From: Max More (max@maxmore.com)
Date: Sat Jun 29 2002 - 14:41:17 MDT
At 02:01 AM 6/29/2002 -0700, Samantha wrote:
>>They may *say*, but I think they should not be considered Protestants at
>>all. They can't really be considered Christians even. The early Church
>>did have protracted and heated discussions about exactly what it meant to
>>talk about "the son of God". However, as a matter of good cognitive
>>practice we should stick to the usage according to which a Christian are
>>all and only those who believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ. [To
>
>I don't think so. The early Christians didn't necessarily have this
>belief. It took the Catholic Church 3 or 4 centuries to sort out what
>they thought dogma should be in this regard. The Catholic take cannot be
>said to reasonably subscribe non-Catholic Christianity. It is not good
>cognitive practice to drop the complexity of the real situation for
>something easier.
In the first 3 or 4 centuries, there was no Catholic/Protestant division.
There were numerous sects with various divergences in belief, but the
Protestants didn't come into existence for another thousand years or so.
There wasn't even a state-backed official Church until the conversion of
Constantine in the early fourth century. The early arguments, as I recall
vaguely, were not about the divinity of Jesus but about in exactly what
*way* he was divine. That was reflected in arguments about the incarnation
and the immanence of the Holy Spirit.
I think that to be considered a Christian, someone needs to believe more
than that J.C. was a really cool kind of guy.
>Actually, they need to seek to be Christ-like, to follow the purported
>teachings of Christ. All of this other stuff is derivative from this or
>that sect.
No, that's clearly insufficient. There are plenty of unreligious humanists
who have explicitly said that Christ as portrayed in the surviving writings
is a archetypal figure to be emulated. But they most certainly would object
to being called Christians, and I think they would be right to so object.
Look, Samantha, there are enough of them as it is. Why try to define more
into existence?!
Max
BRIAN: "HONESTLY, I am NOT the messiah!"
[silence in crowd]
CROWD LEADER: "Only the true messiah would deny his divinity!"
BRIAN: "Oh come on, what sort of chance does that give me?"
_______________________________________________________
Max More, Ph.D.
max@maxmore.com or more@extropy.org
http://www.maxmore.com
Strategic Philosopher
President, Extropy Institute. http://www.extropy.org <more@extropy.org>
________________________________________________________________
Director of Content Solutions, ManyWorlds Inc.: http://www.manyworlds.com
--- Thought leadership in the innovation economy
m.more@manyworlds.com
_______________________________________________________
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.5 : Sat Nov 02 2002 - 09:15:06 MST