Religious fictionalism: believers without 'the belief'?

[PureX]

I think I understand you. Science is concerned with how things seem to work in nature, but not really why or what they "are", in any sense other than how they behave, (as perceived by us). Science it not a metaphysical endeavour. It always leaves deeper, unanswered questions at the point at which the observations - and hence the associated model - run out.

I would challenge the term bias however. Science has its scope and terms of reference, like anything else and it is not reasonable to expect it to go beyond them. The "bias" comes in, it seems to me, when these boundaries, or scope limitations, are not acknowledged.

I think they are very seldom being acknowledged, by a great many people.

 

[shunyadragon]

I think I understand you. Science is concerned with how things seem to work in nature, but not really why or what they "are", in any sense other than how they behave, (as perceived by us). Science it not a metaphysical endeavour. It always leaves deeper, unanswered questions at the point at which the observations - and hence the associated model - run out.

I would challenge the term bias however. Science has its scope and terms of reference, like anything else and it is not reasonable to expect it to go beyond them. The "bias" comes in, it seems to me, when these boundaries, or scope limitations, are not acknowledged.

Excellent post!

 

[Augustus]

https://www.google.com/search?q=ism&oq=ism&aqs=chrome..69i57j0l7.4362j0j8&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
-[sm

1. a distinctive practice, system, or philosophy, typically a political ideology or an artistic movement.
   "of all the isms, fascism is the most repressive"

Often used to describe a negative connotation, but also used many positive ways like to describe a religion as in Hinduism

Was more the 'fictional' that comes before the -ism that I was thinking of

Literalism = belief it's literal
Allegoricalism = belief it's allegorical
Fictionalism = ...

 

[shunyadragon]

Was more the 'fictional' that comes before the -ism that I was thinking of

Literalism = belief it's literal
Allegoricalism = belief it's allegorical
Fictionalism = ..

Your correct, but I do not like dealing with -isms, as in Scientism - belief in science?

 

[Augustus]

Scientism - belief in science?

It used to be something like that: thought or expression regarded as characteristic of scientists.

The contemporary usage of excessive belief in the accuracy, applicability and efficacy of scientific techniques is still roughly in this ballpark.

Irregular words have to be learned individually though, we don't implicitly understand that scientism should be a criticism.

Anyway, it's not really important, I understood how you were using the word which is the main thing.

 

[BilliardsBall]

It seems to me that it all falls down to whether one accepts a symbolic reading or not.

Some people find Christianity to be pointless if the literal person of Jesus did not exist, die and ressurrect.

Not all people do. The doctrine exists regardless, and may legitimally be understood to be valid in and of itself.

News flash: "Some people" in the passage cited include Paul, author of 2/3 of the New Testament. He was responding to this theory saying, "Either Jesus is raised or Christianity is for self-appointed martyrs who like beatings and persecutions."

Some of the doctrine is valid of itself, sure, like "Worship God, stop being an atheist, love your enemies unlike the atheists are unable to, honor the Sabbath unlike atheists who don't want any business to honor their religious conscience," etc.!

 

[shunyadragon]

Was more the 'fictional' that comes before the -ism that I was thinking of

Literalism = belief it's literal
Allegoricalism = belief it's allegorical
Fictionalism = ...

I gave it some more thought as to the problem with -ism use above with wording which causes the confusion

Literalism = belief it's literal. - Belief in literal
Allegoricalism = belief it's allegorical - Belief in Allegory
Fictionalism = Belief in Fiction.

as in Hinduism - Belief in Hindu.

 

[BilliardsBall]

You are banking on the literal truth of scripture. This is not at all necessary.

Let me qualify the above...I believe that people tend to fall into one of two attitudes towards their experience of the world...some favor the hard realities, the practicalities, the "what is". Others favor the possibilities, the potentials and the "what might be". For the former it is probably a lot more difficult to be a believer and not understand that the stories about Christ are not literally true. The story of Christ is just one example of a centuries old story motif that has been passed down through story-tellers and authors throughout the centuries. ironically, the practically minded are, in a sense, forced into accepting something very impractical and unprovable in order to participate in their less strong ability to relate purely to the possibilities of human experience. As such they have to incongruously flip over into "spiritual" mode but they bring with them an attitude of literalism and factuality.

I, as a "possibilities" type, deeply appreciate the ability to "put on this fiction" for a time for the purpose of immersing one's self in the possibilities of human experience and to open one's self up to something greater than what one will ever literally experience in reality. My love for story of all kinds keeps me often immersed in such wonderful reveries and inspirations. But at the end of the day I know that one such story can't be claimed to be more or less literally true than another. I nurture my practical side as well in this and keep a balance between the two.

For me Nikos Kazantzakis says it well in his dialog between Jesus and Paul:



Or the movie rewrite of this...

I can certainly accept your hypothesis. Now all you have to do is prove what you wrote about the Christ stories being not literally true.

Side A: 12 New Testament authors plus apocryphal authors, plus 1/3 of the Earth is Christian and another 1/3 is Muslim and says Christ is a sinless prophet and Lord of Judgment Day

Side B: "I say the stories aren't literally true"

Can you add to Side B beyond hearsay or not?

 

[BilliardsBall]

Simply citing scripture(?) does not represent an argument, because it only addresses those that believe as you do.

The argument is regarding whether Christianity is meant to be taken as fact. Paul, the author of 2/3 of the New Testament, whom I cited, says either Jesus was raised or Christian simply love being hassled (for example, by biased people like yourself).

 

[LuisDantas]

News flash: "Some people" in the passage cited include Paul, author of 2/3 of the New Testament. He was responding to this theory saying, "Either Jesus is raised or Christianity is for self-appointed martyrs who like beatings and persecutions."

Aye. So?

Are you implying that Christianity needs Paul's approval or validation?

I guess that is for Christians to decide, but it is not a given and, frankly, I don't see why it would be true nor desirable.

Some of the doctrine is valid of itself, sure, like "Worship God, stop being an atheist, love your enemies unlike the atheists are unable to, honor the Sabbath unlike atheists who don't want any business to honor their religious conscience," etc.!

Hmm. I will take this as a confession of being utterly confused about Christianity.

Best of luck.

 

[shunyadragon]

The argument is regarding whether Christianity is meant to be taken as fact. Paul, the author of 2/3 of the New Testament, whom I cited, says either Jesus was raised or Christian simply love being hassled (for example, by biased people like yourself).

Again, this is arguing from your belief that it is fact when their is no evidence that it is factual. In this discussion I am not arguing for or against in a biased perspective. I am only saying you are making assertions based on 'belief,' when the acceptance of your interpretation of scripture is only meaningful to those that believe as you do. Inreality Christianity in it's many varied (often conflicting beliefs) forms is a matter of faith and belief and not 'fact.'

For those that do not believe as you do will simply conclude 'Christian simply love is being hassled (?),' or a view more coherently rational.

 

[exchemist]

I gave it some more thought as to the problem with -ism use above with wording which causes the confusion

Literalism = belief it's literal. - Belief in literal
Allegoricalism = belief it's allegorical - Belief in Allegory
Fictionalism = Belief in Fiction.

as in Hinduism - Belief in Hindu.

The OP made it perfectly plain that that is not what "fictionalism" means in the context of this thread. It means the opposite: subscribers to a religion who treat its scripture as a work of fiction.

 

[sealchan]

I can certainly accept your hypothesis. Now all you have to do is prove what you wrote about the Christ stories being not literally true.

Side A: 12 New Testament authors plus apocryphal authors, plus 1/3 of the Earth is Christian and another 1/3 is Muslim and says Christ is a sinless prophet and Lord of Judgment Day

Side B: "I say the stories aren't literally true"

Can you add to Side B beyond hearsay or not?

Yes

No one alive today knows anything about Jesus except through hearsay.

Many of these same people demonstrably deny the miraculous stories of the divinity of Krishna and the Buddha with the same standard for determining certain knowledge as they do for knowing Jesus is divine

The four gospels themselves are not in agreement on events

The four gospels were written decades after the events in question

The different gospels show signs of copying from a written source

The differences between the gospels reflect the author's unique perspective

The gospels show signs of having borrowed from myth from other cultures

There is no archeological evidence for the resurrection nor any evidence that resurrection is even possible

 

[columbus]

Can you add to Side B beyond hearsay or not?

Sure.
Side A depends upon hearsay and the logical fallacy "argument from population".

Side B is based on science, like nobody comes back from the dead and leaves any evidence. It's never happened. Although, on the other hand, lots of people(the majority actually) don't find the New Testament particularly credible. And if you ask them why they don't they'll explain it. But they do(sorta) believe something else, about God and afterlife and such, similar to Christian beliefs.
Similar to Christian beliefs, but different and mutually exclusive. Jesus didn't both die on the Cross and Resurrect, while also faking His death and moving to India.
The latter is the second biggest religious teaching about Jesus's post-Crucifixion life.

It's more plausible than yours, to me.

Although neither is as plausible, to me, as the possibility that Jesus died, and people made up stuff about Him afterwards that wasn't really true.
Tom

 

[Vouthon]

I wonder in fact whether the demands we tend nowadays to make of religious believers, viz. that they should have a fully worked out, intellectually coherent and firmly held conviction about all the doctrines of their faith, are an aberration, arising from an Enlightenment-driven approach to religion in the wake of the Reformation. It was @Polymath257 who, in another thread, drew my attention to the distinction between mythos and logos and the way logos has been emphasised, to the detriment of mythos, since that time. Mediaeval people may have approached religion rather differently.

How likely are people in any given community to be consistently believers in the exact form of dogma presented by any of their local Churches? What are they supposed to do if, say, they do not believe that the communion hosts are literally the body of Christ?

I think you both raise excellent questions for consideration here.

In the middle ages, it was certainly recognised that one did not need to grasp or even strictly assent, propositionally with one's intellect, to every tenet of the faith to be a Christian (distinct from the requirement to not dissent publicly from it, of course!). Religious practice, participation in the ritual and devotional life, mattered more.

See:


https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/bitstream/handle/10871/11543/Lay Religion for JMH.pdf?sequence=5

Recent studies have often suggested that ecclesiastical expectations of the laity were relatively low overall, even if some laypeople exceeded these basic requirements. For example Norman Tanner and Sethina Watson have argued that although medieval churchmen had high aspirations for the laity, they were also willing to tolerate ignorance, in a pragmatic attempt to keep as many people within the church as possible.1 This and some other surveys of medieval religion have also suggested that for many medieval Christians, as long as they accepted some core beliefs, religion was more about participating in the rituals than about having a high level of doctrinal knowledge...​

This is still the modus operandi of the Eastern Churches, for example the Ethiopian Orthodox:

"As one of the world’s oldest varieties of Christianity, brought to northern Ethiopia by Syrian monk-missionaries in the mid-fourth century, Ethiopian Orthodoxy has its own distinctive ethos and theology. Within the sacramental theology that governs this variety of Christianity, it is not correct belief, but rather the sacraments that are efficacious, or more precisely, God’s power working through them (Boylston 2012).

What humans can control is being in the right conditions—ritually, morally—to receive divine grace (Boylston 2012: 80). For this reason, rather than correct knowledge regarding the teachings of the Church, staunch commitment to norms sanctioned by tradition and taught by religious authorities are central to the moral self-crafting of Ethiopian Christians and to their sense of religious identity."

(Eliza F. Kent and Izabela Orlowska, The Religiosity of Church Forests in the Ethiopian Highlands)
​

In Europe, and then globally, the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century is the doctrinal upheaval that set belief ("faith alone" sole fide) at the absolute epicentre of lay Christian life and identity, to the exclusion of earlier models.

One might justly view that as an historical aberration.

 

[columbus]

Something I can't help but wonder about.

How many of the Israelites, say 3000 years ago, actually believed that the stories in Genesis were literally true. I doubt that very many did. They may have been primitive, but they weren't stupid.

Look at the modern world, with all the stuff about Santa Claus. Small children believe, but grown ups don't. Adults treat the legend of Santa with respect. He's the personification of the Spirit of comraderery and generosity and charity, when it's cold and dark in the real world. He's not a pudgy dude in a red suit, living at the North Pole, who brings gifts to the children of well-to-do white folks in a magical sleigh.

I have too much respect for the folks who told the stories, all those centuries ago, to believe that they were dumb enough to literally believe that the stories were accurate history. I think that they were smarter than that. Like modern people who believe in Santa, metaphorically.
Such as me.
Tom

 

[PureX]

Something I can't help but wonder about.

How many of the Israelites, say 3000 years ago, actually believed that the stories in Genesis were literally true. I doubt that very many did. They may have been primitive, but they weren't stupid.

Look at the modern world, with all the stuff about Santa Claus. Small children believe, but grown ups don't. Adults treat the legend of Santa with respect. He's the personification of the Spirit of comraderery and generosity and charity, when it's cold and dark in the real world. He's not a pudgy dude in a red suit, living at the North Pole, who brings gifts to the children of well-to-do white folks in a magical sleigh.

I have too much respect for the folks who told the stories, all those centuries ago, to believe that they were dumb enough to literally believe that the stories were accurate history. I think that they were smarter than that. Like modern people who believe in Santa, metaphorically.
Such as me.
Tom

People love stories, for lots of reasons, even though they know they are fictional, or semi-fictional stories. And most of us understand that even when stories posed as being biographical they're often still exaggerated for effect. I see no reason to assume that people back then were any different in their appreciation for such stories as people are, today, or that they were somehow unable to recognize a degree of "creative license" in the telling of a story.

 

[exchemist]

People love stories, for lots of reasons, even though they know they are fictional, or semi-fictional stories. And most of us understand that even when stories posed as being biographical they're often still exaggerated for effect. I see no reason to assume that people back then were any different in their appreciation for such stories as people are, today, or that they were somehow unable to recognize a degree of "creative license" in the telling of a story.

I have found myself pointing out over and over again to literalists on this forum that, by 200AD at any rate, Church Fathers such as Origen were well aware, from their exposure to the myths of classical antiquity, that myth and allegory were components of the bible. He did not take the Genesis story literally, but was perfectly able to discern the messages for humanity it contains in allegorical form. I have read that Jewish scholars who were his contemporaries in Alexandria took the same view. I have little doubt that they would not have been the first.

 

[exchemist]

I think you both raise excellent questions for consideration here.

In the middle ages, it was certainly recognised that one did not need to grasp or even strictly assent, propositionally with one's intellect, to every tenet of the faith to be a Christian (distinct from the requirement to not dissent publicly from it, of course!). Religious practice, participation in the ritual and devotional life, mattered more.

See:


https://ore.exeter.ac.uk/repository/bitstream/handle/10871/11543/Lay Religion for JMH.pdf?sequence=5

Recent studies have often suggested that ecclesiastical expectations of the laity were relatively low overall, even if some laypeople exceeded these basic requirements. For example Norman Tanner and Sethina Watson have argued that although medieval churchmen had high aspirations for the laity, they were also willing to tolerate ignorance, in a pragmatic attempt to keep as many people within the church as possible.1 This and some other surveys of medieval religion have also suggested that for many medieval Christians, as long as they accepted some core beliefs, religion was more about participating in the rituals than about having a high level of doctrinal knowledge...​

This is still the modus operandi of the Eastern Churches, for example the Ethiopian Orthodox:

"As one of the world’s oldest varieties of Christianity, brought to northern Ethiopia by Syrian monk-missionaries in the mid-fourth century, Ethiopian Orthodoxy has its own distinctive ethos and theology. Within the sacramental theology that governs this variety of Christianity, it is not correct belief, but rather the sacraments that are efficacious, or more precisely, God’s power working through them (Boylston 2012).

What humans can control is being in the right conditions—ritually, morally—to receive divine grace (Boylston 2012: 80). For this reason, rather than correct knowledge regarding the teachings of the Church, staunch commitment to norms sanctioned by tradition and taught by religious authorities are central to the moral self-crafting of Ethiopian Christians and to their sense of religious identity."

(Eliza F. Kent and Izabela Orlowska, The Religiosity of Church Forests in the Ethiopian Highlands)
​

In Europe, and then globally, the Protestant Reformation of the sixteenth century is the doctrinal upheaval that set belief ("faith alone" sole fide) at the absolute epicentre of lay Christian life and identity, to the exclusion of earlier models.

One might view justly that as an historical aberration.

That is very interesting.

What also interests me, as someone with a science background, is the supreme irony that Enlightenment "rational" thinking, applied to religion, led to a demand for intellectual rigour in belief which led some groups to think that biblical literalism was logically necessary for their belief - and thus to the rejection of science!

 

[Vouthon]

I have found myself pointing out over and over again to literalists on this forum that, by 200AD at any rate, Church Fathers such as Origen were well aware

Augustine never interpreted it literally either.

See:

Evolution | scientific theory

Biblical scholars point out that the Bible is inerrant with respect to religious truth, not in matters that are of no significance to salvation.

Augustine, considered by many the greatest Christian theologian, wrote in the early 5th century in his De Genesi ad litteram (Literal Commentary on Genesis):

It is also frequently asked what our belief must be about the form and shape of heaven, according to Sacred Scripture. Many scholars engage in lengthy discussions on these matters, but the sacred writers with their deeper wisdom have omitted them. Such subjects are of no profit for those who seek beatitude. And what is worse, they take up very precious time that ought to be given to what is spiritually beneficial. What concern is it of mine whether heaven is like a sphere and Earth is enclosed by it and suspended in the middle of the universe, or whether heaven is like a disk and the Earth is above it and hovering to one side.
​

Augustine adds later in the same chapter: “In the matter of the shape of heaven, the sacred writers did not wish to teach men facts that could be of no avail for their salvation.” ​

Augustine is saying that the book of Genesis is not an elementary book of astronomy. It is a book about religion, and it is not the purpose of its religious authors to settle questions about natural science that are of no relevance whatsoever to how to seek salvation.

In De Trinitate and his Literal Commentary on Genesis, St. Augustine interprets Genesis as God having endowed creation with the capacity to develop - that is, a view compatible with, albeit different from, our contemporary understanding of evolution. Augustine employs the image of a dormant 'seed' to aid his readers in understanding this point, what Alistair Grath refers to as Augustine's belief in "divinely embedded causalities which emerge or evolve at a later stage." See:


Augustine, Genesis, & the Goodness of Creation | Henry Center

Augustine also argues for a notion of “seminal seeds.” His argument is that, when God created the world, he both created actual “stuff”—animals, vegetation, etc., but also created seminal seeds by which (over time) “new” things would come forth.

Thus, at some point after the original creation, we really do see “new” creatures, “new” vegetable life, and so on. But when animals reproduce, or when the seeds of a plant lead to the existence of a new plant, there is no autonomous creating going on.

Rather, God is still the ultimate creator, because within humans, or within other living things, exist these seminal seeds created by God, and only through these seminal seeds does new life come into being. ​

Young Earth creationism only really became a prevalent thing.....in modern times.

Disturbing but true.

In the middle ages, the main approach to reading and interpreting scripture was allegorical - mystical. Known as "Lecto Divina", it had 4 steps:

Lectio - the slow, spiritual reading of a scripture passage

Meditatio - meditating on the passage (ie reflecting on it)

Oratio - The movement of one's whole heart or being (affective prayer), opening up to God through the words

Contemplatio - One simply rests in God without any attempt at thought or rational analysis, neither using imagination or the memory. It is not an act of doing but rather that of being.

It was neatly summarized by the 12th century mystic and monk known as "Guigio II":

"...Reading, meditation, prayer, contemplation: lectio, meditatio, oratio, contemplatio. Reading is careful study of Scripture, with the soul's attention: Meditation is the studious action of the mind to investigate hidden truth, led by one's own reason. Prayer is the heart's devoted attending to God, so that evil may be removed and good may be obtained. Contemplation is the mind suspended -somehow elevated above itself - in God so that it tastes the joys of everlasting sweetness. Reading accords with exercise of the outward [senses]; meditation accords with interior understanding; prayer accords with desire; contemplation is above all senses..."

- Guigo II (1140-1193), The Ladder of Monks
​