Wednesday, July 16, 2014

... on Heliocentrism and Positive Claims Demanding Positive Evidence

1) Correspondence of Hans Georg Lundahl : With Tom Trinko on Physics of Geocentrism, First Rounds, 2) With Tom Trinko again, Second rounds, 3) Tom Trinko, Third Rounds, Broadening Discussion on Aether, 4) New blog on the kid : Was Not Doing My Best Either - Should have Referred to Tolkien, 5) Diagrams for Geostationary Satellites (Either Cosmology), 6) Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : ... on Heliocentrism and Positive Claims Demanding Positive Evidence

The Evolution of Morality (1-5)
AronRa
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQUxmJR9a5Y


Commented on in sequence of main topic:

... AronRa claims Human Morality is Evolution's Making
http://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2014/02/aronra-claims-human-morality-is.html


Comment on above specific topic, and ensuing debate:

Hans Georg Lundahl
8:14 positive claims require positive evidence.

Our eyes and inner ears (forgot what you call those curved tubes in three dimensions of curving) give us positive evidence, as far as not proven wrong, that earth is still and sun, moon, stars go around us each day, east to west, and that sun lags behind the stars a little each day, adding up to full circle west to east once a year, moon gets full circle west to east compared to stars once a month (lunar month and solar year, obviously).

Lucretius, who was an atheist did not deny this. But he was very inattentive as to mechanism behind these phenomena. When Ptolemy inquired further into the regularities, it was very obvious to everyone that although Aristotle was wrong on particulars, his proof there was a God pushing the univere around us east to west (or commanding stars to go east to west in a very perfect formation, if you go by Abraham's observation as given in Josephus) was right and Lucretius wrong.

Have you since then any positive evidence for positive claims like:

  • Heliocentrism
  • Big Bang
  • getting from just after BB to formation of galaxies and solar system and planets around stars, especially around Sun
  • abiogenesis
  • microbes to man (or to dog or to cat) evolution?
Other subdebate
... on Abiogenesis and Evolutionist Ideology
http://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2014/02/on-abiogenesis-and-evolutionist-ideology.html
mathew2283
You're a massive idiot.
Hans Georg Lundahl
o k ... care to develop?
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl Mate, you just claimed that the Earth doesn't move, that it doesn't orbit the sun and that there is no evidence to the contrary. You're an idiot.
Hans Georg Lundahl
I claimed the Earth doesn't move, and that it does not orbit the Sun, so where is the EVIDENCE to the contrary?

In calling anyone "idiot" who disagrees?
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl That sentence makes no sense

+Hans-Georg Lundahl If the Sun orbitted the Earth, then we should get a full range of seasons in 24 hours.
Hans Georg Lundahl
No, since the stellar day is a few minutes shorter than 24 hours.

Sun's compound movement is 24 hours. And this means compound between the movement of Heaven (stellar day = full circle) and a lagging behind.

Now, the lagging behind makes the full compound circle of Sun in real space around earth 24 hours long (those being by definition 1/24 each of the length of this compound movement), but it also constitutes a relative movement to the circle of the stars, the one called the zodiak, and it is the circle around the zodiak (which is not totally perpendicular to axis of universe, but goes north and south of the equator of heaven) that contsitutes the seasons of the Sun.

Next objection? Shall we take geostationary satellites while we are at it? I have been debating it with om Trinko for some near two weeks.

[Links to the debate with Tom Trinko, see above.] 
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl

Err...no. In the Northern hemisphere it is summer currently because the Earth tilts towards the sun. If the Sun was moving around the Earth then tonight, it would become winter, because we would be tilted away from the sun.
Hans Georg Lundahl
In "Summer" the Sun is further North when turning around the Earth. In "Winter" the Sun is further South when turning around the Earth. That explains exctly as much as a tilt of our (supposed) axis of rotation.
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl

What causes the sun to be "further north"? Is the sun moving up and down in a year long cycle?

Problem with that idea is that the sun is always in the same relative position in the sky. Were it moving relative to the Earths north and south, it would be in a different position in winter to what it is in summer and that just isn't the case.
Hans Georg Lundahl
"Is the sun moving up and down in a year long cycle?"

Yes.

"Problem with that idea is that the sun is always in the same relative position in the sky."

NOT even true.

Rising East and setting West of any location is twice per year, in Spring and Autumn.

Northern hemisphere, in Summer rising and setting are more NE and NW than purely E and W, and in Winter it is more SE and SW than purely E and W. The further North you get, the more marked this is. And yes, this means there is a point on which at Midsummer Night the Sun "sets and rises" due North. I have been in one such location, it is Gellivare in Sweden.

In the Southern hemisphere the variations obviously reverse the directions.

This is of course also what the "tilt of earth axis" would predict.
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl So the Sun is, for no real reason, moving up and the down as it orbits the Earth. What is the mechanism that moves the sun move up and then down?

And if the Earth isn't tilted, how do you explain the Polar Night?
Hans Georg Lundahl
Polar Night and Polar Day are the extremes of the variation I was just talking about.

The Sun is moving "up and down", and I did not say it was "for no real reason".

I would identify the so called or so illcalled "mechanism" of this moving North and South as an angel guiding the Sun's material body.

St Jerome would have such an angel being the soul of the Sun, whereas St Thomas Aquinas prefers it to be simply holding and moving the Sun, as a man might hold and move a lantern.

Either way, the movement North and South of the Sun, are subject to a will. That executes the orders of God who wants winter and summer to exist so we can live longer. In a world without seasons, we would soon starve to death, I presume.
mathew2283
So magic then. It's fucking pathetic mate. Every branch of human inquiry says you're wrong and as soon as you face something yore idea cannot explain "god did it" grow up
Hans Georg Lundahl
"pathetic" and "grow up" and "so magic then" are not arguments.

"So magic then" would be an argument within the naturalist paradigm, but it isuseless against us supranaturalists.

That doesn't mean we will refrain from using it as an argumentum ad homines (not to be confused with fallacy argumentum ad hominem) in a manner of "stick to your own rules".

The other two are outbursts rather than arguments.
Arca Jeth
+Hans-Georg Lundahl
I am not going to argue with you that the sun revolves around the earth. I think you are just trolling.
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl When you invoke magic, there is no counter argument is there? You have called on magic to explain something that doesn't happen and cannot happen to plug a gap in your "theory"

At this point a rational adult would consider that perhaps having to make things up and use magic to justify them probably meant that they are wrong. You won't do that. No amount of logic or evidence will penetrate your wall of cognitive dissonance so discussion becomes pointless.

What is even more pathetic is that what you are using magic to describe doesn't actually happen anyway, you just need it to happen to fit your model.

I'll ask again, can you support your position in any verifiable way?*

Something else. Andormeda is 2,500,000 light years away. For it to be in the same position in the sky every night, it needs to travel 15,700,000 light years in 24 hours. This means that that galaxy is travelling at about 5,700,000,000, times the speed of light.
Hans Georg Lundahl
I have not called on magic. I have taken as explanation something YOU would call magic.

I have not tried to explain something that cannot happen. I have tried to explain or rather successfully explained insofar as you are at all listening something that can on my view very well happen and is happening all the time. Except for Joshua's Long Day.

Can YOU support your Heliocentric position in any verifiable way?

Calling wills as causes "magic" will not do it.

You see:

  • on your view causes are 1) matter and energy, 2) matter and energy complicated by biochemistry, 3) matter and energy complicated by biochemistry in such ways as to form a mind;

  • on my view causes are 1) God, 2) other minds created by God, 3) matter and energy created also by God to be controlled by Himself and by other created minds. Biochemical complications of matter and energy are, in the human case, so to speak a bridge between categories 2 and 3.


"Andromeda is 2,500,000 light years away."

According to Heliocentrics.

As a Geocentric, not accepting the halfyearly 0.76 arc seconds of α Centauri as mirroring our own movement, and as a supranaturalist, believing angels can move the matter God allows them to move, I have no need to accept those kinds of distance measures.

I think this disposes with the rest of your argument.
Niels Steigenga
+Hans-Georg Lundahl

The Sun is moving "up and down", and I did not say it was "for no real reason".

I would identify the so called or so illcalled "mechanism" of this moving North and South as an angel guiding the Sun's material body.

St Jerome would have such an angel being the soul of the Sun, whereas St Thomas Aquinas prefers it to be simply holding and moving the Sun, as a man might hold and move a lantern.

Either way, the movement North and South of the Sun, are subject to a will. That executes the orders of God who wants winter and summer to exist so we can live longer. In a world without seasons, we would soon starve to death, I presume.


wow do you have any evidence for that "mechanism" of the angel.
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl So you dismiss the argument out of hand

HubbleSite : FAQ : How do astronomers measure the distances to galaxies?
http://hubblesite.org/reference_desk/faq/answer.php.id=45&cat=galaxies


That method works whether the Universe revolves around the Earth or doesn't.

Andromeda IS that far away.
Hans Georg Lundahl
@Niels

"wow do you have any evidence for that "mechanism" of the angel."

Do YOU have any evidence of earth turning and tilting?

The same phenomena are explained either way.

I can understand the angel being distasteful to an atheist, but you can hardly ask a Christian to agree with that.

@Matthew, quoting from site you gave:

"Astronomers measure the distance to a galaxy in the same way we estimate the distance to an oncoming car by the brightness of its headlights. We know from experience how much light a car's headlights emits, so we can determine how far away the car is."

We do not know from experience how bright a galaxy is in absolute light emission. Only how much light reaches us.

"To measure the distance to a galaxy, we try to find stars in that galaxy whose absolute light output we can measure."

There is no such thing, since any estimate of absolute output depends on measure of light reaching us and on estimate of distance between output and reaching us.

But THAT in its turn depends, for the nearest and to Heliocentrics "clearest" cases, precisely on parallax measuring.

SO, this measuring method or supposed such is dependent on reliability of parallax measures.

[Note how his next answer does not take issue on this, but only mocks me for not being a believer in scientists:]
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl You should really tell the scientists who measure these things that they don't know what they are doing and that their methods don't work, because they seem to think they do....OR accept you are wrong...either works, just let me know when the highly educated men and women who have spent years studying cosmology laugh in your face.

+Hans-Georg Lundahl Yes, we have given it and you have dismissed it on the basis that magic makes other things happen.

The seasons should occur daily if the sun orbits the Earth. You have no mechanism to explain why we don't see this.

The retrograde motion of the planets in the night sky cannot be explained if the Earth is stationary. You haven't even attempted to explain this.

The Lunar Cycle should occur daily if the Earth is stationary and the Sun orbits the it. It doesn't and you cannot explain that.

You cannot explain the vast speeds celestial bodies are required to move to be in the same position every night. You can only say the way distance is measured is wrong.

You cannot explain why the further things are from Earth the faster they travel according to your model.

You cannot explain why the North star appears stationary with a geocentric model.
Hans Georg Lundahl
"they [the scientists] seem to think they do [know what they are doing/the methods they use work]"

SURE.

But they also think before taking the light intensity method of distance "measure" that some absolute light outputs have been measured by a method of relating light reaching us to distance in its turn measured by their primary method: parallax. Which turns on Heliocentrism.

"The seasons should occur daily if the sun orbits the Earth."

Already answered as a totally spurious argument. Night and day are results of daily Westward movement of Sun around Earth, WITH Zodiak plane, Seasons of its Eastward movement back through Zodiak plane, which goes up and down [I meant North and South, of course].

"The retrograde motion of the planets in the night sky cannot be explained if the Earth is stationary. You haven't even attempted to explain this."

I did not see you mention this before.

Planets dancing around sun are sometimes moving back through the Zodiak plane, as is Sun, but sometimes also moving forward through it.

And there, as with Sun and Moon, "mechanism" is the wrong word, angels are good dancers, but they have wills and wills are not called mechanisms.

"The Lunar Cycle should occur daily if the Earth is stationary and the Sun orbits the it. It doesn't and you cannot explain that."

Explanation parallel to that of Sun.

Except that the movement backward through the Zodiak plane for one thing takes about a month and for another is not alone responsible for phases, there is also relative position in relation to Sun.

"You cannot explain the vast speeds celestial bodies are required to move to be in the same position every night. You can only say the way distance is measured is wrong."

I did say the way you measure distance beyond "solar system" is wrong, but even within the distances I concur with the speeds are vast.

Neptune would, if itself in aphelium away from Earth while Sun was in apogee, and I do not know if those are the present positions or not, have a speed a third that of the speed of light.

Now, the explanation for this speed is God turning the universe, more precisely the aether Westward on a daily basis.

"You cannot explain why the further things are from Earth the faster they travel according to your model."

Yes, I definitely can, they are within a continuous æther that God is turning around us like a spintop.

"You cannot explain why the North star appears stationary with a geocentric model."

I can do that quite as well too.

It is close to the axis of the daily spinning.

Now, your tirade was a fine piece of rhetoric for a liar. But answering your points one by one exposes your dishonesty. Unless it is simply the impatience of a fanatic.
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl Liar? Me?

You dishonest little twat. Your entire theory relies on unobserved things that don't happen and could only happen by magic. The planets DON'T move backwards and even if they did how? Angels again?

You are either a troll, utterly stupid, or so fanatically dedicated to your religion that reason and evidence will not penetrate your mind. Remember this. Denying evidence makes you dishonest. Jesus doesn't like that, does he? 
Hans Georg Lundahl
"Angels again?"

Planets are like all heavenly bodies ruled by such, yes.

Planet Sun (yes, Sun and Moon are two of the Classic Seven Planets) circles earth. Planets like Mars and Venus are conducted by skilful dancers making epicircles.

"Your entire theory relies on unobserved things"

Your[s] relies on unobserved telluric rotation, unobserved telluric orbit around sun, unobserved other contradictions to the immediate testimony of the senses.

Note, one could consider flatness of earth an "immediate testimony of the senses", but unlike Heliocentrism its contradiction, a round earth, is observed in all the voyages all over the globe, even if one were to doubt pictures from moon or from satellites.
Niels Steigenga
+Hans-Georg Lundahl

"Do YOU have any evidence of earth turning and tilting?"

That's shifting the burden of proof. My question was Do you have evidence for the angel. Even if I can't proof the earth is tilted or turning, that doesn't give your angel any validity. That would be an argument from ignorance fallacy.

"The same phenomena are explained either way."

Yeah, one is explained by gravity, the other by angels. The difference is that gravity is demonstrable, angels isn't.

"I can understand the angel being distasteful to an atheist, but you can hardly ask a Christian to agree with that."

I find angels not distasteful like I don't find fairies distasteful, but I find it silly of someone to propose it as an explanation for anything while not providing any evidence.

And what about retrograde motion of planets?
Hans Georg Lundahl
"That's shifting the burden of proof."

Not quite no. You see, by accepting that earth is not just tilting but turning you accept somthing you have never seen, except from:

  • a) diagrams (on paper or animated or either on internet);
  • b) pictures taken from moon, where apparent turning of earth could very well be due to real turning of moon round earth and dito for pictures taken from satellites.


But it is what you think you have to accept in order to not believe a "silly" thing like an angel.

Similarily, an angel per planet and an almighty God for all the Universe is what I have to believe to keep believing my senses.

"Yeah, one is explained by gravity, the other by angels."

So far we have not discussed gravity at all.

As you brought it up, how good is your evidence gravity would be able to keep planets in orbit for billions of years?

Static electricity keeps water drops in orbits for fifteen orbits. Up where there is no gravity interfering.

As you brought gravity up.

You know there are different models of it?

Aristotle, Newton, Einstein.

Aristotle has ALL gravity point down to centre of universe = earth and all gravity on earth to point down to centre of earth.

If man walked on the moon, then this is maybe wrong. But I have not ruled out all "special pleading" about man walking on the moon and Aristotelian gravity being right anyway. There is also the detail, do we know the story is true? A camera gives no all round view. Theoretically the story could be faked.

The other two models are fairly well with Heliocentric model of solar system - until you start asking questions.

For instance: if an angel even theoretically could influence any orbit of any heavenly body (and no Christian will really rule that out, without outing himself as an apostate), how can its orbit give us assurance of its mass? And without such assurance, how can we verify that the mass of each planet corresponds to the orbit according to either Newton's theory or Einstein's refinement of it?

On the other hand, assuming such gravity is true, this will not automatically stop angels from making the orbits go where they want.

And so we lack - except atheists who think angels are silly - any measure of the mass of planets. Estimates, based on view of size and surface matter, that is another thing. BUT that is not what the masses of the planets are based on, since more than once modern cosmology thinks a planet has a core of different density than its obvious surface material.

"The difference is that gravity is demonstrable, angels isn't."

Neither is demonstrable immediately as the one sole cause of planetary movements. Until you consider the stability of orbits. Then you should ask the question whether mere chances of gravity and inertia only by themselves could produce an orbit that stays the same for billions of years.

Even apart from that, yes, angels are demonstrable.

A few years ago (11 or rather 12) in XXth Arr. of Paris, a Saturday or Friday a café owner was shutting his café. The cloth above the terrass should have been rolled in, but precisely that very time it was stuck, really really stuck and finally the café owner did not bother.

Sunday a boy fell from a window several floors above the café (it was a skyscraper, 12th or more floor, I think). The boy fell into the extended cloth, bounced, and a rugby player walking by caught the boy in his arms.

He survived and wasn't even seriously hurt.

I am not buying this was just a chance.

And of course there are all the angels throughout Bible and Church history.

Plus a few in Pagan histories which though identified as gods may well have been angels of the one true God. Like "Hermes telling Aigistes he had to desist from Klytaimnestra" or same "Hermes" telling Calypso she had to give up Ulysses, that could very well have been angels (of course the words "Zeus" uses about the occasion, referring to one, ordering the other, in "debate on Mount Olympus" are pure poet's fancy - no man was there to hear it).

"And what about retrograde motion of planets?"

As two angels take their heavenly bodies along a daily spiralling path, every day close to perfect circle around earth, along with aether turning, namely Sun and Moon, AND they also take these in a path backwards against the turning aether, along the Zodiak plane, which is elliptic and the various distances from earth of which account for inward and outward movements of the daily slightly spiralling near perfect circles, other planets are also taken on daily near perfact circles around earth each day BUT their path along the Zodiak plane in diverse periods, neither Solar years nor Lunar months (which latter is not exactly the time the Moon takes along Zodiak plane, since phases depend also on angle of Sun), and, here is the point, these other paths are ellpitic not directly around Earth, but instead around Sun which is making its double path (daily and yearly) around Earth. That accounts for retrogrades. And that is Tycho Brahe's explanation, a bit mended by that Italian astronomer. Riccioli. Almagestum Novum.
Arca Jeth
Got a few of his comments suppressed as spam, I restored them. This is why I respond only now. HIs three are from 9th, 10th, 11th of July, I respond 16th.
I
+Hans-Georg Lundahl
You really can't be serious, even the most hardcore extreme creationists don't believe that the sun revolves around the earth. This has been settled science for centuries.
My response
+Arca Jeth settled science for centuries is less of a criterium than whether it has very good proof or less good proof.
II
+Hans-Georg Lundahl
You seem intelligent, but at the same time you are fucking retarded. Do you also think the earth is flat?
My response
+Arca Jeth I do not think the earth is flat no.

As to evidence, there is plenty of evidence from voyages that Earth is round. There is much less evidence - in fact none at all as I have seen so far - from space voyages that Earth is moving aorund the Sun.

As to evidence from Moon landing the Earth is turning, it is evidence easily returnable.
III
+Hans-Georg Lundahl
Dude, you need to seek professional help. People are committed to mental health facilities for believing things more logical than what you just wrote. I am not trying to be a dick, but try and get back to reality.
My response
+Arca Jeth "People are committed to mental health facilities for believing things more logical than what you just wrote."

If THAT is so, that is an argument against the "mental health facilities" as you call those horrors.

Plenty of other arguments against them too.
Niels Steigenga also had one in spam filter
Do you know about retrograde motion (weird motion of planets relative to the background stars)

Retrograde Motion
http://www.lasalle.edu/~smithsc/Astronomy/retrograd.html


Starwaders : Retrograde Motion
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=piBBQTkoQ9c


BBC : Mars Loops The Loop - Wonders of the Solar System - Series 1 Episode 2 Preview - BBC Two
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbynKfNfHk4


Is that because earth orbits the sun and the retrograde motion is observed when the earth passes by another planet orbiting the sun at a lower orbit rate or is it god because he wants to confuse us?
My belated response
+Niels Steigenga Before looking into your link[s]*, neither. I have already answered in my other answer. Sorry did not see it before, since it was today I discovered that your comment had been hidden as spam.

Sun gets around Earth, West each day, East each year. It is in each moment, thus for both day and year, the centre of each planet orbitting it, while they also participate in the daily rotation of the universe.

And each planet is therein guided by its angel.

This was, by the way, as I forgot to mention it before, the standard theory about heavenly motions up to Newton's time. How come he made no effort to refute it?

He gave an alternative theory, he did not prove it was better, and he did not prove the other theory wrong. In fact he may probably have thought the angelic theory right. In that case he wanted to propose another theory to draw away attention from it.

Yes he was a Christian - of a sort. He was Arian and he was Rosicrucian. And perhaps it was his interest as a Rosicrucian to get the attention of the public off angels.

* I thought they were only one before responding.
Matthew
Got two comments caught.
I
+Hans-Georg Lundahl Right, firstly the Sun does not move as you claim. Secondly it is not physically possible to move a physical object through force of will.

So what you describe is impossible.

To get around this you invoke Supernatural entities for which there is no evidence of their existence and imbue them with Powers that defy all physical laws.

Yet you deny this is magic.
My response
+mathew2283 Sorry for belated response.

Geometrically my theory about the movements makes exactly as much sense as yours does.

It is not impossible to move an object through will.

I moved my fingers several times, and I willed them to move where they moved. [Grosso modo, excepting one mistype.]

In Christian metaphysics, standard version, no spurious sectarian deviation, God can move ANYTHING through His sheer will. Angels can move anything through theirs insofar as it is an object over which God gave them that power or allowed them to momentarily assume such - they are limited locally.

And human souls regularly move human bodies - insofar as these are able to move.
II
+Hans-Georg Lundahl

Here is something else.

BBC : Learning Zone : The looping movement of Mars in the night sky
http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/the-looping-movement-of-mars-in-the-night-sky/9827.html


How can Mars move this way in the night sky if the Earth is stationary and Mars orbits it?
My response
+mathew2283 As to the BBC clip, the problem you take up is identical to the one taken up in three links by Niels, and my answer is also identical.

Mars does not in its periodical movement East through the Zodiak directly orbit Earth, but only indirevtly insofar as it directly orbits Sun, which in its turn directly orbits Earth.

It is in the Westward, daily movement, that all orbits Earth.
mathew2283
+Hans-Georg Lundahl Even if Mars orbits the Sun as the Sun orbits the Earth, that doesn't explain the retrograde motion of the planets in the night sky. Mars would still only appear to move in one direction.
Hans Georg Lundahl
Mars is moving in only one direction if we consider the daily movement westward. It is the periodical movement eastward that is interrupted by such zig zag. Let me quote a link for you:

"Over the course of a single night, a planet will move from East to West across the sky, like any other celestial object near the ecliptic. [...] If observed from one night to the next, however, a planet appears to move from West to East against the background stars most of the time. Occasionally, however, the planet's motion will appear to reverse direction, and the planet will, for a short time, move from East to West against the background constellations. This reversal is known as retrograde motion, and is illustrated in the following animation."

Note that the animation ONLY takes into account the position of Mars at midnight in relation to stars. Dates shift from Oct 13, 1996 to Jul 26, 1997 BUT it is always 12:00 am:

Retrograde Motion
http://www.lasalle.edu/~smithsc/Astronomy/retrograd.html


Actually one Geocentric explanation for it is already given - the Ptolemaic one. The Tychonian differs from the Ptolemaic in general by identifying Sun with the excentric of each planet. The Riccioli explanation changes circles to ellipses that are only close to circular. But EITHER explanation is here given as not taking the daily rotation into account. Whether the daily rotation is that of Universe Westward around Earth or that of Earth Eastward around itself, this rotation has to be added before fully understanding what is concretely observed.

Tuesday, July 15, 2014

... against Yet Another Puritan as in Stupid Attack on Christmas

1) New blog on the kid : Pope Michael Takes on Pope Francis: Exiled Pope is Living In America (link to video) , 2) Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : ... against Yet Another Puritan as in Stupid Attack on Christmas

Video:

Why was Christmas banned in America until 1820?
Jesusistheway1001
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oZAL80TMLaE


By the way, there is a certain fluidity on exactly where Christmas was banned until 1820. Spanish and remaining English colonies? Those taken over from France? Hardly. But among 13 Colonies, I do not think it probable that either Virginia or Catholic Maryland ever was stupid enough to ban Christmas. That said, here I introduce my somewhat more detailed refutations of their monumental stupidities:

I

Here is one lie:

"It was during the pre-Christian midwinter pagan celebrations of Scandinavia's Norsemen where today's Christmas traditions began, as a means of honouring the pagan sex and fertility god Yule"

  • 1) Pagan sex and fertility god is not named Yule but Frey.

  • 2) Picture accompanying those words was of Odin. Perhaps not quite wrong, since Yulner is another name, it seems according to Swedish wikipedia, for Odin. He was not a sex and fertility god.

  • 3) As to twelve days, that is simply the period between the Christmas date from very much further south than Scandinavia's Norsemen and Epiphany, also from much earlier Christian lands.

  • 4) Exactly when the Odin related feast was celebrated is not known. It was however a feast of three nights, not of twelve days accordinvg to our ONLY source, Snorri:


source:
http://hogtider.wordpress.com/2008/12/21/holls-midvinterblotet-vid-vintersolstandet/


Here are real customs from mid winter sacrifice:

16. ABOUT SACRIFICES.
Sigurd, earl of Hlader, was one of the greatest men for sacrifices, and so had Hakon his father been; and Sigurd always presided on account of the king at all the festivals of sacrifice in the Throndhjem country. It was an old custom, that when there was to be sacrifice all the bondes should come to the spot where the temple stood and bring with them all that they required while the festival of the sacrifice lasted. To this festival all the men brought ale with them; and all kinds of cattle, as well as horses, were slaughtered, and all the blood that came from them was called "hlaut", and the vessels in which it was collected were called hlaut-vessels. Hlaut-staves were made, like sprinkling brushes, with which the whole of the altars and the temple walls, both outside and inside, were sprinkled over, and also the people were sprinkled with the blood; but the flesh was boiled into savoury meat for those present. The fire was in the middle of the floor of the temple, and over it hung the kettles, and the full goblets were handed across the fire; and he who made the feast, and was a chief, blessed the full goblets, and all the meat of the sacrifice. And first Odin's goblet was emptied for victory and power to his king; thereafter, Niord's and Freyja's goblets for peace and a good season. Then it was the custom of many to empty the brage-goblet (1); and then the guests emptied a goblet to the memory of departed friends, called the remembrance goblet. Sigurd the earl was an open-handed man, who did what was very much celebrated; namely, he made a great sacrifice festival at Hlader of which he paid all the expenses. Kormak Ogmundson sings of it in his ballad of Sigurd: --

"Of cup or platter need has none
The guest who seeks the generous one, --
Sigurd the Generous, who can trace
His lineage from the giant race;
For Sigurd's hand is bounteous, free, --
The guardian of the temples he.
He loves the gods, his liberal hand
Scatters his sword's gains o'er the land-"

ENDNOTES: (1) The brage-goblet, over which vows were made. -- L.

Source:
http://lind.no/nor/splitt.asp?lang=gb&emne=&person=&list=&vis=s_be_hakon_den_gode


"during the month of December"

Well, no. Midwinter does not state "winter solstice".

There is exact information that the Hawk Night was AFTER our Christmas. Until one changed that through adaptation to Christianity.

There is a probability that the Hawk Night may well have been 14th of January.

If the "winter half of the year" lasts from October 14th to April 14, then January 14th is exactly in the middle = Midwinter. A Norse synonym for Yule.

However, it may have been as late as February.

Animal or human sacrifices were offered on each of those days?

You are speaking of the Pagan Temple of Elder Uppsala. It is much more likely we are dealing with nine days, since on each day there were nine sacrificed beings. Humans one day, horses another.

And of course NOTHING ties this to Christmas.

And a BIG minus on your credibility for using "encyclopedia of White Magic" as if it were a credible source!

The Wiccans WANT people to believe that pre-Christian traditions are available just by scratching a little on Christian ones.

II

Mediterranean.

Your argument is basically that if Baal was born around Winter Solstice, Jesus Christ must have been born on Summer solstice to keep as far away from Baal as possible.

But in that case St John the Baptist would have been born under Winter Solstice.

So Dionysos is supposed to have been born during the winter solstice?

Which of these quotations, not from Encyclopedia of White Magic, but from real ancient Pagans and Christians who had known them, on the mythological topic of Dionysos' birth says so?

Greek geek site on "theoi" : Dionysios
http://www.theoi.com/Olympios/DionysosMyths.html


In Athens, smaller or rural Dionysiae were held during Poseideon, roughly december, but probably at different dates per Attic Deme.

[One may add that Poseideon does not correspond to a precise set of dates in December, but that any given date in Poseideon would be different dates in December for the different years in which Attic Calendar coexisted with Roman calendars, Julian or pre-Julian.]

Now, the emperor Aurelian extended the season previously known as Saturnalia from dec. 17 through 23 to dec. 17 through 25. So? Perhaps that was a provocation against Christians who in some localities already were celebrating Christmas in December 25. Or a way of giving them a chance to, in appearance, comply. Previous to him, Saturnalia ended Dec. 23 and Christians who celebrated Christmas were doing penance during advent in those days. Or perhaps the penitential season of advent comes from a Christian distaste for Saturnalia. Either way, at least previous to Aurelian, Saturnalia were over by Dec. 23, 24:00 midnight or when ever the feast was supposed to give way to ordinary days again.

Now, let us check about Aurelian.

Here is a wikipedian discussion about relations between Sol Invictus and Christmas:

The Philocalian calendar of AD 354 gives a festival of "Natalis Invicti" on 25 December. There is limited evidence that this festival was celebrated before the mid-4th century.[36][37]

The idea that Christians chose to celebrate the birth of Jesus on 25 December because this was the date of an already existing festival of the Sol Invictus was expressed in an annotation to a manuscript of a work by 12th-century Syrian bishop Jacob Bar-Salibi. The scribe who added it wrote: "It was a custom of the Pagans to celebrate on the same 25 December the birthday of the Sun, at which they kindled lights in token of festivity. In these solemnities and revelries the Christians also took part. Accordingly when the doctors of the Church perceived that the Christians had a leaning to this festival, they took counsel and resolved that the true Nativity should be solemnised on that day." [38]

This idea became popular especially in the 18th and 19th centuries.[39][40][41]

In the judgement of the Church of England Liturgical Commission, this view has been seriously challenged[42] by a view based on an old tradition, according to which the date of Christmas was fixed at nine months after 25 March, the date of the vernal equinox, on which the Annunciation was celebrated.[43] The Jewish calendar date of 14 Nisan was believed to be that of the beginning of creation, as well as of the Exodus and so of Passover, and Christians held that the new creation, both the death of Jesus and the beginning of his human life, occurred on the same date, which some put at 25 March in the Julian calendar.[42][44][45] It was a traditional Jewish belief that great men lived a whole number of years, without fractions, so that Jesus was considered to have been conceived on 25 March, as he died on 25 March, which was calculated to have coincided with 14 Nisan.[46] Sextus Julius Africanus (c.160 – c.240) gave 25 March as the day of creation and of the conception of Jesus.[47] The tractate De solstitia et aequinoctia conceptionis et nativitatis Domini nostri Iesu Christi et Iohannis Baptistae falsely attributed to John Chrysostom also argued that Jesus was conceived and crucified on the same day of the year and calculated this as 25 March.[43][45] A passage of the Commentary on the prophet Daniel by Hippolytus of Rome, written in about 204, has also been appealed to.[48]


Wiki: Sol Invictus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sol_Invictus


Footnotes to this passage:


36 Wallraff 2001: 174–177. Hoey (1939: 480) writes: "An inscription of unique interest from the reign of Licinius embodies the official prescription for the annual celebration by his army of a festival of Sol Invictus on December 19". The inscription (Dessau, Inscriptiones Latinae Selectae 8940) actually prescribes an annual offering to Sol on November 18 (die XIV Kal(endis) Decemb(ribus), i.e. on the fourteenth day before the Kalends of December).
37. Text at [6] Parts 6 and 12 respectively.
38. (cited in Christianity and Paganism in the Fourth to Eighth Centuries, Ramsay MacMullen. Yale:1997, p. 155)
39. Michael Alan Anderson, Symbols of Saints (ProQuest 2008 ISBN 978-0-54956551-2), p. 45
40. The Day God Took Flesh
41. 1908 Catholic Encyclopedia: Christmas: Natalis Invicti
42. "Although this view is still very common, it has been seriously challenged" - Church of England Liturgical Commission, The Promise of His Glory: Services and Prayers for the Season from All Saints to Candlemas" (Church House Publishing 1991 ISBN 978-0-71513738-3) quoted in The Date of Christmas and Epiphany
43. Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church (Oxford University Press 2005 ISBN 978-0-19-280290-3), article "Christmas"
44. Alexander V. G. Allen, Christian Institutions (Scribner, New York 1897), p. 474
45. Frank C. Senn, Introduction to Christian Liturgy (Fortress Press 2012 ISBN 978-0-80069885-0), p. 114
46. William J. Colinge, Historical Dictionary of Catholicism (Scarecrow Press 2012 ISBN 978-0-81085755-1), p. 99]
47. Joseph F. Kelly, The Origins of Christmas (Liturgical Press 2004 ISBN 978-0-81462984-0), p. 60
48. Hippolytus and December 25th as the date of Jesus’ birth

Since link in footnote 48 was missing - here is to St Hippolytus' commentary on Daniel:

Dec. 25 - Textual Tradition of Hippolytus Commentary on Daniel
http://www.dec25th.info/Textual%20Tradition%20of%20Hippolytus%20Commentary%20on%20Daniel.html


No - the Saturnalia were NOT a later name for a feast instituted by Aurelian. They were a feast already in place before he came on the scene. And, as already noted, ended on Dec. 23, traditionally.

III

4:56 "Up to this time, the birth of Jesus had not been celebrated at all."

Wrong, Sub Tuum Praesidium is an early Christmas hymn from Egypt [original in Coptic, translations in Greek and Latin]***.

5:33 "the Church's policy of changing the dates of Biblical events"

Well, no.

In a sense, yes, the dates changed as the calendars changed. Jewish calendar was a lunisolar year with in some years a leap month. The Jewish dates were exchanged for dates on the Julian - later Gregorian - calendar.

But apart from that, no, there was no need to change dates to suit pagan festivals. There were so many Pagan dates, and there were so many Christian events, both Biblical and of the category one could call "Acts 28" - i e Church History - that there was no shortage of Pagan dates to adapt to events dear to Christian piety on same or corresponding dates. Even without positively changing dates.

One exception though: All Saints as commemoration of day when Pantheon after exorcism was remade into the Church of Our Lady and All Saints (one that returned to non-Christian use in/after 1870, after Rome was taken by the Liberals) was changed to compete with the Irish Samhain. Like Christmas to Saturnalia, it was not same date, but the Christian feast was after the Pagan one. Samhain = October 31. All Saints = November 1, making October 31 a Vigil Fast.

5:40 Pope St Gregory I had indeed ordered Saint Augustine of Canterbury to incorporate pagan practises, BUT not "any and all" of them. Only dates and places. Perhaps dances and cuisine too.

Pagan temple = same place as rubble heap of Pagan Temple = same place as New Church after rubble heap.

Pagan festival = consult the martyrology for what Christian event is fitting to replace the Pagan reason for the season.

But this order came well after the date for Christmas was already set.

Any directly idolatrous practise was of course meant to go.

IV

6:02 "Common practises included open sex in the streets, rioting, murder, druidic Halloween rituals?"

First of all, there are plays that are innocent which this kind of learned or wannabe learned Puritans is wont to call "druidic rituals" at a moment's notice.

Then I would like to know how this can be said to be a fair resumé of common Christmas rituals.

Obviously it has happened that crimes have been committed on Christmas. See for instance "Home Alone" - would you consider burglary a modern Christmas ritual, just because the two burglars in that comedy choose Christmas as a good opportunity?

Of course not! And I believe there are families, not having left Macaulay Culkin at home, who come home after Christmas vacation and find their house has had a less than welcome visit. That does not make the "Christmas burglary" a ritual of the Church!

V

1652 Christ's Mass was outlawed?

OK.

First of all, Cromwell is NOT a trustworthy witness about how "out of hand" Christmas celebrations had gotten in England, nor are his Puritans. They were all fanatics and bloodthirsty thugs, the robbers of Ireland, and Cromwell himself was the man who for Irish Catholics had the plan "to Hell or Connaught" (with them).

No, it was Cromwell, it was Puritanism that was out of hand.

Second, if Christmas had gotten out of hand in England by 1652, that may very well be due to the deleterious influence of the Reformation and of Anglican shilly-shallying on diverse Theological issues.

6:27 "The Puritans took the Biblical mandate seriously, which commanded that Christianity be pure and separate from Paganism"

No, it was Old Testament Hebraism that was separate from Gentiles. The New Covenant very clearly includes them by the mandate "in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek".

So far from taking the relevant commands of the Bible seriously, Puritanism flouted them.

Not the least the command "let no one judge you" on feasts or food or drink.

6:44 1656 Christmas was legalised again? Good!

6:58 "The Puritans had lost England" (because they could not persecute Christmas there!) "but they held high hopes for the New World."

Reminds me of what Chesterton said about Mayflower. The Americans have instituted a feast of thanksgiving for the Pilgrim Fathers arriving there, we should institute one for them leaving here, he said.

And oh boy, was he right, according to what you say!

7:09 "They came here for religious freedom, they came here to be free to worship God" no doubt (before I continue video) according to their conscience. Which conscience mandated them to deprive better men than themsleves from the freedom of worshipping God according to their better informed conscience - including in the matter of actually celebrating Christmas. Now I will hear the rest of McKinney's phrase.

Ah "without a hierarchy, and without the corruption of the Church that they had known before".

Well, Anglicanism was actually corrupt through lack of true Catholic hierarchy. Not through presence of it! See decision of Pope Leo XIII on Anglican orders (recently openly flouted by Bergoglio).

VI

They came here with a "clear knowledge" of the dangers of the "Pagan" practises that had been so dear to their ancestors?

I am reminded of the Little Horn, of the King of the North, of a man who shall not worship the God of his fathers.

Pagan rituals of Halloween?

Duh ...

Frankly, the Sunday Schools were doing a good thing and doing what Catholics had been doing for centuries, all over the Catholic parts of Europe.

Apart from that, "blatantly Pagan roots" and so on is simply assuming her "demonstration" was obvious, while in fact it was not.

The one thing that was blatantly anything, it was blatantly Irish Catholic.

[And that was obviously enough to make it "Pagan" in the eyes of Ulster Scots and Williamite Orangist Freemasonry!]

VII

During the Saturnalia holly was hung up?

I would for one like the reference in Macrobius for that!

But even if true, this is exactly the kind of thing that can have an innocent meaning and which can also therefore be accepted by Christians if used in that meaning.

13:23 - 13:32 (note that this reference to Wiccan rituals comes at a time** that can be considered as 1332, divide that by two and you see what I mean ...)

It is so abhominably stupid to refer to Wiccan rituals as evidence that Christmas customs are of Wiccan origin. All of these Christmas customs are older than the new religion called Wicca, which is to its supposed Pagan roots exactly what the Reformation was to supposed Christian roots beyond and earlier than the common customs - ecclesiastical or otherwise - of Christendom.

This is where we get our custom of hanging mistletoes in doorways ... c'mon!

Has it ever occurred to you that:
  • kissing the cheek is a pretty innocent way of starting a relationship, including marriage, though not obliging that way? or that:
  • some people are shy and some are plain or even ugly and can need that extra help? or that:
  • some people by remaining unmarried instead would not thereby be hallowed in chastity and holiness, but rather be debased by unchastity or sourness or both?


And your expertise on that spell with mistle-toes, does it come from that wonderfully accurate (not!) source Encyclopedia of White Magic again, the cover of which was shown more than once already?

I find evolutionism stupid, but this is also stupid.

14:11 "evergreen trees ..." (will not bother to repeat that stupid stuff) the Christmas tree comes from the 17th Century Bavaria!

Centuries after the conversion of Tassilo from Idolatry to Catolic Christianity.

Eight centuries between a supposed Pagan root, in the archaeological remains of which we find nothing that looks like Christmas trees, and an emergence of an overtly Christian thing in an obviously Christian country, supposed to be - according to this idiotic "expertise" - a reemergence of Paganism.

How stupid can one be if one accepts Christmas trees as idolatrous!?

14:20 "during the winter solstice" - there was even no Pagan feast in sight in Scandinavia, midwinter referring not to winter solstice, but to middle of winter season! - "trees were chopped down, brought inside and decorated as idols to be worshipped" - well, I would like to see a good old reference to any of the most direct sources now available for Norse Paganism before believing such a thing.

You see, the most direct sources now available for Norse Paganism is NOT this Encyclopedia of White Magic which this show has referred to ore than once, but rather they are things like Adam of Bremen, Saxo Grammaticus, Snorre, the Sagas, when ever they set aside any passage on describing Pagan customs.

SO FAR - and I have done my reading on Norse Paganism, the mythology was interesting, precisely as Marvel comics had been earlier on - SO FAR there has not even once been any of them stating any such thing.

Idols were cut out of wood? SURE. But their shape was not logs put into the fire, nor trees with branches still on them. Their shape was wooden sculpture. How could these guys miss that little Emil of Lönneberga, each time his father chases him into the toolshed were idols? Except the rural dean, which was of course° a voodoo doll.

Here is the quote from wikipedia:

Most of the time Emil plays a prank, he escapes his choleric father's wrath by running away quickly and locking himself in a tool shed. Since the door can also be locked from the outside, his father responds by locking him in there for a while as punishment. Emil is usually embarrassed by what he has done, but it is not a severe punishment for Emil, who likes sitting in the shed and takes to carving a wooden figure during each of his stays. He eventually accumulates 369 of them, except for the one his mother buries because she claims it looks too much like the rural dean.


Wiki : Emil i Lönneberga
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emil_i_Lönneberga


That is FAR closer to the Norse Idols than Christmas trees are. But not near close enough!

Notes:

* As a Swede and a Mythology buff, I am very well placed to know HOW incompetent the show was.

** Saw wrong. Probably either lack of sleep or someone abusing excommunications like a kind of kabbalah magic against me. I stopped the video at 13:23 and read 13:32.

*** And yes, Coptic version of Sub Tuum Praesidium does predate Aurelian, and yes again, it is ONLY the Latin version that actually omits a pretty clear reference to the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, i e her total purity and freedom from Original Sin, from the Moment of Her Conception in Her mother's womb.

° To the very stupid and devoid of sense of humour: it was of course not a voodoo doll, I was ironic. But the stupidity of Emil's mother (a stupidity of which the parson's daughter Astrid can have seen genuine examples, which may have prompted her apostasy from Christianity) was so reminding of the stupidity of these Christmas accusers and liars.

Wednesday, July 9, 2014

... on who AronRa, a fav opponent of mine, really is (five facts)

Five Facts -tagged
AronRa
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdbRcxVYWSY


I Aron not Aaron
Aron is actually the Scandinavian form of Aaron, thus, yes, related.

In Swedish you find it with two a's if at all only in the Bible. A man with that name usually spells it like you.

However, it is, in Swedish (either spelling) pronounced exactly as you pronounce it.

II Descends from Skiold, son of Odin
Descending from Odin is probably as common in Scandinavia (really Scadinavia, but someone added a stroke over the first a) as descending from King Alfred is in England or descending from Conor Mac Nessa in Ireland.

He was king of Uppsala. Elder Uppsala - the archbishopric of Sweden was a few miles away. He was succeeded by his stepson, Niord's son Frey. Unlike Skiold, Frey was also deified. His son Fiolner was not, since he drowned in a vat of mead, as guest of Froda Haddingsson. King of Denmark.

We all thought Asgard was Viking Heaven ... it was.

When Odin tricked himself to real kingship and false godhood in Uppsala, he arranged so his family could keep up the status after he died.

He did that by arranging for a funeral pyre and for his survivors to say "he has gone to Asgard". And explain that that was where he habitually ruled from.

The only Norse concerned Christian author who explicitly does not believe this happened was Paul the Deacon. The story about Odin giving battle luck to the Vinniles after their women had appeared before his balcony with hair dressed as bears (hence long-beards = Lombards) was, he thought, ridiculous. "Because Odin is none other than Mercury, who lived long before this time in Greece".

Btw, setting Odin in the third c. AD is probably based on medium length generations after some known posterity. If we go from Ynglingatal - the Kings' "Length" (list) of Uppsala - he was probably alive in the time of Caesar. If we go by Saxo, there were two different Froda's and the one that was contemporary with Augustus was not the I who received Fiolner, but the II. I disbelieve that. Saxo put either longer reigns or simultaneous ones as consecutive or simultaneous regional series as consecutive national series. You know, Scania (=Scadinavia), Sealand, Fyn, Lolland, Falster, Jutland may have united later than he wanted people to think - and yet he would not pass by any king's name. Hence the doubling of the Frodas.

Someone in India have Krishna in his family tree? Probably there exists such a claim, yes.

Krishna helped the Pandava side, but the Pandavas died without heirs and Krishna's cousin or sth took over.

Krishna was also deified after a funeral pyre - UNLESS in his case there were many accretions between his lifetime and Mahabharata written thousands of years later.

His death is said to be the end of one and the beginning of our present "yuga" or age, and it is put close to the Flood. Flood = 2957 BC, Krishna's death = 3100 sth BC. I e, the memory of his person, if there was one, was kept alive beside the Biblical tradition. Noah when writing down his portion of the Genesis skipped over much of the war (there is more of it in Book of Henoch), but someone else, probably Cham since he was probably ancestor of Indians, kept more details alive.

BUT India wanted to forget there was a Flood between that and themselves. So, an "earlier avatar of same god" saved a king through the Flood (admit, after the Flood Noah was pretty much King, but perhaps he didn't stay so and didn't even want to). And hence Flood was demoted to "before Krishna, Pandavas, Kauravas". Though the latter are pretty recognisable as if not first generation at least second generation nephelim (esp. Bhima).

Hence ALSO insistance on having a LONG tradition. Someone came over thinking - correctly - Flood happened a thousand years earlier, and they would say "what Flood?" and enumerate a false continuity with - essentially - Nod or else "sure there was a Flood, but that was forty thousand years ago".

III Not a Professor wants no part in fake claims "like Hovind"
3:11 the attack on Kent Hovind was not necessary.

He was not condemned for "fraud" but for "tax fraud". Even that was idiotic, but he has a PhD in Education. Ill-deserved, I have read the thesis, but he has made up for that bad Church History (essentially making incorrectly St Athanasius a Proto-Darwinist) by very decent advocacy of Creation Science.

But his PhD is, if ill-deserved, genuine. If someone told you he was condemned for fraud, about the PhD, that is because someone - about him - got the wrong idea.

Kent Hovind STILL In Prison - Son Speaks Out In Personal One-on-One with PPSIMMONS
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2GADfTc_j9Y


Here is on allegation Kent Hovind would have been fraudulent when giving references on carbon dating anomalous examples:

Assorted retorts from yahoo boards and elsewhere : ... on Kent Hovind's supposed failure in Carbon Dating Subject
http://assortedretorts.blogspot.com/2013/08/on-kent-hovinds-supposed-failure-in.html


IV Famous in Iowa, Desmoines, for bringing a lizard that was shot by the police
[They faked size of lizard in some reports, plus tried to charge him with "tree climbing alligator" because a lizard was not illegal.]

Scripture is as valuable as the transcript is honest.

That one was not. And the dishonest policemen did not exactly found a new community on misrepresenting your lizard, nor did they die martyrs testifying on a false size of it.

THAT is not an argument against factuality of Scripture.

V Was mistaken for Big Foot in New Mexico
Hard to believe in Big Foot, when you realise you're him?

I have never been mistaken for Big Foot, but if I were, this would not mean to me Big Foot could'nt exist any more than your story means that.

Tuesday, July 8, 2014

... on Ordeals and When Abolished

The Science of Lying
SciShow
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MX3Hu8loXTE


The speaker is among other things explaining what ordeals were, and ends the outburst in words which quoting I begin my comment:

3:29 "Medieval Judicial system, how I love you!"

Apart from the irony which is a lie as obvious as "Michael Jackson is my aunt", you were lying about how it worked.

Or rather when it worked. It was actually during the Middle Ages that Trial by Ordeal was abolished because Catholic Church fought it.

True, while it lasted, it was also partly the Church that administered it.

Documentation of my previous claim:

Canon 19 forbids the blessing of water and hot iron for judicial tests or ordeals.


From Catholic Encyclopedia on Fourth Lateran Council (1215)
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09018a.htm


Here is a further quote on origins of this trial system (previous to 1215 and Fourth Lateran Council, of course):

Ordeals were known and practised by various peoples of antiquity, and are still to be met with today among uncivilized tribes. The Code of Hammurabi prescribes their use for the ancient Babylonians. The person accused of a certain crime was subjected to the test of cold water, which consisted in the person's plunging into a river; if the river bore him away his guilt was established; if he remained quiet and uninjured in the water, his innocence was believed to have been proved (Winkler, "Die Gesetze Hammurabis", Leipzig, 1902, 10). Among the Jews existed the test of the Water of Jealousy, conducted by the priests, in which the woman accused of adultery must consume the draught in their presence, after having offered certain sacrifices, and the effects of which established the woman's guilt or innocence (Numbers 5:12-31). Among the Indians are to be found likewise various kinds of ordeals, particularly that of the red-hot iron. This test of holding a red-hot iron was also known among the Greeks. The Romans, however, with their highly developed system of dispensing justice, did not employ this means of obtaining proof. Ordeals found their chief development among the Germanic peoples, in Germany itself as well as in those kingdoms which came into existence, after the migration of the nations, in the old Roman Provinces of Gaul, Italy, and Britain. They were an essential part of the judicial system of the Germanic races in pagan times, were preserved and developed after the conversion of these peoples to Christianity, became widespread and were in constant use.

The Christian missionaries did not in general combat this practice. They opposed only the duel, and endeavoured to minimize the barbarity attendant upon the practice of ordeals. By prayer and religious ceremonies, by the hearing of holy Mass and the reception of holy communion before the ordeal, the missionaries sought to give to it a distinctly religious character.


From Catholic Encyclopedia on Ordeals
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/11276b.htm


Previous to that, here is an example:

"The struggle waged against simony in the eleventh century led to violent scenes in several Italian cities. At Florence, Bishop Peter Mezzobarbo, known also as Peter of Pavia, (not to be confused with Pietro da Pavia who lived a century later) was publicly accused of simoniacal acquisition of the episcopal dignity. As he strenuously denied the charge and had numerous and prominent supporters, the controversy caused intense agitation at Florence. The Vallombrosian monks were his chief accusers, and upon the insistence of the people for proof, the judgment of God, or trial by fire, was resorted to. The Abbot St. John Gualbert designated for the test Peter Aldobrandini, who successfully underwent the ordeal (1068), hence called "Igneus", or Fire-tried. This triumph of the monks was followed by confession on the part of the bishop."


Wikipedia : Peter Igneus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Igneus


Note that this trial by ordeal was in 1068, well before 1215.

Monday, July 7, 2014

... on Who's the Right Pope and on Grandchildren of Reformation Finding Back to Veneration of Saints

Video a) commented on
WARRIOR Cassie Bernall
Chris Hicks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iiCQaSJ96dY
Video b) commented on
She Said Yes
Marco Valencia
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zofXVR5gTKY
Video c) commented on
"Thank You": A Rachel Joy Scott Tribute Video
BostonChick06
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKkQ3Ggdkfs
own comment on both all three videos
Catholics who do not think Bergoglio is the Pope have basically two choices on who is. Pope Michael or Pope Alexander.

Acc. to Alexander Cassie and Rachel would be in Hell for not having been Catholics. Michael is MY Pope.
Under mine
On c)
Michael Wallner
She gave everything for what she believed.
On b)
zetsusempie
Start a chain reaction, Accept Rachel's Challenge. 1. Eliminate Prejudice by looking for the best in others 2. Dare to Dream-Set Goals-Keep a Journal 3. Choose your influences-input determines output 4. Kind words-Small acts of kindness-HUGE impact 5. Start a Chain Reaction with family and friends ( copy and paste if you accept Rachel's Challenge.)
On a)
Cassie Long
R.I.P CASSIE BERNALL

... on First Ten Minutes of Madalyn Murray O'Hair's "Consider the Atheist" Speech

Video commented on:
Consider the Atheist
AronRa
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yflQd2jyp7Y
I
A few others speaking about her first 10 minutes, I only took two out of a bunch and my answer to the latter of the two :

ArguingFromIgnorance
This is a really good speech from 10:43 onward, but she almost lost me with 10 straight minutes vitriol against atheists. The history of the constitution and founders' outspoken contempt of churches is truly fascinating in it's own right; and the massive financial burden of government church subsidies, overshadowing the then 15 year long Vietnam War, is striking.

I wouldn't blame anyone for skipping the unnecessarily long and derisive preamble, but you're missing a treat if you don't listen to the last 35 minutes.

Jeremy Raines
The "preamble" was my favorite part. One day, when religion is virtually extinct, distinctions between non-theists will be much more interesting. I watched it with that point of view, and found it very entertaining.
Hans-Georg Lundahl
+Jeremy Raines
"One day, when religion is virtually extinct,"

When or if? How much of Atheistic thought is simply a not yet substantiated bet on the future?

"distinctions between non-theists will be much more interesting."

Oh, they are interesting now.

Therevada Buddhists, Mencian Confucians, Classic Western Atheism, Raelianism ... none of them Theist, no two very much alike.

And who says "non-theism" implies "non-religion"?

II
Not sure if you noted it BUT Madalyn Murray O'Hair is (unless wikipedia is a hoax just this article) a fair example that Western Classical Atheism (among non-Theists no one would consider her Raelian or Theravada Buddhist, and hardly Mencian Confucian even) is a sect of Protestantism.

"Madalyn Mays was born in the Beechview neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,[4] on April 13, 1919, to Lena Christina (Scholle) and John Irwin "Irv" Mays.[5] As an infant, she was baptized into the church as a Presbyterian.[6] In 1937, she graduated from Rossford High School in Rossford, Ohio."


Presbyterian means Calvinist or possibly (at best) Arminian Protestant. But usually Calvinist.

Her diatribe against the Theistic "non-sense words" is very reminiscent of Calvin's diatribe against Popery. I had a little taste while refuting his take on a major Catholic proof-text against Protestantism: Matthew 28. But him calling Popery "sorcery" in an angry tone (with the word choices I have a hard time imagining him smiling) and her calling "transcendent" and "prayer" and creation" non-sense words in an angry tone (it is audible), it is so much one cultural phenomenon. Not two widely different ones.

Note that her least complex ridden atheist, the primitive one, is one who has intellectually let go of ... not Judaism, not Islam, not Buddhism BUT Christianity.

Another giveaway that Protestantism and Atheism are two successive stages of an anti-Catholicism that shares very many cultural traits.

I agree that negative words are not the same thing as bad words. But negative movements are often, even if good, angry movements. And she and Calvin had about the same anger. They negate about the same thing and in about the same direction. They negate Catholicism and they negate the transcendental and prayerful part of it. As well as the ritual part. She only does it more consistently than Calvin.

That the hate-ridden Atheist is an ex-Catholic may be because Catholicism takes more breaking away from than some other versions or perversions of Christianity. That the fanatical Atheist left Watchtower Society is perhaps because people do not become very different persons just because they change their mind about religion. I did not become an ascetic just because and immediately on becoming a Christian.

To get back to the hate-ridden, ex-Catholic atheist, it is probably partly also due to an Anti-Catholic culture in US. Jews say any Jew who is a Christian or otherwise non-Jewish is a self-hating Jew. What she seems to think of is a self-hating Catholic. A Catholic with a "Galileo complex" if you have heard the phrase.

"we exceptional few and our superior philosophy"

5:45

Here we have a very great part of the cultural background history of Atheism in very little verbiage.

I'd have enjoyed a discussion with her as Chesterton enjoyed doing debates with Shaw.

"we exceptional few and our superior philosophy"

It is also one trait which unites Calvinism and Atheism.

III
7:42 priests found living carnally with their housekeepers!

Ha, I knew the pædophilia scandals were tied to Vatican II. After that era, priests have so many fewer female housekeepers!

IV
10:03 "he is as negative as Columbus, who denied the flat earth"

Was that what he did, or has she been reading too much Washington Irving?

The theory that stated he could not cross the Ocean and find China was neither flat earth, nor the truth there is an American continent between but simply saying parts of the globe would be impossible to survive in.

They more or less thought the Equator was as hot as we have better reasons to believe now that Venus is - a place where a man dies very quickly. And as for the Western "blocking zone" that was thought to be a too turbulent sea.

That theory was what Columbus was - luckily enough rightly so - negative about.

V
10:22 "he is interested in here and now and sees Theism as irrelevant to human life"

Reminds me a bit of a fictional character of Arthur Conan Doyle. Actually what HE (Sherlock) considered irrelevant to human life was Heliocentrism. Wonder if that trait was also from the doctor who inspired Sherlock's general scientific qualities?

As for Theism being irrelevant for human life, it is pretty inconceivable how a Catholic could come to think so, but very easily conceivable (yes, here I am harping again on Atheism in the Western version being a Protestant sect) how a Calvinism could come to think so, even before shredding the Calvinist remains of the Catholic religion.

Of course a Catholic apostasising could come there too, but only after considering his religion wrong.

As we Catholics know, God is very relevant, both because life is a waiting room for eternity AND our choices are really of importance to our eternal destiny. Calvinists would say a damned man cannot save himself by being pious and an elect could not damn himself by neglecting pieties - oversimplifying, but that is their general tendency.

And also, one more way in which God is relevant, is because God does miracles and hears prayers and rewards virtuous actions even in this life. So, better find out what kind of actions He likes and what kind of prayers He is likely to hear and if there are special places where He is likelier to hear them. Calvinists famously claim (against evidence) the age of miracles ended when the last apostle died and that pilgrimages are a waste of time. Of course, some of this kind of atheist actually do pilgrimages just for the fun of it.

VI
11:06 "a need for a fuller life of mankind" (philosophically as well as etc)

I am not sure if you know of one French man called Charles Maurras.

He was intellectually satisfied, for himself, as a positivist, a disciple of August Comte, one of the guys who would celebrate Columbus Day or Darwin Day instead of Christian Holidays.

But he was also satisfied that for social mores, Catholicism was pretty adequate. I have heard a rumour he converted on his way to the gallows (he was shot or beheaded as "collabo") and I have heard a denial of that rumour. But his master in social doctrine was, for once, not Comte but de la Tour du Pin. A Catholic Christian. Which previously named Christopher Columbus was also.

VII
"no man is an island"

quotation from one poet who was also an Anglo-Catholic "bishop" in CofE or CofI in his time. Like Ussher was.

Was it John Donne?