Christian Communism

[waqob]

Christian communism is a form of religious communism based on Christianity. It is a theological and political theory based upon the view that the teachings of Jesus Christ compel Christians to support communism as the ideal social system. Although there is no universal agreement on the exact date when Christian communism was founded, many Christian communists assert that evidence from the Bible suggests that the first Christians, including the Apostles, established their own small communist society in the years following Jesus' death and resurrection. As such, many advocates of Christian communism argue that it was taught by Jesus and practiced by the Apostles themselves.

Christian communism can be seen as a radical form of Christian socialism. Christian communists may or may not agree with various parts of Marxism. They generally do not agree with the antireligious views held by secular Marxists, but do agree with many of the economic and existential aspects of Marxist theory, such as the idea that capitalism exploits the working class by extracting surplus value from the workers in the form of profits and that wage-labor is a tool of human alienation that promotes arbitrary and unjust authority.

[Yuppie Grinder]

I'd say most posters on revleft are familiar with christian communism or liberation theology and critical of it to varying degrees. I'm not a militant atheist in that I think evangelism scares people away from whatever it is you have to say, but I also really dislike the idea of a messiah or an all powerful god.
This idea that there is all knowing father figure who will give your life meaning if you submit to him is very un-communist in my mind. People say Jesus was a communist, but Judas and Satan seem more revolutionary to me.

[Decolonize The Left]

I'm not sure why jesus needs to be up in leftism in any sense, other than religious people once again feeling the need to push their beliefs on others by insisting that a reasonable and common sense political philosophy requires the addition of psychosis.

Also, just for giggles, god would be a, if not the, prime example of "arbitrary and unjust authority."

[Post-Something]

To be fair, I can see scenarios where using religion to further your political aims is justified, that's what everyone else does. The way Malcolm X used Islam for example was a stroke of political genius I think.
Obviously most Christians are morons though, anyone who believes they're going to live forever is.

[waqob]

I'm not sure why jesus needs to be up in leftism in any sense, other than religious

Jesus was a socialist

[BIXX]

Jesus was a socialist

Even if he was, he was wrong about the God thing. At least as far as hierarchy is concerned. And materialism.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

Christian communism is not bad in its social ideal but is problematic regarding its praxis. How do we bring Communism about? By preaching the words of Jesus? What will non-Christians think? How would you stop reactionaries from "twisting" the words of Jesus to justify their reactionary ends? The advantage of non-theistic Communism is that it can focus on an analysis of social relations to give a clearer path for liberation than you could get through theology alone.


I'd say most posters on revleft are familiar with christian communism or liberation theology and critical of it to varying degrees. I'm not a militant atheist in that I think evangelism scares people away from whatever it is you have to say, but I also really dislike the idea of a messiah or an all powerful god.
This idea that there is all knowing father figure who will give your life meaning if you submit to him is very un-communist in my mind. People say Jesus was a communist, but Judas and Satan seem more revolutionary to me.

Consider that Satan is associated with material greed and envy, and Judas killed Jesus supposedly for some silver coins.


I'm not sure why jesus needs to be up in leftism in any sense, other than religious people once again feeling the need to push their beliefs on others by insisting that a reasonable and common sense political philosophy requires the addition of psychosis.


Describing religion or prophecy as "psychosis" is not a reasonable claim to make and is imposing a modern medical category on something which was just routinely accepted as a part of life 2,000 years ago. It assumes that anything which can be seen as "superstition" comes from a kind of mental disease or something like that, which just isn't the case. Perhaps you rightly think such a belief is unjustified, but that hardly makes it "psychotic"



Also, just for giggles, god would be a, if not the, prime example of "arbitrary and unjust authority."Depends on your definition of "God" and of "authority"


To be fair, I can see scenarios where using religion to further your political aims is justified, that's what everyone else does. The way Malcolm X used Islam for example was a stroke of political genius I think.
Obviously most Christians are morons though, anyone who believes they're going to live forever is.

You just realize you called Malcom X a "political genius" and then in the next sentence implied he was an idiot. Unless that is you think a Muslim believing in life after death is any better than a Christian believing it.


Even if he was, he was wrong about the God thing. At least as far as hierarchy is concerned. And materialism.

Again, this depends on how you define God or what basis he had to believe in it. He knew he existed, and Christianity includes the belief that Christ himself is God, so it's hard to say he's "wrong" about the existence of God when he was fully aware of his own existence. Whether it is justified or not to believe that a mortal human can be "God" or whether or not the identity between Jesus and God was something that came about among later Christians are other issues. As for the idealism/materialism issue, I don't think it's exactly fair to impose 19th century philosophical categories to people living 2,000 years ago

[Sea]

"Duly noted." squawked Sea, in a Forrest Gump voice.

Since the first post sounds so cookie-cutter like and generic and vauge, I thought I'd google a chunk of it to figure out where the OP plagiarized it from. Wait till you see what popped up!


Christian communism is a form of religious communism based on Christianity. It is a theological and political theory based upon the view that the teachings of Jesus Christ compel Christians to support communism as the ideal social system. Although there is no universal agreement on the exact date when Christian communism was founded, many Christian communists assert that evidence from the Bible suggests that the first Christians, including the Apostles, established their own small communist society in the years following Jesus' death and resurrection. As such, many advocates of Christian communism argue that it was taught by Jesus and practiced by the Apostles themselves.
Christian communism can be seen as a radical form of Christian socialism. Christian communists may or may not agree with various parts of Marxism. They generally do not agree with the antireligious views held by secular Marxists, but do agree with many of the economic and existential aspects of Marxist theory, such as the idea that capitalism exploits the working class by extracting surplus value from the workers in the form of profits and that wage-labor is a tool of human alienation that promotes arbitrary and unjust authority.from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_communism

Good job, waqob. Maybe if you honor thy mother and father make Mummy and Daddy happy you'll be promoted to god general secretary some day.

[BIXX]

"Duly noted." squawked Sea, in a Forrest Gump voice.

Since the first post sounds so cookie-cutter like and generic and vauge, I thought I'd google a chunk of it to figure out where the OP plagiarized it from. Wait till you see what popped up!

from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_communism

Good job, waqob. Maybe if you honor thy mother and father make Mummy and Daddy happy you'll be promoted to god general secretary some day.

Top lel

I didn't even consider googling it but I should have.

[Vici]

As for the idealism/materialism issue, I don't think it's exactly fair to impose 19th century philosophical categories to people living 2,000 years ago

The debate has been going on since pre-Sorcratic philosophers. Just off the top of my head, I can think of Anaxogoras's advocacy of idealism and Epicurus's, Thales's and Democritus's critique a hundred years later. And of course, there's Plato's theory of the forms: classical idealism.

The more recent idealism, from the likes of Kant, is more sophisticated but it still holds the same underpinnings that has been used for thousands of years, by Western and Eastern (think how Buddhist atomism criticized the prevailing idealism).

Marx was extremely well versed in the materialists from Socrates's time, in fact his doctoral research explored Democritus's and Epicurus's differences in their philosophy of nature.


[...] Materialism and idealism offer interpretations of the world which are irreconcilable. Which of the “two great camps”, as Engels called them, we choose still constitutes today, as in the past, the basic question of philosophy.

[Marshal of the People]

If Jesus was a socialist (which he wasn't) he wasn't a very good one because he believed that he was better than everyone else, he believed that women are inferior to men, he hated children, he hated LGBT people, he supported slavery and the list goes on and on. Jesus wasn't a socialist! What kind of socialist would support slavery or think of women as inferior?

[Aware]

Jesus probably didn't even exist, so stop paying attention to ideas that already had 2000 years of fuck-up.

[Niccolo]

Religion is inherently oppressive, reactionary, intolerant and hierarchical. In my opinion, completely antithetical to communism; obviously it is in opposition to Marxism, through its idealist foundation and opposition to a materialist theory of history.

Christian communism has not much to do with the revolutionary left. It is more an alternative lifestyle lived through the formation of highly exclusive communes for the highly religious. Not exactly an ideology that could guide the proletariat to its liberation.

[Tolstoy]

My situation is unique because I dientify as a (dont laugh) Catholic Atheist. I admire all of the mythology and messages that lie within Christianity, but ultimately I cant get behing a theistic god.

More on topic, I see nothing inherently wrong with Christian communism, many great comrades were Christians like Ernesto Cardenal. When religion ceases to act as an opiate preventing genuine revolution and the Christian is no long content with going to sugar candy mountain, than religion isnt doing any nore harm

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

Jesus was a socialist

Ignoring the issue that he didn't exist and is probably an amalgamation of various Jewish dissenters, the conditions for socialism didn't exist at the time of the early Christian church.

[Tolstoy]

The philosophy Christ does contain alot of spite for the rich as we all know.

Interestingly enough, Christs hatered for divorce was actually progressive for its time. The issue was that when Jewish men married they would pay a dowry and wealthy men would often divorce one wife and marry another one and pay another dowry due to the fact that men enjoy sexual diversity. This created a class of women who could not work and nobody wanted a nonvirginal bride. Christ was trying to abate that problem.

On another note, Crucifxion was a punishment exclusively for those who attempted political insurrection in Ancient Rome

[Quail]

Well... I suppose if someone's Christianity causes them to engage with revolutionary communist politics, and they didn't preach, I wouldn't have a problem with working with them in theory. I don't actually know any Christian communists though.

[Tolstoy]

Well... I suppose if someone's Christianity causes them to engage with revolutionary communist politics, and they didn't preach, I wouldn't have a problem with working with them in theory. I don't actually know any Christian communists though.

The only Christian Communist ive known was diagnosably insane. This guy was a fairl intense Anglican Trotskyist of Tamil descent. He really, really liked pastoral communism and monarchism and was always talking about Chesterton. He also found birth control horribly immoral and believed very strongly in traditional gender roll, though he was cool with the LGBT community. I discovered after a while that his whole philosophy was basically designed to "keep women in line"

[Decolonize The Left]

Jesus was a socialist

There was no 'working class' at the time of historical jesus; there was no socialism; hence historical jesus could not have been a socialist any more than he could have been a Biebeliver.


Describing religion or prophecy as "psychosis" is not a reasonable claim to make and is imposing a modern medical category on something which was just routinely accepted as a part of life 2,000 years ago. It assumes that anything which can be seen as "superstition" comes from a kind of mental disease or something like that, which just isn't the case. Perhaps you rightly think such a belief is unjustified, but that hardly makes it "psychotic"

I submit to you:

Psychosis is a loss of contact with reality that usually includes: False beliefs about what is taking place or who one is (delusions) ; Seeing or hearing things that aren't there (hallucinations).

Christians believe that there is a male figure which exists outside of our reality yet which can be qualified as 'heaven' who controls everything yet is in constant battle with another male figure who resides in an underworld. The first male figure then knocked up a virgin who gave birth to a 'savior' who performed feats which defy reality and the laws of physics, was killed, then rose from the dead and returned to 'heaven.' You, believing all this, then go to church and 'drink his blood and eat his flesh' in a ritual which is supposed to somehow alter the first male figure's opinion of you such that when you die, and your 'soul' is transported to another world to be 'judged,' you will get to go to the first place which is supposed to be awesome.

How, the fuck, is that not psychotic? There is no god, heaven, hell, satan, magical jesus, soul, etc... believing in these things is, by definition, delusional. Religious people are medically psychotic.

[Marshal of the People]

Jesus probably didn't even exist, so stop paying attention to ideas that already had 2000 years of fuck-up.

Actually he did exist (historical records prove it) but that doesn't mean he is a god.

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

I'd be interested in seeing those records.

[Marshal of the People]

I'd be interested in seeing those records.

Most historians agree that he existed and there is evidence to back it up (but don't worry I am not a christian, I am an atheist:lol:).

Here are some websites with evidence of his existence (though not of his divinity of course).

http://www.livescience.com/38014-physical-evidence-jesus-debated.html

http://www.ucg.org/science/surprising-archaeological-find-proof-jesus-existence/

http://thedevineevidence.com/jesus_history.html

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

Ideology rules academia as much as any other facet of society. Jesus' existence is a sacred cow that gets you run out if you question it, so yes all mainstream historians accept his existence as fact just as all mainstream economists accept capitalism as ideal. How the shroud of Turin still gets rolled out as proof is the true mystery of our age.

[Marshal of the People]

Ideology rules academia as much as any other facet of society. Jesus' existence is a sacred cow that gets you run out if you question it, so yes all mainstream historians accept his existence as fact just as all mainstream economists accept capitalism as ideal. How the shroud of Turin still gets rolled out as proof is the true mystery of our age.

If Jesus never existed how do you think christianity came into being so suddenly? I guess you don't believe that neither Muhammad nor the Buddha existed either

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

Do you really think one person is responsible for Christianity? Its been added to and modified thousands of different ways. Christ's divinity wasn't even decided until long after his supposed death.

As for Muhammad there's tons and tons of historical evidence for his existence, don't know about Buddha. For Christ there is very little and just about all of it is unconvincing unless you start by taking his existence as fact to begin with.

[Marshal of the People]

Do you really think one person is responsible for Christianity? Its been added to and modified thousands of different ways. Christ's divinity wasn't even decided until long after his supposed death.

As for Muhammad there's tons and tons of historical evidence for his existence. Don't know about Buddha. For Christ there is very very little.

What do you mean there is no evidence? I give you evidence and then you accuse all the historians of being corrupt.

[rylasasin]

Most historians agree that he existed and there is evidence to back it up (but don't worry I am not a christian, I am an atheist:lol:).

Here are some websites with evidence of his existence (though not of his divinity of course).

http://www.livescience.com/38014-physical-evidence-jesus-debated.html

http://www.ucg.org/science/surprising-archaeological-find-proof-jesus-existence/

http://thedevineevidence.com/jesus_history.html


If Jesus never existed how do you think christianity came into being so suddenly? I guess you don't believe that neither Muhammad nor the Buddha existed either



You do realize the first one at least is a refutation of said evidences, right?

The 2nd one is a known fraud.

3rd is an extremely biased source that attempts to reargue refuted-a-thousand-times arguments over again.

And as for "Most historians agree" (yet another lame talking point I hear done to death,) well...

What most historians "think" is completely irrelevant. What matters is evidence, not the opinions of a bunch of paper-pushing "academics"

And like ethics said, Ideology rules academia. Especially the field of history, which unlike science is a very hierarchical field. Most "historians" are either a. Christians themselves, and therefor subject to confirmation bias, b. Not interested enough to actually look into the matter and just say "Eh historical jesus probably did exist. Now leave me alone so I can go back to studying Y" or C. Simply do not want to make waves in fear of the backlash.


If Jesus never existed how do you think christianity came into being so suddenly? I guess you don't believe that neither Muhammad nor the Buddha existed either

By that logic I suppose you think that there must also have been a historical Zeus, a historical Yahweh, and a historical Osiris too, huh?

[Marshal of the People]

You do realize the first one at least is a refutation of said evidences, right?

The 2nd one is a known fraud.

3rd is an extremely biased source that attempts to reargue refuted-a-thousand-times arguments over again.

And as for "Most historians agree" (yet another lame talking point I hear done to death,) well...

What most historians "think" is completely irrelevant. What matters is evidence, not the opinions of a bunch of paper-pushing "academics"

And like ethics said, Ideology rules academia. Especially the field of history, which unlike science is a very hierarchical field. Most "historians" are either a. Christians themselves, and therefor subject to confirmation bias, b. Not interested enough to actually look into the matter and just say "Eh historical jesus probably did exist. Now leave me alone so I can go back to studying Y" or C. Simply do not want to make waves in fear of the backlash.



By that logic I suppose you think that there must also have been a historical Zeus, a historical Yahweh, and a historical Osiris too, huh?

Okay, looks like was worong then, Jesus never existed!

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

I remain unconvinced by the shroud of Turin, splinters of the cross, and vague statements made in fragments of documents. If this is enough for you then by all means stick to it. In your first post you said there was a historical record which proves he existed, you weren't able to produce it, that's all I was after. what you believe doesn't bother me.

[Marshal of the People]

I remain unconvinced by the shroud of Turin, splinters of the cross, and vague statements made in fragments of documents. If this is enough for you then by all means stick to it. In your first post you said there was a historical record which proves he existed, you weren't able to produce it, that's all I was after. what you believe doesn't bother me.

Well I said that I believe he never existed now (it is quite hard to believe in something you don't believe in). And I don't actually have access to that historical record but you think I do for some reason.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

The debate has been going on since pre-Sorcratic philosophers. Just off the top of my head, I can think of Anaxogoras's advocacy of idealism and Epicurus's, Thales's and Democritus's critique a hundred years later. And of course, there's Plato's theory of the forms: classical idealism.

The more recent idealism, from the likes of Kant, is more sophisticated but it still holds the same underpinnings that has been used for thousands of years, by Western and Eastern (think how Buddhist atomism criticized the prevailing idealism).

Marx was extremely well versed in the materialists from Socrates's time, in fact his doctoral research explored Democritus's and Epicurus's differences in their philosophy of nature.

You're right - the divide certainly began to form in ancient Greece and there were equivalents in Indian philosophy. Certainly, the divide between Plato and Aristotle revolved around problems of idealism and materialism to a point. I don't know if I'd call it "Idealism" and "Materialism" in the same way as modern philosophers though.


There was no 'working class' at the time of historical jesus; there was no socialism; hence historical jesus could not have been a socialist any more than he could have been a Biebeliver.


I think the point is that he opposed property accumulation. He was certainly no class analyst.




I submit to you:


Christians believe that there is a male figure which exists outside of our reality yet which can be qualified as 'heaven' who controls everything yet is in constant battle with another male figure who resides in an underworld. The first male figure then knocked up a virgin who gave birth to a 'savior' who performed feats which defy reality and the laws of physics, was killed, then rose from the dead and returned to 'heaven.' You, believing all this, then go to church and 'drink his blood and eat his flesh' in a ritual which is supposed to somehow alter the first male figure's opinion of you such that when you die, and your 'soul' is transported to another world to be 'judged,' you will get to go to the first place which is supposed to be awesome.

How, the fuck, is that not psychotic? There is no god, heaven, hell, satan, magical jesus, soul, etc... believing in these things is, by definition, delusional. Religious people are medically psychotic.

There are differing interpretations of Christian dogma, however. Also, none of these claims actually apply to current material reality but only some "deeper" metaphysical reality and some historical events that can't be confirmed either way. To me psychosis refers to some beliefs about actual material reality. So if you think that angels exist in some celestial realm that we can't understand, that's one thing, but thinking that there are angels in the outfield making us win baseball games because we're Christian would actually be delusional.

All the miracles and metaphysical beliefs you mention are reasons I don't find Christian mythology convincing, but I wouldn't equate a Christian to someone who thinks that the CIA monitors their brain through cellphone towers or that their dog is telling them to kill people.

[Dave B]

So much crap has been said it is hard to know where to begin.

It is crystal clear from gospel texts [excluding Paul’s material- more on that later] that Christianity started off as religion of the poor and oppressed; with a class analysis and hatred for the rich and ruling class etc.

Eg the rich having as much chance of getting into heaven as camel going through the eye of a needle etc.

The camel was a relatively big object at the time, and an ugly one at that, so it would be a bit like saying as much chance of a jumbo jet flying through a key hole.

[Some people have suggested that it may have been a small transcription error and originally was a rope passing through the eye of a needle as there is only a squiggle of a difference between in greek between rope and camel as with ‘i’ and j.]

The letter from James, allegedly JC’s brother, expresses the same class hatred of the rich, read it if you wish although in some translations it is watered down a bit.

Acts, and most of the writings of Paul, are regarded by experts [atheists included] as contemporary.

Acts as in 2;43 describe the early Christians as communistically sharing their property etc etc.

[one popular argument for the historicity of Jesus is that Paul said he knew his brother- for which there is no strong counter argument eg from the likes of Richard Cevantis Carrier.

There are interesting ongoing debates between academic atheists like Bart D. Ehrman andCarrier on the historical existence of JC].

The early critics of Christianity are perhaps the most interesting especially the work by Celsum written sometime before 210 AD as preserved and quoted from by the refutation or response from Origen.

The early christians were dismissed by Celsum who couldn’t take them seriously because the were all ‘women, slaves, children and the uneducated masses’. As well obviously their ‘leader’ who was a crappy carpenter.

Being a carpenter might not sound so bad now but then they were regarded as like ‘tinkers’ and ‘gypsies’ compared to landowning peasants.

There was in particular wage labour in part of the world at the time due to the peculiar economic and Judaic circumstances after the incorporation of Judea into the Roman empire post 6AD.

An analysis of which I shall leave.


But the consciousness of wages and [agricultural] wage labour is actually included in the text; in metaphors etc.

There is stuff in the Josephus material as well but mainly construction or building wage labour.

Apart from the idea that the rich were a bunch of bastards and were going to hell to suffer for eternity ; or put up against the wall and shot, and let off lightly, put it in modern terms.

Power wealth and all that crap was in the gift of the devil and thus satanic.

Thus JC was given the option to sell out and become a member of the ruling class eg Matthew 4:8.

That is not to say that JC’s only target was rich bastards, the other was the hypocrisy of organised religion and the state church.

On the idea that the old testament god was a vicious vindictive and psychotic bastard and a contradiction to what JC was saying etc.

That came out in the early christian circs 150AD ‘Marcion heresies’.

Which went something along the lines that the old testament god was a completely different one to JC’s dad etc.

The ‘Marcion heresies’ seem to carry on through to 200-300Ad as can be understood from angry criticisms of it from the time that ‘still survive’.

You can learn a lot of a ‘subject’ from contemporary opponents. Thus the early Judaic critique of the origins of JC choose to focus on the fact that his mother was a trollop and prostitute and the product of a financial arrangement with a roman soldier, an Archer- just for detail.

[Hence Monty pythons life of Brian- I think Terry Jones read that kind of stuff when at Oxford university.]

There is a theory that JC might have been an ‘Esssene’ or influenced by them eg from Kautsky even before the emergence of the dead sea scrolls material.

The Essenes appeared to be some kind of proto communist or communualist outfit; although perhaps you can read too much into it.

What Christianity became, or was turned into, or is now or whatever is beneath contempt.

As is Stalinism.

But you would think that the process can be understood clearly enough.

Sure enough early christianity was a metaphysical, magical and theological class analysis of society; of the blessed poor and damned rich.

But it was still a class analysis.


This is not eccentric marxism by the way eg

http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1908/christ/index.htm


and;

http://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1894/early-christianity/index.htm


The revisionist Paul, which most christians quote from was an exceptional christian; he was ex Gestapo and a member of the [Roman] ruling class, as is clear from the documents themselves.

[Decolonize The Left]

There are differing interpretations of Christian dogma, however. Also, none of these claims actually apply to current material reality but only some "deeper" metaphysical reality and some historical events that can't be confirmed either way.
A claim of "deeper metaphysical reality" is a claim on current material reality (seems pretty obvious). And given that "deeper metaphysical reality" doesn't exist, it's psychotic to claim it does.


To me psychosis refers to some beliefs about actual material reality. So if you think that angels exist in some celestial realm that we can't understand, that's one thing, but thinking that there are angels in the outfield making us win baseball games because we're Christian would actually be delusional.

This is a pretty poor defense of christianity. You're basically saying that by being delusional you don't get to be subjected to rational inquiry and hence classified as psychotic...


All the miracles and metaphysical beliefs you mention are reasons I don't find Christian mythology convincing, but I wouldn't equate a Christian to someone who thinks that the CIA monitors their brain through cellphone towers or that their dog is telling them to kill people.

I would. What, exactly, is the difference between the two? In one the CIA is monitoring you and telling you to kill people, in the other it's god!

[Czy]

All the miracles and metaphysical beliefs you mention are reasons I don't find Christian mythology convincing, but I wouldn't equate a Christian to someone who thinks that the CIA monitors their brain through cellphone towers or that their dog is telling them to kill people.

The dog claim has no verifiable evidence.

The God claim has no verifiable evidence.

What is the difference, other than the fact that a small minority believe the first claim, which constitutes them as 'out of the ordinary' and a large majority believe the second claim, so does that make it any less psychotic? I think not.

Both have no grounds in reality and are delusional: they're beliefs people hold without adequate evidence.

[waqob]

If Jesus was a socialist (which he wasn't) he wasn't a very good one because he believed that he was better than everyone else, he believed that women are inferior to men, he hated children, he hated LGBT people, he supported slavery and the list goes on and on. Jesus wasn't a socialist! What kind of socialist would support slavery or think of women as inferior?

You are very wrong. Jesus never hated anyone and he believed everyone was equal. And Jesus was in fact a socialist. By looking at his teachings it is clear that he preached socialism. Jesus was the first recorded socialist in history

[waqob]

Ignoring the issue that he didn't exist and is probably an amalgamation of various Jewish dissenters, the conditions for socialism didn't exist at the time of the early Christian church.

Jesus did in fact exist. And Jesus lived in the Roman Empire so the conditions for socialism were right. And the Christian church never existed when Jesus was alive

[Post-Something]

You just realize you called Malcom X a "political genius" and then in the next sentence implied he was an idiot. Unless that is you think a Muslim believing in life after death is any better than a Christian believing it.

No, because I don't think Malcolm X actually believed in God. I think he used it to further his political aims.

[Yuppie Grinder]

No, because I don't think Malcolm X actually believed in God. I think he used it to further his political aims.
What evidence to you have to have to support that claim?

[waqob]

There was no 'working class' at the time of historical jesus; there was no socialism; hence historical jesus could not have been a socialist any more than he could have been a Biebeliver.



I submit to you:


Christians believe that there is a male figure which exists outside of our reality yet which can be qualified as 'heaven' who controls everything yet is in constant battle with another male figure who resides in an underworld. The first male figure then knocked up a virgin who gave birth to a 'savior' who performed feats which defy reality and the laws of physics, was killed, then rose from the dead and returned to 'heaven.' You, believing all this, then go to church and 'drink his blood and eat his flesh' in a ritual which is supposed to somehow alter the first male figure's opinion of you such that when you die, and your 'soul' is transported to another world to be 'judged,' you will get to go to the first place which is supposed to be awesome.

How, the fuck, is that not psychotic? There is no god, heaven, hell, satan, magical jesus, soul, etc... believing in these things is, by definition, delusional. Religious people are medically psychotic.

There was no working class but there were kings and rich who had everything and ordinary people who had nothing. In fact, the Bible says it will be difficult for rich people to enter heaven

[Post-Something]

What evidence to you have to have to support that claim?

The fact that he interpreted his religion in terms of the things around him. For example, he saw white people as the devil, and the condition blacks were living in was hell. In that sense heaven was probably the better future he could make, and God was the hope and faith and drive needed to get there. Packaging the struggle in that language was politically useful because only using racial language would have alienated a lot of people, and class was out of the question as many black had felt betrayed by the white working class. In his youth he was a well known atheist, even referred to as Satan while in jail for how hard it was to argue against him in terms of religion. And then it hit him, Islam was the only way to concentrate the racial oppression without losing focus of the real enemies, and without alienating too many others. He was a master of reinventing himself, and there are even biographies named after his ability.

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

A claim of "deeper metaphysical reality" is a claim on current material reality (seems pretty obvious). And given that "deeper metaphysical reality" doesn't exist, it's psychotic to claim it does.


One could think that material reality works wholly within a realm of scientific laws and that God exists outside of it.



This is a pretty poor defense of christianity. You're basically saying that by being delusional you don't get to be subjected to rational inquiry and hence classified as psychotic...


That's not what I'm saying at all. Take rational inquiry to it - just call it what it is - mythology, not psychosis. Psychosis, if you check the definition, includes various delusions about the way the world works and hallucinations, but that's not what makes it psychosis alone. It's a psychological condition. Religious mythology is a long established institution of myths, stories, metaphors and so on from which people try to gain meaning. I'm not saying don't be critical of religion, I'm just saying don't be hyperbolic by using words like "psychosis"



I would. What, exactly, is the difference between the two? In one the CIA is monitoring you and telling you to kill people, in the other it's god!

Most religious people don't think God ever directly tells them to kill people.


The dog claim has no verifiable evidence.

The God claim has no verifiable evidence.

What is the difference, other than the fact that a small minority believe the first claim, which constitutes them as 'out of the ordinary' and a large majority believe the second claim, so does that make it any less psychotic? I think not.

Both have no grounds in reality and are delusional: they're beliefs people hold without adequate evidence.
Believing in something without verifiable evidence isn't the definition of psychosis.

[Sea]

Most historians agree that he existed and there is evidence to back it up (but don't worry I am not a christian, I am an atheist:lol:).

Here are some websites with evidence of his existence (though not of his divinity of course).

http://www.livescience.com/38014-physical-evidence-jesus-debated.html

http://www.ucg.org/science/surprising-archaeological-find-proof-jesus-existence/

http://thedevineevidence.com/jesus_history.html (http://thedevineevidence.com/jesus_history.html)Try again, please.

[Flying Purple People Eater]

Jesus was a socialist

Jesus was an insane man with a god-complex who encouraged slavery, developed Mao's "the people" ideals before he did (i.e. taking a 'neutral' stance in a matter of oppression vis a vis the landlords and serfs of the time), defended the Old Testament, a book filled with genocide, repression, massacre and despotism, cursed all of the inhabitants of any town who did not listen to him to a slow and painful death, and sentenced an out of season fig tree to death for not giving him figs when he wanted.


Fuck Jesus.

[Marshal of the People]

Try again, please.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Historicity_of_Jesus

http://listverse.com/2013/03/31/8-reasons-jesus-definitely-existed/

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Evidence_for_the_historical_existence_of_Jesus_Chr ist

http://beginningandend.com/jesus-exist-historical-evidence-jesus-christ/

http://www.npr.org/2012/04/01/149462376/did-jesus-exist-a-historian-makes-his-case

[Ethics Gradient, Traitor For All Ages]

The fact that he interpreted his religion in terms of the things around him. For example, he saw white people as the devil, and the condition blacks were living in was hell. In that sense heaven was probably the better future he could make, and God was the hope and faith and drive needed to get there. Packaging the struggle in that language was politically useful because only using racial language would have alienated a lot of people, and class was out of the question as many black had felt betrayed by the white working class. In his youth he was a well known atheist, even referred to as Satan while in jail for how hard it was to argue against him in terms of religion. And then it hit him, Islam was the only way to concentrate the racial oppression without losing focus of the real enemies, and without alienating too many others. He was a master of reinventing himself, and there are even biographies named after his ability.

You're a little mixed up. He preached the white devil stuff while with the nation of Islam, which is a break off of mainstream Islam developed by African Americans early in the 20th century. In the last years of his life he converted to traditional sunni Islam and rejected his former racist statements along with 90% of the other crap the NOI taught. The last period of his life was the more radical part, when he began to just preach black nationalism. You should read his autobiography its a great story.

[nor-commie]

I would call it a "communist heresy" :ohmy:
Because socialism and communisms main focus is equality, that cannot be achieved by any religion, religion make us believe in strange unnatural things and divides us.

[Decolonize The Left]

One could think that material reality works wholly within a realm of scientific laws and that God exists outside of it.

One could. One could also make up whatever one wanted and merely claim that some crazy shit existed outside of 'a realm of scientific laws...' Surely you can see how this is not a defense of religious psychosis, but only furthers my claim: religious people refuse to accept reality and insist on claiming that things exist outside and within (read: delusions).


That's not what I'm saying at all. Take rational inquiry to it - just call it what it is - mythology, not psychosis.
Nope. Mythology is accepted as a non-truthful story. Religious people actually believe the crazy shit written in the bible = psychosis.


Psychosis, if you check the definition, includes various delusions about the way the world works and hallucinations, but that's not what makes it psychosis alone. It's a psychological condition.

Indeed it is. That's what I'm saying.


Religious mythology is a long established institution of myths, stories, metaphors and so on from which people try to gain meaning. I'm not saying don't be critical of religion, I'm just saying don't be hyperbolic by using words like "psychosis"

As I pointed out above, religious mythology is a non-truthful creation myth. The word myth even means falsity. So no one here has a problem with religious mythology, really, as it's accepted to be just another made up story about where we all came from and why we're here. Yet religious belief and dogma is a totally different case. It's psychotic as it involves:
1) Delusions about reality: the existence of souls, heaven, hell, god, satan, angels, sins, jesus as a god, etc...
2) Hallucinations: god appearing in nature, being touched by god/jesus, seeing jesus in toast/clouds/whatever, seeing angels/satan, etc...

Religious people have a psychotic medical condition.


Most religious people don't think God ever directly tells them to kill people.

Lol. Google 'religious atrocities' and eat your words for a couple hours.

[Decolonize The Left]

There was no working class but there were kings and rich who had everything and ordinary people who had nothing. In fact, the Bible says it will be difficult for rich people to enter heaven

That's tangentially related, at best - furthermore, there have been economic disparities for a long time and many people have said that they shouldn't be. Nothing novel there.

And also, the bible says you should be stoned to death for being homosexual....

[Post-Something]

You're a little mixed up. He preached the white devil stuff while with the nation of Islam, which is a break off of mainstream Islam developed by African Americans early in the 20th century. In the last years of his life he converted to traditional sunni Islam and rejected his former racist statements along with 90% of the other crap the NOI taught. The last period of his life was the more radical part, when he began to just preach black nationalism. You should read his autobiography its a great story.

Yes, I understand this. But don't you agree with the thrust of my point? That Malcolm X had to use Islam, in both the Nation of Islam and after as a Sunni to promote his political aims? He had nothing else to use. First mixing in heavily race based language to eventually be able to address the real issues head on with some of the less racial organisations? It's kind of dialectical in a way how he did it, I have an enormous respect for the man.

In other words, the NoI would have never succeeded if it was a normal muslim group, likewise if it was a black nationalist group.

[waqob]

That's tangentially related, at best - furthermore, there have been economic disparities for a long time and many people have said that they shouldn't be. Nothing novel there.

And also, the bible says you should be stoned to death for being homosexual....

Those people could have been socialist too. And I doubt the Bible said that homosexuals should be stoned to death

[rylasasin]

And I doubt the Bible said that homosexuals should be stoned to death

Wrong. (http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/says_about/homosexuality.html)

[Sinister Cultural Marxist]

One could. One could also make up whatever one wanted and merely claim that some crazy shit existed outside of 'a realm of scientific laws...' Surely you can see how this is not a defense of religious psychosis, but only furthers my claim: religious people refuse to accept reality and insist on claiming that things exist outside and within (read: delusions).


Again, not all people who have false beliefs are "psychotic". In addition, most religious stories go over events which cannot be confirmed or denied or can be interpreted metaphorically. I'm not saying religion is "true" (or false) just that having a system of false beliefs is not a psychological disorder.



Nope. Mythology is accepted as a non-truthful story. Religious people actually believe the crazy shit written in the bible = psychosis.

That's equivocating with the term "myth"


Religious people have a psychotic medical condition.Not according to actual psychologists, as again, not all people with false or unjustified beliefs or experiences are classified as "psychotic".



Lol. Google 'religious atrocities' and eat your words for a couple hours.Most religious people who kill for religious reasons don't think that God directly told them the way God told Moses the 10 commandments. For instance, Sunni suicide bombers would be committing blasphemy or heresy if they claimed that God spoke to them personally. It's communicated indirectly through the priestly class, religious texts, etc, and hence the reason religious institutions are politically problematic.

[Dave B]

What appears to be going on here is a popular materialist analysis of [religious] literature and ideas as to opposed to a materialist analysis.

First of all any historical idea, perhaps written down in literature goes nowhere and is never heard of again without a receptive readership.

So when looking at a new ‘popular’ idea we should as historical materialists concentrate and analyse not on the ‘great person’ genius of the originator but the state of mind and ideology of those that received it.

It is true enough that ideologies are or can be selected and censored by the ruling class who own and control the means of dissemination etc.

But what can we perhaps attempt understand from the original popularity of likes of George Orwell’s book “Animal Farm” and the “Gospel Story”?

Should we just say that “Animal Farm”, with more sensational miracles than in any of the Gospel stuff with its talking pigs etc, isn’t true?

Or an allegorical myth based on an actual truth [perhaps understood] and reflected or mirrored in the consciousness of its readership.

So who would be originally interested in the idea of the someone saying the;

‘Pharisee’ organised religion is an ideological patsy of the ruling class, the rich are a bunch of bastards and the poor are great etc. for no personal gain.

And opposed the stoning to death of prostitutes.

And who was then stitched up and crucified, as a ‘terrorist’, for speaking ‘truth to power’ [ eg Manning etc] ; and attempting to throw the money changers out of [I]Zuccotti Parketc.

But fortunately we don’t have to peer back into ancient history to see the materialist and economic content of early Christianity manifest itself and being re-accommodated back again into the ruling class mainstream in the process of history repeating itself.

Martin Luther King, Jr. addresses strikers in Memphis, Tenn., March 18, 1968

http://www.aft.org/yourwork/tools4teachers/bhm/mlkpeech031868.cfm

[Sea]

Wrong. (http://skepticsannotatedbible.com/says_about/homosexuality.html)I know I've said something similar before, but just FYI:

If someone's talking about how great Christianity was and they haven't even read the bible, you're entitled to tell them to stick a ******* up their ************************

[Decolonize The Left]

Again, not all people who have false beliefs are "psychotic". In addition, most religious stories go over events which cannot be confirmed or denied or can be interpreted metaphorically. I'm not saying religion is "true" (or false) just that having a system of false beliefs is not a psychological disorder.

Not according to actual psychologists, as again, not all people with false or unjustified beliefs or experiences are classified as "psychotic".

Dictionary definition of psychosis, bold added:

Psychosis is a loss of contact with reality that usually includes: False beliefs about what is taking place or who one is (delusions) ; Seeing or hearing things that aren't there (hallucinations).

Christians believe historical jesus was the son of god. He wasn't; there is no god. Delusions? Check.
Christians believe that god is watching over them and that he appears to people in mysterious ways. They then provide "examples" of his appearance, or the appearance of jesus, mother teresa, etc... Hallucinations? Check.


Most religious people who kill for religious reasons don't think that God directly told them the way God told Moses the 10 commandments. For instance, Sunni suicide bombers would be committing blasphemy or heresy if they claimed that God spoke to them personally. It's communicated indirectly through the priestly class, religious texts, etc, and hence the reason religious institutions are politically problematic.

Religion is psychologically problematic. So it's no surprise that its political institutions are totally fucked, is it?

[Rafiq]

Political institutions that require psychotic and backward beliefs are inherently psychotic and backward to begin with. Social relations which breed those political institutions are just so.

Religion today doesn't simply exist because social relations created it. The major religions today were able to adapt so well with those relations and that is why they continue to exist. Christianity with it's protestantism and modern Islam with its militant class collaborationism. Once we rip off the many faces of the same enemy the struggle becomes universally a single struggle. Religion then becomes foolish, it is de legitimized and taken seriously by not even the class enemy.

[Rafiq]

Religion is a form of madness. But we, as Communists must inherit that very same madness to further our own ends. Communism must not be a political hobby of workers, it must be a religion, a universal truth hell bent on world domination.

[Rafiq]

Religion is a form of madness. But we, as Communists must inherit that very same madness to further our own ends. Communism must not be a political hobby of workers, it must be a religion, a universal truth hell bent on world domination. I do not mean superstition, I mean ultimate dedication and loyalty to the conquest of state power. I mean militant communist fanaticism.

[Zizz01010101]

I don't agree with Marxist Communism on many things (including suppressing religion,) though I don't believe in basing a government on religious pursuits and I'm even a Christian.

[Dave B]

Aspects of “Religion” may be an anachronism in the modern scientific age and perhaps ‘mad’ today because of that.

However I think to say that it is all ‘mad’ in the sense that it has always been mad is an error.

People like Plato, Aristotle and to a certain extent Socrates were not ‘mad’.

As should be realised by the fact that many of their basic precepts of logic etc have been successfully carried over into the modern scientific method.

On early Christianity.

For many of the early Christian theoreticians pre 200AD the works of Plato for instance formed an intellectual framework for their belief structure; and monotheism in particular.

Including the ‘Platonic’ idea, for example, that the existence of “evil” excludes the possibility of an omnipotent God.

You can actually find traces of this kind of thing in the Gospel material as well as in the writings of Justyn the Martyr circa 110 AD and Origen 220AD.

Platonism and Neo-Platonism and Marcionism was later, like Justyn and Origen, expunged from early Christianity and sent down the memory hole in the middle Christian Stalinist type purges of late 3rd and 4th century onwards.

[They were stupidly and arrogantly confident enough though to preserve the essence of many of the ideas in their enthusiastic trashing of them.

A bit like Trotsky bashing the ultra leftist moneyless/stateless ‘no compulsion’ whatever socialist Menshevik Abrahamovitch

http://www.marxists.org/archive/trotsky/1920/terrcomm/ch08.htm

]


A concept of a general economic status quo that wasn’t the will of an omnipotent God exposed the ruling class to potential criticism.

The last proponents of the idea of a non omnipotent God was probably the Cathars who seemed to hold the idea that the material world was under the control of the devil.

The institutionalised catholic church of the 12th century ruling class obviously dealt with that idea in predictable Stalinist fashion; that doesn’t require further elaboration.

That much can be gleaned even from the surviving history of the victors.

There were pre 200AD atheists who obviously rejected the standard polytheistic as well as monotheistic theorems.

They were generally referred to as the ‘Epicureans’ and were regarded at the time as ‘mad’ and ‘beneath contempt’ by most of the elite intellectuals and intelligentsia of the time.

Which should be considered in historical context by our contemporary mocking ubiquitous revleft slavish admirers of intellectuals and the intelligentsia.

[Incidentally there was an almost disturbingly rational, and non psychotic, discussion on the nature of ‘magic’ in Origen’s debate with Celsum.]

One of the so called or labelled Epicureans was Democritus; the subject matter of Karl’s doctoral thesis in 1841;


http://marxists.anu.edu.au/archive/marx/works/1841/dr-theses/index.htm


Democritus was the first theoretical chemist; the basic idea was that we were all living in legoland.

And all the complexity that we see around us was just the dazzling and ‘random’ result of recombination’s of basic and more simple components etc etc.

A totally blue-sky idea for which there was no evidence whatsoever at the time.

But basically true as things turned out.

[Incidentally there appears to be a Democritean ‘joke’ in John 4; re truth being the bottom of a well, which was attributed to Democritus.]

And for some Plato’s ‘ether’ or Aether is now being associated with the Higgs field.

You can fall into the trap of finding truths in the ramblings of old cranks but you can’t dismiss Plato and Democritus, and as I believe ‘early christians’, as just ‘cranks’ [I think] without a historical context.

In Origens contra Celsum; Celsus criticises the ‘Anarcho’ Christians for not wanting to and refusing to integrate themselves with the Roman state as awkward bastards; a argument that Origen ‘fudges’ rather than denies.





I am more interested on who were these people were rather than what they became.

Eg Stalin with his;


Where there are no classes, where there are neither rich nor poor, there is no need for a state, there is no


page 337

need either for political power, which oppresses the poor and protects the rich. Consequently, in socialist society there will be no need for the existence of political power



http://www.marx2mao.com/Stalin/AS07.html#c3

[Revenant]

What an interesting period of history God decided to incarnate, he seemed to be really pissed off with the Jews back then.

Little more than a century after the Maccabee revolt against the Hellenic Seleucid empire, he comes along preaching a new doctrine claiming to be the fulfilment of the Law, the Son of God, truth and the light etc, under the Maccabees, Hasmoneans or Edomites he wouldn't have lasted long, so he owed a lot to the Romans off the bat.

The Zealots and Sicarii however seemed fundamentally opposed to the Roman Empire, they were recorded by Josephus as being agitators against Roman Tax laws in Judea organizing mass resistance, public demonstrations etc, Jesus said "give to Ceasar what is Ceasar's" and "the poor are always with us", in other words acquiescence in the face of poverty.

[Venas Abiertas]

Jesus said "render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's" in response to being shown a coin with Augustus Caesar's face on it and asked if it was lawful to pay taxes to the Roman authorities. The question was posed as a trick in order to get Jesus arrested for being a "tax dodger". Jesus's answer explains the proper separation of Church and State: "render unto Caesar what is Caesar's and unto God what is God's".

I suopose an anarchist would be against rendering any duties to the authorities but a Marxist.-Leninist would agree that a lawful government does have the authority to require certain things from its citizens. Whether or not Augustus Caesar constituted "lawful authority" at that time is a different question and would make for an interesting debate.

In addition, Jesus had previously said that no man can serve two masters. He must choose between serving God or serving Mammon (the Babylonian god of money. We get the word "money" from Mammon.) Some interpret Jesus's words above as being a continuation of that statement. He was asking his interrogators to choose between serving Mammon, the Roman state and its money, or serving God.

"The poor you will always have with you" was Jesus's response to the criticism of the Apostle Judas Iscariot, a thief and traitor, when Jesus allowed a woman to anoint his head with a flask of expensive perfume. Judas argued that the money could have been better spent on the poor.

This quote is interesting on two levels. First, Jesus preached that equality and justice would not be reached until the "Kingdom of God" was achieved. Conservative Christians teach that the Kingdom of God will not be reached until the end of time, so in the meantime we just have to put up with suffering and injustice. Others, for example the early Apostles themselves or modern Liberation Theologians, believe that it is our duty to create that Kingdom here on this earth. This is why the early apostles shared all of their belongings and assured that no one among them would suffer want or need. This is also the message of the Old Testament social laws requiring periodic forgiveness of debts and release from servitude, as well as commands to care for widows and orphans and feed and house foreigners and indigents.

The other and complimentary interpretation is found in the same text. Jesus told Judas that "the poor you will always have with you, but you will not always have me" because he knew that he would soon be crucified. We see Jesus on several occasions celebrating weddings and at religious festivals. He seems to be challenging the idea that just because one cares about the poor he/she is obligated to go around with a long face all the time, denying him/herself any comforts or entertainment. Some leftists seem to follow this thinking, depriving themselves of any fun or rest in a manner that would impress a desert hermit.

I just put this explanation out because so many of us have only been exposed to the right wing conservative interpretation of the Christian message, in the same way that most people have only been exposed to the right wing conservative interpretation of Marxism or anarchism.

[Dave B]

I find it somewhat embarrassingly tedious as a ‘Marxist’ appearing to defend early Christianity.

However I am interested in it as history; and as a partisan pulling the rug from under the feet of modern or conservative Christianity.

It is par for the course I suppose that Old Testament (and misogynistic Pauline) ‘leftists’ interpret Christianity in the same way as conservative Christians do, and leap to each others defence when that is questioned

As ‘conservatives’ in general interpret communism in the same way as Stalinist do.

The ‘interpretation’ is just a matter of criticism for one side versus advocacy for the other.

As with Lenin’s state capitalism in 1918.

It was just a matter of was it good ie Lenin, or bad re Bukharin?



http://www.marx2mao.net/Lenin/LWC18.html







As the previous poster pointed out the obvious context of the ‘trap’; of render unto Ceasar quotation is everything.

There was obviously only two answers; tell people not to pay the taxes etc or tell them to pay it.


Analysing it; you would guess that it was in fact not JC’s opinion that mattered but that of the audience.

If JC said pay it then he would loose sympathy and credibility with his audience etc, the trap.

Say don’t pay it then it would be a thought crime and incitement to break the law etc etc.

[We have a similar situation now I suppose with the editor of the Manchester Guardian aiding and abetting ‘terrorism’ by publishing the Snowden stuff- which I think is really funny.]

JC responds it seems, for what its worth, by drawing attention to whose head was on the coin which would have been ‘Tiberius’.

Head of the imperialist state and decadent even by Roman standards let alone the ‘moral’ norms of Judiac society.

It was dirty unclean gentile money and as bad as handling pork in the first place.

The stuff about;


Old Testament social laws requiring periodic forgiveness of debts and release from servitude.

Is interesting because after the incorporation of Judea etc into the Roman empire in 6AD; all those old ideas as incorporated in state laws etc were progressively broken down as well as taxes having to paid in cash rather than or less so than in kind.

The stupid peasants waited until harvest time to sell their produce for cash to pay taxes; when there was a glut and prices were low. The frugal peasants paid with their cash horde and held out for higher prices later.

And so it went on in an almost predictable way.

Followed by the lending of money by the Judiac Kulaks to the poor peasants for them to pay their taxes on the due date.
Then debt, foreclosure on the land of the poor peasants followed by the Judaic Kulaks employing the dispossessed as wage labourers to work the land which was formerly their own etc etc.

Slavery proper or serfdom wasn’t a historical superstructural cultural or economic norm.

Thus the paying of cash taxes was not just a matter of not liking paying taxes to the state; was having economically and socially revolution affect a bit like the land enclosures in England etc.

There is I think an albeit loose parallel between what was going on in Judea and Russia at the end of the 19th century and onwards.

As the landowning class and the state, on the edge of the international ‘whirlpool of capitalism, became more interested in cash payments than duck eggs and bushels of corn.

Lenin wrote some interesting stuff on it [ie in Russia] somewhere I think; he wasn’t a complete chuckle head when it came to stuff like that.

That kind of stuff could have been going on, undocumented, elsewhere in a multicultural world Roman Empire I suppose.

[Revenant]

As the previous poster pointed out the obvious context of the ‘trap’; of render unto Ceasar quotation is everything.

There was obviously only two answers; tell people not to pay the taxes etc or tell them to pay it.


Right and that's what happened the Zealots and Sicarii, the radical resistance to Roman imperialism organized mass demonstrations and told people not to pay these taxes, they were betrayed in the fight when Jesus the pacifier came along telling the people to "believe in him and they'll live even if they die" etc.



Say don’t pay it then it would be a thought crime and incitement to break the law etc etc.
Doesn't Lenin say something to the effect that breaking the law is occasionally a necessary part of class struggle?

Jesus said "love thy enemy", "if he slaps you on the cheek, offer him the other", let me be explicit, from the book of Matthew 5:40
"If someone drags you into court and sues for the shirt off your back, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. And if someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life."

In my view he wasn't a socialist he was clearly a sado-masochist.

[blake 3:17]

I've been going to some events organized at a church that a socialist anarchist friend is the priest at. We've been friends for 20 years and know each other through anti-war, anti-imperialist and literary and arts stuff. As well as being just friends.

I've been pretty impressed with things going on there, she got my involved in her church years back doing yummy good vegetarian cooking for folks on the street or marginalizing housed or whatever (one of the deals was No Mandatory Prayer!).

I was raised Christian, but it was pretty loosey goosey liberal but I've been re-examining it in recent years. Two of the best things I've read are Chris Hedges' I Don't Believe in Atheists and Terry Eagleton's The God Debate. Eagleton really points out how wild the Jesus story is & I've been a little hepped up on the Gospels the past year or so. Matthew and Mark are slammers.

[Remus Bleys]

God chris hedges sucks so much. F

[blake 3:17]

God chris hedges sucks so much. F


What's really interesting in his book is that he's a believer and all of his of examples are actually from atheistic thinkers, mostly artists and poets. Whereas Eagleton, who isn't a believer, draws on a pretty much much purely Christian thinkers. Eagleton does make some interesting comparisons between Aquinas, Wittgenstein and Heidegger, so...

[Remus Bleys]

I'm saying chris hedges is a social democrat who calls for violent revolt then reverts to pacificism and calling anarchists the scum of occupy wallstreet, and who's criticism of the ussr is basically "they were totalitarian"

[Logical seal]

Christan communists, While arrogant, I don't think we should fuck with them.

[AntiFascism]

My view is that we as communists must be committed to the scientific method and that means explaining material phenomena by naturalistic means instead of the supernatural or divine. Sure, not all Christians (or Muslims, Jews etc.) reject the applied sciences, however, they often use science in a narrow and functional way instead of a means of explaining natural phenomena. A fundamentalist Christian will say even if something can be scientifically proven, if it contradicts Scripture, then Scripture trumps science. This is why it's possible for their to be very intelligent Christians who may hold PhDs in mathematics, engineering, computer science, physics etc. but still deny the theory of evolution.

I think though with the expansion of science in every cultural sphere and with rising economic prosperity, religion will become less and less important. This has basically already happened in the developed world, the USA being the exception. Religion will ultimately be its own undoing, as people become more sophisticated, they start thinking for themselves and question religious dogma.

At the moment, religion is here to stay though and it's not something we should retreat from, we'll just have to try and accommodate it somehow. A lot of progressives in Latin America and Asia are Christians. Ultimately, it's man that shapes religion so if people can morph it into something progressive, then that's a positive step. Scripture can and should be interpreted to fulfill revolutionary class war. There are more and more Christians today protesting income equality, LGBT* rights, reproductive rights etc.

[Revenant]

AntiFa, what do you think of people like Fritjopf Capra and Deepak Chopra who are basically synthesists, blending advanced scientific theories to support their theosophic/eastern mystical world views and new age religion?

Though I agree with you about traditional religions declining, there are still plenty of examples of perhaps even worse religious ideology enjoying a resurgence, the eastern transcendental systems, UFO cults, conspiracy theories, Moonies, Sufis, Theosophists, occultists and solipsism of various forms have alll benefited from a resurgence on the internet.

Many of these groups beliefs overlap and often they are open about being fundamentally opposed (theosophy especially) to western science, or "this world is all there is science" as it's often called by their megalomaniac leaders.

Even parts of the Vatican hierarchy are talking about the likelihood of Alien contact these days, so perhaps even the traditional church is attempting to reinvent itself, remodel and "universalize" it's doctrine in line with the 21st century?

[Dave B]

I'm saying chris hedges is a social democrat who calls for violent revolt then reverts to pacificism and calling anarchists the scum of occupy wallstreet, and who's criticism of the ussr is basically "they were totalitarian"



Hammond defines himself as “an anarchist communist.” He seeks to destroy capitalism and the centralized power of the corporate state. His revolutionary vision is “leaderless collectives based on free association, consensus, mutual aid, self-sufficiency and harmony with the environment.” He embraces the classic tools of revolt, including mass protests, general strikes and boycotts. And he sees hacking and leaking as part of this resistance, tools not only to reveal the truths about these systems of corporate power but to “disrupt/destroy these systems entirely.”
He participated in the Occupy movement in Chicago but found the politics of Occupy too vague and amorphous, a point on which I concur. He said Occupy lacked revolutionary vigor. He told me he did not support what he called the “dogmatic nonviolence doctrine” of many in the Occupy movement, calling it “needlessly limited and divisive.” He rejects the idea of acts of civil disobedience that protesters know will lead to their arrest. “The point,” he said, “is to carry out acts of resistance and not get caught.” He condemns “peace patrols,” units formed within the Occupy movement that sought to prohibit acts of vandalism and violence by other protesters—most often members of the Black Bloc—as “a secondary police force.” And he spurns the calls by many in Occupy not to antagonize the police, calling the police “the boot boys of the 1 percent, paid to protect the rich and powerful.” He said such a tactic of non-confrontation with the police ignored the long history of repression the police have carried out against popular movements, as well as the “profiling and imprisonment of our comrades.”
“Because we were unprepared, or perhaps unwilling, to defend our occupations, police and mayors launched coordinated attacks, driving us out of our own parks,” he said of the state’s closure of the Occupy encampments.
“I fully support and have participated in Black Bloc and other forms of militant direct action,” he said. “I do not believe that the ruling powers listen to the people’s peaceful protests. Black Bloc is an effective, fluid and dynamic form of protest. It causes disruption outside of predictable/controllable mass demonstrations through ‘unarrests,’ holding streets, barricades and property destruction. Smashing corporate windows is not violence, especially when compared to the everyday economic violence of sweatshops and ‘free trade.’ Black Bloc seeks to hit them where it hurts, through economic damage. But more than smashing windows they seek to break the spell of ‘law and order’ and the artificial limitations we impose on ourselves.”
I disagree with Hammond over tactics, but in the end this disagreement is moot. It will be the ruling elites who finally determine our response. If the corporate elites employ the full force of the security and surveillance state against us, if corporate totalitarian rule is one of naked, escalating and brutal physical repression, then the violence of the state will spawn a counter-violence. Judge Preska’s decision to judicially lynch Hammond has only added to the fury she and the state are trying to stamp out. An astute ruling class, one aware of the rage rippling across the American landscape, would have released Hammond on Friday and begun to address the crimes he exposed. But our ruling class, while adept at theft, looting, propaganda and repression, is blind to the growing discontent caused by the power imbalance and economic inequality that plague ordinary Americans at a time when half of the country lives in poverty or “near poverty.”
http://www.truthdig.com/report/page2/feeding_the_flame_of_revolt_20131117