That's the way Sells. Don;t like Christianity? You must have been abused by priest! Because that's the most likely explanation isn't it? You would know.

Anyway, also I wonder why david doesn't mention the communists? could it be because this thread is not about them in the slightest? Their contribution to art wasn't very significant either as far I can tell.

Dear Sells,

I have not said anything about communism because your sanctimonious blather has been confined to Christianity.

Marxist theory owes much to Christianity. Marx became converted to Christianity at six and received a Lutheran education. He was a disciple of Hegel who saw history as occurring in stages. Apparently Hegel was influenced by Joachim of Fiore who history as a three stage process with the first stage , the stage of the father characterised by Edenic bliss, the next stage was the stage of the son exemplified by conflict and the final stage was the stage of the Holy Ghost. This was the Millennium which would go on for a thousand years. Hegel saw freedom as humans working in concert for a common goal rather than the democratic concept of people living together while making their individual choices. Hegel’s concept of freedom was consistent with the totalitarian state.

Hegel also thought of history in stages with Christianity the highest stage of religion and the Prussian state the highest form of the nation. The followers of Hegel split into the Left Hegelians under Marx and the Right Hegelians who were German nationalists.

Rather than people divided by states Marx saw people divided by class with the proletariat the class with the potential to lead humanity in to the Marxist millennium.

History as seen by Marx was a variant of history as seen by Joachim. There were three stages with primitive communism in a tribal culture in an economy of scarcity as the first stage, class conflict under capitalism as the second stage and advanced communism in an economy of plenty as the ultimate stage. The transition from the first to the second stage was effected by the original sin of capitalism. The transition from the second to the third stage would be effected by communist revolution. Thus Marx transformed the murderous nonsense of Christianity into the murderous nonsense of communism.

In the battlefields of eastern Europe during WW2 the Soviet descendents of the Left Hegelians fought it out with the Nazi descendents of the Right Hegelians.

david f,

I think why Islam has not the toll that Christianity has, is because it is the "new kid" on the block, some 800 years of so.

It certainly is catching up ... and this is the 21st century. It too, purports to be a religion of peace.

I believe one group are hell-bent on destroying the pyramids - pagan monuments ... yadah, yadah, yadah

Incidentally, my father and over fifty members of his family perished in the gas chambers, so I don't hold false allusions about any group.

Bugsy,

Indeed, I can't think (at this moment) of any art worth mentioning under the communist regime. Those dreadful posters ...

All this is very depressing. What a litany of hatred we human-beings as a species, are capable of - and seemingly compulsively so.

Just different hats ... and undoubtedly interchangeable.

Dear Sells,

Why ask about communism when the thread had nothing to do with communism? Is it your perception that a person critical of Christianity must be a communist?

Dear Danielle,

I don’t know the motives that drive artists. Some of them could well be magical or religious. The artists who produced the works in the Altamira caves could have been inspired by magical or religious motives. However, to assume those were the motives is questionable since we can no longer ask the artists. Those who ascribe motives to them are seeing them through the prism of their own worldviews.

Science does not seek to reveal the ultimate mysteries to us. In my opinion an ultimate mystery cannot be revealed. I don’t think it is possible to live in a world where there is no more to be revealed. If there is an ultimate mystery that means that, with the revelation of that mystery, there are no more mysteries.

Science tries to yield the best explanation for observed phenomena. That implies that an explanation that has an exception is no longer an explanation so a better explanation must be sought.

We really don’t want what the fall of Rome was due to. Lead in the pipes would not explain the decay in the many areas which had no plumbing.

From http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?term=dark+ages

any benighted time in history, period of ignorance; specific focus on the centuries from the fall of Rome to the revival of secular literature is from 1830s.

I regard the Dark Ages as starting from the adoption of Christianity as the official religion of Rome as learning not regarded as essential to Christian belief was suppressed and considered frivolous.

Until the fourteenth century Islamic universities were great places of learning. However, a movement of reactionary clergy succeeded in limiting ijtihad, the process of inquiry, to theological questions at that time.

At about the time the western world was emerging from their Dark Ages Islam was entering their Dark Ages.

Given the choice between Christianity and Islam I’d ask for another choice.

Dear david f

"Science does not seek to reveal the ultimate mysteries to us. In my opinion an ultimate mystery cannot be revealed. I don’t think it is possible to live in a world where there is no more to be revealed. If there is an ultimate mystery that means that, with the revelation of that mystery, there are no more mysteries."

You are absolutely right. I stand corrected.