The Psycology of Fear
 

The Fear and Reverance of the Lord is the beggining of wisdom. So Fear itself is not nesessarily a bad thing. When we fear something we imedietly react by either embracing it or rejecting it. The type of fear that is to be embraced is like a stealth bomber. We know it exist and we know it can do great harm, only there is nothing we can do to stop it's destructive intent. So we embrace it and realize it's a weapon of defence. Like fire if we use it the right way it's a good thing. The type of fear that is to be rejected is like a lying tounge, nothing good can come of it so we fight it tooth and nail until it fleas.
Having a war on terror is like fighting off this lying tounge. So what do you fear? Stick your hand on a hot stove and it will burn you. Tourch a block of Ice with a flame thrower and it will melt. Don't fear the one who has the power to murder you fear the one who has the power to cast you into hell.

Loves The Cellar. You never know what you're going to get. I was hoping for a discussion of deBecker's The Gift of Fear.

Yup - is good, the cellar.

Better with pictures though.

I'm cold and frightened.

The OP highlights one of my pet peeves - religions that are fear based are responsible for more destruction in society as a whole and to individual psyches than just about anything else.

What kind of god demands that you "love" him or you will burn in hell? What kind of god is pleased by the Christian inquisitions and Islamic jihadists and all the rest?

Every person without fail whom I have met who was raised in some hell fire denomination is messed up to a greater or lesser extent. This includes strict catholics, Jehovah's Witnesses (an especially nasty sect), many Mormons, baptist fundamentalists and more.

A human father who told his kid that unless he was "loved" and obeyed, he was going to throw the child in the fire place would be arrested for child abuse. If the father actually carried out the threat, he'd go to jail for a very long time.

Never mind about us meeting god's standards. How about god meeting OUR standards?

As the Buddha taught:

Hatred does not vanquish hatred.
Only by loving kindness is hatred dissolved.
This law is ancient and eternal.

:rant:

Saints be praised ... they're there for you.
http://www.kegworks.com/images/blogp...ard-barrel.jpg

Aww, bless his little whiskey bringing heart. :luv:

Brilliant.

the truthful tounge would say.. fear is not the end of this... I kind of see it more like the lion king... the dad dies and the boy runs away.. then the boy comes back and retakes the mountain...

teach a child to love and he will love to obey- Tim Boone

A former friend had a St. Bernard. That was the most loyal, loveable, slobberingest fool of a dog. Evah! Josh was his name, the dog not the friend. He weighed an even 280 when he died/was put down, again, the dog not the friend.

what was the name of the last bible-passage-spewing trollbot? I'd forgotten them until now..... The last one spelled better, though.

I don't think Klyde's a trollbot. I think this is just the stuff that plays on his mind.

I learn something new every day. The Lion King was a Christian recruiting film.
Glad I never saw it now.

A god that tells one of his followers -Abraham- to kill his son Isaac as sacrifice, and then tells Abraham 'haha, only kidding' at the last second is not the kind of god i want to follow.

I'm with you there 2.
A god that advises parents to stone their stubborn and rebellious children isn't for me either.

Link to the Stone Your Children verses in Deuteronomy via The Brick Testament - a Lego illustrated guide.

I still wish I could remember the name of the last one, though. Maybe I'll have to look it up.

~Highway 61 Revisited (Bob Dylan)

There is quite a lot more going on in that story than just that. But by all means, if the simplistic reading makes a better punching bag, have at!

I thought it was about premature ejaculation. This completely undermines the foundation of my worldview.

Thank you for the reference to Kierkegaard's take on the matter. Unfortunately, Kierkegaard, just like the angel of compassion, flies far over the heads of most fundamentalist "theologians."

Oh sure, in the light of a certain kind of faith, the giving up of all- including a son- in the face of god's demands, is a worthy act of ultimate submission and a proof of ultimate faith in god. And the act of Abraham committing to this ultimate personal sacrifice transforms him. And god is actually generous because he stops the sacrifice once Abraham has shown himself to really be willing to do it. It makes for a wonderful story with all sorts of deep symbolism.

But it still boils down to a god telling Abraham to kill his son as a sacrificial offering. This coming from a biblical world of a deity that just loves blood sacrifices of all kinds. If that is the ultimate god of reality, he has issues.

I think all of the blood sacrifices are allusions to menstruation.

(I have no idea what we're talking about.)

How is Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son for his god different than a muslim suicide bomber's willingness to sacrifice himself for his?

God is the real terrorist. I understand now. Thank you for the illustration.

So you don't want to or can't answer the question?

I have to smile and giggle. oh my silly ones. woowoowooo.

:blush:

gee willickers, fellers.

shyshyshy

The comparison is about Abraham and a suicide bomber, not god and allah.

Discuss.

easy. abraham was asked by God, well commanded really, to sacrifice his son. a suicide bomber is killing himself. there is a big difference. it's one thing to sacrifice yourself but to sacrifice your offspring is another. in abrahams; case he showed God that God came first. over everything and everyone.

just sayin.

FSM only asks for your meatballs.....

You just can't fake this kind of crazy. JBklyde is my new favorite nut bar....

Sorty, monster...you've been ousted.

Abraham is a fictional character, or at least based on someone so far in the past that they are irrelevant. A suicide bomber is real and hurting other people now.

I prefer a few crazy parents (almost) murdering their children, to someone actually blowing up as many people as possible.

The suicide aspect is irrelevant.

Abraham believed he was doing god's will. A suicide bomber believes he is doing god's will.

Frankly, I think they're both hallucinating crazies, but this is an entertaining philosophical discussion.

I usually end up doing dog's will, too. The worst I end up with is a sore arm from throwing a tennis ball for three hours.

I don't know what kind of dog Abraham and suicide bombers follow, but I hope I never find out.

Honestly, there are secular beliefs that are every bit as stupid as "obeying god's will." Humans are great at justifying irrational behavior, whether they are mentally ill or not.

I'll attempt to answer the sucide bomber vs abe question.

First off abe's son did not get sacraficed. It was a test to see how serious abe really was. Kind of like a weed out coarse in college. If your going to be an engineer, they want you to be an excellent engineer.. not a half arsed lego builder. Therefore you go through certain test to see if you have what it takes. And that is what God dose is test us. He will never test us beyond our limits.

Suicde Bombers are lead astray by there leaders.. in totall annilation the code to self destruct is "control alt delete" deletleing one's self is like earseing your name off of the book of life there fore you are hell bond.

God's goal and the goal of most God fearing relegions is to go to Heaven and to take as many up with us as possible. Therefor Islam is evil for calling it's people to "cntrl alt delete" themselfves in the name of God. So is charles manson but maynson is an evil nazi not a christian.

k peash...

But wasn't it an incomplete test? Why didn't God let Abraham kill his son and then simply resurrect Abraham's son as God is purported to have done with his own son Jesus? Does God have a convenient set of double standards ... one for his own son and another for Abraham's son?
Does that imply God was afraid that Abraham would, in hindsight, have changed his mind about following God if Abraham had actually killed for him? That's not a problem with suicide bombers; so, maybe they're just God's Test 2.0 (new and improved).
God is entitled to change His mind about that to suit the times we live in.
Yet without evil there'd be no martyrs. God moves in mysterious ways ... who are you to second guess Him.

Can the pot say to the potter why did you create me like this.. dose the potter not have the right to make some pots for noble purposes and some to just crush???

did someone mention pot?

potentially

Sweetheart, that's not really the pot talking, you know. Well not the ceramic pot anyway. Pots can't talk. They don't have vocal chords or tongues. Do you think you might enjoy a nice lie down?

Hang on, is this about Voldemog?

I just wanted to see how long it would take him to go from actually answering a question to answering a question with a question. It took only one iteration: his shit is weak.

It's not weak it's just that God gave us the Bible to Learn from and your twisting it like you have the right to rewright it. I choose not to enguage any further into that cokkamania.

Dude, the bible is a collection of the folk legends of ancient middle-eastern tribes, nothing more. It is interesting from a cultural anthropological point of view, but taking it as literally true is nuts.

Don't you dare dispute this. This post is a revelation from the almighty. And because this post tells you this post is a revelation from the almighty, you'd better not question it. Got it?

Bullshit. Man wrote the Bible. Not God. Even the 4 main actors most likely did not write those chapters themselves. And then there are the chapters that were left out on purpose.

Jeremiah 13:12-14 (New International Version, ©2011)

Wineskins
12 “Say to them: ‘This is what the LORD, the God of Israel, says: Every wineskin should be filled with wine.’ And if they say to you, ‘Don’t we know that every wineskin should be filled with wine?’ 13 then tell them, ‘This is what the LORD says: I am going to fill with drunkenness all who live in this land, including the kings who sit on David’s throne, the priests, the prophets and all those living in Jerusalem. 14 I will smash them one against the other, parents and children alike, declares the LORD. I will allow no pity or mercy or compassion to keep me from destroying them.’”

lol @ "cokkamania"

I read that in the New American Bible, whatever that is, they're going to replace the word "booty" with "spoils of war" to avoid snickering. No snickering! :lol:

I hope no cocks wake them up in the morn.

What a dick.

Dude! Open bar! :jig:

God didn't write that either.

You gotta admit, Jewish God was way more of a badass, before He had His mid-life crisis and became such a forgiving and peaceful Dirty Hippie Christian God.

"I will allow no pity or mercy or compassion to keep me from destroying them."

Yeah, I think that was Gaddafi.

If I truly believed in the Jewish God, I'd be frighterned enough to do all that stuff with separate utensils and not flicking switches too. Loki had nothing on him for temper and trickery!

Charlie Sheen.

I agree and I have smart-aliky theories for it which would probably send me to hell.

oh no, I am probably going to hell because I already thought them. :eek:

seriously,

I believe in some sort of god but not religiosity. Not THAT.

yep

'sok, no hell in judaism....

Our first alien overlord (named god) showed the puny humans the full capability of his destructive power. He used his orbiting battlestation (named Heaven) to cause the great flood, destroy Sodom and Gomorah, etc. He like to punk the humans, telling them to paint their lintel with lambs blood, to eat unleavened bread, to not trim the hair on the sides of their heads, to kill their kids, etc. He was a real practical joker, and the aliens got lot's of laughs (and god made a mint from his bookie on the Job wager). A subsequent alien overlord (named Jesus), was much more laid back. He used his awesome alien power to walk on water, heal humans, and raise them from the dead, among other things. Child's play, compared to what his fellow alien overlords did to the Vulcans.

Hey, it's as plausible as most god concepts.

Well, my theories related directly to fobble's comment and were based on modern human psychology and succinct. Imagine that. spex, you made my day.