Jesus promoted Anarchism

[blackie]

They are in my fish tank.

[Alex Libman]

Everything you need to know about Jesus in <30 seconds:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2_fneen2G2k[/youtube]

[lucidhawk]

Good discussion.  How would you address the counterarguments, lucidhawk, that bring up Jesus' mandate to "render to Caesar the things of Caesar's, and to God the things of God", as well as the whole "Romans chapter 13" argument?

One interpretation says: What is God's? Everything. What is Caesar's then? Nothing.

Another interpretation was dividing the secular from the non-secular. That in context the Pharisees were "hypocrites" because they used a Caesar issued coin. (That interpretation is complex)

Yet another interpretation says the coins were essentially Caesar's property they even had his face on it and they should be given back to him. This relies on the whole context of the quote :

"15 Then the Pharisees went out and laid plans to trap him in his words. 16 They sent their disciples to him along with the Herodians. “Teacher,” they said, “we know that you are a man of integrity and that you teach the way of God in accordance with the truth. You aren’t swayed by others, because you pay no attention to who they are. 17 Tell us then, what is your opinion? Is it right to pay the imperial tax[a] to Caesar or not?”
 18 But Jesus, knowing their evil intent, said, “You hypocrites, why are you trying to trap me? 19 Show me the coin used for paying the tax.” They brought him a denarius, 20 and he asked them, “Whose image is this? And whose inscription?”
21 “Caesar’s,” they replied.
Then he said to them, “So give back to Caesar what is Caesar’s, and to God what is God’s.”
 22 When they heard this, they were amazed. So they left him and went away."

Romans Chapter 13 is a bit more complicated and problematic.. There are a lot of liberty oriented people that do an analysis of Romans 13 online.
The Bible is made up of numerous books written by different people. Someone could just consider Romans 13 as one contradiction of one man (Paul) to the rest of the many anti-statist things in the Bible in of course most Christians won't do this..

[hellbilly]

Didn't really understand that last bit.

I think there's a difference between following rules you agree to (natural law, essentially) and following rules that were given you by someone who will punish you if you don't.  Once again, it's the difference between being self-governing and being ruled.

 "Christians" agree to follow the Bible. A "Christian" who follows the Bible because they fear punishment isn't a Christian. Unless a "Christian" wants to come forward and disagree with me on that?

When laws are based on Christianity then everyone ends up having to submit to Christianity whether they believe in the bible or not. (sodomy, etc.)

It isn't logically possible to come to the conclusion that Jesus promoted Anarchy since everything he was about was submitting to God's will.

[hellbilly]

Better late then never i guess.

The Book Of Alaric
Rules to live by.
A. McCoy


1.1 Follow the Non Aggression Princepal.
  1.1a Do not mess with people who are not harming or aggrieving against a innocent individual.
1.2 Fuck with people who are not following the Non Aggression Principle.
  1.2a As much as possible, using Cost/ benefit commen sense.
     1.2aa Monkey wrenching huge powerfull bullies or groups of bullies is fine as long as getting caught is nearly impossible.
  1.2b Stop when the victimiser has been neutralized.
     1.2ba Vengeance is usually breaking the NAP.
1.3 Do not Set up innocent people.
  1.3a Don't trick people into doing illegal things for example.

Agreed! Except a little bit on 1.2b & 1.2ba.. I think acting to prevent future aggression is acceptable.

[alaric89]

That whole thing was supposed to be a gag after Quickmikes 'people have to make their own rulebook' comment, I was going to write "the NAP- the end" and got carried away. Also if I was going to have my own Bible I really wanted to have the word "fuck" in it.
When I said neutralized, I meant "rendered harmless". I made those rules for me, seeking any vengeance hasn't worked for me. If I dislike someone and they stay out of my face, I just don't deal with them anymore.

I guess I can chime in as  the Deist representative on the religious aspect of religion and government. I feel that God wants humans to have a progressive and free society. This is the only way of achieving any sort of overriding bliss. To achieve this, the beings of the higher plane would only allow people, who enact and enable the fruition of such, to continue on in spirit.
I figured if I wanted a Heaven I would simply only allow people, who worked to make the world around them better and gave more then they took, in.
As far as Jesus goes, I feel he was a good enough guy and all. I just don't dig the fear mongering that most of his Representatives are into and am sure he'll understand why I didn't buy into it on judgement day.
"Look, I tried to help everyone I could the best I could, and tried to be a helpful nice person. Can't you let the 'not listening to hypocritical priests' thing slide?"
"No Al, You Should Have Obeyed The Evil Authorities!!! Off To The Pits Of Hell For All Time!!!!!"
"Well, shit."
 

[velojym]

Oh... so if we're digressing from the point, everything's ok then.

My point wasn't whether the OWNER knew the item had been taken, but whether the person picking the apple knew whether it belonged to anyone,
or whether the supposed owner ever existed in the first place... outside of an old book, anyway.
Anything that supposes otherwise isn't really germaine to any point I'm making, therefore it's irrelevant.

To me, anyway.


In other words, when god himself shows up, proves his existence and that he created the land (the 3D space I occupy, even), then I'll start to pay rent from that point directly to him. Though.... I'd have to wonder why an omnipotent deity would need rent. Worship, perhaps, if he were really saddled with a serious inferiority complex, but not rent.