JonIrenicus
05-25-2010, 03:27 PM
I was listening to the radio today on Pragers show, and he had a guest on (Stephen Prothero) talking about his new book - God is not one -
I found it pretty interesting. His basic point is exactly what the title says, that religions are not the same, they do not all teach the same thing.
They were formed answering DIFFERENT questions, and so you often find VERY different solutions. Not a view of all paths leading to the same mountaintop, a sort of flattening, but many different mountaintops.
Guys like Bob I think go along with some of this, he too seems to have a view that religions are products of their environment and their characteristics are directly related to the social/societal conditions they were spawned from.
Where he falters, and where this Prothero guy goes further is making the case that those initial differences in solutions the religions attempt to answer, MATTER over time and how they interact and form societies.
That the religions themselves have an effect once started, however they were formed, on a society. You cannot decouple peoples beliefs and shift the onus of behavior and practice back hundreds or thousands of years, or solely on society because the religions themselves have a hand in SHAPING the society.
This was a bit more than what he talks about, but that is sort of where it leads. Here is a slip I found of him talking about some of this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSbH0hAuNKE
Not as in depth as the radio talk that was probably over 40 minutes of talk time, but you get some idea of his ideas.
I found it pretty interesting. His basic point is exactly what the title says, that religions are not the same, they do not all teach the same thing.
They were formed answering DIFFERENT questions, and so you often find VERY different solutions. Not a view of all paths leading to the same mountaintop, a sort of flattening, but many different mountaintops.
Guys like Bob I think go along with some of this, he too seems to have a view that religions are products of their environment and their characteristics are directly related to the social/societal conditions they were spawned from.
Where he falters, and where this Prothero guy goes further is making the case that those initial differences in solutions the religions attempt to answer, MATTER over time and how they interact and form societies.
That the religions themselves have an effect once started, however they were formed, on a society. You cannot decouple peoples beliefs and shift the onus of behavior and practice back hundreds or thousands of years, or solely on society because the religions themselves have a hand in SHAPING the society.
This was a bit more than what he talks about, but that is sort of where it leads. Here is a slip I found of him talking about some of this
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XSbH0hAuNKE
Not as in depth as the radio talk that was probably over 40 minutes of talk time, but you get some idea of his ideas.