Why are abrahamic religions like Judaism, Christianity and Islam so hateful against polytheism?

[PolishTruthSeeker]

As an aspiring occultist, I want to know the political implications of it.

 

[Faria]

As an aspiring occultist, I want to know the political implications of it.

I can't speak for all of the 30,000 + denominations of Christianity, nor the multiple versions of Islam and Judaism, but I'll try to briefly summarize the Abrahamic perspective.

There is only one God. Not one God bigger or better than the others, but only one. All the rest, including all the millions of different versions of Jehovah, are fiction. Not real. Nonexistent. Symptoms of human consciousness.

It is tempting to think of those things as real beings with real power, who respond and interact in a godlike manner. It is tempting, but it's wrong. When we choose to follow wrong things under false assumptions, we end up in bad situations. If we think God loves killing people, we end up killing people. If we think God likes strippers, we get a religion of strippers like they had in Babylon. If we think God is about being the biggest best and baddest, we get patriarchal cults with infant sacrifice and slave labor. Every time we try to pin down God to a set of human-like identities, the culture founded on those beliefs becomes an evil monster that sometimes doesn't go away until natural disaster wipes it out. Whenever you find people engaged in mass atrocity, you can be sure it is rooted in their beliefs about how the universe is governed.

You can believe in any deity you want, and you will find a mountain of reasons to think that it's real. The real God is always going to be a step beyond comprehension, hence the term "ineffable" applied to it in the lore of magic. Something so grand has no problem relating to you as a father, as a brother, as a friend, or as some squid monster or period-costume character if that's how you approach it.

 

[PolishTruthSeeker]

I can't speak for all of the 30,000 + denominations of Christianity, nor the multiple versions of Islam and Judaism, but I'll try to briefly summarize the Abrahamic perspective.

There is only one God. Not one God bigger or better than the others, but only one. All the rest, including all the millions of different versions of Jehovah, are fiction. Not real. Nonexistent. Symptoms of human consciousness.

It is tempting to think of those things as real beings with real power, who respond and interact in a godlike manner. It is tempting, but it's wrong. When we choose to follow wrong things under false assumptions, we end up in bad situations. If we think God loves killing people, we end up killing people. If we think God likes strippers, we get a religion of strippers like they had in Babylon. If we think God is about being the biggest best and baddest, we get patriarchal cults with infant sacrifice and slave labor. Every time we try to pin down God to a set of human-like identities, the culture founded on those beliefs becomes an evil monster that sometimes doesn't go away until natural disaster wipes it out. Whenever you find people engaged in mass atrocity, you can be sure it is rooted in their beliefs about how the universe is governed.

You can believe in any deity you want, and you will find a mountain of reasons to think that it's real. The real God is always going to be a step beyond comprehension, hence the term "ineffable" applied to it in the lore of magic. Something so grand has no problem relating to you as a father, as a brother, as a friend, or as some squid monster or period-costume character if that's how you approach it.

So, verdict? Am I right about stating that abrahamic religions do hate polytheists?

 

[Faria]

So, verdict? Am I right about stating that abrahamic religions do hate polytheists?

At some point in their history, just about every religion decides to hate some other group of people, usually adjunct to economic or political goals. Those same hateful religions have tons of "Don't hate the sinner, hate the sin" doctrines, but people cherry pick what they want from their scripture.

From a purely doctrinal perspective, sin (including idol worship) is just wrong, a mistake. It's "evil" in that it leads people to making decisions and plans based on false things, leading inevitably to suffering for more than just the person preaching it. Again purely from doctrine rather than practice, but the idea is that the sin is to be despised, not the person doing the sin.

You've seen people get upset about plastic 6-pack can holders that kill sea creatures? Same deal. It's not a hate for beer, or six packs, or for the people who drink them, or for the people who make them. People get upset about the plastic rings because it's a thing that potentially causes the world to be just that much worse even if it happens in a way we don't see. Some people are willing to make a scene to force companies to stop using those plastic rings, to reduce the amount of dead sea life from our carelessness, and maybe it would help to see the effort to get people to stop worshiping idols as similar to that.

 

[PolishTruthSeeker]

But abrahamic religions carry the grudge against women... do you know any other belief systems like this that hate women as well?
Doesn't matter, I was raised in Poland.

 

[Faria]

But abrahamic religions carry the grudge against women... do you know any other belief systems like this that hate women as well?

More than half the planet falls under the umbrella of "Abrahamic" religion. If you want to argue that more than half the planet hates women, you're going to have a hard time discussing religion. Hinduism has a significant part of the remaining global population, and you can find every bit as much woman-oppression in their scriptures and traditions. Ancient religion fared no better, with a few outlier examples like Athens where women were so respected that they weren't allowed to vote, own property, or have legal representation and were required to do domestic labor.

I'm in this thread to discuss monotheist doctrines regarding polytheist people. If you want to discuss sex and gender issues, maybe make a different thread for that.

 

[PolishTruthSeeker]

More than half the planet falls under the umbrella of "Abrahamic" religion. If you want to argue that more than half the planet hates women, you're going to have a hard time discussing religion. Hinduism has a significant part of the remaining global population, and you can find every bit as much woman-oppression in their scriptures and traditions. Ancient religion fared no better, with a few outlier examples like Athens where women were so respected that they weren't allowed to vote, own property, or have legal representation and were required to do domestic labor.

I'm in this thread to discuss monotheist doctrines regarding polytheist people. If you want to discuss sex and gender issues, maybe make a different thread for that.

Hence why I talked about it in "controversy" section. But OK, let us stick to the topic.

 

[cormundum]

But abrahamic religions carry the grudge against women... do you know any other belief systems like this that hate women as well?
Doesn't matter, I was raised in Poland.

Lol. You think Christianity, Islam, and Judaism hate women? Look at how Marxism totally erases the female identity as a thing. Thelema, taken literally, idealizes the Whore as the best female archetype. All traditional religions have taboos surrounding women that have nothing to do with any sort of monotheism. Get out a bit and read some books. I know Poland has a hard time as a former Catholic country that was then dominated by Marxism, but you have access to open internet, obviously, so actually look into treatment of women and how pagan societies worked before making such rash judgements.

 

[KjEno186]

Every time we try to pin down God to a set of human-like identities, the culture founded on those beliefs becomes an evil monster

This makes sense. There's a thread about reading the book of Psalms every day as a kind of ritual practice, and I thought the idea was interesting enough to get out my Bibles and see which ones were most readable. I used to read the Bible quite a lot in my younger days before I became an atheist. I'm not quite an atheist nowadays, though I would probably refuse to give the Ineffable a name. One of the Bibles I have uses Jehovah throughout the OT. I was reading another book recently which referenced the Jerusalem Bible. The quotes in it appeared quite readable, so I began reading JB translation of Psalms online. JB uses Yahweh where the tetragrammaton appears in the original text.

What struck me more profoundly now than it ever did in my past was how often the Psalm writer invoked Yahweh/Jehovah by name and attributed human-like qualities to his deity. Now I do realize that the Middle East was quite a violent place 2-3000 years ago, so it makes some sense from a historical perspective that violence is a common theme in these ancient writings. I also realized that the Psalmists were usually underdogs of some kind since they often wrote about being surrounded by enemies. And these enemies weren't just foreign kingdoms but people within their own tribe(s). Yahweh was being constantly invoked in poetic form to protect the victim of injustice. It comes across as a bit over-the-top at times, but I recognize a bit of hyperbole too.

What is clear from an objective reading of the OT is that polytheism was recognized. The creation account says, "Let US make man in our image." Much of the posturing in the books of the Bible sounds like kids boasting about who has the strongest daddy (god). It would not surprise me if tellers of tales told some whoppers of lies just to improve the morale of the tribe(s) preparing for battle. "Did you hear about the time our god made the walls of Jericho fall down?" And yet, how many times in the book of Psalms does the writer complain that Yahweh isn't helping? "Wake up, Yahweh!" Ps 44:23.

Well, we get down to the topic at last. The way I see it is that Abrahamic religions tend to literal interpretations of their holy scriptures. I cannot speak for Judaism and Islam, but among more fundamentalist Christians, the belief in Biblical inerrancy makes them jump through many fallacies to reach illogical conclusions, and then they demand you accept them! The games they will play with words can astound you. You may think that Christians hate Pagans for their polytheism, but in fact many Christian sects hate each other for their different interpretations of the same scriptures. Joel Baden's concept of the "inclusion of differences" eludes them. What this means is that the Bible is a compilation of contradictory writings, and this was apparently okay at the time they were assembled because the stories didn't have to make logical sense in a time when most people were illiterate. The writings contained allegorical information that mattered more than concrete facts to their way of thinking.

The Christians that don't hate other sects are quite likely to be more accepting of varying belief systems and participate in interfaith movements. I somehow doubt you'd have problems with more liberal Christian denominations since the members are less inclined to worry about doctrinal dilemmas, focusing instead on social programs in the community.

 

[Morell]

Christianity and Judaism base their hate against polytheists on the first of ten commandments and tales of old testament.

Which is irony because in new testament Jesus hesitated to heal a pagan woman, but since she was spart and reasoned with him, he then healed her.

Can't speak about Islam, but reading Quoran I felt like vomiting, Apologies but to me that text is pile of shit written by brainwashed cultist. That's me after reading that thing. So no surprise there for me.

Post automatically merged: Yesterday at 8:25 AM

As an aspiring occultist, I want to know the political implications of it.

Oh wait, political? (Looking at USA) Is that really necessary to ask?

 

[PolishTruthSeeker]

Oh yes, Muslims, Christians and Jews certainly love their own women as long as they conform to the purity expectations (“bone of my bone”), but do they love the OTHER woman, the witch, the freak, the whore, the woman that bleeds, the woman that lives on her own outside of the community (according to her own rules), the woman that freed herself from the schemes of reproduction?

I can't speak for all of the 30,000 + denominations of Christianity, nor the multiple versions of Islam and Judaism, but I'll try to briefly summarize the Abrahamic perspective.

There is only one God. Not one God bigger or better than the others, but only one. All the rest, including all the millions of different versions of Jehovah, are fiction. Not real. Nonexistent. Symptoms of human consciousness.

It is tempting to think of those things as real beings with real power, who respond and interact in a godlike manner. It is tempting, but it's wrong. When we choose to follow wrong things under false assumptions, we end up in bad situations. If we think God loves killing people, we end up killing people. If we think God likes strippers, we get a religion of strippers like they had in Babylon. If we think God is about being the biggest best and baddest, we get patriarchal cults with infant sacrifice and slave labor. Every time we try to pin down God to a set of human-like identities, the culture founded on those beliefs becomes an evil monster that sometimes doesn't go away until natural disaster wipes it out. Whenever you find people engaged in mass atrocity, you can be sure it is rooted in their beliefs about how the universe is governed.

You can believe in any deity you want, and you will find a mountain of reasons to think that it's real. The real God is always going to be a step beyond comprehension, hence the term "ineffable" applied to it in the lore of magic. Something so grand has no problem relating to you as a father, as a brother, as a friend, or as some squid monster or period-costume character if that's how you approach it.

Christianity and Judaism base their hate against polytheists on the first of ten commandments and tales of old testament.

Which is irony because in new testament Jesus hesitated to heal a pagan woman, but since she was spart and reasoned with him, he then healed her.

Can't speak about Islam, but reading Quoran I felt like vomiting, Apologies but to me that text is pile of shit written by brainwashed cultist. That's me after reading that thing. So no surprise there for me.

Post automatically merged: Yesterday at 8:25 AM

Oh wait, political? (Looking at USA) Is that really necessary to ask?

Morell, yes exactly. But did you interact wit followers of Judaism and Christianity?

 

[Morell]

Yep, With Muslims as well. Even personally. But let's say that EU is in no way USA. Visibly judgmental people are usually leaning to extremism here and they are not common.

 

[Beyond Everything]

Christianity and Islam are genocidal religions that have consistently sought to eliminate competing belief systems over many, many centuries.

All 3 monotheisms are egregoric horrors that will inhibit the individual's own ascension if one engages with them. In their esoteric forms, misunderstood experiences of so-called divine energies lead the hapless seeker astray, yet people keep piling in thinking they are getting somewhere.

 

[Morell]

I would prefer them to disappear myself. I agree that they cause a lot of pain and terror... and they are not done yet.

 

[PolishTruthSeeker]

Christianity and Islam are genocidal religions that have consistently sought to eliminate competing belief systems over many, many centuries.

All 3 monotheisms are egregoric horrors that will inhibit the individual's own ascension if one engages with them. In their esoteric forms, misunderstood experiences of so-called divine energies lead the hapless seeker astray, yet people keep piling in thinking they are getting somewhere.

I agree. That's why I'm depressed about having to share my space with those genocidal religion followers, here in Poland and I would be elsewhere as well.
I"m just a 25 year old woman and I feel like I will never achieve anything e.g. as a musician, because of vast censorship of anti-authoritarian songs and fascist AI replacing musicians.

Post automatically merged: Yesterday at 8:03 PM

Yep, With Muslims as well. Even personally. But let's say that EU is in no way USA. Visibly judgmental people are usually leaning to extremism here and they are not common.

Let's hope Poland doesn't allow radical Muslims here.

Post automatically merged: Yesterday at 8:33 PM

I would prefer them to disappear myself. I agree that they cause a lot of pain and terror... and they are not done yet.

Well, religions like this should be marginalized. Anglo-Irish conflict or Israeli-Palestinian conflict didn't come from nowhere!

 

[Beyond Everything]

I agree. That's why I'm depressed about having to share my space with those genocidal religion followers, here in Poland and I would be elsewhere as well.
I"m just a 25 year old woman and I feel like I will never achieve anything e.g. as a musician, because of vast censorship of anti-authoritarian songs and fascist AI replacing musicians.

Do your own thing. Don't let these ideologies depress you, as that is giving into them in another way. People were making their own music under the communist regime, so where there's a will there's a way.

 

[PolishTruthSeeker]

Do your own thing. Don't let these ideologies depress you, as that is giving into them in another way. People were making their own music under the communist regime, so where there's a will there's a way.

Got any tips? Long? punctuated? I would be thankful for that.