The Inherent Danger of Theism

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AlphaLogica157's picture
The Inherent Danger of Theism

Theism is, simply put, dangerous.

The danger lies in the central claim of Theism, that of divine revelation from the creator of the universe that is perceived by its various adherents as the ultimate authority. This belief has been expressed in many ways, most notably with the killing of heretics and implementation of blasphemy laws. To lay claim to an ultimate authority, one cannot allow any challenge to this authority, otherwise it is not truly ultimate. This leads to a greater problem, in most discussions with Theists one often hears that interpretation is key, how one chooses to personally interpret divine revelation shapes their understanding of the religion that they follow, and yet, there is nothing more divisive than personal interpretation.

These elements, combined with dogmatism and religious zeal are a powder keg, precariously perched on the edge of an open flame of inevitable misunderstandings and misinterpretations.

This is the inherent danger in Theism, one that cannot be avoided. As long as Theists remain absolutely convinced on matters they cannot possibly know history is bound to repeat itself, persecution of heretics and blasphemy laws will take different forms than those of the past, in some places more so than others. But above all this belief shared by Theists, that of some claim to an ultimate authority, will always lead to an obstruction of progress, bigotry and persecution.

Thank you for your time.

AlphaLogica

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Nutmeg's picture
The way out of this, and the

The way out of this, and the way the Anglican church has adopted, is to manage to reconcile this 'ultimate' authority with interpretations which have progessively weakened it. It's probably easier with christianity than with other religions because the gospels are witness statements rather than the word of god, so human and therefore able to be interpreted.

Islam is different because the koran is the word of god so not subject to interpretation. That's on the face of it, though; there are numerous different sects who routinely massacre each other so some interpretation has taken place.

If we had peaceful situations there would be the possibility for islam to start the same road map as the Anglicans and develop a softer, more inclusive version of the religion. That's happened to some degree in Europe where compromises have been made to the secular states.

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