Gods have little to do with morality. Most behavior that listed as acceptable in myths is more to explain tabboos and appropiate offerings in that religion.
Gods have little to do with morality. Most behavior that listed as acceptable in myths is more to explain tabboos and appropiate offerings in that religion.
If God is in your mind, you are almost there.
It's the myth of God that is in my mind. OMG, I think like Stephen Hawking. Well, I am related to Einstein through the Koch family.
You have good genes.
Gods have little to do with morality. Most behavior that listed as acceptable in myths is more to explain tabboos and appropiate offerings in that religion.
I agree that myths are, by and large, stories meant to convey lessons, and thus can be useful for understanding taboos, norms, etc., but why do you say that "Gods have little to do with morality"?
Because the gods are rarely moral themselves. And let's be honest, prison doesn't deter criminals and gods don't deter immorality. If the god's truly controlled morality, then there would be examples of people's suffering at the hands of the gods for not following that morality. The other thing is, is that once you lose your body, morality is no longer a thing. So once you're on the same plane of existence is the gods, morality isn't even a factor.
Because the gods are rarely moral themselves
Very strong disagree there. The Gods are Good.
Sure, myths will portray them as flawed beings, but mythic representations of the Gods are not there to accurately portray the nature of the Gods, the Gods are given flaws for the sake of the story and lessons being told/imparted.
gods don't deter immorality
Even if I grant that, I don't see why that means they have nothing to do with morality? The Gods created the world and helped direct its development, which includes our own development.
While we are flawed and imperfect beings due to the nature of physical existence, humans evolved to generally find things like murder to be immoral (as one example). While cultural elements can influence how we interpret our base moral intuitions, the most foundational moral intuitions humans generally have seem to be aligned with the Good.
If the Gods played a role in our development, then that means they played a role in our moral intuitions as well.
once you lose your body, morality is no longer a thing. So once you're on the same plane of existence is the gods, morality isn't even a factor.
Why would morality stop being a thing absent the physical world?
If you think Zeus is good because he rapes women, you have a serious problem. And which creation god are you giving credit of the Earth to? What makes something immoral, is that it violates another. You can't do that without a body.
If you think Zeus is good because he rapes women
Again, myths are stories, not necessarily accurate reflections of the Gods. Zeus does not rape people, that is just a characterization he is given in various myths, but not an accurate reflection of his true nature.
And which creation god are you giving credit of the Earth to?
Why should I limit it to a singular God? Reality emanates from all the Gods, they all participate and can act as the metaphysical "center".
What makes something immoral, is that it violates another. You can't do that without a body.
I disagree with your concept of morality, but even granting it, why wouldn't you be able to "violate" another without a body? Or a better question might first be to ask what you mean by "violate"
Yes, Zeus, as depicted in Greek mythology, is described as having a body. He is often portrayed as a mature, powerful, and athletic man with a beard and a commanding presence. While he is a god and possesses divine attributes, his form is generally presented as humanoid, allowing for both physical strength and regal appearance.
Zeus does rape people. Hes pretty proud of it. Your opinion the gods are one does not have to be shared.
In the literary tradition, Zeus overcomes most of his female victims by trickery: he rapes Leda in the form of a swan, Danaë in the guise of a golden rain, and Alkmene in the persona of her legitimate husband (holding up the dawn for three nights to draw full profit from his scheme), and he does not even hesitate to take on so coarse a disguise as that of a randy satyr for the purpose of violating Antiope.
OMG, is Zeus a Trump?
Such mythic literalism wasn't even common in Ancient Greece or Rome. The view that Zeus is a rapist isn't even logical, let alone something people ever actually believed (with maybe some exceptions among the least educated rural populations).
The idea that such characterizations were anything but inventions of the poets for the purposes of telling stories was mostly popularized by early Christians as a means of attacking and criticizing the pagan beliefs and Gods.
Kinda sad to see someone calling themselves "Polytheistwitch" parroting those talking points.
To expand on this, Cicero when talking about the nature of the Gods never even considers the view of mythic literalism as anything serious, not even to simply dismiss it. It was so far from his thoughts that he basically ignored the possibility that it would be considered by those reading his works.
Sallust, whose work On the Gods and the World was essentially a primer meant for the broadest possible audience (rather than an in depth analysis meant for the highly educated) even says that it is requisite for people coming to the Gods to not have been nourished with foolish opinions and that they need to have common sense, and part of that common sense is that the Gods are Good.
Plato, Aristotle, Xenophanes, etc., are philosophers that all talk about the Gods being good. The idea that the Gods were flawed, that they might rape people, etc. was so ingrained in public consciousness that even poets would include nods to it in their works sometimes (“For my part, I do not believe that the gods indulge in unholy unions; and as for putting bonds on hands, I have never thought that worthy of belief, nor will I now be so persuaded, nor again that one god is naturally lord and master of another. For the deity, if he be really such, has no wants; these are miserable tales of the poets.” Herakles, Euripides).
In fact, when you look at the texts, hymns, etc. that portray the actual practiced religion, not merely the stories and myths told for entertainment and to impart lessons, it is so prevalent that the Gods are good that even modern scholarship admits such. See HS Versnel Coping with the Gods and Jon D Mikalson Greek Popular Religion in Greek Philosophy for two prominent examples.
Your opinion the gods are one does not have to be shared.
Also, I don't know what you mean by me saying the Gods are one.
I am neither a monotheist nor a soft polytheist, the Gods are many.
I don't know why you seem to suggest I think otherwise.
BS. You excusing bad behavior is your view.
How am I excusing bad behavior? I am not saying Zeus raped people and is Good, or that Zeus is good despite having raped people, or even that what Zeus did isn't rape for reason X, Y, Z.
I am saying that it just didn't actually happen, that you are conflating mythology with religion too much, that Zeus engaging in such acts is poetic invention.
How is that "excusing bad behavior"? That accusation only makes sense if you think it is absolute fact that Zeus raped people, but I showed how such a view wasn't even really taken seriously even in ancient Greece and Rome.
To say the gods never engaged in bad behavior because their gods and their behavior can never be bad, is evangelical. Rape, whether done by a god or not is a bad thing. And there is nothing poetic about it. I will not excuse behavior like that from any being just because they might be a deity or they might be more powerful astraly than me.
Rape, whether done by a god or not is a bad thing.
I agree, rape is bad. So what? That doesn't address anything I actually said.
And there is nothing poetic about it.
No idea what point you even think you are addressing with this.
I will not excuse behavior like that from any being just because they might be a deity or they might be more powerful astraly than me.
Okay, and? You literally are arguing with points I never made. Try actually reading what I said, not just creating a straw man to attack instead of putting in the effort to read.
The Bible claims God raped a Virgin Mary to conceive his son Jesus. So rape is justifiable in Christianity.
Rape is justifiable to a lot of people. Monotheists, in general, seem to not have a problem with it. And obviously there are plenty of polytheists that don't either. Just say, oh, that's not really what the myths are talking about.It's some sort of allegory. Well, I'm not sure what kind of point one is trying to make. When it say Zeus rapes women, but he doesn't actually rape women. Sounds like saying they asked for it. Imagine that.
When it say Zeus rapes women, but he doesn't actually rape women. Sounds like saying they asked for it. Imagine that.
That isn't even close to what I was saying. At this point I am al.ost convinced you are purposely misrepresenting me, so let me try this one more time.
I am saying that the myths are just stories where the Gods appear as characters, but that they include elements not true to history, the Gods, etc.
Not that different than people can tell stories about Abraham Lincoln as a Vampire Hunter.
Was/is Lincoln actually a vampire hunter? Of course not.
Same with Zeus. There are stories of him raping people, but did the actual Zeus, the God that exists, do those things? No.
The Gods are Good. It isn't that what they do is good so if Zeus raped someone then it wasn't evil when he did it, it is that the Gods are good and thus don't do evil, which means Zeus, being good, didn't rape anyone.
Yes, Zeus in some myths did rape people, but those events were the invention of the poets. You wouldn't read Percy Jackson and say that what the Gods do in those books are what the actual Gods have done/do in real life, that same standard should be applied to the ancient myths.
And this way of viewing the Gods, the myths, etc. was normal in ancient Greece and Rome.
Please tell me you finally understand the point I was making, because I genuinely don't know how to simplify it any more than I have.
I'm not going to agree with you on this. You're free to think whatever you want, I'm not going to respond to any more posts about it.
Even if you don't agree, maybe don't misrepresent me in the future like you did when replying to Debby
Thank you for recognizing that.