tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471082069031980581.post7483411378578355423..comments2024-03-11T08:31:04.022-04:00Comments on Bieganski the Blog: Peasants. Darwin. Nazis.D Goskahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09353495585591945881noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471082069031980581.post-653071698631470462014-03-25T20:30:25.608-04:002014-03-25T20:30:25.608-04:00Extremely fascinating and eye-opening. I am also ...Extremely fascinating and eye-opening. I am also speechless.Brian Lewskinoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471082069031980581.post-91148424145796695742011-05-25T20:17:39.177-04:002011-05-25T20:17:39.177-04:00John, it goes without saying that I respect you as...John, it goes without saying that I respect you as a person. <br /><br />Your comment here offends, disturbs, and alienates me.<br /><br />My post is serious, based on serious and accepted scholarship. It addresses matters of great gravity. <br /><br />Your post is snide and easy. It didn't require any work or integrity. <br /><br />"all pre-Darwinian people as paragons of charity and love"<br /><br />This is an insulting thing to say. No responsible person has ever argued that "all pre-darwinian people are paragons of charity and love." None. Never. <br /><br />To imply that I believe that, or that I argued that, is insulting to me. <br /><br />You've ignored the serious scholarship and gravity of the issues addressed in my post and replaced all that with an insulting straw man. <br /><br />"There's a human love of slaughter in the OT"<br /><br />In the OT there is a strong condemnation of the very real practices of Pagans placing their own children into ovens dedicated to a Pagan God, to highly exploitative cultic sexual practices, to invasions, to enslavements, to massacres. <br /><br />There is a hesitance to use violence -- note how long God gave the Egyptians to mend their ways -- and a condemnation of ethnocentrism, of violence -- the Cain and Abel story -- of arrogance. <br /><br />If you really want to see "a human love of slaughter" you can turn to Israel's neighbors, the Assyrians, who decorated the ruler's palace with bas relief of the ruler flaying victims alive. There is nothing like that in the OT. <br /><br />In the OT, you will find good people in every ethnic group – something most traditional literatures do not depict. In Jewish sacred literature you will hear God chiding his angels, telling them not to celebrate the death of Egyptians. Again, not a theme you will find in other traditional literatures. You will find God punishing his own chosen people when they exhibit unjust behaviors. And you will find, in the OT, redemption of those who do bad things. David did wretched things, suffered for it, repented, and was redeemed. That option is missing in many other traditional literatures. <br /><br />You are reading a different Old Testament. You can't blame the book on the glasses you wear when you read it. <br /><br />As for this "paragons of virtue" comment. Again, it's a straw man comment, and I should not even honor it with a reply. Why you would say something so thoroughly insulting to me about my scholarship escapes me. It's something I'd expect from someone with far less integrity than you.<br /><br />In any case, neither I nor any other respectable person has ever argued that before Darwin inheritors of the Judeo-Christian tradition are paragons. Rather, as my post makes clear, as is visible for anyone to see, foundational myths changed. When Christians committed atrocities, they did so against their own scripture and lived tradition. Concerned members of the community pointed this out. Change was demanded. An example of this: Bartolomeo de las Casas devoted his life to protesting atrocities committed by Conquistadors against Native Americans. He did this, as he himself explicitly stated, because he saw Christ in the Native Americans. "Jesus Christ, our God, scourged and afflicted and beaten and crucified, not once, but thousands of times."<br /><br />No such process is even possible given Scientific Racism. Rather, as my post, above, makes clear, its foundational scriptures make the opposite true. One must fight against seeing a fellow human in others. <br /><br />A perfect demonstration of this: there is a notorious woodcut, I think, of conquistadors watching dogs eat Native Americans alive. Christians used images like this to PROTEST mistreatment of Native Americans. That very image was used by a Scientific Racist in a textbook to DEMONSTRATE how peoples SHOULD behave toward each other.<br /><br />If you really can't see the difference between those two approaches, John, if you insist on distorting my post to put words in my mouth that I never said, then we really cannot communicate on these very serious and important matters.D Goskahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09353495585591945881noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471082069031980581.post-21139910076036041882011-05-25T16:32:39.348-04:002011-05-25T16:32:39.348-04:00Interesting post, Danusha. I don't think that...Interesting post, Danusha. I don't think that religion is the source of all trouble, but the Old Testament doesn't seem to present all pre-Darwinian people as paragons of charity and love. There's a human love of slaughter in the OT that scares me.John Guzlowskihttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13052735138993479204noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8471082069031980581.post-64386427677167668592011-05-25T16:07:16.975-04:002011-05-25T16:07:16.975-04:00Very informative, and terrifying.Very informative, and terrifying.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com