Site Project: Conquering metaphysical monsters… Finding ultimate liberation in absolutely no conditions reality and existence.

List of contents for this section: Getting to the point; Fighting Monsters; Bad Religious Ideas; The Big Picture (Historical descent of mythical/religious pathology); Defending unconditional; Islamic violence; Introduction; Herman on Declinism; The Christian Contradiction (brief version); Page Content Lists; Terror in Mumbai; Ancient Alarmism; Calming religious concerns; It Stands on Its Own (Who needs Jesus?); Muhammad affirms Jewish/Christian influence; The real battle against terror, and more.

Contact: wkrossa@shaw.ca Copyright @ Wendell Krossa

It is the single most profound shift in human consciousness- to reject the myth of some ultimate Threat behind life (i.e. the punishing gods of mythology and religion, the core retribution of Greek thought, or contemporary “secular” Threat mythologies- the revenge of Gaia, angry planet, or payback Karma), and to embrace the view that there is only an “absolutely no conditions Love” behind all. Unconditional takes our supreme ideal of love to its highest expression. It is the ultimate definition of authentic humanity.

Getting to the point… a project to counter alarmism of all forms, religious and secular. Alarm/fear is often at the root of “defensive” aggression and violence. Add this to your understanding of movements like ISIS. Bad ideas incite, inspire, guide, and validate bad behavior.

Explanatory note… This site assumes the following basic relationship between belief and behavior: that people look to ultimate ideals and authorities- i.e. gods- for inspiration, guidance, and validation of their actions and lives. They have done this since the beginning. Unfortunately, over history some of the most inhumane features have been projected onto our gods- things like tribal exclusion (the “us versus them” of tribal thinking- opposition toward outsiders, enemies), hatred and vengeance toward outsiders, the condemnation and punishment of human imperfection, and the destruction of the enemy.

The outcome of projecting these base features onto our highest ideals and authorities is the creation of ultimate Monsters that validate the same inhuman features and behavior in people. We see this in religious violence across history, and still today. Violent, vengeful gods validating violence toward others. Therefore, you have to bring down the core metaphysical Monster in order to properly bring down the brood of related features that are validated by the core Ideal- religiously inspired hatred, tribal exclusion of unbelievers, vengeance, and the punishing spirit. In more positive terms- its not just “bringing down” something, but more about the full “humanization” of our highest ideals and authorities.

This site goes to the foundation of much alarmism over history- the myth of some ultimate Threat.

I’ll get right to the point…

There has never been some great metaphysical Threat behind life. There have never been angry, punishing gods, and there is no vengeful Gaia, angry planet, or payback Karma- some greater metaphysical intention behind the common natural consequences of life. The idea of some great retributive force or punitive spirit behind life has been the greatest fraud ever beaten into human consciousness. The accidents, disease, and other forms of imperfection and suffering in life, are not punishment from some greater force or spirit.

The result of this threat pathology has been millennia of wasted human endeavor on Salvationism, whether religious or secular. Think of the blood that has been shed in the sacrifice industry starting in prehistory, and the endless time wasted in religious ritual to appease threatening gods. Also include modern anti-development appeasement efforts and the trillions that this has cost humanity in hindered, blocked, or abandoned development projects- i.e. Earth goddess or Gaia appeasement. Add the emotional distress and despair from this mental pathology, and more. Salvationist responses have wasted immense amounts of human time, effort, thought, emotion, and resources that could have been better spent on improving the human condition from the healthy standpoint of “rational optimism”.

I continue…There is no need to make a payment for human imperfection, an atonement of some sort. There has never been any “broken relationship” with Ultimate Reality/God, no separation from our creating Source. There has never been the loss of an original paradise and decline of life toward something worse. There is no such thing as fallen, sinful humanity that deserves punishment. Huh? Yes, to the contrary, we began in primitive brutality and have gradually become something better, a more humane species, over our history. See detail below for the evidence-based narrative of the human story. Our gradual progress in the ever-imperfect historical process, our slow rise toward something better, does not deserve punishment. As Julian Simon said, our gradual improvement of life over time deserves praise and celebration.

Further, there is no cosmic dualism and there should be no related oppositional dualism in the human family- i.e. true gods versus false gods, and the consequent battle of true believers versus unbelievers, the exclusion of some people as “enemies”. There is no coming apocalyptic end to history, and no future judgment or ultimate destruction. Hell is simply the most psychopathic perversion ever conceived by human minds. These things have never been located in any kind of truth or reality. They are distorting fictions derived from humanity’s original great error- that the imperfection of life was punishment from the gods. Humanity’s original great fail.

Note that sages like the Historical Jesus intentionally corrected this primitive error of punishing deity. He stated that the tower that fell and killed people, and the man born blind, were not incidents of punishment for sin. Paul, the creator of Christianity, did not get this critical point in Jesus’ teaching. To the contrary, he told the Corinthians that they were sick and dying because of their “sin”. He believed the primitive myth that a punishing deity was responsible for sickness and death. The scholars are right that Paul did not pay attention to what Jesus actually taught.

The above denials of pathology- no this, no that- are some of the liberating conclusions that are derived from the single greatest human discovery ever- that there is an “absolutely no conditions Love” behind all. Despite the inevitable imperfection that life hands everyone- bad things happening to good people- there is an incomprehensible Love behind reality and life. And everyone is ultimately safe. This is the foundational argument of this site and it involves the single most profound shift in human consciousness ever, from viewing some grand retribution or payback behind life, to understanding that there is a transcendently unconditional reality behind all.

This is about hope that is based on good evidence and the finest historical insights of humanity. Its also about the Daddy in me telling others- don’t be afraid, don’t worry, its going to be all right. And yes, for everyone.

My further argument here- despite centuries of good reform effort, and the moderation projects of religious traditions, these horrific ideas of ultimate Threat of punishment are still preserved at the core of our great religious traditions, in our gods, and in secular systems of thought like contemporary environmental alarmism.

While these perceptions of Ultimate Threat provide diversionary entertainment as in modern apocalyptic story-telling, it should be recognized that they are entirely false perceptions of reality. There is no evidence to support them. They have too long distorted human perception of reality and hindered the full liberation of human consciousness and the human spirit.

Note: Two lines of “evidence” (quotations marks for the skeptics) affirm the rational optimism on this site. They affirm the argument that there is an ultimate Goodness behind all things. I refer to the long-terms trends of improvement in the cosmos, life, and human civilization- i.e. developing organization, complexity, and decreasing violence. And I refer to the ultimate reach of human imagination, that the unconditional treatment of all is our highest understanding of what it means to be authentically human or humane. Note Nelson Mandela as a striking recent example. What is ultimately humane then gets us closest to the discovery of ultimate truth and reality. This is what unconditional is all about- reasoning from the best in humanity and projecting that out to define deity, but to transcendent degree.

Further evidence: You could add the majority status of goodness in life- such as ordered, predictable reality (natural law), abundant energy and other resources, stability and peace as dominant features of life, contrasted with the minority or aberrational status of disaster, accident, and cruelty. Again, evidence of foundational goodness behind all. In arguing this line of thought, I am embracing here the reasoning of the Palestinian wisdom sage quoted often on this site- i.e. his appeal to the sun and rain that is given to all as evidence of Unconditional Goodness behind all. That wisdom sage is someone entirely opposite to the Christian Jesus.

(Note: The great question of human meaning is not solely- Why is there so much misery and suffering in life?, but even more important- Why is there so much beauty and goodness in life? Nonetheless, any argument for ultimate Goodness or Love will be met with the justified challenge of why suffering still exists in life. I would suggest that the best explanations are in the direction of the relationship between love and freedom. Our views of these ideals are often subhuman. We cannot imagine a love that will not intervene to prevent suffering. But some of the more helpful explanations argue that authentic love is not controlling, it does not intervene to over-rule human freedom and short-circuit the learning process (i.e. our struggle with imperfection in life). Despite these explanations, the problem of ultimate Goodness, and the continuing existence of suffering, is still hard to embrace. Others offer that ultimate Goodness and Love has incarnated in all of humanity and it is solely our responsibility to end suffering. God is invisible spirit… we are the physical embodiments of the spiritual realm in the here and now of material reality.)

I venture beyond conventional approaches to evidence- i.e. science- because we need to respond to the most profound impulses of human consciousness- the impulses for meaning and purpose. Science will never get us to the ultimate truth about all things with any finality and it should not be expected to do so. Note also the general scientific fear of purpose and the potential spiritual implications of this. Science has a limited mandate and a limiting methodology but this works fine for the scientific venture. For the bigger issues of meaning we need projects like philosophy, psychology, theology, spiritual insight, and general human experience. Areas of knowing that, if engaged properly, will get us to the authentically humane, which is the ultimate desire of the human spirit.

Fundamental to evidence- I take conscious human experience seriously. It is the single most real thing that we know. Therefore, I do not discount experience like the Near-Death Experience. But I evaluate all such things with my own criteria for truthfulness, notably my baseline of absolutely no conditions love. Some of the better NDEs are among the few things that meet this criteria.

Fighting Monsters

I have framed the project on this site roughly according to the story line noted by Joseph Campbell- that we go out into life and confront monsters, and in our struggle to conquer them we gain insights and learn lessons that we can bring back to benefit others. Julian Simon also spoke of a similar pattern in life- that we face problems and in our struggle with those problems we will find solutions that benefit ourselves and others.

Campbell also noted that in our struggle with monsters we most likely will be wounded.

This site is about my death struggle with a great monster, one of the greatest monsters that humanity has ever faced, a monster that has terrorized more people across history than anything else. This monster has caused far more and far worse harm than any form of physical terrorism. I am talking about the monstrous mythologies of angry, violent, and punishing deities. Gods that threaten ultimate judgment, exclusion, and destruction (i.e. Hell). This metaphysical pathology, in all its historical varieties, has endlessly traumatized human consciousness with unnecessary fear, anxiety, depression, and despair. Threatening deity is a form of terrorism that goes to the very depths of the human spirit to wreak psychic trauma. It has even incited and validated physical aggression by people.

And as Campbell noted in his outline of human story, in my struggle with the Beast I have suffered wounds. I know what it means to take religious ideas seriously and to feel intensely the destructive power of “bad religious ideas”. The particular embodiment of the monster that I have engaged is the Christian deity. The wrathful God of Paul. That is where my personal battle has taken place. Paul’s Christ myth is another expression of this very same metaphysical monster.

Christ and the Christian God as monster? Yes. I am referring to the foundational features of Paul’s deities- anger at imperfection, vengeance, punishment, exclusion, and ultimate destruction of unbelievers.

(Note: To be balanced, in other comment I have affirmed the more humane features that have also been projected onto these gods)

This site offers the single most potent weapon to slay these monsters- the long ago discovery by the wisdom sage, Jesus, that God was absolutely no conditions love. That discovery entirely overturns the monstrous features of the threatening gods of historical religion, such as Paul’s Christian God.

Added note: This struggle is not about some dreaded adventure as the forgoing paragraphs might suggest. I am journeying with a merry band of fellow adventurers and fighters that maintain fun as central to our adventure. Others feel that we are perhaps a bit quixotic and just running our lances at windmills as we chase our monsters. But we see the real monster clearly. We know what the real human battle is all about. The physical battles of history are just little side skirmishes compared to this foundational struggle of humanity with these great metaphysical monsters.

Further, conquering and slaying these metaphysical beasts is critical to the proper long-term conquest of evil. Fighting with other human beings is to miss the real enemy, the real evil. I am talking about the residual animal in each of us, that inheritance of base drives that are too often incited and validated by bad religious ideas (i.e. the animal/sacred relationship). So make sure in your life struggle that you slay the real monster, the real enemy, the real Terrorist.

Do we go after these monsters just because we are religious adrenalin junkies? No. As explained throughout this site, in order to solve problems thoroughly and for the long-term future, you must deal with foundational issues or causes.

Take violence- all the varied approaches to solving violence are important. You need to engage political, economic, social, and personal elements. But you can do all those things, you can militarily defeat ISIS and Al Queda, and more of the same will keep popping up to take their place. So you must also go to root ideas, to foundational ideals, that across history have fueled endless outbursts of religious violence. We see this also in Jewish and Christian history. Nothing is more critical to deal with than the pathology in humanity’s highest ideals and authorities- the gods.

This struggle is focused on the greatest liberation movement ever- the full liberation of human consciousness and spirit from the most deeply embedded of all pathologies. It is about freedom at the very foundation of human awareness, perception, and thought.

Recent comment: The full version of the Christian Contradiction, is now posted just below. This material covers the central breakthrough of Historical Jesus- a stunning new unconditional theology- and the subsequent Christian denial and burial of that discovery with the highly conditional atonement theology of Paul’s Christ myth, the fundamental error of the Christian tradition.

I repeatedly argue that you don’t need Jesus as a validating religious authority because unconditional is self-validating as our highest ideal. But still, in Jesus’ original teaching we have one of the best statements of this ideal.

This contradiction between what Jesus originally taught and what Christianity teaches is critical for understanding what is right and what is wrong in the larger human story. It illustrates the very best that we have discovered on how to create an authentically humane society- i.e. the unconditional treatment of all people, both good and bad. But it also illustrates some of the worst of human thought and practice- notably, the religious endeavor to validate ultimate threat, exclusion, punishment, and destruction of the differing other, the unbeliever to our system of ideas.

Bad Religious Ideas

Bad religious ideas (Sam Harris’ term) have caused humanity more grief and harm than anything else. They have endlessly incited people’s worst emotions, impulses, responses, and consequent actions, even validating violence between people. Bad religious ideas have hindered human development, restraining people at subhuman stages of thinking, emotion, and behavior. See comment by psychologists like Lotufo, below. Bad ideas have promoted endless unnecessary fear, anxiety, depression, and despair in the stories of human beings.

Many note that religion obviously plays a role in violence across the world, but few actually spell out what exactly it is in religion that incites violence. Here are some specific ideas that incite, inspire, guide, or validate violence.

These pathological religious ideas appear in the earliest human writing, which means they most likely originated in the prehistory era. They were then lodged deeply in human consciousness and worldviews, and have remained largely unchallenged down through subsequent religious history, forming the core themes of most human belief systems. I have repeatedly traced their descent from Sumerian/Akkadian/Babylonian mythology, down through Zoroaster (the most influential religion in history- Boyce), then into Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, all the offspring of Zoroastrianism in our Western tradition of thought. Many bad religious ideas were secularized in 19th Century Declinism, from where they shaped contemporary Green religion or environmental alarmism, and much other modern ideology, including scientific thought. These myths have also infected most societies across the world. See, for example, apocalyptic themes in Buddhism and Hinduism as noted in the research of Mircea Eliade.

Why focus on this dark stuff? Because these bad religious ideas have played the single most obstructionist role across history in preventing billions of people from seeing clearly the absolutely no conditions Love at the core of all reality.

My list:

1. There is an angry, vengeful, violent, and punishing God behind all things. This is the worst of all bad ideas and the inciting mainspring for the rest. This bad idea appears right at the beginning in the Sumerian flood myth, and in the punishment of Enki for eating the 8 original plants (Dilmun paradise myth). It is also evident in the early belief in sacrifice- i.e. the required appeasement of angry, threatening deity. This core bad idea evokes the overwhelming terror of divine punishment. With this bad idea you have the worst of pathology projected onto humanity’s highest ideal and authority- deity. This myth of divine anger, vengeance, and violent punishment then distorts and buries entirely the true nature of Ultimate Reality as unconditional love.

This angry, punitive god myth is childish and subhuman in the extreme, but it continues to dominate human consciousness in such things as the revenge of Gaia myth, and angry planet, or payback Karma thinking. Angry, punishing deity has long incited and validated the worst impulses in people. And it adds the psychic burden of fear, anxiety, depression and despair to already unbearable physical suffering. Remember the Japanese lady after the tsunami, standing among the ruins and asking rhetorically, “Are we being punished for enjoying life too much?”

2. An original paradise or perfect beginning- i.e. the past was better. The Eden myth. Early people could not believe that divine power and goodness would create imperfection right at the start. So they misread the obvious imperfection of life all around them (i.e. natural disaster, disease, accident, death, violence from others) as a fall from an original perfection. The imperfection of the world was all evidence of the ruin and loss of the original perfection. This perverse myth of original perfection reverses entirely the actual narrative of life- that life has progressed from an imperfect beginning and toward more complexity and higher stages of development.

This myth of original perfection creates the platform for the narrative of life as being in decline since the loss of the perfect beginning. Loss of original perfection is at the basis of Declinist mythology and thought, that all has been going downhill since the original paradise was lost.

And original perfection mythology is at the basis of the devaluation of humanity. It is central to the myth that we humans ruined the original paradise, that we are corrupters of perfection and therefore deserve punishment. We have ruined the original perfection that God created.

Original paradise, or Eden mythology, also creates the basis for the myth that God desires perfection, that he only creates perfection and that we have ruined his perfect creation or plan.

None of this helps us to understand the critically important role of imperfection to our development as human. It is only by struggling with imperfection in life that we learn and grow as human. Perfection mythology does not help us to embrace imperfection as a natural part of our learning process. By embracing the imperfect historical process and struggling to make it better, we discover insights and find solutions that benefit others.

The original paradise myth is the bedrock myth of the entire apocalyptic template of ideas. It also helps to understand why there will be a world-ending apocalypse. The angry, vengeful deity must purge the ruined world of the corrupting element- fallen humanity- in order to restore the lost original paradise.

3. As noted above, early people also believed that their ancestors had become corrupted or “sinful” and they had caused the ruin of the original paradise by committing an original error or sin. So “fallen, sinful” people now deserved punishment and destruction. This belief in the loss of original perfection, and blaming humanity for that loss, has led to the ongoing devaluation of humanity as something that has been corrupted, that has become evil. The fallen humanity myth also reverses entirely the actual narrative of human history- that we have consistently progressed toward something better than before, toward less violence and more empathy/love, and toward more creative improvement of life. We have emerged out of a brutal animal past to become human, to become more humane over history.

Fall myths, along with original perfection myths, promote the distorting idea that life has been in decline from the imagined perfect beginning. They promote the fraud that humanity continues to ruin the world and life. Humanity is also believed to be in decline, and degenerating toward something worse. This decline myth distorts entirely the actual trajectory of life and misses the masses of evidence that show undeniable progress toward ever better conditions and higher stages of development, both in life and in humanity. Anti-human Fall mythology misses the essential love, goodness, and creativity of humanity that is evident in the overall improvement of life. This decline myth then incites unnecessary fear, fatalism, resignation, depression, and despair. It is a great distortion and lie.

This anti-human myth of fall and decline continues today in the Green religion pathology that views humanity as a virus on the planet, a cancer on nature. This has resulted in anti-population alarmism (i.e. the “population bomb”) and anti-human polices. This loathing and hatred of humanity as a corrupting force has promoted far too much anxiety and misery over being imperfectly human. It misses entirely the wonder of being human and that more human minds on the planet means more creative solutions to problems and more creative advance in life and civilization. Julian Simon was right that in net terms we have been more creators than destroyers. More people are not a threat to life.

Note: “Original noble savage” mythology is part of this fall and decline distortion. Many in the academic world (see LeBlanc’s Constant Battles) still propagate the myth of early noble savages that have “fallen”, or become corrupted, in emerging human civilization.

4. One of the most psychologically damaging of all bad religious ideas is the myth of humanity being rejected by God (i.e. thrown out of Eden), of humanity becoming “separated” from God and now under obligation to heal some imagined broken relationship, to become reconciled. Separation from our Source never happened. We have not been rejected and abandoned by our Creator.

5. The myth of cosmic dualism and the related human dualism. This bad idea states that there is a cosmic Good Force/Spirit that exists in opposition to a Bad Force/Spirit. The cosmic dualism is then played out via human dualisms- i.e. the tribal thinking of us versus our “enemies”, us versus some other group in the human family. Such oppositional dualism incites and validates all the varied forms of human exclusion, domination, and destruction of outsiders- all the racial, national, religious, ideological, and other dualisms that we create to exclude and oppose others that differ from us. Dualistic tribal thinking misses entirely the essential oneness of the human family. It incites endless conflict and warfare.

6. Looming and always imminent apocalypse. The threat of coming collapse and ultimate destruction stirs fear, and fear incites defensive aggression and violence. This mythology is often accompanied by victimhood alarmism- that there is some threat or enemy that we must eliminate in order for us to survive.

7. Violent and overwhelming divine intervention is necessary to purge the corrupting element from life and restore the lost paradise, to bring in some hoped-for utopia. The apocalypse itself is the great final instantaneous purging of imperfection that will permit “true believers” to escape from imperfection and instantly enter into some utopia. People have always tried to escape the slow, messy historical process for some mythical perfect existence. We hate the slow learning process, the struggle with imperfection.

This violent intervention mythology validates coercive action to “save” the world, or human civilization, or whatever else is believed to be threatened. We are watching the impact of this thinking right now in ISIS and the fight for its utopian caliphate. A similar situation is playing out in the environmental alarmist movement with its demand for coercive centralized action to “save the world” and restore a lost paradise. So also Marxism engaged violent intervention to purge the world of “destructive capitalism” and to restore the imagined lost paradise of original egalitarian communalism and hunter/gather existence.

Violent intervention mythology validates the coercive overruling of individual freedom in the name of some greater good. It misses entirely the importance of embracing the human struggle with imperfection and that this gradual learning process- i.e. our wrestling with the imperfect historical process- is vital to human development. Many other bad ideas come in here- i.e. the felt need of people to act violently as the agents of God to get the delayed apocalypse and the purging of life moving along.

Further, this instant, violent purging myth (apocalypse) does not understand authentically humane love and power. Truly humane love will not coercively overwhelm and intervene to bring instant change. Authentic love patiently respects human freedom of choice and tries to gently persuade. Love does not violate the freedom of others. And far from being a “weak response to evil”, such love is the most powerful response to transform life and people for the better. Note how Nelson Mandela’s non-coercive unconditional approach spared South Africa from civil war. As he said, it brought out the best in others and made friends out of former enemies.

Again, we balance this with the responsibility of love to restrain violence.

8. The demand for a salvation plan. Historically, this has been the demand for sacrifice. Religious Salvationism has always been highly conditional (sacrifice as payment, punishment) and believes that violence is necessary to solve problems (i.e. blood sacrifice). Salvationism believes that God must hurt/harm an innocent victim in order to find satisfaction, in order to be appeased. Punishment must be meted out. Lotufo rightly stated that this view is psychopathic. Green religion also demands sacrifice in order to save something.

(Note: This is not to deny the obligation to care for nature. But while doing so, we must beware of Green Salvationist exaggeration and distortion of problems and their extremist anti-human responses.)

9. Payback as true justice. Based on the above belief in punishing deity- a God that demands the full punishment of sin, the full payment for sin- so human justice systems have been oriented to punishment, to getting even, or to getting revenge. This is known as ‘eye for eye’ justice. It originates with primitive offense and retaliation response- that if someone offended you, you then had the right to get even. This primitive retaliation view of justice is about retribution as necessary to make things right again. And it misses entirely the humane ethic of loving enemies, of forgiving unconditionally, and of treating all people with unconditional inclusion and generosity. Unconditional love is the supreme expression of authentic humanity, of authentic love. Humane justice systems should be based on an unconditional approach, as restorative justice that affirms responsibility and accountability in an unconditional framework. Not justice as promoting retaliation and punishment.

Further, studies in psychology conclude that punishment approaches do not work with children or criminals. Punitive approaches do not teach alternative humane behaviors.

10. Bob Brinsmead would add another to this list of bad religious ideas. He points to the myth of a hero messiah, common throughout all cultures and notable in the Greek epics such as the Odyssey. He says that the gospel of Mark appears to be based on the Homeric epic model, and the miracles of Jesus in Mark are similar to the Homeric epic.

The myth of a super-human hero is found in the Sumerian/Akkadian combat myths. Zoroaster speaks of a savior that would defeat evil and a great final battle. The Roman emperors were super-human political messiahs. Brinsmead says, “Usually these divinized heroes were virgin born or born of some miraculous union with the divine”.

Brinsmead continues, stating that every messiah was expected to be someone who would bring victory by superior violence. The book of Revelation expresses this hope. But in the Q Sayings Gospel, the original teaching of Jesus, there is none of this messianic Christology, says Brinsmead. Jesus made a complete break with this messianic violence myth. He rejected what many of his followers wanted him to be.

Add your own bad religious ideas…

These bad religious ideas are the foundational themes of all three Western religions- Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. They are, in varied features, very much the expressions of base animal impulses, impulses long ago projected onto the gods, embedded in myths and religious beliefs, and now considered the untouchable sacred. They continue to incite and validate inhuman behavior.

The humanizing project that has impacted most of the rest of life must confront these bad ideas, purging them and replacing them with more humane alternatives such as unconditional.

Some will note that if you purge these particular ideas from Christianity then you have nothing left of the original religion. But if you replace them with the central theme of Jesus- unconditional- then you have rediscovered the best of everything, something far better than the retaliation religion of Paul.

Once again- If you take the step and reject the idea of some great Threat behind life, and embrace the ideal of absolutely no conditions Love at the core of all, you will have embraced the greatest liberation ever, the single most profound shift in human consciousness. If the core idea of ultimate Threat is purged, then the supporting/inciting basis for all the other bad ideas collapses.

The Big Picture (Historical descent of mythical/religious pathology)

Intro: The following material comments on how mental pathology begins and develops over history. See further below for more comment on the logic behind the ancient misread of the natural realm and its imperfection. We (i.e. humanity across history) have always had a hard time embracing imperfection. We just do not appreciate its role in promoting struggle, learning, and our development as human. For example, what about the role of inhuman behavior in the struggle to learn how to love? Opposites that provide opportunity to exhibit the better human qualities. Again, I would point to Joseph Campbell’s comment on human story- that our struggle with “monsters” has the outcome that we gain insights that can then benefit others. Julian Simon also affirms the role of struggling with problems, and how such struggle then prompts the search for personal solutions and that produces solutions that benefit others. But still… Yechh, eh.

Our ancestors tried to understand and explain the big question- the presence of imperfection in life. Why natural disaster, disease, cruelty and violence, and death? They concluded that life must have been originally perfect but that our ancestors messed it up somehow. They could not accept that Ultimate Goodness or Power would have created an imperfect world. So blame humanity for some original error or “sin”. They then wrongly concluded that the subsequent imperfection of life was punishment from angry gods, gods that were pissed at human failure to honor and obey the gods, failure to offer sacrifice, or failure to live according to the dictates of religious taboos and commands. The result of their misread of human suffering was the profound mental and emotional pathology that is still lodged at the core of most myth and religion. All those “bad religious ideas” (Sam Harris’ term).

But laser in on the worst of all bad ideas that came out of the early misread of imperfection- that God was angry and would punish human imperfection. An entire suite of other bad ideas was developed to support this core bad idea.

Here is a long-term historical view of the origin and descent of some of the main ideas that are explored on this site. I have focused quite intensely on the pathological ideas that have caused more damage to human consciousness and life than anything else. Across the millennia these themes have become hardwired in human subconscious where they work in concert with our inherited animal impulses to incite, inspire, guide, and validate the worst behavior. These themes have long shaped how people see the world, how they feel, and how they respond to life.

Again, the cohering central theme behind the bad religious ideas listed below is that of a threatening deity (the worst of all bad ideas), a God that uses violence to resolve problems, to punish people. Further, I have gathered these ideas under the umbrella framework of apocalyptic. Ernst Kaseman called apocalyptic the “Mother of Christian theology”. I would expand that out to argue that apocalyptic is the Mother of most mythology, most religion, and much ideology. Its just that prominent and persistent across history- the pessimistic belief that life is declining toward some catastrophic ending where this imperfect historical process will be abandoned. Many of the other bad ideas noted below relate intensely to apocalyptic. They are part of the larger template of tightly inter-connected apocalyptic mythology.

Note how these ideas descend down through history, being absorbed into ever new systems of thought or belief. Subsequent systems (i.e. religions) make changes and revisions to adapt these inherited ideas to their local situations and cultures. But it is important to note that the core themes remain the same. It is always the same old, same old being repeated, whether in religious or later secular systems of belief.

Historically, apocalyptic has been mainly about a divine intervention to punish bad people for ruining an original paradise, and to purge the world of corrupt and evil humanity so that paradise can be restored. Apocalyptic is the destruction and removal of fallen, corrupted people. That would be most of us. Except for the “true believers” in the destroying God. They are exempted. Saved.

This summary is incomplete because brevity was the goal. See rest of site for more detail. I am posting this because it is helpful to keep an overall historical picture in mind, a greater background template in which to locate things. For brevity, I am only touching on some major nodes down through history and I am tracing mainly down through to our Western tradition. One also finds similar bad ideas moving down through the Eastern tradition. See Mircea Eliade, and others, on apocalyptic themes in Hinduism, Buddhism, and elsewhere.

Lets start in prehistory. Pre-historians John Pfieffer and Jacquetta Hawkes state that what we find in the first human writing (i.e. Sumerian cuneiform tablets) we can assume represents what was believed in the pre-literature or prehistory era.

Pfieffer suggests, for instance, that people in prehistory may have already held an original golden age myth, the cornerstone myth of apocalyptic. The belief that life began in some early paradise. Is he on to something? Well, consider that our line of humanity emerged about 150,000 years ago. And consider that evidence of developing consciousness also begins far back- i.e. ancient people burying their dead, artistic beauty in tool-making, sacrifice to appease spirits, and so on. Prehistory people were already engaging their impulse for meaning and purpose, the fundamental impulses of human consciousness. They were trying to understand and explain life (especially the bad parts), the world, and the cosmos, and what it all meant.

Some checking of the natural history of the more ancient past shows that the previous interglacial- the Eemian Interglacial Period- occurred from about 130,000 to 115,000 years ago, well within the span of developing human consciousness. And some research shows that the Eemian Interglacial may have ended abruptly, within several centuries. The ancients would have considered that loss of better interglacial conditions in terms of the loss of a paradise- the warmer interglacial- and descent toward something worse- the colder glaciation that followed. That severe downturn/decline in climate may have prompted the belief in early apocalyptic. Those people may have wondered why the gods were punishing them. Such is how myth originates and develops.

Note on following: Early myths of apocalyptic floods may originate from varied natural events such as Mediterranean tsunamis or the great Black Sea Deluge of 5600 BCE.

Sumerian mythology– Here we find the first human writing and literature. Writing begins roughly around 3000 BCE (noun lists of temple produce, and kings lists) and then more expressive literature (words as verbs, adjectives, etc.) develops around 2600 BCE. Then we start getting early poems, stories, epics, and related material. The Sumerian cuneiform tablets are broken and scattered but later Akkadian and Babylonian versions are more complete and are quite identical to the earlier Sumerian versions of the same myths.

Apocalyptic is not found in any formal statement of theology in that first writing. It is more a scattering of themes throughout the epics. For instance, we find an original paradise theme in the story of the city of Dilmun where there is no sickness, death, predation, or corruption. We then find a loss of paradise and “fall of man” mythology in the story of the god/man Enki eating the 8 forbidden original plants and becoming ill. The Dilmun myth states that he was punished for his “sin”. The paradise of Dilmun was then corrupted and lost.

A statement of early proto-apocalypse is also found in the Sumerian Flood myth. In this myth the waterworks god, Enlil, becomes enraged at people. There are too many people and they have become too noisy and he is sleep-deprived. So he plans a great flood to wipe out humanity and end human history. Some “nicer gods”, arguing against drowning, suggest that they could destroy people by having wild beasts tear them apart. Ah, such mercy.

Again, this is not formal apocalyptic theology but the core themes are detectable in this mythology, right at the beginning of human writing.

Egyptian mythology: Running almost historically parallel with the development of Sumerian mythology, Egyptian mythology also appeared in art and architecture, and then in written form, around the mid-Third Millennium BCE. In Egyptian myth we also find gods (i.e. the Eye of Ra) planning to destroy humanity (the Middle Kingdom myth of the ‘Destruction of Mankind’) and plotting to dissolve the ordered world and take all back to chaos. This expresses a form of eschatology or apocalypse.

Skipping over to another major node along the way- Zoroaster is dated around 1500 BCE. He is credited with shaping ancient apocalyptic themes into a more formal statement of apocalyptic theology. He claims that there is a great cosmic dualism, a cosmic battle between a good God (Ahura Mazda) and an evil power (Angra Mainyu). Zoroastrian cosmic conflict is similar to early combat mythology. The cosmic battle is played out through humanity, with the followers of the good religion set in opposition to the unbelievers, the “bad people”. The good God eventually destroys the world in an apocalypse of fiery molten metal that purges the world of corruption. Note that Zoroaster shifts from a water apocalypse to an apocalypse by fire. Then after the final purging, the lost original paradise can be restored.

Zoroaster makes revisions and changes to the myths that he adopts, but he preserves the core themes of previous apocalyptic in his “new” religion. Zoroaster is then credited with shaping Jewish thinking and belief. Varied routes to this line of descent are suggested- e.g. Jewish exile in Babylon, or Jewish descent from the Sumerian/Mesopotamian region, or the usual exchange of ideas over centuries of mutual contact and trade.

Jewish apocalyptic belief is stated more formally around the second to first century BCE in books like Daniel, written roughly around 175 BCE. See Walter Schmittals’ “The Apocalyptic Movement” for more detail.

The next historical node is a major one- Christianity. Christianity is a religion created by Jewish people within Jewish culture. Paul, the main creator of the version of Christianity that came down to us, was a Jew. His apocalyptic Christianity has shaped Western consciousness and society more than any other body of thought (see James Tabor, Mary Boyce below). Tabor says that apocalyptic influenced all that Paul said and did.

In the Christian scriptures we find all the main themes of apocalyptic- original paradise, early human sin and the loss of paradise, the corruption of life, the decline of life toward something worse, toward some great catastrophic end where evil people will be punished and purged from the world, and then the original paradise will be restored, or a new utopia created. In the meantime, the true believers exist in opposition to unbelievers (Zoroastrian dualism- good versus bad, truth versus falsehood).

Note that Salvationism, often thought of as the basic Christian message- i.e. Jesus died for our sins in order to save us from Hell- is a sub-category of the larger apocalyptic system of belief. Salvationism derives from the myth that humanity suffered an early Fall into sin when paradise was lost and people must subsequently find salvation from the apocalyptic wrath to come (punishment for sin, a God angry at humanity for ruining paradise). The threat of future punishment pushes people to find some atonement scheme- a payment for sin in order to escape the coming apocalyptic wrath of God (Romans 5:9).

(Side note: The Jewish/Christian movement also gave us one of the best expressions of the new insight into absolutely no conditions reality, though this Christian movement then immediately buried that insight in highly conditional reality)

And with this template of pathological ideas the Western world entered the Dark Ages of Christianity- very much a consequence of such irrational and damaging mythology. However, the humanizing influence of Jesus’ core teaching (i.e. Matthew 5:38-48 and related material) also remained within the Christian tradition. That central theme of no conditions love helped to blunt the harsher impacts of the larger body of Christian teaching.

Then, continuing the Western line of descent, we have the stepchild of Christianity- Islam. The early revelations of Muhammad begin roughly around 610 CE when Muhammad was about 40 years old. And yes, as Joseph Azzi’s The Priest and the Prophet shows, Muhammad borrows Jewish/Christian ideas from his Jewish Christian mentor Waraqa (Ebionite Christian) and shapes Islam around those ideas. Islamic apocalyptic also believes that an angry, vengeful God will destroy all unbelievers, purging them from the world and will then restore a lost caliphate- Islamic paradise- across the world. See, for instance, David Cook’s books on Islamic apocalyptic belief.

Islamic historian Abbas Amanat adds that Islamic apocalyptic includes the beliefs in the advent of the Mahdi (Islamic Messiah) to be followed by a great resurrection and Day of Judgment. This will include the restoration of the utopian Islamic community. See “Apocalyptic Islam and Iranian Shi’ism”.

And then the next major historical node- The Enlightenment and scientific age from roughly the 1600s on to the present. From this time, in a more widespread manner, people begin to think more critically, scientifically, or secularly. Less mythically, or at least they believe so. They shift toward a more rational way of viewing life and reality. Again, so they think. And much is good in this shift. Empiricism emerges more widely- observing natural evidence and making rational conclusions based on evidence- and is developed further. The empirical/observational approach actually began initially with the Greeks but never became as widespread as during the Enlightenment.

But something else happened in the shift toward the more widely accepted scientific worldview. People also brought along the themes of primitive apocalyptic mythology into their new scientific worldviews. They actually “secularized” ancient mythical themes, giving them new secular expression. Thus the same old, same old continued into modern consciousness. How so?

Arthur Herman (The Idea of Decline) details some of the transformation of mythology into secular ideology. But he notes only a few themes from apocalyptic mythology. For instance, he states that 19th Century Declinism- also known as Cultural Pessimism, or Degeneration theory- borrowed ideas of an original golden age that was lost, a pristine natural paradise before humanity. He also notes the Declinist belief in the violent purging of the corrupting element from the world- i.e. removing the destructive human technological, industrial society. This purging myth is derived from the similar Christian belief that God will violently purge the world of corruption- the present “evil” world system- in the final apocalypse. Despite Herman’s limited references to previous apocalyptic mythology, the full template of primitive apocalyptic is still visible in 19th Century Declinism. Herman then rightly concludes his book showing that Declinism has subsequently shaped contemporary Environmental Alarmism.

(Note: In the development of Declinism there was also a notable anti-science element. That was a rejection of the rational approach of science and a longing to re-establish the mythical mindset. Also, a strong anti-human element was built into Declinism. That has always been part of the mix of human mythology, religion, and more recent ideology.)

And this brings us to today. As Herman and others have noted, the environmental alarmist movement repeatedly voices the themes of primitive apocalyptic. Environmental alarmists believe that the world was an original paradise before humanity emerged to engage, use, and change nature. They believe that corrupt, greedy humans have destroyed the original paradise and all is now in decline toward some catastrophic collapse and ending. So Gaia must take revenge and punish humanity. The salvation scheme? We must purge the world of the corrupting element- greedy, destructive humanity in industrial society- in order to restore the lost paradise.

Apocalyptic despair infects more than just environmental extremism. Its core theme of violent, punishing deity finds expression in such widely embraced myths as punishing Karma, or angry planet.

I detail this below.

And I am now verklempt. Discuss this mental pathology- these bad religious ideas- amongst yourselves.

Explaining and Defending the focus here on Unconditional reality

Orienting ourselves to the unconditional treatment of every human being is about finding and maintaining our humanity in an imperfect world. It is about trying to live and respond as authentically human, despite the traumatizing horror of violence from others.

But being human, as in treating all others unconditionally, is not inconsistent with protecting the innocent. Any common sense understanding of love will grasp that love involves robust action against evil of all forms- restraining, imprisoning where necessary, and eliminating if other options fail. You cannot make peace agreements with irrational psychopathy, as in ISIS and similar groups or persons. Often, your only option is to press the trigger and vaporize. Do not limit the definition of love to some form of pacifism. Love is responsible to protect, to actively defend.

But even the worst failures in the human family deserve an unconditional, restorative approach, where possible. And we widely recognize this humane treatment of “enemies” in our international policies on the decent treatment of prisoners of war.

However, no matter how we are obligated to act in the midst of outbreaks of violence, nothing weakens or diminishes the truth of a core reality that is Unconditional Love. There is simply no more humane understanding or explanation of ultimate Goodness (deity), despite how we struggle to live and express such an ideal in an imperfect world.

I return repeatedly to figures like the Chinese sage Laozi who advised that sometimes we must regrettably use force to defend ourselves but we should not then engage triumphalism when defeating “enemies” (Karen Armstrong, The Great Transformation). We should employ force non-aggressively, unassertively, not in a spirit of vengeance, retaliation, or harsh punishment. This is not a denial of the need to act defensively, but more about the attitude that we adopt and the means that we employ when engaging any defensive action.

Its about maintaining our humanity no matter what we experience in life. Maintaining the attitude of restorative justice toward even the worst people. It is about recognizing that grotesque outbreaks of violence can stir our basest impulses to respond in kind with hateful vengeance and thereby drag us down into cycles of further dehumanizing violence. Note Nelson Mandela for a recent contemporary example of humane response to violent abuse and endeavor to lift a society toward something better.

Further: During times of conflict we do not help things by dehumanizing others as less than human, or by fostering a sense of victimhood that demands aggressive vengeance against threats. Note the horrible failures in Serbia and Rwanda during the 90s where “enemies” were dehumanized as vermin that deserved to be destroyed. Despite the failure of some to act as human, they are still fellow members of the one human family.

We act more humanely when we take our horror at violence and direct it toward lessening future outbreaks of violence. James Payne urged this in his book “History of Force”. He argued that we should find ways to lessen cycles of violence in the future and thereby help contribute to the long-term decline in violence across history. Using their revulsion at violence is how people began to decrease religious violence over the past.

Our very humanity is at stake in our response to violence in all forms and at all scales.

Islamic Violence

Careful expression of distinctions is required when pointing to a problem like the religious violence incited, or validated, by Islamic teaching. One needs to re-assure moderate Muslims that one is not damning all members of the Islamic community.

But it also means being clear that part of the violence problem derives from the religion itself and its holy book. It is very much about core Islamic teaching or ideas- again, those “bad religious ideas”- that incite and validate violence. Religious violence has long sought validation from such bad ideas as an angry, punishing God that uses violence to solve problems. This is the same problem that has been experienced in the histories of Christianity and Judaism, where violence is also advocated in their sacred scriptures. Remember also that Islam directly borrowed Jewish/Christian beliefs. Fortunately, many members of all three Western religions have learned to ignore those bad ideas and to moderate their approach to their religion and to life. That moderation must be affirmed while at the same time helping those people to see the remaining pathology that is still embedded at the very heart of their religious systems, in their ultimate ideals and authorities. The core pathology has to be completely removed in order to fully and properly ensure our progress toward a safer and more humane world.

Note: Some express tiredness at all the talk of “root causes of violence”. But if we are ever to thoroughly and properly solve violence for the long term future then we must understand its historical origins and development- i.e. the inherited animal drives and the mythical/religious validation of this animal inheritance. Problem solving means dealing fully with root causes, foundational ideas, and then offering potent alternatives. This is all part of the complex mix of things necessary to solve violence, along with social, political, economic, and personal elements.

Introduction

Mythologist Joseph Campbell outlined human story as a struggle with monsters, overcoming and defeating monsters, and in the process gaining insights that benefit others.

The argument of this site is that the greatest monsters of all are the gods of mythology and religion. These are the Master Terrorists that have terrorized more people than anything else.

My personal struggle has long been with the monstrosity embedded in the Christian God, with the pathological features associated with that deity- myths of fallen/sinful humanity, separation from and abandonment by that deity, condemnation of human imperfection, demand for violent appeasement (blood sacrifice), exclusion and opposition toward other members of the human family (true believers versus unbelievers), and the threat of coming catastrophe and destruction (violent apocalypse and Hell), and more.

Therefore, this site explores, among other things, humanity’s ultimate ideals and authorities (i.e. the gods) and their impact on human consciousness and life, particularly the damaging impact from pathology in deity. Note, for instance, the history of human appeal to violent gods to validate violence toward others. See Terror In Mumbai below for a recent example. Remember also ISIS exhibiting this pathology today. Judaism and Christianity also have well-documented histories of violence incited and validated by deity.

Beginning back in prehistory, people have appealed to ultimate ideals and authorities to guide, inspire, and validate human behavior (the belief/behavior linkage). Unfortunately, the ancients projected some pathetically inhumane features onto early gods that have remained embedded at the core of most versions of deity ever since.

In response, a central project on this page is to fully humanize theology (as in human perception of greater ideals and authorities); to purge deity of subhuman features such as animal-like vengeance, tribal exclusion and opposition, payback punishment, or violent destruction of outsiders. We already have the stunning discovery that points us in the right direction- the radical redefinition of deity with the ideal of absolutely no conditions love. A discovery that liberates entirely from the pathology of so much past mythology and religion.

I repeatedly employ the Jesus/Paul contradiction to illustrate the deformity in Western religion and how to correct that. That contradiction illustrates the very heart of what is wrong in the larger human story (i.e. the impact of our animal inheritance with its features of vengeance, tribal exclusion, and violent destruction of enemies, and how these features are validated in Paul’s Christ myth with its similar themes of retaliation, exclusion, and destruction of unbelievers). The Jesus/Paul contradiction also tells us how to make things right (i.e. the exodus out of animal existence and toward an authentic human existence, a truly unconditional existence, as outlined in the breakthrough insight of Historical Jesus). The Jesus/Paul contradiction is about how we get to the better future that we all want- a more humane world. And its about the ongoing resistance to that liberation and progress, often religious resistance. Christianity, with its Christ myth, has played a major historical role in resisting and blocking progress toward a more humane world (i.e. the widespread impact of varied subhuman Christian ideas on human consciousness and society).

Balancing note to clarify the last statement above: The Christian influence is mixed. There is that core Jesus tradition (mainly the Matthew 5:38-48 rejection of ‘eye for eye’ justice), an undeniably humane influence. But that brilliant insight has been seriously blunted by the overall Christian framework of ‘eye for eye’ atonement.

Further note: Christianity is in the same pathology basket as Judaism and Islam. They comprise the Western religious tradition, all descendants of Zoroastrian apocalyptic. The pathology they share? As noted above and more thoroughly below- Zoroastrian dualism (saved insiders, damned outsiders), payback vengeance as justice (punishment), and the final exclusion and destruction of unbelievers (apocalypse and Hell), and more. Foundational to this pathology is the core myth of violent deity, a God that solves problems using coercive violence. This is the heart of Christian atonement theology.

One more… I fully recognize that challenging the Christ myth of Paul is the worst possible blasphemy and heresy to the Christian mind. I get the offensiveness of my comment on this. I was an Evangelical Christian earlier in life. But look carefully at the original gospel of Jesus and his core theme of unconditional and then compare that to Paul’s highly conditional Christ myth (i.e. the supreme condition of atonement, a payment for sin before forgiveness is offered). Consider the contradiction and note its consequences for human consciousness, behavior, and society. I have noted some of the best research on this by Robinson, Ellens, Lotufo, and others. See the “Christian Contradiction” below.

The harmful consequences explain why I go after Paul’s Christ and risk the possibility of offending some people. Because, as the religious scholars note, that influential myth has long been central to Western consciousness and society. Its influence? The scholars/historians note that it has shaped our ethics/behavior, our systems of justice as punitive, our international politics as oppositional exclusion and destruction of “enemies”, and it has even contributed to mass-death movements such as Marxism and Nazism (Landes’ research on the influence of Christian apocalyptic millennialism). Disorienting stuff to consider but the evidence is sound. The consequences have been widespread and harmful. See also the comment of the Mennonite theologians on this issue.

Most Christian will react with the protest- What about all the New Testament teaching on love, grace, and other good ideals? How can you criticize such goodness? Yes, that is also there in the tradition. But the larger context of a retaliatory deity undermines and weakens those better ideals. Note that repeated threat of exclusion, punishment, and ultimate destruction scattered all through Paul’s letters. I feel little hesitation about going after Paul’s Christ because he so bluntly rejected the core discovery of Jesus that God was non-retaliatory. Look at Paul’s absolutely contrary Romans 12 statement, and many other verses, that his God would engage retaliatory vengeance on human imperfection.

Further Introductory comment:

The unconditional treatment of every human person, both good and bad, is the single most profound ideal ever discovered by humanity. This stunningly humane ethic is based on the related discovery that there is an “absolutely no conditions love” at the core of reality and life.

(Note: Religious traditions have missed this insight entirely over history. Early Christianity included it but then set about burying it with Paul’s highly conditional Christ myth.)

The belief/behavior link in the above two things is critical to get a grip on. People act according to what they believe. Note also that I am using unconditional across the entire spectrum of human ideals and ethics- unconditional inclusion of all, unconditional forgiveness of offenses, unconditional generosity toward all, to name a few features. Remember also that unconditional orients consciousness toward scandal in that it offends conventional views of justice as payback- i.e. reward the good, punish the bad. Authentic unconditional means “Absolutely no conditions. None”.

Religious use of the term unconditional tends to drag it toward the distorting direction of religious conditions. For instance, when you try to explain unconditional in terms of a supreme condition- e.g. the sacrifice of Jesus- then you are talking oxymoronic nonsense. Christian use of unconditional in relation to their atonement belief- God now loves unconditionally after demanding the conditional sacrifice of Jesus- shows that Christianity has never understood the core teaching of Jesus. His unconditional discovery has long been buried in highly conditional Christian theology.

The absolutely no conditions love at the core of reality robustly counters the “worst idea” to have ever infected human consciousness- that there is some great threatening force/spirit behind reality and life, something that will condemn, exclude, retaliate, punish, and destroy imperfect humanity. See material below on the ancient logic that led to this error. Our ancestors reasoned from natural disaster, disease, and human violence to explain ultimate realities. A huge fail. Ever since, people both religious and secular have never fully let go of that original pathology.

People who believe in violent, punitive gods have too often treated others in the same harsh manner. The belief/behavior link again. Note ISIS today in this regard. People shouting “God is great” as they kill others are acting according to a horrifically pathological view of God that deforms human consciousness and life. See comment just below on “Terror in Mumbai”. The killers were not shouting “Political oppression”, or “Economic disparity”, or “Western social corruption”, as they killed innocents. They were shouting “God”, “God”, and more “God”. Too much political correctness does not enable people to see this critical theological element behind violence.

I have heard two politicians get close to nailing this root issue behind religious violence. Both Rick Santorum and Marco Rubio have stated that ISIS terrorism is driven by apocalyptic theology. So far, so good. But now set aside any instinctual protectiveness and take this back further to its historical source- Christianity. This is all about the basic theology of Western religion, notably Christian apocalyptic theology. Lets quit pussy footing around and assign full responsibility just where it belongs.

And before anyone concludes that I am picking on Islam, let me place Islam in its proper historical context as a descendent of the Western religious tradition. Islam shares the common heritage of bad religious ideas- apocalyptic- that have descended from Sumerian mythology to Zoroastrianism, to Judaism and Christianity, and even down into Declinism and Environmental Alarmism. Note also the research below which shows that Jewish Christianity shaped early Islam- i.e. Joseph Azzi’s The Priest and The Prophet. It will be disorienting for many religious people to embrace, but Islam adopted the violent deity of Christianity. Using Azzi’s research, among others, I have traced the historical linkages- from the hellfire threat in the gospel of Matthew, and the Ebionite gospel to the Hebrews that was roughly similar to Matthew, and then to the Quran which absorbed the Hebrew gospel. See Section Three below.

This myth of threatening, punitive, and violent deity is probably responsible for more human misery than anything else that humanity has created. It is the foundational idea behind multiple millennia of apocalyptic alarmism and salvation religion. It has been at the basis of far too much inhumane treatment of others (inciting, guiding, validating). In its more extremist expression it has been employed to validate outright murderous violence. But it also finds expression in varied forms of punitive justice. Note the Mennonite comment that Christian theology is at the foundation of Western punitive justice. The outcome? Just an example- The US is the world’s most prominent Christian nation and it imprisons more people than any other nation.

The threat of divine violence against human imperfection is found in the earliest writing (e.g. the Sumerian Flood myth). This core idea of divine violence then continued into most subsequent mythology/religion and was supported by a developing complex of similarly “bad religious ideas”. These include the following: that early humanity had ruined an originally perfect world (original paradise, Eden); that humanity had “fallen” and become corrupt or sinful; that humanity had become separated from deity (“broken relationship”); that humanity consequently deserved punishment; that life was in decline toward some catastrophic ending; that humanity must appease the threatening deities with some sacrifice (i.e. the conditions of the salvation industry); that unbelievers will eventually be excluded and destroyed; and that, in the future, the world will be instantaneously purged of imperfection (escapism- apocalypse as the abandonment of the slow historical process); and the original paradise will be restored (utopia- escape to some mythical realm).

(For more detail, see “Top Ten Bad Religious Ideas” in Section 2 below)

These primitive and terrorizing ideas have darkened and deformed human consciousness for millennia, permeating all areas of human thought, both religious and secular. They have enslaved people in subhuman stages of development (see psychotherapist Lotufo below), and have often incited violence between people. Zoroastrian dualism has added the burden that “true believers”- the chosen people- are obligated to affirm that their God will dominate and destroy unbelievers or outsiders to the “true religion”. True believers are obligated to help their God purge the world of evil.

This site repeatedly isolates the main features in the pathology of some great Threat behind life- features such as retaliation, vengeance, exclusion, punishment, domination/control, and violence. These harsh elements have long defined the core of the great Monsters that people have lodged at the foundations of their mythologies, religions, and ideologies (e.g. vengeful Gaia). Monsters that have terrorized humanity with unnecessary fear, anxiety, depression, despair, defensiveness, and aggression. Bad ideas have always stirred the worst impulses in people.

(Note: Having created those ultimate monsters to terrorize others, is it any wonder that subsequent generations of people have suffered varied emotional and mental pathologies? See Lotufo, Nelson-Pallmeyer, Ellens, and others below)

The fear engendered by such monsters drives people to embrace irrational salvation schemes, schemes to save themselves, their communities, or to save the world. Salvationist responses, motivated by fear, have always led to horrific waste, even destructiveness. Look at the damage to both people and the environment from environmental alarmism (e.g. Carson’s chemical alarm and the ban on DDT, or the bio-fuels fiasco).

This site exists to counter and to bring down these threatening monsters, whether religious or secular. The project to counter alarmism is not a denial of the serious problems that exist in life. It is more about going after the exaggeration and distortion of problems to apocalyptic scale- from an acorn falling to the sky is falling (i.e. the Chicken Little hysteria syndrome). It is about countering the mental and emotional terrorism from alarmists.

Important to emphasize here- the bad ideas listed above have also descended into contemporary secular versions where they continue to damage human consciousness and retard human development and progress. I have traced the line of descent often below- from Sumerian gods threatening to destroy humanity in a great flood, to following Akkadian and Babylonian versions, to the Zoroastrian God threatening a great fiery destruction of the world, to this very same God adopted into the Western traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, to the 19th Century Declinist threat of looming catastrophe, to the threatening deity of Green religion today- vengeful Gaia, or angry nature, angry planet.

Herman on Declinism

Arthur Herman’s book The Idea of Decline in Western History is critical to understand the shift that humanity made over roughly the past four centuries, from the mythical expression of our past to the more secular expression of our present “scientific” era. Despite an apparently fundamental shift in human worldview, Herman helps us see that humanity preserved the defining mythical themes of the past but simply restated them in new secular versions in the ideology of Declinism, or Cultural Pessimism (also known as Degeneration theory). Nothing really changed at the core of human thinking. You can see this continuity of mythical themes in environmental alarmism.

Add to Herman

All systems of thought/belief develop in relation to previous systems of thought. Nothing develops in total isolation. Succeeding systems borrow and absorb ideas from previous systems. Yes, they revise and restate the borrowed ideas, but often retain the essential core themes. To detect the borrowed ideas, do not look for some exact restatement of any given idea, but look for the core theme that is embodied in the new expression.

The Christian contradiction (brief version- see full version elsewhere)

(Note: I embrace the view that there was a historical person called Jesus and that he presented a core message of unconditional love, in both ethic and theology. But the Christian scriptures, while including his core teaching of Matthew 5:38-48 and Luke 6:27-36, then rejected the theme of unconditional and developed the myth of the Christ. The Christ myth is all about the demand that a supreme condition must be met- a blood sacrifice- before any forgiveness is offered. The central difference between the historical Jesus and the Christian Christ is this difference between absolute unconditional and highly conditional. Note also that Paul, the creator of the version of Christianity that we have today, ignored the actual teaching of Jesus and formed Christianity around his personal visions of Christ.)

Christianity is vital to understanding the unconditional ideal, and the intense opposition to this ideal. Both elements are found in the Christian religion. Christianity therefore embodies the best and the worst of human thought and practice. To use Thomas Jefferson’s colorful description, Christianity presents the situation where you have the diamonds of Jesus’ teaching (i.e. Matthew 5:38-48) but they are buried in the “dunghill” of a less humane context.

Jefferson did not clarify the unconditional feature at the core of Jesus’ teaching, but he sensed something profoundly human in the “sublimely moral” sayings of Jesus. He also recognized that “inferior minds” had written the rest of the gospels.

I have framed the Christian situation this way- peripherally using Historical Jesus research, and Q Sayings Gospel research, neither of which clearly present the points that I am making below: The original ‘Historical Jesus’ presented an entirely new theology that centered on the unconditional treatment of all people, both good and bad0 Matthew 5 and Luke 6. According to Historical Jesus, God was absolutely no conditions love. That meant no required payment for human imperfection (i.e. no sacrifice), no exclusion of anyone (no saved versus unsaved, no Zoroastrian dualism of true believers in opposition to unbelievers), no final judgment or punishment, and no final destruction (no Hell).

Paul, the creator of the Christian religion that we have today, out-rightly rejected and then buried the unconditional breakthrough of Jesus in his highly conditional Christian theology. See, for instance, his formal statement of atonement theology in Romans (i.e. the supreme condition of a human sacrifice). This ranks as one of history’s greatest contradictions and scandals. The very religion that claims to represent Jesus, actually opposes his central teaching on the unconditional treatment of all, an ethic that he based on the unconditional God at the core of all. Essentially, Jesus said, act like this because God does this.

Paul created the Christian Jesus, known as “Jesus Christ” or just “Christ”, a mythical person entirely opposite to Historical Jesus. Again, the difference between highly conditional reality and unconditional reality. The gospel writers- notably Matthew and Luke- adopted Paul’s Christ myth. They then wrote all sorts of conditional things in their gospels (i.e. threats of divine vengeance and punishment, statements of Jesus coming to make a payment for sin, a sacrifice) and they put these statements in the mouth of Jesus, claiming that he taught these conditional things. But this added gospel material contradicts Jesus’ core teaching in Matthew 5:38-48 and Luke 6:27-36. The gospel writers tried to bury the actual teaching of Jesus with their conditional Christ mythology that they had received mainly from Paul.

(Note: In 1 Corinthians 1-3, Paul, in a general manner, opposed the wisdom tradition of sages like Jesus. See for instance, Stephen Patterson’s “The Lost Way”. Then, in Romans 12 he more specifically rejected the core ethical/theological breakthrough of Jesus. In the Romans 12 passage he appeared to get the ethic of non-retaliation but in an entirely contradictory conclusion, he based it on a theology of retaliation. Pure oxymoron. Closer inspection shows that he also missed the ethic of Jesus in that he urged non-retaliation in order to assure divine retaliation on offenders- to “heap burning coals on their heads”. He missed the core unconditional message of Jesus on both counts- ethical and theological. Retaliation, or eye for eye justice, was the central theme in Paul’s thinking.)

There are varied other elements in Christianity that can be affirmed as decently humane and I would certainly affirm the general contribution of Christian believers to society. Over the past few centuries, most Christians have learned to moderate the practice of their religion despite retaining its darker features. But it is inexcusable to continue to protect the larger theological framework of Christianity that distorts and buries the unconditional ideal that was taught by Jesus. That larger framework is based on the pathological myth of an angry, punishing God that demands a blood payment before he will forgive anyone. That God demands that a supreme condition be met first before he will show mercy to anyone. This conditional gospel of Paul is entirely opposite to the unconditional theology of Jesus. For two millennia Paul’s theology has tried to bury the no conditions discovery of Jesus.

Paul’s Christ myth- the sacrifice of Christ to appease an angry God (Romans 5:9)- is the great anti-Jesus myth. It is about a supreme condition that negates entirely the no conditions teaching of Jesus. Meditate on this for a while, and check the varied New Testament passages listed below that set forth this stunning contradiction at the heart of Christianity. See, for instance, the comparison of Jesus and Paul in List of Topics, Section Two.

(To reduce the need to search below I will include here the following 7-8 paragraphs that are a quote pulled from the List of Topics further below on the contrast between Jesus and Paul)

“The stunning contrast between the core teaching of the historical Jesus and the entirely opposite teaching of Christianity: Jesus rejected retaliation and punishment and instead introduced a new ethic and theology of non-retaliation or the unconditional treatment of all persons. That was his core theme, his gospel. Do not retaliate because God does not retaliate. Love your enemies because God loves all enemies.

(Note: Some Jesus Seminar Fellows respond that unconditional is not the core theme of Historical Jesus. Ultimately, it matters not if we can establish unconditional from the Jesus tradition. We take what is useful from such traditions and then make our own conclusions for today. We do not need to appeal to religious authority to establish the validity of unconditional for defining authentic humanity.)

“Jesus’ new theology blew away the foundations of conditional religion. It over-turned entirely all previous belief in the required conditions of sacrifice, atonement, and salvation. He stated clearly that God was unconditional love and did not demand that people meet any conditions at all in order to be forgiven and accepted. (Note: He did not dismiss human responsibility to counter wrong and promote right; to be accountable for one’s actions)

“Paul reversed the new theology of Jesus and retreated back to a primitive retaliation/punishment view of God. He re-established the divine demand for blood sacrifice, atonement, and highly conditional salvation religion. He made divine conditions the foundation of Christianity (See Romans 1-5). He rejected outright the greatest liberation movement ever offered to humanity and took the opposite view to that of Jesus. His Christian religion was based on his stunning reversal of Jesus’ teaching. This is history’s greatest scandal because it is an outright rejection of history’s single greatest discovery.

“Paul buried the unconditional theme of Jesus, the core theme of his gospel.

“Summary contrast of Jesus’ gospel compared to Paul’s opposite gospel:

“Ethic and Theology of Jesus (Matthew 5:38-48, Luke 6)- Do not retaliate against evil, but instead, love others unconditionally and you will be like God (this bases the non-retaliating ethic on the identical non-retaliating theology). God loves enemies, is kind, merciful, and compassionate to the evil and gives good things to all alike (unconditionally), both just and unjust.

“Ethic and Theology of Paul (Romans 12)- Do not repay any one evil for evil, do not take revenge but… (he then bases the non-retaliating ethic on the absolutely contradicting retaliatory theology)… leave room for God’s wrath…for ”Vengeance is mine, I will repay says the Lord”. Paul reverts back to a retaliating, punishing God.

“Note in regard to the above- theology determines ethics. What people believe (i.e. their highest ideals and authorities) will determine how they act. This helps explain why people holding high ethical standards will still treat others inhumanely. Note, for instance, how harsh Paul was toward all who disagreed with his views. Paul did not love his enemies, not even his fellow believers that differed from him (see, for example, Galatians 1:8-9). He damned them to eternal destruction. Despite his comments on the noble ideals of love and non-retaliation, when others disagreed with him, he then responded just like his vengeful, punishing God.

“Also note that Paul, while advocating non-retaliation toward offenders, urged this response in a spiteful manner, to ensure punishment of the offender (“to heap burning coals on his head”, Romans 12). He missed the main point of the unconditional ethic of Jesus as well as his unconditional theology.” (End of quote from List of Topics)

Keep in mind also that Christianity has shaped Western consciousness and life more than any other body of ideas (Tabor, Boyce, and others). While some of that influence has been positive, those bad religious ideas are still present at the heart of Christian theology and they continue to undermine and cloud the more positive Christian influence. Most significant, Christian theology continues to hinder any broader human appreciation of unconditional reality. Basic Christian beliefs, whether viewed literally or metaphorically, orient consciousness and identity to overall exclusion, separation, punishment, and destruction of outsiders to the religion (unbelievers).

The breakthrough discovery of Historical Jesus orients consciousness to authentic hope, to true liberation at the depths of human consciousness and spirit, and to the highest form of love ever known, an unconditional love that defines us as truly human or humane. Unconditional means absolutely no conditions. None. The central unconditional theme of Historical Jesus is a death blow to all conditional religion.

Again, the main point here is the discovery of absolutely no conditions love at the core of all and the related ethic of the unconditional treatment of all people- the single greatest discovery of humanity, ever. Explore with us the liberating and humanizing potential of this supremely humane ideal.

Added note: The “spiritual insight” that “no conditions love defines ultimate reality” is necessary to engage in order to properly counter the original error- a mythological/religious error- that some threatening, retaliatory spirit defines ultimate reality. Ultimately, the spiritual is critical to fully meet the human impulse for meaning and purpose.

Insert: Posing some oppositional dualism between religion and atheism, as humanity’s only choice, is simple-minded dogmatism, on both sides of this debate. We can do much better, with more diverse alternatives. Let seven billion (plus) flowers bloom. See further comment below on religious/atheist issues.

Another note: There is growing public recognition that we must deal with the ideology behind terrorism if we are going to win the long-term war against terror. You can militarily defeat a group like ISIS but, absent a plan to deal with the inciting/validating belief system, you still lose the overall war against terror. Another group with the same ideology will just take its place. You have to deal with the root causes (the disease) behind religious terrorism and not just the repeated symptoms, such as groups like Al Queda or ISIS.

So there is growing recognition that we have to engage the “battle of ideas”. Some have stated more directly that the problem behind terrorism is “bad religious ideas” (e.g. Sam Harris). It is more than just an “ideological” issue; it is more of a theological/religious problem. But few have stated exactly what those bad ideas are. I have set forth the basic template of bad religious ideas in such comments below as “Top Ten Bad Religious Ideas” (Section 2), and other comment on grand narrative themes.

But more important, I have repeatedly set forth the worst of all bad ideas- that of a violent deity/God. This is the core bad idea behind violence. This is the real monster that we face- the Master Terrorist. A violent, threatening God has long been at the root of human religious violence, inciting and validating the worst impulses in people. We are talking about a primitive mythical theme that was long ago embedded in human subconscious where it works a damaging influence with inherited animal drives. (See more detail further below on how bad religious ideas incite and validate our inherited animal impulses to harm others.)

Consequently, a violent, vengeful God has long provided the ultimate model for human existence, the ultimate ideal and authority for people to commit violence, and other forms of inhumanity, against others.

Page Content Lists

(The lists below are only a partial listing of each section’s comments, but they cover most of the material on this page.)

Site Comment: Section One

The true state of life- It gets better; Anti-science alarmism; CO2 alarmism; Plimer and Moore quotes on the benefits of CO2; Grappling with imperfection; Human narrative- Old story versus new story; Rethinking justice; Dogmatic meaninglessness; Defining the core of ultimate reality (some theological musing); Noble savage mythology; Authentic liberalism- its all about freedom; Alleviating irresponsible alarmism; Karma as payback myth.

Site Comment: Section Two

The foundational error in human thought- that there are punishing, violent forces or spirits behind life; A potent response to the original pathology- the discovery of absolutely no conditions love; List of Topics; Challenging the Greek view that retribution is at the core of reality; Main indicators of the true state of life- the status of forests, fisheries, soil, species; Confronting alarmism with hope based on the best available evidence; The problem of conditional religion; Top Ten Bad Religious Ideas; Theism/Atheism debate; A model of religion and violence; Countering the holiness distortion in Western theology; Inoculate children against religious pathology; Garcia on Alpha God and animal-like subservience; Pessimism as mental masturbation; Moore- Celebrate CO2.

Site Comment: Section Three

Violence- Getting ultimate inspiration and validation from bad religious ideas; Bad ideas promoting bad behavior; Christianity and violence in the Western tradition; Jewish Christianity shapes Islam; The great Contradiction- the unconditional theology of Historical Jesus contrasted with the supremely conditional theology of Paul/Christianity (or non-retaliation versus retaliation); The great scandal at the heart of Christianity; Chronology of the contradiction; James Robinson quotes on the contradiction.

Site Comment: Section Four

Disorienting historical evidence- Richard Landes on Christian apocalyptic shaping mass-death movements, Marxism and Nazism; Bad religious ideas; Zenon Lotufo quotes (Cruel God, Kind God- violence in God as psychopathic); Nelson-Pallmeyer (Is Religion Killing Us?); Ellens (The Destructive Power of Religion); Discussion group comment.

Site Comment: Section Five

Roots of apocalyptic/alarmist thinking; A thought breakthrough; Grand narrative core themes (humanizing worldviews); The futility of reforming religion (the stunning contrast between the unconditional teaching of Jesus and the conditional atonement of Paul); Standing up to bully gods- the monsters of the metaphysical; History’s greatest terrorist- the pathology of violence in God.

Site Comment: Section Six

A brief history of punishment; Tackling Paul; Ethics and theology contrasted- Jesus versus Paul; Maccoby on Paul inventing his Christ myth; Paul’s great reversal/retreat from Jesus; Eliminating Zoroastrian dualism; Solving the root causes of violence; The wonder of being human; The most potent force against evil; CO2 or natural variation?; Secularized mythology- apocalyptic in modern ideology.

Site Comment: Section Seven

The problem of deity- defining and describing God; Punishment thinking; Reason for this page- leaving conditional religion for unconditional freedom; I am a dreamer (my list of greatest things); Unconditional as the cohering theme of Historical Jesus; Dating the New Testament books (watching the great contradiction unfold); Mandela’s example; Unconditional is impractical?; Unconditional and the use of force- advice of the Chinese sage; Brinsmead on non-retaliation in relationships; Humanity’s greatest mistake.

Site Comment: Section Eight

Humanity’s greatest discovery; Post to Jesus Seminar Fellows; Grand narrative context; Paul’s dominant themes; The benefits of blasphemy; Two grand narratives of the cosmos, life, and humanity; The Ultimate Resource- Julian Simon; Stephen Pinker on the decline of violence over history; Remembering Nelson Mandela; Environmentalist/Environmentalism; The ultimate insight; The Mennonite solution- Lipstick on a pig.

Site Comment: Section Nine

Unconditional goodness; Big picture approach; No Hell beneath us; Climate change alarmism; Decline or Rise- What is the actual trajectory of life?; Nothing to fear behind life; Retaliation/non-retaliation; The apocalyptic error and the real nature of life as unconditional; Creating divine monsters; Excerpts from Near-Death Experiences (unconditional love at the core of reality); The historical trend from retaliation to the unconditional treatment of all (leaving animal existence to engage human existence); Entirely opposite: Jesus versus Paul, An unconditional TOE; Depression and bad theology.

Site Comment: Section Ten

Dense complexity (causes of violence); Mimetic Mennonites; Ellen’s Destructive Power of Religion; It all gets better; History’s greatest liberation movement; Celebrating more CO2; Hitchens on violence; The longing for perfection; Brinsmead on imperfection; God as psychopath; The pathology in Western religion; Zenon Lotufo quotes (the psychopath behind atonement theology- finding satisfaction in the suffering of others); review of Armstrong’s Fields of Blood, Love and freedom- understanding suffering.

Terror in Mumbai

Fareed Zakaria narrates the CNN documentary ‘Terror in Mumbai’ on the attacks that killed 170 people there in 2008. The documentary includes taped telephone conversations between the man in Pakistan controlling the shooters, and the shooter’s responses to the controller. In the back and forth between the controller and the shooters, note the repeated appeal to God.

Some examples:

The controller encouraged his protégés to start killing, stating, “This is a struggle between Islam and unbelievers… God chose you to kill unbelievers”.

The controller repeatedly appealed to the promise of heaven if his shooters would kill unbelievers, “You must kill people in order to get your reward in heaven… (then as the death toll mounted and the shooters faced death themselves)…you are close to heaven”.

The controller insisted that God was assisting the shooters with success, “With God’s blessing you’ve done a great job”.

After one of the shooters was killed by police, either the controller or another shooter said, “May God accept his martyrdom”.

The controller at another point affirmed to the shooters, “God is waiting for you in heaven”.

When the shooters were hesitant about killing hostages, the controller impatiently urged, “Do it in God’s name”. Then as the shooters continued to kill, the controller encouraged them with, “Praise God. God keep you”.

As one of the shooters, already wounded, faced his own death, he told the controller, “May God accept my martyrdom”.

And so it went, a violent episode of mass murder, drenched in God-talk and appeal to God. Much like the Christian Crusaders of previous millennia appealed to God (i.e. seeking God’s blessing, thanking God) as they slaughtered Jews and Muslims.

If you want to win the war on terror then, among other things, you must confront and correct the pathological theology at the heart of this madness. And recognize that you are not dealing with some aberrational theology that is just unique to the terrorists. You are dealing with a core element in the foundational theology of all Western religion- violence in the ultimate ideal and authority of deity.

Religiously inspired terrorism is not just an Islamic problem. The inciting idea of violent deity goes back to the very beginning of human mythology/religion. And this core bad religious idea has long dominated Western thought, producing an endless “river of blood” in all three Western religions. The idea of violent deity descended from Zoroastrianism to Judaism, to Christianity, and then to Islam. It is a direct line of succession to the religious violence of today. And Christianity bears major responsibility for bringing this Master Terrorist into Western consciousness.

If you are going to deal thoroughly and fundamentally with violence, then you must purge this worst of all bad ideas (the divine ideal of vengeful violence) from human systems of thought. This is what the “humanization” project on this site is all about. Slay the real beast, the Master Terrorist behind human terrorism.

Ancient Alarmism

Pre-historian John Pfieffer (Explosion: An Inquiry Into the Origins of Art and Religion) suggests that fear was central to the earliest religion. He claims that the ancients used religious forms of fear-mongering (early alarmism) to control people. He states that early people painted drawings on cave walls deep within the earth, some 25,000 years ago, partly so the darkness would disorient people. Further, it was “anamorphic art”- drawings that appeared to move in flickering candle-light. More to scare people. Also, the shaman claimed special knowledge of the “invisible” realm, and could use their claimed knowledge of religious secrets to manipulate others. Add here that sacrifice- appeasing, placating threatening deities- has also been discovered far back in prehistory…. A variety of facts that suggest the early use of fear or alarm in relation to religion. It appears that religion may have begun, among other reasons, as an early social institution to create fear and to enable early elites- shaman, priests- to control others. Some information to ponder.

Further note on religious alarmism: Much alarmism is based on the primitive mentality that you have to threaten and scare people in order to get them to behave properly. The discipline of psychology has largely rejected this thinking because research shows that most people respond better to affirmative or restorative approaches, and not to punitive approaches. See detail below, e.g. Australian Psychology Association paper.

Calming Religious Concerns

This site is not anti-religion. I am not advocating that people leave their religious traditions. And I am carefully affirming all reformation of religion, all endeavor to make religion more moderate, inclusive, and peaceful.

But as you try to reform any religion, be fully aware of what you are doing if you decide to preserve the larger context/framework of religious beliefs. Too much reformation of religion retains the core mythical ideas- concepts such as corrupted humanity deserves punishment, atonement (required payment for sin, appeasement of angry deity), or gods as punitive, judgmental, retaliatory, and destructive. These features only cloud and bury the better ideals of a religious tradition.

Any reform of religion must critically evaluate all “bad ideas” and understand how such ideas influence the better elements of the tradition. The influence of bad ideas is about weakening, undermining, distorting, and even burying the more humane ideals that people are trying to promote via religion.

My argument is that you need to fully humanize religion, especially the core ideal of deity.

We understand what is authentically humane today. We know better. And take the Historical Jesus seriously when he says, “Do not put new wine into old rotten wineskins”. And take seriously his central breakthrough insight- that there is no Threat behind life, but only an inexpressible Love.

Sorting out the issue of religious violence

It is as simple as the basic human discernment between good and bad. Most of the rest of human thought and life has had to face this project of separating the bad from the good, and then abandoning the agreed-upon bad. Unfortunately, some serious bad stuff was long ago placed in the realm of the sacred and since then humanity has had a hard time questioning that religious bad. Religious people, in particular, have had a difficult time re-evaluating, questioning, purging, and then abandoning the nastier elements of their systems. The result has been cognitive dissonance in religious minds- the felt obligation to maintain or merge a mixture of severely contradicting bad and good ideas in one system of belief.

The ongoing protection of bad religious ideas has now become inexcusable as the general human understanding of bad and good has progressed further and further. Religion must now do the same as all other areas of life- quit defending what is clearly pathological just because it has long been considered sacred. Things like violence in deity are no longer defensible in any common sense manner. So also, apply this discernment between good and bad to atonement theology which is plainly the belief in human sacrifice as payment for human imperfection. This barbaric belief in blood sacrifice to appease gods was long ago abandoned by most rational people.

Religious traditions must also engage the project of distinguishing bad from good, and then purge the bad. This is what it means to humanize all of thought and life.

Added note: For the health of Western consciousness, it is critical that we overcome the cognitive dissonance- the great contradiction- of good and bad at the heart of Christianity. You cannot merge in any common sense manner the belief that “God is love” with the belief that “God will punish and destroy unbelievers in Hell”. Both are ultimate statements of opposite extremes at the core of Christian belief. The expression of ultimate love in deity, and the expression of ultimate hate in the myth of Hell. The myth of a threatening, punishing God perverts entirely the ideal of ultimate love. To attribute such hate to a God of love is to defile the ideal of deity entirely. It certainly defiles and distorts the ideal of love.

Hell no

There is no greater statement of hatred toward another human being than to claim that they are going to Hell, to be rejected by their Creator, punished, and tortured forever in fire. This barbaric belief in Hell involves the related belief in primitive tribal dualism, that the human family is divided into factions of true believers set in opposition against unbelievers. And the unbelievers deserve condemnation and punishment. It also involves the belief that violence is required to deal with the unbelievers. Add to this the belief that unbelievers are a dangerous threat to the true religion- i.e. the requirement to aggressively protect oneself against a threatening enemy, the sense of victimhood.

It is a small step then to feel that you must send the unbelievers on their way to their fate by killing them in the name of your God. If your God hates others that much then surely you will find favor with your God if you help to finish the enemy off, to remove “the dangerous threat”.

Look at the holy books of all three Western faiths and note how densely repetitious this note of hatred actually is- verses on angry deity, threats of rejection, punishment, destruction, violence, Hell. Count the verses. Others have counted them, and they number in the multiple hundreds for each holy book. For instance, 1214 verses advocate cruelty or violence out of a total of 31173 verses in the Bible; 527 verses advocate cruelty or violence out of a total of 6236 verses in the Quran. See ‘Dwindling in Unbelief’ site, among others.

And sure, there are many other verses advocating mercy, love, forgiveness, and other human ideals. But these better themes are often overwhelmed, distorted, and buried by the nastier stuff.

Religions of peace and love? You tell me.

Added note to “Calming fears”…

Most Christians do just as Thomas Jefferson did and differentiate between the sublime moral teachings of Jesus and the other inferior material in the gospels. More generally, they pick and choose between the good stuff in their Bibles, and the nastier stuff. They may not act as blatantly as Jefferson did and actually cut out the bad stuff from their holy book, keeping only the good material in a much reduced booklet- i.e. Jefferson’s personal gospel that was published in his day.

Instead, many Christians will just ignore the darker stuff and focus more on the better material. For instance, they no longer heed the Old Testament commands to stone disobedient children or put adulterers to death. And they do not demand that women cover their heads or be silent in church. They do not push women to submit to their husbands, and they certainly do not advocate that slaves should be subject to masters, a command from Paul.

Added Note: Due to the common human spirit and common human consciousness, people have an amazing capacity to find the human thing in all sorts of less-than-human contexts, a capacity to hold on to the more human elements. Despite larger inhumane and distorting contexts. But the question remains- Why do that? Why not just start with the authentically human and create entirely new contexts without the distorting and dehumanizing features of the old religious frameworks? Why not create new wineskins for the new wine?

Disorienting

It is difficult, even disorienting, for the religious mind to embrace, but there is one foundational idea behind religious violence that has incited and validated more harm over history than any other idea. It is the idea of a violent God, a God that employs violence to solve problems.

Many religious people believe that God punishes people with violence in natural disaster, accident, disease, war and death. They believe that God demands violent sacrifice as payment for human imperfection. For instance, the New Testament teaches that “without the shedding of blood, there is no forgiveness of sin” (Hebrews 9:25). Religious people also believe that God threatens to end the world with a violent destruction of humanity in an apocalypse. And that God promises unbelievers will suffer eternal violence in Hell.

The religious ideal of violent deity has been the foundational belief in Western religion. It is the single worst idea ever conceived, and it has long been protected as sacred and unquestionable in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. And adding insult to injury, people who refuse to believe this ideal of divine violence are subject to condemnation as heretics and are threatened with eternal punishment.

If we are ever going to properly solve the curse of human violence then we must purge all deity of any trace of violence. We must fully humanize the ultimate ideal and authority of humanity- God.

This site exists to counter this religious pathology with the greatest human insight ever- that absolutely no conditions love defines ultimate reality. This discovery takes human consciousness to the height of the authentically humane. It liberates consciousness entirely from the darkening, enslaving influence of divine violence.

It stands on its own (or Who needs Jesus?)

Even if Jesus had never existed, or if he had never taught the unconditional treatment of all people, unconditional would still stand on its own as the most humane ideal ever conceived. It would have eventually emerged somewhere as our ultimate ideal, the ultimate definition of authentic humanity. It is true in itself, not because some religious authority figure taught it. It stands on its own as the highest form of love. It needs no validating authority from anyone. And because it is the highest expression of authentic humanity, it is the most true and the most real thing that we can imagine.

Qualifiers to no conditions love

Below are some responses to the common complaints that an unconditional ethic is a “weak response to evil”, that it will result in chaos, that it is not a robust enough form of justice (i.e. the felt need for justice as payback punishment), and so on. Further to this, note the comment of Bob Brinsmead below that the most severe punishment that any person can endure is the self-judgment/self-punishment for the inhuman deeds that they commit.

Responses to complaints

Everyone without exception is safe, ultimately. This does not deny the fact that life will offer up sickness, disaster, accident, and the cruelty of others. Bad things happen even to good people. And there will always be an element of mystery to evil and suffering. “Natural consequences” also helps explain much human suffering.

Everyone without exception is equal by virtue of being human and possessing human consciousness. Every human being is an equal member of the one united human family. But this does not then mean equality of outcomes in life. Differing inputs produce differing outputs. And there is, for example, a legitimate difference between such things as good forms of economic inequality and bad forms of economic inequality. For helpful explanation of this issue see William Watson’s new book “The Inequality Trap: Fighting Capitalism instead of poverty”.

Everyone without exception deserves unconditional treatment from others but we all live with the natural consequences of our words and actions. For instance, people who do not control their worst impulses- e.g. violent assault- must be restrained by others in order to protect innocent victims. So we have prisons for repetitively violent people and we employ military force to stop terrorists and protect the innocent. Unconditional love embraces common sense and is not dogmatically pacifist.

But these and other qualifiers do not lessen the wonder of absolutely no conditions love at the core of reality and life. They do not lessen the fact that everyone, both decent and inhumane, deserves unconditional treatment.

And as Bob Brinsmead argues, there is no worse punishment than the self-judgment for wrong deeds committed. Bad acts that are committed, will punish the one who does wrong with personal guilt, shame, and regret. To realize that one has “wasted” too much of one’s life acting inhumanely is the greatest regret of all. Self-punishment for the failure to live as human, at any level, is the worst form of punishment. So also, reward is experienced in good behavior (i.e. the satisfaction from acting as truly human).

But unconditional at the core of reality means no ultimate threat of punishment.

Muhammad affirms Jewish/Christian influence (Again, see Joseph Azzi’s The Priest and The Prophet)

Muhammad does not deny the Jewish/Christian influence on his religion. In the Quran he repeatedly refers to “the previous books, or gospel”. His argument, of course, is that Islam fulfills and completes the previous teaching. But he admits that he does embrace that teaching (i.e. the Jewish Christian strain of early Christian thought- monotheistic, not Trinitarian, among other adopted Jewish/Christian themes).

The real battle against terror

The real battle against terror takes place inside each of us. I am talking about our personal impulses to vengeance, exclusion, domination, opposition to some “enemy”, and destruction of our enemies. These impulses arise from our animal inheritance, or core animal brain. We all have to struggle to overcome these base impulses, and to encourage the expression of the unconditional human spirit in our unique personal story. This is our greatest personal contribution to the overall battle against violence and terror. Our only real enemy is the animal inside each of us. Unfortunately, the animal has long been incited and validated by religious myths of vengeance, punishment, exclusion, and violent destruction.

One of the central lines of comment on this page: To properly solve the problem of violence/terrorism for the long-term we need to radically humanize our ideas of deity, purging this ideal of all elements of violence. Any “reform of religion”, or endeavor to moderate religion, must engage this core issue. Violent gods have incited or validated human violence endlessly across history, and violence in God remains deeply embedded as the foundational idea in the great Western religions of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Consequently, this ideal continues to work its damaging influence on human consciousness and life. Detail below. Further, the belief in God has always served as humanity’s highest ideal and authority, the supreme model for human life (note, for instance, comment below on research of anthropologist Clifford Geertz).

Further Intro: This site is a project to bring down humanity’s greatest monster- the myth of ultimate Threat, as in religious myths of divine vengeance, exclusion, condemnation/judgment, punishment, or violent destruction. This site offers a humane alternative to define ultimate reality, something non-religious, but also non-materialist- i.e. as in “philosophical materialism”. We can do much better than the traditional explanations of dogmatic religion or dogmatic atheism.

Further: It is unquestionably the most radical re-orientation of human thought ever- the shift from viewing retribution at the core of reality- the Greek view- to understanding that non-retaliation, or no conditions love, defines the core of reality. The shift to non-retaliation, or a core love, is the outcome of insights such as the stunning new theology of Q Sayings Jesus- “the secular sage”- someone entirely opposite to the Christian Jesus.

The expression of unconditional in the Historical Jesus breakthrough of Matthew 5:38-48 is the first ever statement of authentic universalism, the first ever expression of the genuinely humane inclusion of all, and the first clear expression of the full equality of all people. I emphasize that his unconditional breakthrough was “the first ever” because he was the first person in history to get the ethical/theological linkage right. He argued that people should love their enemies because God loved enemies- humane behavior based on humane belief. Unfortunately, even though his breakthrough was included in the gospels of Matthew and Luke, Paul had previously rejected and buried that breakthrough in the highly conditional theology of Christian payback atonement (detail below). Paul’s letters to the Thessalonians are the earliest Christian writings, at least in the version of Christianity that we inherited.

More: Unconditional is the ultimate humanization of the ideals of mercy, kindness, compassion, forgiveness, generosity, inclusion, and love. Unconditional takes these ideals to new heights of authentically humane meaning and expression. It lifts these features out of the stingy realm of limited payback thinking. It therefore fully liberates human consciousness from the retribution orientation of our animal past as nothing ever before. The common tendency is to limit these ideals with payback qualifiers and conditions. Most religious thought does this. We all share the tendency to be somewhat harsh and stingy toward others and their failings, especially toward outsiders to our groups- i.e. the animal-like tribal orientation to “us versus our enemies” thinking. Note the origins of tribal dualism in animal reality and then the subsequent religious validation of that tribal dualism- true believers versus unbelievers.

Qualifier: Unconditional forgiveness and mercy is not a call for some form of mushy feel-good hugginess toward evil. Unconditional can embrace the present imperfect human condition; it can even embrace rage at cruelty and violent inhumanity. But it recognizes that there is a greater reality behind all, where all is swallowed up in an incomprehensible love, including even the worst failures in the human family.

More: This site is about the great mythical/religious themes of human history, themes now revised and absorbed into secular systems of thought. I am interested in the impacts of these themes on human consciousness and life. Hence my focus especially on the impact of “bad religious ideas” that represent the very highest of traditional human ideals and authorities. And I give an intense focus to “the worst of all bad ideas” ever conceived by humanity- that of punitive, violent deity. The Monster of the metaphysical. This site exists to slay that greatest-ever monster.

One more: I have combed through human thought and literature across history and I have not found any more humane insights than the following two, noted just below. These are by far the most robust responses to the worst pathology of the past- i.e. the myth of some great Threat behind reality and life that will punish human imperfection, whether the angry God of religious belief or the vengeful Gaia of more secular belief systems. I refer- one- to the discovery that there is “absolutely no conditions Love” at the core of reality, and- two- the equally important discovery that the essence of the human spirit and human consciousness- the authentic human self that is each of us- is that very same Love. We are inseparably one with That Love. Despite our experience of suffering with imperfection in this life.

A mindfulness suggestion: If we embrace the reality that our essential self is love, it would transform life for the better as nothing else ever has. It would grant a new laser focus to the meaning and purpose of human life- as existing to learn and express something of the love that is our essence. And it will transform human self-image away from “fallen humanity mythology” to a more healthy valuation based on the wonder of being human.

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