Posted by x from ? (160.129.27.22) on Thursday, January 09, 2003 at 6:12PM :
In Reply to: The Many Faces Of Jesus posted by pancho from pool0658.cvx24-bradley.dialup.earthlink.net (209.179.212.148) on Thursday, January 09, 2003 at 4:28PM :
... that religion, since *at least* the time of the beginning of Judaism & perhaps even before that, has ALWAYS been used in politics... & in fact, one could also argue that religion *was* politics & vice versa in those ancient days.
Why did Abraham or Moses feel the urge to make up a new religion? Because they felt like it? Or because they needed it - a unifying religion that:
a.) didn't sound TOO different from that of the Egyptians (who had already developed the belief in one god) so that it was palatable to a conquered tribe residing in Egyptian territory & which crudely used Mesopotamian religious stories (perhaps indicating a Mesopotamian origin of that tribe of people), but
b.) which was different enough (having different one god) from their conquerors religion to distinguish that tribe from the Egyptian "others" who had conquered them? & perhaps this is also why circumsion of the males was started as a practice - a relatively harmless surgery performed at the beginning of life which would be a physical sign that this boy or man was of this tribe & not of another?
The modern day separation of church & state was also accomplished to meet political ends. & perhaps it's just a superficial separation, as some of us now see how much Bush's "religious" persuasion influences (to put it lightly) his political agenda.
-- x
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