4 ms·

Evil is not a religious concept.

shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
Dude. Good & evil is such a central concept in Christianity it is practically ingrained in your society if you live in a christian country even if you are secular.
- lupusreal 3y ago
  Christianity also features the premise of marriage, so does that mean no secular conception of marriage can exist? Most people think otherwise. Christianity doesn't own "good and evil", even though it features it, and nor are these premises even owned by religion generally.
- skissane 3y ago
  The English words for good and evil are pre-Christian in origin. So are their cognates in other European languages. Greek philosophers were debating “good and evil” centuries before Jesus of Nazareth was born. So there is nothing inherently Christian about those words, or the concepts they describe.
  - shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
    You are correct, but you are also ignoring the fact that we are no longer living in ancient greek time. I did not claim that Christianity invented good & evil. I claimed that it is a central concept in Christianity. Your way of reasoning here is often referred to as a straw mans argument.
    - skissane 3y ago
      > You are correct, but you are also ignoring the fact that we are no longer living in ancient greek time. Even today, people still read and are influenced by Plato and Aristotle. > I did not claim that Christianity invented good & evil. I claimed that it is a central concept in Christianity. You claimed you don’t believe in evil because you are not a Christian. Not being a Christian and not believing in evil have little connection with each other, given billions of non-Christians believe in evil. > Your way of reasoning here is often referred to as a straw mans argument. You argument was too unclear to strawman.
      - shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
        In my part of the world, christianity has dominated for 1000+ years. There are no influences from eastern religion or Plato or whatever. I suspect the same is true in your part of the world.
        selimthegrim 3y ago
        You do realize there was a great deal of Ancient Greek influence on Christianity?
        Tainnor 3y ago
        Christian theology is heavily influenced by Plato and especially Aristotle, so what you wrote is self-contradictory. I don't know where you live but it's almost impossible to overstate the significance of Plato on Western thought.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- anthk 3y ago
  Goodness and evilness predates Christianity by millenia. Read about Mesopotamian religions, or the Hindic ones.
  - shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
    It's not relevant since those religions are no longer practiced. Christianity is, and is still influencing our world, like I wrote above.
    - anthk 3y ago
      Hinduism it's pretty much alive, and Christianity it's just a fork of Judaism. When Cristianity didn't even exist, the Chinese already had a good chunk of philosophy perfectly set and written, and even modernish rules for war and diplomacy: Tao Te King, and The Art of War. Heck, America from Canada to the Patagonia didn't even know about Jesus until the Europeans arrived 1500 years later. 1500s damn years. For a huge continent mass spread over from almost the North Pole to the South pole. So much for an 'Universal' God. So universal that Aquinas had to rip a good chunk of Greek philosophy to adapt (more like smash it down with nails and duct tape) ancient Middle East fairy tales into the less-desert bound Europe as the modern Christian canonical sources. If any, the Western world is shaped by the Roman architecture and law, and the Greek worldview, mindset and math.
      - shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
        >> It's not relevant since those religions are no longer practiced. >> Christianity is, and is still influencing our world, like I wrote above. > Hinduism it's pretty much alive, and Christianity it's just a fork of Judaism Okay, so you're a hindu or a jew. Are you arguing my point about christianity influencing "our" world? I guess I expressed myself rather western-centric.
        anthk 3y ago
        I am not neither a hindu or jew. Christianism in Europe is larguely cultural, our values shifted a lot since the Enlightenment times. The US, not much, they have a large sense of prudeness which affected even policitically left leaned people. I mean, here people it's Christian by name only. Technically, even the Southern Spain with infamous street parades with large walks carrying a big structure with a Virgin, most of that it's just a showoff and a way to say "look how loaded we are, so much that we can build great golden clothes for our Virgin". If any, lots of lore in Europe it's just paganism with a Christian disguise. Even Christianism itself it's so-so Christian-wannabe unlike the original one which came from the Middle East; it was largely repurposed with Greek values so people here could assimilate better these alien customs such as not being able to eat pork or nonsense about alcohol when the risk of dehidrating in Europe was near nil. Kinda like North Korea with Communism. Marxist? Today, in name, maybe. Because Juche it's almost a copycat of right wing fascism with Asian features. Kinda like the Japanese one, but with Koreans.
hnbad 3y ago
Evil as a moral judgement isn't. Acts can be good or evil. In more secular terms we prefer to say "harmful" or "unjust" but the meaning is arguably the same. But the idea that "evil" is an attribute a person can possess is 100% a religious one. If you're not religious, there can be no evil person unless you think there is an "evil" gene or an "evil" psychosis - "sociopath" and "psychopath" are often used this way but usually in ways that have very little to do with diagnostic criteria and more with trying to sound more profound than just calling someone a bad person; in pseudoscience this also sometimes manifests as the idea that some people are more predisposed to crime, though usually nowadays this more often manifests as vague notions of "racial culture" than measuring skull shapes, but this too is just a more elaborate way to call groups of people inherently bad. As a religious concept, "evil" can be somewhat nebulous where people just take some wrong turns and "evilness" seeps into them making them irredeemable: many Christians (especially certain sects of American protestantism) believe "sins" (i.e. disobeying God's rules, not necessarily causing measurable harm to others in secular terms) work kind of like this where habitual sinning in one way can lead to sinning in other ways as sinfulness takes over the person's life (like an addiction spiraling out of control). It can also be a much more literal idea of outright demonic possession (e.g. the kind of thing you need an exorcist to help with) or demonic presence (e.g. evil people actually being lizard people masking themselves as fellow humans to hide among us). And yes, I'm labelling certain fringe conspiracy movements as religious as they operate on a similar framework and often have direct ties to religious traditions and concepts. Conversely, not only are "evil people" a religious concept but so are "good people". If good is something you do that means you need to continously demonstrate your "goodness" by doing good things. But if good is something you can be then any accusations of wrongdoing are highly suspect because a good person would do no such things. This is why most people don't take kindly to being told even in the most polite terms that something they did was kinda racist (or sexist, or misogynist, or...) because "I'm not a racist" (i.e. thinking of it as an innate attribute of their character rather than one of their actions and hence something they can and need to actively control) - mind you, liberals did not do a good job with this distinction either over the past decade because as it turns out even self-professed non-religious people often have religious upbringings that stick with them (i.e. self-applied labels like "feminist", "anti-racist", etc should only ever be read as statements of intent and dismissed if they do not manifest in their actions which they rarely do).

Dude. Good & evil is such a central concept in Christianity it is practically ingrained in your society if you live in a christian country even if you are secular.

lupusreal 3y ago
Christianity also features the premise of marriage, so does that mean no secular conception of marriage can exist? Most people think otherwise. Christianity doesn't own "good and evil", even though it features it, and nor are these premises even owned by religion generally.
skissane 3y ago
The English words for good and evil are pre-Christian in origin. So are their cognates in other European languages. Greek philosophers were debating “good and evil” centuries before Jesus of Nazareth was born. So there is nothing inherently Christian about those words, or the concepts they describe.
- shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
  You are correct, but you are also ignoring the fact that we are no longer living in ancient greek time. I did not claim that Christianity invented good & evil. I claimed that it is a central concept in Christianity. Your way of reasoning here is often referred to as a straw mans argument.
  - skissane 3y ago
    > You are correct, but you are also ignoring the fact that we are no longer living in ancient greek time. Even today, people still read and are influenced by Plato and Aristotle. > I did not claim that Christianity invented good & evil. I claimed that it is a central concept in Christianity. You claimed you don’t believe in evil because you are not a Christian. Not being a Christian and not believing in evil have little connection with each other, given billions of non-Christians believe in evil. > Your way of reasoning here is often referred to as a straw mans argument. You argument was too unclear to strawman.
    - shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
      In my part of the world, christianity has dominated for 1000+ years. There are no influences from eastern religion or Plato or whatever. I suspect the same is true in your part of the world.
      - selimthegrim 3y ago
        You do realize there was a great deal of Ancient Greek influence on Christianity?
      - Tainnor 3y ago
        Christian theology is heavily influenced by Plato and especially Aristotle, so what you wrote is self-contradictory. I don't know where you live but it's almost impossible to overstate the significance of Plato on Western thought.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
anthk 3y ago
Goodness and evilness predates Christianity by millenia. Read about Mesopotamian religions, or the Hindic ones.
- shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
  It's not relevant since those religions are no longer practiced. Christianity is, and is still influencing our world, like I wrote above.
  - anthk 3y ago
    Hinduism it's pretty much alive, and Christianity it's just a fork of Judaism. When Cristianity didn't even exist, the Chinese already had a good chunk of philosophy perfectly set and written, and even modernish rules for war and diplomacy: Tao Te King, and The Art of War. Heck, America from Canada to the Patagonia didn't even know about Jesus until the Europeans arrived 1500 years later. 1500s damn years. For a huge continent mass spread over from almost the North Pole to the South pole. So much for an 'Universal' God. So universal that Aquinas had to rip a good chunk of Greek philosophy to adapt (more like smash it down with nails and duct tape) ancient Middle East fairy tales into the less-desert bound Europe as the modern Christian canonical sources. If any, the Western world is shaped by the Roman architecture and law, and the Greek worldview, mindset and math.
    - shzhdbi09gv8ioi 3y ago
      >> It's not relevant since those religions are no longer practiced. >> Christianity is, and is still influencing our world, like I wrote above. > Hinduism it's pretty much alive, and Christianity it's just a fork of Judaism Okay, so you're a hindu or a jew. Are you arguing my point about christianity influencing "our" world? I guess I expressed myself rather western-centric.
      - anthk 3y ago
        I am not neither a hindu or jew. Christianism in Europe is larguely cultural, our values shifted a lot since the Enlightenment times. The US, not much, they have a large sense of prudeness which affected even policitically left leaned people. I mean, here people it's Christian by name only. Technically, even the Southern Spain with infamous street parades with large walks carrying a big structure with a Virgin, most of that it's just a showoff and a way to say "look how loaded we are, so much that we can build great golden clothes for our Virgin". If any, lots of lore in Europe it's just paganism with a Christian disguise. Even Christianism itself it's so-so Christian-wannabe unlike the original one which came from the Middle East; it was largely repurposed with Greek values so people here could assimilate better these alien customs such as not being able to eat pork or nonsense about alcohol when the risk of dehidrating in Europe was near nil. Kinda like North Korea with Communism. Marxist? Today, in name, maybe. Because Juche it's almost a copycat of right wing fascism with Asian features. Kinda like the Japanese one, but with Koreans.

hnbad 3y ago

Evil as a moral judgement isn't. Acts can be good or evil. In more secular terms we prefer to say "harmful" or "unjust" but the meaning is arguably the same. But the idea that "evil" is an attribute a person can possess is 100% a religious one. If you're not religious, there can be no evil person unless you think there is an "evil" gene or an "evil" psychosis - "sociopath" and "psychopath" are often used this way but usually in ways that have very little to do with diagnostic criteria and more with trying to sound more profound than just calling someone a bad person; in pseudoscience this also sometimes manifests as the idea that some people are more predisposed to crime, though usually nowadays this more often manifests as vague notions of "racial culture" than measuring skull shapes, but this too is just a more elaborate way to call groups of people inherently bad. As a religious concept, "evil" can be somewhat nebulous where people just take some wrong turns and "evilness" seeps into them making them irredeemable: many Christians (especially certain sects of American protestantism) believe "sins" (i.e. disobeying God's rules, not necessarily causing measurable harm to others in secular terms) work kind of like this where habitual sinning in one way can lead to sinning in other ways as sinfulness takes over the person's life (like an addiction spiraling out of control). It can also be a much more literal idea of outright demonic possession (e.g. the kind of thing you need an exorcist to help with) or demonic presence (e.g. evil people actually being lizard people masking themselves as fellow humans to hide among us). And yes, I'm labelling certain fringe conspiracy movements as religious as they operate on a similar framework and often have direct ties to religious traditions and concepts. Conversely, not only are "evil people" a religious concept but so are "good people". If good is something you do that means you need to continously demonstrate your "goodness" by doing good things. But if good is something you can be then any accusations of wrongdoing are highly suspect because a good person would do no such things. This is why most people don't take kindly to being told even in the most polite terms that something they did was kinda racist (or sexist, or misogynist, or...) because "I'm not a racist" (i.e. thinking of it as an innate attribute of their character rather than one of their actions and hence something they can and need to actively control) - mind you, liberals did not do a good job with this distinction either over the past decade because as it turns out even self-professed non-religious people often have religious upbringings that stick with them (i.e. self-applied labels like "feminist", "anti-racist", etc should only ever be read as statements of intent and dismissed if they do not manifest in their actions which they rarely do).