Baptism

[Jakub]

Baptism clears man (and woman) of original sin. If not done, you go to hell, the story says.

Is it an invention of the Church to ensure lifelong observance and succession, and to increase the drive to convert? Or is it simply a parable that's been adapted for Church power purposes?

I mean, obviously, it makes no sense. Did Noah go to hell? Moses? What about people who lived perfectly good lives but never even heard the word "Jesus" because they were still in the New World or out in Asia?

So: invention, or adaptation?

[MikeSofaer]

It may have come from the practice of annointing kings with oil.

[chumpface]

According to Dante, Noah, Jacob, etc. did go to Hell and Christ brought them to Heaven during the Harrowing of Hell.

[Jakub]

Is Dante canon?

[Jamie Madigan]

Southern Baptists don't believe that you HAVE to be baptised to avoid Hell, for what it's worth. It's just an outward, symbolic demonstration of a personal decision/belief.

[Jamie Madigan]

Is Dante canon?
No. It's fiction.

[MikeSofaer]

Is Dante canon?
No. It's fiction.

Hehe. Cool. :)

[Talisker]

Obviously, it makes no sense.
Ha, ha, you're right, silly Christians.

[Nick Walter]

The "Baptism Defense" used to be pretty popular until it was eclipsed by the "Wookie Defense". You don't see it much anymore.

[Theodore Rex DX]

:!: There are two es in wookiee.

My question is:

What is hell? The concept seems to vary wildly - really, really, really wildly - from testament to testament, and no two people seem to have the same definition. You'd think that would have been something made explicitly clear.

[Jason McCullough]

http://www.google.com/search?q=baptism+history

Really. :D

[Duality]

The Christian baptism also has the dual purpose of entry into the church, as well.

[BrewersDroop]

Give me some of that old time religion where people were baptized properly. None of this namby-pamby annoint their head with water from the fount shite. Give them a good dunking in a river. Especially young women. Clad in practically see through white shifts. Mmmm. In fact, I think some of them Oklahoma schoolgirl lesbians probably need a good saving right now. Come on boys, we gots us some soul saving to do!

[Nick Walter]

Give me some of that old time religion where people were baptized properly. None of this namby-pamby annoint their head with water from the fount shite. Give them a good dunking in a river. Especially young women. Clad in practically see through white shifts. Mmmm. In fact, I think some of them Oklahoma schoolgirl lesbians probably need a good saving right now. Come on boys, we gots us some soul saving to do!

This is probably indicative of some malfunction in my brain, but I read both instances of "saving" in your post as "shaving" the first time through. Made it even better.

[Anaxagoras]

What is hell? The concept seems to vary wildly - really, really, really wildly - from testament to testament, and no two people seem to have the same definition. You'd think that would have been something made explicitly clear.

It wasn't made explicit because the Jews don't have a clear conception of hell, and the early Church was basically building off the Jewish tradition. (If I remember correctly, hell is a non-issue for the Jews... they don't believe or disbelieve in it... they just don't care.) When hell was mentioned, it was probably meant to refer to some sort of end times on Earth or something. Again, the idea wasn't real clear, so the "or something" is pretty important.

Later on, the organized church formalized the idea of hell, partly because of the influence of pagans, (mostly Roman, but possibly also Celtic or other sources) partly because hell made an excellent threat to keep the violent, uneducated peasants in line.

As for what Hell really is.... that depends on the Church. Most Protestant sects literally believe in a fiery brimstone sulfur thingy of eternal suffering. Well... that's the traditional view for Protestants, anyway. Catholics have a more nuanced and subtle conception of hell. For the lay Catholic, Dante might as well be canon... that's how hell is usually portrayed for the masses. But most Catholic theologians don't buy that at all. Some theologians noticed that an all-loving, all-forgiving God condemning people to eternal hell because of a couple years of naughtiness is rather unfair, so advanced Catholic doctrine created the idea that Hell is a place to "work off your sins", so a couple years of naughtiness will earn you, say, 1000 years of hell, then you move up to Purgatory. I forget how Purgatory works... it's kinda convoluted. But eventually, almost everyone gets to Heaven. The Catholics also have an idea of the Deadly Sins... I think they get you sent to Hell permanently, but I'm not real clear on them.

Finally, the Orthodox church (Greek and Russian) believe that everyone goes to the same place when they die. If you've been a good Christian, then that place will seem like heaven. If you've been a bad Christian, it will seem like hell. Think of it this way: you get teleported to a plain white room with nothing in it but a Bible and a picture of Jesus. To me, spending eternity there would be hell... I'd be bored out of my skull. To a good Christian, he's in heaven: he gets to read the word of God and contemplate the image of Jesus for all eternity. That's the basic idea behind the Orthodox conception of the afterlife.

Umm... this turned into kind of a long post. Sorry if wrote way more than you're interested in reading. This is kind of a pet topic for me. I find religion pretty fascinating.

[Warning]

The Orthodox take is interesting Anaxagoras. Do you have any references for them? I'd be interested in reading more.

[Kalle]

This reminds me of Paulie and Chris discussing Hell and Purgatory in an episode of the Sopranos.

Paulie's mathematical calculation of his time in purgatory, and how 5,000 years of purgatory is nothing in eternity terms cracked me up.

[Houngan]

At a guess, baptism is probably a Christianization of a pagan rebirth ceremony. I base this on no facts whatsoever, other than rebirth seems a popular theme among cults, and Christianity swiped a lot of rites and dogma from religions that preceded it. Anyone have a Cultural Anthropology degree?

H.

[Bullhajj]

That's pretty interesting stuff, Anax. You forgot about limbo for the Roman Catholics. Or did they do away with limbo in Vatican II?

[Jakub]

Is Dante canon?
No. It's fiction.
It was a rhetorical question. :)

[milo]

Anaxagorus has confused Hell with Purgatory, but otherwise he is mostly correct. Here is some additional information from the New Advent Catholic Encyclopedia.

Heck:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07207a.htm

Purgatory:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12575a.htm

Limbo:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/09256a.htm

--milo
http://www.vatican.va

[Jamie Madigan]

It was a rhetorical question. :)
Ah. Well, you never know. ;)

[Anaxagoras]

The Orthodox take is interesting Anaxagoras. Do you have any references for them? I'd be interested in reading more.

Unfortunately I don't. I grew up Russian Orthodox, which is how I learned about this. What's more, it will prolly be hard to find more info on this topic: the Orthodox don't really care about hell, so they don't write about it or talk about it much. While Catholics and Protestants can use hell as a sort of threat to their followers, the Orthodox version of hell makes for a lousy threat. "If you're naughty... you go to the same place as everyone else!" Somehow, that doesn't make me quake in my boots. The Orthodox developed their theory mostly so they could make sense of the references to "Hell" or "damnation" that appear in the Bible. And they made sense of those references by creating an intellectually interesting theory, but one that makes Hell pretty much irrelevant.

Milo- Thanks for the correction, and thanks even more for the links.

[Midnight Son]

Before I became an atheist, I was baptised. I was an infant or I would have protested vehemently! That said, I find cathedral architecture to be very interesting.

(On subject? Uh, sure!)

[Alex Handy]

All I know about Christianity I learned from Preacher

[Jakub]

It was a rhetorical question. :)
Ah. Well, you never know. ;)
I know, this is P&R. We rarely get above sarcasm.

[Gav]

It wasn't made explicit because the Jews don't have a clear conception of hell, and the early Church was basically building off the Jewish tradition. (If I remember correctly, hell is a non-issue for the Jews... they don't believe or disbelieve in it... they just don't care.)


Off the topic of baptism, but...

That's not quite correct (although pretty close) for Orthodox Jews. There's a concept of hell (gehenom), although I guess in Christian terms it's more like purgatory. You go there after you die if you're not yet good enough to get into heaven.

So, Jews say kaddish (the prayer for the dead) for only 11 months after a relative dies, b/c we believe that you'd have to be horribly evil to not be in heaven yet after that point (and, of course, no-one we'd be saying kaddish for should be that evil :) ).

However, it is true that the exact details of what heaven and hell are aren't really fleshed out anywhere. Maimonides kinda-sorta takes a stab at it (although he's more interested in heaven anyway), but I can't think of anyone else off-hand who bothers. That's probably because Jewish thinkers tend focus very heavily on the intricate minutiae of the law, which doesn't leave a lot of room for speculations on the after-life, whereas Christianity has been more focused on the afterlife.

Gav

[extarbags]

I mean, obviously, it makes no sense. Did Noah go to hell? Moses? What about people who lived perfectly good lives but never even heard the word "Jesus" because they were still in the New World or out in Asia?

contradictioninherentinchristianity++;

[milo]

Geez, could you like use camelCase or embedded_underscores or something? I mean you should be sent to Hell just for using a variable name that ugly.

;)

--milo
http://www.starshatter.com

[Brad Grenz]

I mean, obviously, it makes no sense. Did Noah go to hell? Moses? What about people who lived perfectly good lives but never even heard the word "Jesus" because they were still in the New World or out in Asia?

contradictioninherentinchristianity++;

Not all Christian sects believe in original sin. This is one of those things some protestant sects rejected during the schism. Getting absolved of all sin when you're an infant seems like a terrible waste, might as well wrack up a good record before the purge.

In addition, the whole idea of Christianity is that those who came before Christ are judged by different standards than those who lived after he created a new covenenant.

[DavidCPA]

Southern Baptists don't believe that you HAVE to be baptised to avoid Hell, for what it's worth. It's just an outward, symbolic demonstration of a personal decision/belief.

Those must be the Southern Baptists who live in the north. Where I'm from, you can't join the church without a dunking even if you were previously baptised in another church.

My sister was baptised as a Methodist in her youth (not an infant but 10 or 11). When she joined a Baptist church later in life, she had to be baptised again to officially join it and partake of communion.

-DavidCPA

[shift6]

Oooh, Anax were you an Old Believer? Did you take a religious trip to see Rasputin's cock? Hehe :wink:

On baptism: there is as much dissension on this as just about any other topic in Christianity. Clearly the ritual existed before Christ, as John the Baptist performed baptisms, including on Christ himself, as an illustration of the coming Spiritual Baptism. Whether it is required to go to heaven seems clear to me (the second robber on the cross next to Jesus wasn't baptised, but the JC said he was saved and would see him in paradise after he only expressed his faith in Christ). I imagine in 100 years the Catholic Church and other ritual-focused sects will change its view again on whether baptism is actually required to go to heaven. They believe in a real fickle God, don't they? :?

[Jakub]

God is fickle.

He's also stupid, short-sighted, has no concept of the consequences of his own actions, and has retreated into inactivity for fear of fucking things up further, if the Bible is to be believed.

"I'll give humans free will."

Adam bites the apple: "Shit, I'm God, but I didn't see that coming. Fuck fuck fuck... OK, I'll have them commit incest for a few dozen generations until they litter the Earth. But no more incest after that! And none of thise horse-sex either."

Noah's Ark: "Crap, a race of morons has bred itself. They're heathens... sigh, time to wipe them out with a flood. Let's plan the incest better this time around. Alright, whose genes, when inbred for a few centuries, will produce halfway decent people? Ah, that geezer Noah. Man, this is really gonna screw up the animals too. I wonder who I'll have re-populate the Americas and Australia?"

Abraham-Moses: "Alright, the entire world is full of tools again. I'm gonna need to pick my own people and make them suffer for millenia, give false promises, deliver meaningless victories that lead to worse disasters, and thus always keep them dependent on me. I don't know why I need them to believe in me, but I do. I created everything, but those fucking Philistines don't believe that. It's all their fault."

Job: "Lucifer doesn't believe me that people really love me. Fine, I'll ruin Job's life. Not like I have anything to prove to a rogue angel. I swear, I don't care what he thinks. I'm only doing this because I'm curious if Job really does worship me."

Jesus: "OK, I've got an actual plan this time. The Jews are getting pretty fucking sick of Babylonians, Syrians, Assyrians and Romans shitting on their country every century or so, and are wondering if I actually exist. I'll stick my own son/self out there and deliver a spiritual kingdom, since I obviously can't deliver a real one. Wait... my people crucified my son... according to my plan... but they don't believe in him? I don't get where I went wrong."

Post-Jesus: "Shit, I'd better not do anything ever again. Every time I make a miracle or empower a prophet or send my fucking son onto the Earth, I just seem to make things worse."

That's a 5 minute interpretation of the Bible from a cynical point of view.

I'm sure people are gonna correct me on a few things.

And no, I'm not atheist or whatever. I just don't find the Bible a very credible source.

[shift6]

Now you're trolling with 2000 pound test line. Yawn.

[Jakub]

Now you're trolling with 2000 pound test line. Yawn.
You're probably one of two people in this forum who could ever possibly be trolled by that.

If I was trolling:

a). Would have done a better job
b). I'd pick an area with the proper audience

[Anaxagoras]

You're probably one of two people in this forum who could ever possibly be trolled by that.


Yeah, no kidding. I thought it was pretty funny. And if anyone is actually offended by that piece, they need to lighten up about their faith. The Bible says some wacky shit. Better learn to laugh a little at it, or else others will laugh at it for you.

[Brian Koontz]

God is fickle.

He's also stupid, short-sighted, has no concept of the consequences of his own actions, and has retreated into inactivity for fear of fucking things up further, if the Bible is to be believed.

Very nice post. This belongs in the historical annals.

[Jakub]

God is fickle.

He's also stupid, short-sighted, has no concept of the consequences of his own actions, and has retreated into inactivity for fear of fucking things up further, if the Bible is to be believed.
Very nice post. This belongs in the historical annals.
Brian, please tell me that's sarcasm.

[shift6]

I wasn't "offended". In fact, the only thing that "offends" me is the word "offend" and its incredible rise to power in the modern vocabulary. That said, the post was a troll. What is a troll? A post designed explicitly to elicit heated emotions and negative replies, usually with some good hyperbole.

This: "God is fickle."; not a troll. It wasn't really extreme in any way.

This: "He's also stupid, short-sighted, has no concept of the consequences of his own actions, and has retreated into inactivity for fear of fucking things up further, if the Bible is to be believed."; clearly a troll in my view.

Hey, you don't have to agree with me. This isn't a mutual admiration society and I'm definitely not at the rallying point of QT3 opinion on any topic. But in my view, that post was clearly inflammatory and hyperbolic, designed to get someone heated. That's a troll, plain and simple.

[Jakub]

shift6, did you read the rest of the post? I mean, it's obviously in a humorous vein - if not exactly being quality humor.

[Brian Koontz]

Very nice post. This belongs in the historical annals.
Brian, please tell me that's sarcasm.

Minorly comedic, but not sarcastic. That could be part of the "Third Testament".

What didn't you like about the post?