Religion vs. Philosophy

[rising crescent]

Originally Posted by cwes99_03

can you see there being a problem with the way this book approaches Islam. Does it go above and beyond the original texts in trying to show what Islam has become since the Koran and Hadith were provided by Allah? If so, are the teachings that have shaped the faith into what it is today (which really is much like christianity in that there are many different viewpoints on the teachings of the Koran) still based solely on the Koran, or are they based on human philosophy, or has the Koran been updated with other holy books provided by Allah?

There are difference between what happen in christianity and what happen in Islam :hyper:

 

One thing for sure.Quran Forever-ly Never changed from prophet ages,this is different than christianity.

 

Maybe you have heard about Uthman Mushaf,but the trueone is :

the one who arrange its construction,is by prophet himself in Allah"s directly command .There are secret behind it,but we dont go to it,now.

 

of course we receive traditional teching including Quran teaching.

but,You must know : No one able to Teach Quran except Allah Godself,not even prophet... (QS :Ar Rahman :1-3)

 

You also must know :Islam is holy book Quran and Quran is Islam.The intention to be moslem is make their Self into Quran Personalities.

In other words,there are no philosophy in this way, philosophy is used in order to explain orther people who live in philosophy way.

But the true one,religion and philosophy arent mixed each other.

 

Quran is Last Holy Book opened for humans, descended by Allah.

THERE ARE NO UPDATED,WHATEVER FROM ALLAH AGAIN.Islam is not christianity who make their own holy book...-Remembering everything has been made decision from beginning by Allah,very far before its real reality still not come/happen yet.

[cwes99_03]

Okay, sorry again Crescent, your English reads crypticly for me, and I will have to study your words to understand you fully. Perhaps we can keep our comments shorter to help each other out.

 

1) Quran is a holy book for Muslims. It is said to have been delivered by the angel Gabriel to the prophet Muhammed around the 7th century already written, thus a human hand did not write it (similar to what happened with the two tablets containing the 10 commandments from God, Ex. 31:18.)

Correct?

[Erasmus00]

If academically we can find a reason to separate philosophy from religion, we will have discovered a method for ending some of the debate. We will have identified that many do not actually practice any religion. Instead they follow human philosophy and raise it on high as divine.

 

If someone showed you "proof" that your religion was "merely philosophy" do you really think that it would stop you from believing as you believe? No, it would just give you something to be angry about.

 

Also, if your deffinition/catagorization of religion somehow excludes any of the major world religions, it has failed. Given that most religious conflicts are between major religions, it seems unlikely that a catagorization will solve any real problems.

 

The Bible answers your question about "If an otherwise devout Christian feels strongly, morally that homosexuals should be able to marry, how does he/she know that internal voice isn't divine inspiration?". Thus the point of defining the difference, and the necessity of defining religion vs philosophy.

 

You are missing my point. My whole point is that the books of the bible were written by men. How does a Christian know that their own personal voice of conscience doesn't come from God? Maybe the original author got something wrong? How can you prove otherwise? Again, how do you prove divine inspiration?

 

I also find it hard to believe that such a God could care at all about humans, as human philosophy has often been the cause of wars, poverty, sickness, etc.

 

So has religion, although I'm sure you'll say "it wasn't really religion, but human philosophy elevated to the divine." It seems to me that a just God wouldn't order scorched Earth policies on his enemies.

 

So, Will, can we get on with our defining the difference between religion and philosophy? I do appreciate your input.

 

I believe you can sum up the only (perhaps artificial) distinction: a religion claims divine inspiration, and is a philosophy specifically directed at the supernatural.

-Will

[cwes99_03]

Well, I think you'd be hard pressed to show them "proof" as they most likely wouldn't accept it as proof. You might succeed in making them angry, but then you might also open their eyes to seeing that they have been mislead into believing their teachings were divinely inspired.

 

Quote originally posted by cwes99_03:

The Bible answers your question about "If an otherwise devout Christian feels strongly, morally that homosexuals should be able to marry, how does he/she know that internal voice isn't divine inspiration?". Thus the point of defining the difference, and the necessity of defining religion vs philosophy.

 

 

You are missing my point. My whole point is that the books of the bible were written by men. How does a Christian know that their own personal voice of conscience doesn't come from God? Maybe the original author got something wrong? How can you prove otherwise? Again, how do you prove divine inspiration?

 

I didn't miss your point. I said that the Bible tells every christian how they would know if "their own personal voice of conscience doesn't come from God." I haven't specifically enumerated them here because I expect it is fairly obvious. Perhaps that is my fault for making such an assumption.

 

The reason for a religious text is that it is searchable. Just as a scientific theory isn't of any value until it is peer reviewed, personal beliefs aren't generally valued in religion until there is corroborating evidence from another divine source. Thus when the Apocryphal writings were attempted to be introduced as Bible writings, they were reviewed and found to be completely opposed in some aspects to other Bible teachings.

Coherency is a big thing in Christianity (at least what I will call Biblical Christianity). I can only imagine that coherency is an issue in other religions as, I believe, Crescent has pointed out that there are those who do not follow the teachings of Islam but claim to be muslim.

This is the issue. How can someone claim to be a christian (or muslim or budhist, etc.) when one holds obviously different viewpoints from others who are of that religion? Is it vagueness in the teachings? Is it inserting one's own philosophy, or is there a God out there incapable of ensuring his/her wishes be fulfilled when he/she hands down a writing, which is what you are suggesting with this line of reasoning?

[Erasmus00]

or is there a God out there incapable of ensuring his/her wishes be fulfilled when he/she hands down a writing, which is what you are suggesting with this line of reasoning?

 

This is most certainly true. There are several mutually contradictory holy books all about the same God (Christian/Jewish Bible, Koran, Book of Latter Day Saints.) These cannot all be correct. Hence, God clearly does not care about how accurate the writings are. He/she/it has already allowed errors to be written.

-Will

[cwes99_03]

You assume one large thing (that God doesn't care and that he has commissioned contradictory books), and then conclude what you have assumed (see parenthesis above), thus cyclical reasoning there Will.

 

There are certainly some contradictory writings. I myself have not read the Koran (Quran) to verify if it says anything contradictory to the Bible. From what I have read that was written by others about the Koran, it would certainly seem to be. Of course, I would have to say that for a true examination I do not fully expect to take the word of others as an absolute, as many have likewise written things about the Bible and its teachings and gotten them wrong.

I have read the OT and the NT, the books canonized and used throughout the world as the holy writings of the christian God, and found them to not be contradictory. I have read excerpts from the Book of Mormon and know that certain things written there were obviously in contradiction to the Bible.

Do the existence of these books mean that God is incapable or uncaring about how accurate the writings are?

From the state of things, I would say that is contradicted by the state of religion. If God didn't care, then all of those books would be acceptable by people of all faiths.

The reasoning that these cannot all be correct is IMHO the only correct thing you said above. But that is the point of the religion vs religion thread, not this one, so I will steer you back on topic.

 

The reason for a religious text is that it is searchable. Just as a scientific theory isn't of any value until it is peer reviewed, personal beliefs aren't generally valued in religion until there is corroborating evidence from another divine source. Thus when the Apocryphal writings were attempted to be introduced as Bible writings, they were reviewed and found to be completely opposed in some aspects to other Bible teachings.

Coherency is a big thing in Christianity (at least what I will call Biblical Christianity). I can only imagine that coherency is an issue in other religions as, I believe, Crescent has pointed out that there are those who do not follow the teachings of Islam but claim to be muslim.

This is the issue. How can someone claim to be a christian (or muslim or budhist, etc.) when one holds obviously different viewpoints from others who are of that religion? Is it vagueness in the teachings? Is it inserting one's own philosophy?

How do you answer these questions?

The final part of that was intended to ask if you believe in an uncaring God. Will's answer was yes, God (if there is one) doesn't care, or is fickle and changes his/her mind often. Of course, as a christian, I believe this is not true based on Biblical scriptures which I will not quote here, but is it a possibility according to other religions? If so, could you give a holy writing that says so, so that others may say you are applying it or are just giving your own philosophical viewpoint on the issue?

[Erasmus00]

You assume one large thing (that God doesn't care and that he has commissioned contradictory books),

 

Lets start from the beginning of my argument, and you tell me where I go wrong.

 

1. There are several contradictory books that all make the claim to be the direct word of God.

 

2. Because they are contradictory, we have two choices: God has changed its mind several times, OR they aren't all the word of God.

 

Assuming the latter, as many don't want to believe that God is fickle, and noting that

 

3. God hasn't changed/removed the books wrongly attributed to him/her/it.

 

Hence, we are left with one conclusion: there are books and writings that claim to be from God which simply aren't.

 

This calls into question EVERY book claiming to be from God. If God allows ANY wrong information about him to float around, all the information about God becomes suspect. As such, the honest intellect admits he chooses to believe for reasons outside logic.

 

Do the existence of these books mean that God is incapable or uncaring about how accurate the writings are?

From the state of things, I would say that is contradicted by the state of religion. If God didn't care, then all of those books would be acceptable by people of all faiths.

 

Just because God doesn't care does not mean that people don't. People LOVE the feeling that they are right and everyone else is wrong. It fuels a type of "fundamentalism" in nearly every type of human endeavor.

-Will

[cwes99_03]

The point where you go wrong is making the leap from point 3 to your unenumerated point 4.

 

Your point 4 seems to be

 

Because God hasn't removed the books wrongly attributed to him, then there is no reason that any book that claims to be from God is really from him.

 

Let me give you an example. A person becomes famous for taking some photographs of a particular subject. A few years after that person stops taking photos alltogether, a few new photos surface and are attributed to the original photographer. That photographer sees these new photos, but rather than fight them directly he decides that, if someone really wants to know whether or not those are my photos, they will examine them and consult an expert on my work to see if they really are my work.

Meantime a couple of the people who created the fake pictures, go out and start telling everyone that those pictures are the original work of the photographer. They get a couple of others to do the same, as well as to take some more pictures that are similar but with slight differences and claim they are originals. Then again a few months later, more pictures surface, and these are claimed to be new pictures taken by the original artist who decided to continue his work.

Must that original artist say those aren't mine? If he doesn't, does that mean they are his? Truth is truth, it can't be changed. The original photos are his, the fakes are not, and the only way for you to know is by studying the works you know to be his and determining if the later ones are false. And since the later ones are likely pretty convincing, you'll have to work at it whole hearted, whole souled, and with your whole mind.

[Erasmus00]

The original photos are his, the fakes are not, and the only way for you to know is by studying the works you know to be his and determining if the later ones are false. And since the later ones are likely pretty convincing, you'll have to work at it whole hearted, whole souled, and with your whole mind.

 

Your analogy is flawed, we have no way of knowing which are the "originals" and which are "fakes." We don't have ANY that we know for sure are from God.

-Will

[cwes99_03]

What do you base this finding on?

 

Let me take that further. Go back to the first books. Why would you say those aren't the originals?

 

Then let me take that one step further. Can we identify certain ones that certainly aren't? Can we identify different groups that generally agree with each other but not necessarily with others?

 

Then let me take it further still. Isn't the classification a scientific process?

 

To create another analogy. Guttenburg started printing books. He influenced a revolution. Today a student says that he created the first printing press. Is that student right? Some say yes. Others say no. They say that 400 years before Guttenberg there were printers in China.

So I ask the question is it possible to know who first developed the printing press, with 100% certainty?

No. Perhaps it was the Persians but all of their printeries and any evidence of them was destroyed and forgotten about. But is there a reasonably good set of evidence that the Chinese came before Guttenberg? Yep.

[C1ay]

Why would you say those aren't the originals?

 

Why would anyone say they are? Is there some proof, i.e. physical evidence, to show conclusively that some god, any god actually wrote anything?

[cwes99_03]

I would say there is. There have been prophecies. There's more than enough in my study to lead me to this conclusion. I'm also a real skeptic. Check out my posts, I'm always looking for ways that something could be misrepresented, false, inaccurate.

Not saying I don't make mistakes, but I'm pretty tough on everything I examine. That's why I excel at my current job.

[C1ay]

Sorry, "just cuz I say so" isn't proof or evidence of anything. What physical evidence is there that any word in any book is written by the hand of some god? Remember, this is a science forum, faith doesn't count.

[Erasmus00]

What do you base this finding on?

 

Let me take that further. Go back to the first books. Why would you say those aren't the originals?

 

Fine then, lets say the first books are from God- i.e. of the major world religions I believe the vedic scriptures come first? So you are claiming Hinduism is the one true faith? Polytheism outdates monotheism, so I guess when in doubt we defer to many Gods?

-Will

[cwes99_03]

Sorry, "just cuz I say so" isn't proof or evidence of anything. What physical evidence is there that any word in any book is written by the hand of some god? Remember, this is a science forum, faith doesn't count.

 

I said, prophecy would be a start. How about prophecies?

[cwes99_03]

Fine then, lets say the first books are from God- i.e. of the major world religions I believe the vedic scriptures come first? So you are claiming Hinduism is the one true faith? Polytheism outdates monotheism, so I guess when in doubt we defer to many Gods?

-Will

 

When you say it outdates monotheism, how do you determine this?

 

The first books of the Bible make claim they were written (first edition) more than 3000 years ago. Furthermore, they are believed to be based on some other historical books that no longer exist and definitely cover history hundreds if not thousands of years before the time of their writing.

 

In the case of the Vedas, read the first paragraph from

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vedas

 

It says that "The Vedanta and Mimamsa schools of Hindu philosophy assert that the Vedas are apaurusheya ("unauthored"), that is, they have neither human nor divine origin, and are eternal in nature." Thus, while the information in the writings is considered godly wisdom, the writings themselves have no attributed author, neither supernatural nor human. I don't mean to make light of it, but if neither authored the book then how do they exist?

[C1ay]

I said, prophecy would be a start. How about prophecies?

 

What prophecies? Is there any proof these happened because they were prophecies instead of being simply coincidental? Imagine for example that I prophecize that it will rain next Tuesday and it does. According to Occam's Razor do you think the simplest explanation is coincidence or that it rained because I said it would? Prophecies don't have much holding as scientific evidence with me. Good evidence is testable and repeatable using the scientific method.