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[flagged]

jayGlow 1y ago
[flagged]
guywithahat 1y ago
Yes you, presumably someone who is not a christian and has never read the bible, know better than billions of christians and the millions of people who've actually read the bible. I'm not religious, but this is a bad take.
- bee_rider 1y ago
  “Socialist Jesus” is kind of a meme (or, maybe a blowback meme on Capitalist Jesus). But, he was apparently pretty into taking care of the poor, right?
  - vintermann 1y ago
    Selling all you own and giving the money to the poor, even. One thing Jesus was definitely not, was an optimizing utilitarian. He repeats in a dozen different ways in the Sermon on the Mount that people should do what is right, right now, and not worry about what's going to happen (worry about tomorrow, worry about what they will eat, what they will wear etc.)
  - guywithahat 1y ago
    The meme relies on assuming Socialism==being a good person. This is obviously not the case, as any economic structure is more complex than just being a chill dude, and the bible has a more complex view of morality than just "being nice to thy neighbor".
    - bee_rider 1y ago
      It also relies on modern understandings of the words “socialist” and “capitalist,” which, as far as I know, hadn’t been invented yet when the Bible was written. Memes are silly, that’s the point.
    - plorg 1y ago
      No? The meme relies on Jesus having lived and spoken in a way that a large group claiming to be his followers today would deride as "Socialism", whether or not it resembles your own, Karl Marx's, or Maduro's "Socialism", and in fact regardless of whether the meme-sayer thinks Socialism by some definition is good. It's a statement about how the loudest followers of Jesus or Christianity preach and act at odds with the meme-er's understanding of the gospel (specifically the 4 books of the Bible that tell the story of Jesus), and for it to work you don't even have to assume that Jesus was good.
    - dragonwriter 1y ago
      > The meme relies on assuming Socialism==being a good person. No, it doesn't. It relies on understanding what views today have been described by their opponents as "socialist", and what views Jesus espouses in the Scripture. It does not require: (1) thinking Jesus is good, or (2) thinking socialism is good, or (3) knowing or applying any actual definition of socialism (since it only involves the term "socialism" being used as a hostile epithet, not any concept of whether or not something actually is socialism.)
- lovich 1y ago
  I read their comment as more of a critique on the actions of the "true" believers, not a critique of anything Jesus would do
- plorg 1y ago
  >Yes you, presumably someone who is not a christian and has never read the bible... > I'm not religious, but this is a bad take. ???
  - guywithahat 1y ago
    Say neither of us are French, have never been to Paris, and have never studied it. Everyone in France says one thing about the city Paris, but you say the opposite. I don't need to be an expert on France and Paris to say that the millions of people living there probably know better than you. In the same vein, claiming you know more about a religion than the millions/billions of people who follow it is a low-IQ take, especially if the person making the claim knows nothing about the religion.
    - plorg 1y ago
      The person you are responding to is making a point that many Christians have made in the past and present. Hell, the entire story of Jesus in the Bible is one of conflict with existing religious and government institutions and authorities, culminating in his death at the hands of those same characters.
  - Zigurd 1y ago
    "I didn't vote for..." "I'm apolitical..."
- dfxm12 1y ago
  If you ever do get around to reading the new testament, you'll find that Jesus is obviously more of a collectivist than a capitalist. Jesus "radicalized" me. You can try and delay this realization by arguing over the minutiae of what exactly socialism is and if Jesus would agree with Marx on every little thing, but that, and also failing to practice what he preached doesn't change Jesus' obvious message that hoarding wealth, consolidating power, othering people, etc., is not a path to heaven.
  - guywithahat 1y ago
    [flagged]
    - AngryData 1y ago
      As the devil's advocate, who exactly enacted socialist policies outside of singular goods or for any length of time? And how often was that socialist government actually run by workers or worker collectives, rather than an authoritarian or handful of oligarchs using "socialism" as the excuse for all their arbitrary decisions? For as much as people talk and argue about socialism both for and against, I haven't seen very much actual implementation of socialist ideas or principles in history outside of meaningless PR statements.
  - hinkley 1y ago
    Throwing down moneylenders tables in the temple is pretty unambiguous. How many times did Jesus show violence or aggression? That’s the only one I can think of really. Though he did throw out some wicked burns a time or two.
    - freedomben 1y ago
      > How many times did Jesus show violence or aggression? That’s the only one I can think of really. I think you might be forgetting about the bulk of the Old Testament
      - meetingthrower 1y ago
- lazide 1y ago
  I don’t know about you, but I got kicked out of church (well, asked to leave and not come back) after I read the Bible and started to, uh, ask questions. And compare what the pastor was saying vs ‘the word of god’. I personally am 100% sure Jesus would be dead pretty quick if he came back - a lot faster than before, and I doubt it would take 30 pieces of silver either!
  - brulard 1y ago
    He should not come as a mortal anymore. But I agree there would be many judases to do the job.
  - hinkley 1y ago
    “In the land of the blind the one eyed man is burned at the stake.”
- hinkley 1y ago
  You know Christianity was built in a time of broad scale illiteracy don’t you? The reason sermons and the Bible are so at odds with each other is that for the most part only the priesthood had read the damned thing. Even today most Christians haven’t read the whole thing. I’m not Christian in large part because I did. And it’s almost all batshit.
  - matwood 1y ago
    > I’m not Christian in large part because I did. And it’s almost all batshit. Haha, same. I was forced to go to church and Sunday school as a kid, which I hated. But since I was there, I read large parts of the bible. This led me to asking a lot of questions, some of which caused me to be remove from Sunday school a few times. Eventually I was old enough to explain why I was an atheist and never went back.
    - hinkley 1y ago
      I don’t talk about this often but I took seminary classes. Where they tried to explain away the incongruities. It mostly stuck until it didn’t and then the whole mess of it tore itself apart with tremendous violence. If I hadn’t had a friend who was into social justice at the time to hold onto like flotsam after a ship sinks I don’t know if I would be here today.
      - freedomben 1y ago
        It is amazing how rapidly the whole thing shimmies apart once the first domino starts to fall. For me it was Theodicy, and the backbending required to explain whose "free will" is to blame for hurricanes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters that kill hordes of innocent people (including children) every year.
        TheOtherHobbes 1y ago
        It gets worse. Spend any time reading about psychology and it becomes obvious that the OT god ticks all the boxes for grandiose narcissistic personality disorder. The OT god is an abuser who demands unconditional and unquestioning love and admiration and threatens disobedience with eternal torture. It's textbook. The NT is more complex, but huge swathes of Christianity are still hypnotised by the OT. They like the idea of Jesus as an authority, but not so much the reality of the teachings.
zajio1am 1y ago
Never heard about Jesus pleading for 'seizing means of production'. I heard it was more like 'Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s'.
- dragonwriter 1y ago
  > Never heard about Jesus pleading for 'seizing means of production'. This is something he has in common with many of the people that modern dominant (in the US, at least) political groups condemn for "socialism".
  - ryandv 1y ago
    Then they should choose not to identify with a word that is defined by "social ownership of the means of production," [0] whose main proponent advocates that there is "only one way, [...] and that way is revolutionary terror." [1] You can't equivocate terms like this, identifying with the more extreme definition but walking it back when pressed. This is active distortion and manipulation of language, and this is far from the only instance of such in society. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism [1] https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/11/06.htm https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/11/06.htm
    - gs17 1y ago
      They can't choose it, they didn't (necessarily) identify as it in the first place. > the people that modern dominant (in the US, at least) political groups condemn for "socialism" They weren't talking about actual socialists, they're talking about the right's propensity to call anyone else a leftist. For example, if you ask my dad if Biden was a socialist, he'd tell you yes, and then if you asked how, he would list many things that have nothing to do with economic policy.
      - ryandv 1y ago
        > They can't choose it, they didn't (necessarily) identify as it in the first place. On a postmodern basis: if enough people believe in that narrative, it becomes reified as the truth, which is socially constructed. Therefore if the dominant belief is that they are socialist, then it is so.
CyrsBel 1y ago
Jesus was a socialist? Was that before or after he used supernatural powers to increase the quantity of food instantly? Easy to be a "socialist" in such cases, but let's not pretend that there's any serious economic theorizing being done when people say this about Jesus. It's usually just a convenience for people looking to grift or instigate. lmao.
- matthewdgreen 1y ago
  I mean, he did actually die on a cross and fast in the wilderness. Don't think the "multiplying food" thing was a huge escape hatch in the bible.
  - CyrsBel 1y ago
    Because that is part of what he came to do at that time. He intentionally chose to die on a cross and fast in the wilderness. If he wanted an escape hatch from that fate, he would've not come or he would've summoned a bunch of angels to defend him.
- krapp 1y ago
  People call Jesus a socialist because of the numerous times he commanded people to distribute their wealth to the poor and needy, help the sick, forgive debts and treat immigrants with respect and dignity. No one is literally claiming that Jesus was espousing some kind of proto-Marxist economic theory so much as pointing out that in the context of modern (specifically American) political discourse, Jesus would be considered a socialist. Then again, so would Ronald Reagan and Adam Smith. At this point the Overton window of what constitutes "socialism" has drifted so far that anyone to the left of Ayn Rand might as well be a tankie.
  - 47282847 1y ago
    > At this point the Overton window of what constitutes "socialism" has drifted so far that anyone to the left of Ayn Rand might as well be a tankie. This. Thank you.
  - 1y ago
tomhow 1y ago
We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44126690 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44126690 and marked it off topic. Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. It tramples curiosity. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

[flagged]

Yes you, presumably someone who is not a christian and has never read the bible, know better than billions of christians and the millions of people who've actually read the bible. I'm not religious, but this is a bad take.

bee_rider 1y ago
“Socialist Jesus” is kind of a meme (or, maybe a blowback meme on Capitalist Jesus). But, he was apparently pretty into taking care of the poor, right?
- vintermann 1y ago
  Selling all you own and giving the money to the poor, even. One thing Jesus was definitely not, was an optimizing utilitarian. He repeats in a dozen different ways in the Sermon on the Mount that people should do what is right, right now, and not worry about what's going to happen (worry about tomorrow, worry about what they will eat, what they will wear etc.)
- guywithahat 1y ago
  The meme relies on assuming Socialism==being a good person. This is obviously not the case, as any economic structure is more complex than just being a chill dude, and the bible has a more complex view of morality than just "being nice to thy neighbor".
  - bee_rider 1y ago
    It also relies on modern understandings of the words “socialist” and “capitalist,” which, as far as I know, hadn’t been invented yet when the Bible was written. Memes are silly, that’s the point.
  - plorg 1y ago
    No? The meme relies on Jesus having lived and spoken in a way that a large group claiming to be his followers today would deride as "Socialism", whether or not it resembles your own, Karl Marx's, or Maduro's "Socialism", and in fact regardless of whether the meme-sayer thinks Socialism by some definition is good. It's a statement about how the loudest followers of Jesus or Christianity preach and act at odds with the meme-er's understanding of the gospel (specifically the 4 books of the Bible that tell the story of Jesus), and for it to work you don't even have to assume that Jesus was good.
  - dragonwriter 1y ago
    > The meme relies on assuming Socialism==being a good person. No, it doesn't. It relies on understanding what views today have been described by their opponents as "socialist", and what views Jesus espouses in the Scripture. It does not require: (1) thinking Jesus is good, or (2) thinking socialism is good, or (3) knowing or applying any actual definition of socialism (since it only involves the term "socialism" being used as a hostile epithet, not any concept of whether or not something actually is socialism.)
lovich 1y ago
I read their comment as more of a critique on the actions of the "true" believers, not a critique of anything Jesus would do
plorg 1y ago
>Yes you, presumably someone who is not a christian and has never read the bible... > I'm not religious, but this is a bad take. ???
- guywithahat 1y ago
  Say neither of us are French, have never been to Paris, and have never studied it. Everyone in France says one thing about the city Paris, but you say the opposite. I don't need to be an expert on France and Paris to say that the millions of people living there probably know better than you. In the same vein, claiming you know more about a religion than the millions/billions of people who follow it is a low-IQ take, especially if the person making the claim knows nothing about the religion.
  - plorg 1y ago
    The person you are responding to is making a point that many Christians have made in the past and present. Hell, the entire story of Jesus in the Bible is one of conflict with existing religious and government institutions and authorities, culminating in his death at the hands of those same characters.
- Zigurd 1y ago
  "I didn't vote for..." "I'm apolitical..."
dfxm12 1y ago
If you ever do get around to reading the new testament, you'll find that Jesus is obviously more of a collectivist than a capitalist. Jesus "radicalized" me. You can try and delay this realization by arguing over the minutiae of what exactly socialism is and if Jesus would agree with Marx on every little thing, but that, and also failing to practice what he preached doesn't change Jesus' obvious message that hoarding wealth, consolidating power, othering people, etc., is not a path to heaven.
- guywithahat 1y ago
  [flagged]
  - AngryData 1y ago
    As the devil's advocate, who exactly enacted socialist policies outside of singular goods or for any length of time? And how often was that socialist government actually run by workers or worker collectives, rather than an authoritarian or handful of oligarchs using "socialism" as the excuse for all their arbitrary decisions? For as much as people talk and argue about socialism both for and against, I haven't seen very much actual implementation of socialist ideas or principles in history outside of meaningless PR statements.
- hinkley 1y ago
  Throwing down moneylenders tables in the temple is pretty unambiguous. How many times did Jesus show violence or aggression? That’s the only one I can think of really. Though he did throw out some wicked burns a time or two.
  - freedomben 1y ago
    > How many times did Jesus show violence or aggression? That’s the only one I can think of really. I think you might be forgetting about the bulk of the Old Testament
    - meetingthrower 1y ago
lazide 1y ago
I don’t know about you, but I got kicked out of church (well, asked to leave and not come back) after I read the Bible and started to, uh, ask questions. And compare what the pastor was saying vs ‘the word of god’. I personally am 100% sure Jesus would be dead pretty quick if he came back - a lot faster than before, and I doubt it would take 30 pieces of silver either!
- brulard 1y ago
  He should not come as a mortal anymore. But I agree there would be many judases to do the job.
- hinkley 1y ago
  “In the land of the blind the one eyed man is burned at the stake.”
hinkley 1y ago
You know Christianity was built in a time of broad scale illiteracy don’t you? The reason sermons and the Bible are so at odds with each other is that for the most part only the priesthood had read the damned thing. Even today most Christians haven’t read the whole thing. I’m not Christian in large part because I did. And it’s almost all batshit.
- matwood 1y ago
  > I’m not Christian in large part because I did. And it’s almost all batshit. Haha, same. I was forced to go to church and Sunday school as a kid, which I hated. But since I was there, I read large parts of the bible. This led me to asking a lot of questions, some of which caused me to be remove from Sunday school a few times. Eventually I was old enough to explain why I was an atheist and never went back.
  - hinkley 1y ago
    I don’t talk about this often but I took seminary classes. Where they tried to explain away the incongruities. It mostly stuck until it didn’t and then the whole mess of it tore itself apart with tremendous violence. If I hadn’t had a friend who was into social justice at the time to hold onto like flotsam after a ship sinks I don’t know if I would be here today.
    - freedomben 1y ago
      It is amazing how rapidly the whole thing shimmies apart once the first domino starts to fall. For me it was Theodicy, and the backbending required to explain whose "free will" is to blame for hurricanes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters that kill hordes of innocent people (including children) every year.
      - TheOtherHobbes 1y ago
        It gets worse. Spend any time reading about psychology and it becomes obvious that the OT god ticks all the boxes for grandiose narcissistic personality disorder. The OT god is an abuser who demands unconditional and unquestioning love and admiration and threatens disobedience with eternal torture. It's textbook. The NT is more complex, but huge swathes of Christianity are still hypnotised by the OT. They like the idea of Jesus as an authority, but not so much the reality of the teachings.

zajio1am 1y ago

Never heard about Jesus pleading for 'seizing means of production'. I heard it was more like 'Give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s'.

dragonwriter 1y ago
> Never heard about Jesus pleading for 'seizing means of production'. This is something he has in common with many of the people that modern dominant (in the US, at least) political groups condemn for "socialism".
- ryandv 1y ago
  Then they should choose not to identify with a word that is defined by "social ownership of the means of production," [0] whose main proponent advocates that there is "only one way, [...] and that way is revolutionary terror." [1] You can't equivocate terms like this, identifying with the more extreme definition but walking it back when pressed. This is active distortion and manipulation of language, and this is far from the only instance of such in society. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Socialism [1] https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/11/06.htm https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/11/06.htm
  - gs17 1y ago
    They can't choose it, they didn't (necessarily) identify as it in the first place. > the people that modern dominant (in the US, at least) political groups condemn for "socialism" They weren't talking about actual socialists, they're talking about the right's propensity to call anyone else a leftist. For example, if you ask my dad if Biden was a socialist, he'd tell you yes, and then if you asked how, he would list many things that have nothing to do with economic policy.
    - ryandv 1y ago
      > They can't choose it, they didn't (necessarily) identify as it in the first place. On a postmodern basis: if enough people believe in that narrative, it becomes reified as the truth, which is socially constructed. Therefore if the dominant belief is that they are socialist, then it is so.

CyrsBel 1y ago

Jesus was a socialist? Was that before or after he used supernatural powers to increase the quantity of food instantly? Easy to be a "socialist" in such cases, but let's not pretend that there's any serious economic theorizing being done when people say this about Jesus. It's usually just a convenience for people looking to grift or instigate. lmao.

matthewdgreen 1y ago
I mean, he did actually die on a cross and fast in the wilderness. Don't think the "multiplying food" thing was a huge escape hatch in the bible.
- CyrsBel 1y ago
  Because that is part of what he came to do at that time. He intentionally chose to die on a cross and fast in the wilderness. If he wanted an escape hatch from that fate, he would've not come or he would've summoned a bunch of angels to defend him.
krapp 1y ago
People call Jesus a socialist because of the numerous times he commanded people to distribute their wealth to the poor and needy, help the sick, forgive debts and treat immigrants with respect and dignity. No one is literally claiming that Jesus was espousing some kind of proto-Marxist economic theory so much as pointing out that in the context of modern (specifically American) political discourse, Jesus would be considered a socialist. Then again, so would Ronald Reagan and Adam Smith. At this point the Overton window of what constitutes "socialism" has drifted so far that anyone to the left of Ayn Rand might as well be a tankie.
- 47282847 1y ago
  > At this point the Overton window of what constitutes "socialism" has drifted so far that anyone to the left of Ayn Rand might as well be a tankie. This. Thank you.
- 1y ago

tomhow 1y ago

We detached this comment from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44126690 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44126690 and marked it off topic. Please don't use Hacker News for political or ideological battle. It tramples curiosity. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html