they are talking about a new concept.

[FatGermanBastard]

@StormTrek

They are trying to confuse people by means of an equivocation fallacy. Let's say I said "Hitler was a nice guy". Once you protest I say "I define the term 'nice guy' to refer to brutal mass murderers. Do you think Hitler was a brutal mass murderer ?" Once you say 'yes' I respond: "Well then by my definition of 'nice guy' you agree that Hitler is a nice guy, right ?" Once you say 'yes' I then go ahead asking: "If you agree Hitler was a nice guy then what is your problem with him ?"

[StormTrek]

@FatGermanBastard Trying to confuse someone is intentional deception. But if someone is trying to communicate new concepts by using old words they are forced to redefine or their audience will never understand a new concept was introduced. Therefore, if a NT writer intended to introduce a new concept he would be sure to make it clearly known. If no redefinition is attempted then it is better to conclude the writer intended the accepted definition accepted by his audience.

[FatGermanBastard]

@StormTrek

Of course they give you a clear new definition but then they jump back and forth between the new definition and the old one hoping that you will not notice it.

[StormTrek]

@FatGermanBastard When you say they hope no one will notice it you're referring to a scenario where the communicator is trying to deceive. I think that idea needs to be discarded because it isn't an effective rebuttal to ProfMTH's video. Your original comment seemed to be in support of Randy's rebuttal. And I think Randy's rebuttal implies good faith on the part of the NT authors.

[FatGermanBastard]

@StormTrek

Oh no I haven't even seen ProfMTH's video. That was just a general remark and deception is exactly what I was referring to.

[StormTrek]

@FatGermanBastard Oh, ok. 

[jemerson85]

Good video, Randy.

[RevJoshua]

Do symbols include words too? Meaning, can a word be a symbol?

[randyhelzerman]

@RevJoshua Sure.

[RevJoshua]

@randyhelzerman Ok. Thanks!

[randyhelzerman]

@RevJoshua I guess a good example in a christian conext would be the greek word "logos". Pre-socratics used it to mean something like "scientific theory" but the author of the gospel of John used it to mean God, something that was with God, and a certain Jewish carpenter.... through which the entire cosmose was created...haha.

[RevJoshua]

@randyhelzerman Yes absolutely! I asked because I have been very intrigued lately by Variablast and his attempt to change the idea of the word Nigger. Your video helped me to better understand his rhetoric and put it in context.

[randyhelzerman]

@RevJoshua come to think of it, yeah, that's exactly what Variablast is trying to do....

[RevJoshua]

@randyhelzerman At first I struggled with the concept because I've been raised my whole life to imagine a black man in my head when I hear the word Nigger. Not even from my parents, but from society. After watching Variablast and his experiment with this word, I realized that all my life, I have been conditioned to be racist, even though I really don't consider myself to be at all racist. By having words that separate and exclude people from certain "groups", we are all racist in that regard.

[StevenErnest]

@RevJoshua  All words are metaphors, in that they stand for, represent, something which they are not.