Materialists

Quote from ShoeshineBoy:
I'm curious about this. Isn't this more a characteristic of reformed Jews?

And exactly what do you mean by observant?
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it's "reform", not "reformed", lol.

but the answer is no, it is prevalent across all streams - maybe least so with the chabad/lubavitch crowd. but since they're busy trying to recreate the utopia of a 19th century polish ghetto we don't take them to to seriously. :D

an example of "observant" is not eating pork shellfish etc. short version - trying to abide by the 613 "suggestions" sprinkled throughout Torah (first five books in c'ian bible).

strict observance is currently physically impossible because some of the knowledge has simply been lost and is unlikely to be regained. the corners of a prayer shawl, for instance, are supposed to have a thread dyed with a very specific blue - but we no longer know for sure how to make that particular die. so most prayer shawls are in fact non-compliant on purpose by not having any kind of blue thread - because being non-compliant in full knowledge is generally considered better than fooling oneself into a false sense of compliance.
 
Quote from ShoeshineBoy:

are orthodox, reformed and conservative roughly equal in proportion. (I realize there's a lot of grey in there probably...)
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tons and tons of gray area. "observance" is difficult to define and there is no real universal definition especially since some of the stuff is currently impossible to do.

at any rate, the answer is none of the above: more jews are unaffiliated than affiliated with any of the main streams. beyond that, the level of observance is not very well correlated with stream. you'd think orthodox would be more observant than reform, but that is an incorrect assumption a surprisingly high amount of the time.
 
Agreed.


peace

axeman




as long as they don't act on such a belief by violating the basic human rights of atheists, i don't have a problem with c'ians believing that.
 
Quote from damir00:

it's "reform", not "reformed", lol.

but the answer is no, it is prevalent across all streams - maybe least so with the chabad/lubavitch crowd. but since they're busy trying to recreate the utopia of a 19th century polish ghetto we don't take them to to seriously. :D

an example of "observant" is not eating pork shellfish etc. short version - trying to abide by the 613 "suggestions" sprinkled throughout Torah (first five books in c'ian bible).

strict observance is currently physically impossible because some of the knowledge has simply been lost and is unlikely to be regained. the corners of a prayer shawl, for instance, are supposed to have a thread dyed with a very specific blue - but we no longer know for sure how to make that particular die. so most prayer shawls are in fact non-compliant on purpose by not having any kind of blue thread - because being non-compliant in full knowledge is generally considered better than fooling oneself into a false sense of compliance.
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I'm curious about something else: roughtly what % of Jews across the board believe that the Scripture is "divinely inspired". I know that's a Christian term and somewhat tough to definte, but I think you know what I mean. How many think that the torah, was really given to Moses (Moshe?) and that the prophets really spoke from God, etc., i.e. that the Scripture is not just literature/mythology.

I know you said 1/3rd were essentially atheistic, but I'm curious if only a small % are in the "opposite camp".

Here's another one for 'ya: how many believe in a supernatural side of life, i.e. that God did interact with the Israelites directly and still does today supernaturally/spiritually?
 
those are impossible to answer without much tighter definitions. the bottom line is Jews generally consider such questions relatively uninteresting. 4000 years on it simply doesn't matter if Moshe really talked to a burning bush or if he simply got caught in the noonday sun after popping 'shrooms at high altitudes.

there are far more pressing issues to spend time on..
 
Quote from damir00:

those are impossible to answer without much tighter definitions. the bottom line is Jews generally consider such questions relatively uninteresting. 4000 years on it simply doesn't matter if Moshe really talked to a burning bush or if he simply got caught in the noonday sun after popping 'shrooms at high altitudes.

there are far more pressing issues to spend time on..
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interesting. thx...
 
Ok, promised some Shoe sparks. Here we go

Shoe:
>The explosive growth in Christianity is coming
>almost entirely from the evangelic (and of course
>charismatic) communities.

"explosive growth in christianity"? You live in a dream world my friend, where everyone agrees with you (we'll get to that) and christian growth "explodes".

From http://www.religioustolerance.org/worldrel.htm
I checked quite a number of other christian websites and found similar results (footnotes for the following are included on the web site)


Rate of change of Christians and Muslims:

Of the two largest religions, the "market share" of Christianity appears to be fairly constant:

U.S. Center for World Mission estimated in 1997 that the percentage of humans who regard themselves as Christians rose from 33.7% in 1970 to 33.9% in 1996. 2 Its total number of adherents is growing at about 2.3% annually. This is approximately equal to the growth rate of the world's population. Islam is growing faster: about 2.9% and is thus increasing its market share.

Author Samuel Huntington disagrees: "The percentage of Christians in the world peaked at about 30 % in the 1980s, leveled off, is now declining, and will probably approximate to about 25% of the world's population by 2025. As a result of their extremely high rates of population growth, the proportion of Muslims in the world will continue to increase dramatically, amounting to 20 percent of the world's population about the turn of the century, surpassing the number of Christians some years later, and probably accounting for about 30 percent of the world's population by 2025." 3

The UK Christian Handbook has lower figures. They estimate that 28.3% of the world's population identified themselves as Christians in 1990. They expect this to drop to 27.7% by the year 2000, and to 27.1 in 2010. 4 They attribute the drop to the lower birth rate among Christians compared to followers of other religions.

So, there is NO "explosive growth in christianity". Depending on the source it is either holding steady or falling. Even christian polling organizations are predicting a significant decline in the number of christians relative to the worlds population over the next years.

Sorry, Shoe myth #1 busted.

JB

Continued:
 
Shoe Myth #2: Evangelicals agree on core doctrine so therefore this talk of christian/biblical core conflict is really overblown.

Shoe:
>Again, I think you see remarkable consistency around
>evangelicals, which represent 1000's and 1000's of
>different churches and denominations worldwide.

>Evangelical Christianity is REMARKABLY consistent
>on core doctrines.

>Evangelicals only disagree on peripheral issues such
>as what we've talked about on this thread such as "how
>hot is hell" and "how do you baptize somebody?" and
>"what kind of music do we want in church?", etc.

Ok, for the sake of the conversation I will stipulate (see Shoe, it's not painful) that *all* evangelicals agree on *all* core doctrine.

First some numbers from http://www.adherents.com/adh_branches.html

World Chrisitian population: ~2,000,000,000
World Protestant Population: ~ 400,000,000

So, ~20% of the Christian community is Protestant (remember this #)

Ok, from http://www.religioustolerance.org/evan_defn.htm (again, footnotes available on web site)


Barna Research Ltd.: This is the main Evangelical polling organization in the U.S. They define an "evangelical" very precisely, as a person who can affirm all of the following:

They have been "born again;" i.e. they have been saved by having trusted Jesus as Lord and Savior.

"...their faith is very important in their life today."

They feel that they have a personal responsibility to share their religious beliefs with non-Christians.

They believe that Satan exists as a living entity.

They believe that salvation is possible only through grace, not by personal effort or works.

They believe that Jesus Christ lived a sinless life on earth.

They believe that God: Exists, Created the universe, Is omniscient, omnipotent and perfect, and Rules the universe today.

They estimate that 11% of all Protestants meet their definition.


Catch that last number shoe? So, ~11% of all Protestants are Evangelicals (by the Evangelicals OWN numbers) This would mean (.20 x .11) that ~2% of Christians are Evangelicals.

WOW!!!!!!!!! 2% OF THE CHRISTIAN POPULATION AGREES WITH EACH OTHER REGARDING CORE DOCTRINE.

Well no offense, but woopie freakin' do.

Next, we move on to the REST of the christian world where large segments CAN'T agree on core doctrine such as the path to salvation (and how much more core can you get then that?)

Later.

JB

PS, notice Shoe that none of the referenced web sites are "materialist" sites. I'm keeping things as fair as I can.
 
Quote from ShoeshineBoy:

I am of the opinion that there is no group that can hold a candle - candlestick if you prefer - to the materialists in terms of defaming, insulting and demeaning people of other belief systems. Call me biased, but I don't see the Jews, Christians, deists, true agnostics, etc. generally calling each other "stupid".

Can someone please explain to me why materialists (with the exception of a couple of individuals such as Turok) are almost the opposite of all other groups? I'm trying not be prejudiced here, but I'm really struggling. (And, puh-leez, no whining: "It's cuzz of that street preacher that told me I was going to hell.")

There's got to be a deeper reason, a certain personality type perhaps that is attracted to materialism? Or are the humanist leaders (B. Russell, Ted Turner, etc.) highly belittling and disrespectful individuals?

Or maybe we're all missing the point: maybe the materialists are really vastly intellectually superior to all of us? Perhaps their arrogance is justified? Should we not just accept them as leaders and usher in a new age - pardon the expression - of peace and prosperity? Can our feeble intellects even contribute to any meaningful dialogue with them?

I hope someone out there will help me with all these questions. I don't want to harbor ill will - I need to understand...
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I have been notorious for screaming moron from the top of my lungs to all the jesus freaks on ET, but it was only because I felt deep-deep-deep guilt over being homo. I was upset with JC and the Christian religion as a whole for condeming my love of anus. Recently though JC and I had a talk and we seem to have found a healthy medium, he will accept the fact that I am a pillow biter if I go on the road as a traveling evangelist. On top of this, now that I am out of the closet and I have confessed my love for our very own Scientist, my relief is so profound that it is almost spiritual. I would like to make a sincere apology to all of my religious brethren here at ET for any hateful remarks I might have made over your beliefs and JC. Please accept my apology.
 
Quote from Turok:

Ok, promised some Shoe sparks. Here we go

"explosive growth in christianity"? You live in a dream world my friend,
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Yes, I live in a fantasy land. Let me explain with a little history:

1. In Africa in the year 1900, there were approximately 10 million Christians on the continent. By 2000 there were 360 million!
2. The Anglican church is a great example of this. The U.S. branch has been declining over the last 40 years to 2.3 million. But in Uganda alone, there are 8 million Anglicans!
3. Now 70% of evangelicals live outside the West.

As you can see the numbers are mind boggling and there is no sign of it stopping.

I'll be writing off and on as I've got a five year old running around...
 
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