• j4k3@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    So starting from a schizophrenic as the lineal foundation resulted in a three headed god concept never contained in any canonical part of their book, the mulligan do-overs completely disconnected from their ancient ways, and the other brother magic tripping LSD globe trotter of the desert. Does that surprise anyone. What is surprising to me is that something so obviously nonsense is still so accepted.

    • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      I view it as slightly better than that interpretation. The Old Testament is what links the three. The interesting thing about the Old Testament is that it was written over a few thousand years starting around the time of two major historical events that could have precipitated what would look like a potential “apocalypse,” to anyone at the time.

      The Green Sahara period had just come to an end, denying Egypt what I would imagine was a substantial breadbasket for the Egyptian, and possibly Assyrian Empires. That event may not have directly caused The Bronze age collapse, but they happened quickly enough together, that I would imagine it was a factor.

      So in a period of a few hundred years, a savannah that had plentiful game and foraging turned into the largest desert in the world. The Levant went from a seemingly temperate mediterranian climate, aka “the promised land,” to a desert mediterranian climate. All the empires that you know of just collapsed in a period of 150 years. You might just get a bit superstitious, and borrow some ancient creation myths to write down the “history” of your people.

      Lots of cultures did this. We know from archeological evidence that the Israelites weren’t ever in Egypt, so everything up to, and including Moses, was made up to try to teach their descendants how to live in this new horrible dying world. It’s just absolute random chance that the Israelite texts survived long enough to spawn the other two belief systems.

      • Uruanna@lemmy.world
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        4 days ago

        The green Sahara was gone 5 000 years ago when Egypt barely started being Egypt and long before Assyria, the Bronze Age Collapse happened 3 200 years ago, and the Old Testament started getting written a bit before 600 BCE over a few hundred years. The Egyptians and Assyrians already had their breadbasket, it was the fertile crescent from the Nile to the Tigris and Euphrates, it was not a desert there.

        The israelite texts survived because they were written right when some big empires (Babylon and the Achaemenids) came around and then carried them over until the Greeks and Romans came by.

        • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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          1 day ago

          I’m not going to entertain the fiction of “Christian Scientists.” Show me a real archeological expedition that showed any Israelite pottery in Egypt. There are none. All Israelite pottery and artifacts that have been found, have been in the Levant. They also do not share any similarities to Egyptian pottery or artifacts, and do share iconography with Cannanite pottery and artifacts.

          I watched your misinformation video and they presented nothing but supposition.

          • Flax@feddit.uk
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            1 day ago

            Why would a captured slave people be producing their own pottery, exactly?

            The old testament shows Egyptian influences- Moses’ name is Egyptian, the Ark of the Covenant is Egyptian in design. There is a lack of archeological expeditions either in this field. I don’t really know how you’d definitively prove this.

            • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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              1 day ago

              Because even slaves needed their own pottery. This is easily proveable at many archeological sites, even in Egypt. The archeological sites in Egypt contain lots of slave made and owned pottery fragments. None are Israelite.

              The old testament is pure fiction up till the period around 500 to 600 BCE, at that point it finally starts recording events that actually happened. Jericho was sieged multiple times, we have evidence of this. The Israelites never razed Jericho. There’s no evidence of a battle at the time that the fiction of the OT would have you believe.

    • shneancy@lemmy.world
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      4 days ago

      in my personal edgy opinion, religions are a cope & a great tool of control.

      They give you hope against the biggest fear ingrained in us - death, and even worse - death being equal for everyone, good person, bad person, both will die. It’s a nice thought to believe that there is fairness to it all, that good actions should be done despite bad actions being easier. It’s a nice thought to believe there is something else after you die, and none of your good (or bad) deeds go unnoticed, that you, a good person, will live in paradise, and your enemies will finally suffer the consequences of what they’ve done.

      it also helps bring people together, creates a unified peoppe and a culture of those who believe in the same thing & allows a potential leader to have an easier time rallying everyone towards the same goal.

      religion is a wonderful tool for both coping with existential dread, and unifying people. but as a tool it has the capacity for explaining away both good and bad things quite equally (helping poor, crusades, personal growth, bigotry).

      what relgion is based on is close to irrelevant, it just has to be something, preferably a good overall story with many smaller stories that teach the common folk how to be a good [insert religious identity]. Try reading ancient Egyptian mythology, i suspect most of that shit was written on heavy doses of psychedelics, and despite how completely insane all of it is - it unified people and was an integral part of the biggest empire of the ancient times.

      honestly i don’t want to “debunk” people’s religions, if it’s something that keeps them going then why take it away, i personally tried but failed multiple times at believing in any god, but i can’t lie the existential dread of “one day i will die, no matter how much i managed to achieve, no matter how good of a person i was, i will die the same as every murderer or war criminal, and there will be no justice in that, and then, one day my name will be spoken for the last time, and i will be forgotten” is a heavy thought to bear, no wonder that as a species we’ve always tried to find some reason, any reason, for that not being the case

      • seeigel@feddit.org
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        4 days ago

        They give you hope against the biggest fear ingrained in us - death, and even worse - death being equal for everyone, good person, bad person, both will die.

        Or they teach us to fear death. Nothing to worry about death unless you will live afterwards forever and take your memories with you. Now you have to make good memories soon.

        • shneancy@lemmy.world
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          4 days ago

          nah i’m pretty sure evolution taught us to fear death, no species looks like it feels neutral about dying

      • Zoboomafoo@slrpnk.net
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        4 days ago

        The receptors for psychedelics aren’t there for no reason, heavy prayer and meditation can trigger similar effects. Substances are just a shortcut, that’s why religion don’t tend to like them. Personally I think that as long as it isn’t used as a crutch it’s totally fine to buy a day pass.

        • shneancy@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          the receptors for psychedelics are the same as normal happiness receptors, just constantly stimulated by the drugs binding to them (similar to SSRI). prayer and meditation can have partially similar effect, fractals, feelings happiness, and even ego death yes, but there is more to psychedelics than those, they can completely alter your perception of reality and thoughts

          • Zoboomafoo@slrpnk.net
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            3 days ago

            So can meditation, if you are good enough and go deep enough. I’ve heard stories of Buddhist monks that think LSD is weak stuff.