A statue is not automatically an idol. The image is engraved on your heart - it means you are following something before God. The wood symbolism is from the symbolism of the ideal soul being like uncut wood.
Discussion
Yes it is. And since many worship a digital token and its 'creator', false idols abound.
That anyone givs a fuck proves my point. This is literally the least important thing to have happened in the past forever
I'll have to agree with Joel on that, Comte. The reason for it is because, despite the fact that anybody can make a statue, those statues are not supposed to be worshiped in the first place.
Not to mention that this is essentially taking the Mark of the Beast on the right hand by obeying Papal Rome's dictates, of which worshiping statues as Joel described is taking the mark on the right hand.
No one is worshipping it. Show me a picture of someone praying in front of it or leaving food for it. That's what people did/do with idols. The point of the second commandment is simply this : the map is not the territory.
Things that you think are real are not real, or at least not completely real. If you think they are, then everything around you is an idol. You're not inhabiting the real world - you're in your own mental model of the world, and that's only a map. A perfect map wouldn't be a map, it would just be the territory. Where is the map? Inside you. If you know its not the real world, then its only in your head ; but if you mistake **_things_** with reality, then the image of the things is engraved on your heart, and "you" are in the shape of the image. This is why Jesus says you're saved if you **_believe_** - believe what? Belief in Christ precludes a belief in the material world. You can't serve two masters. You can't go down both roads. Are you seeing what I'm saying? I feel like you could read or hear these words and not get it.
Statues can be idols, yes. But if you're so confused that you think a thing is a god, then you would have to already be confused about the entire experience of reality. To an idolater, a stapler is an idol, even if they don't know it. When you're hungry, for at least that moment food is your idol. When you're horny, for that moment sex is an idol. Your character, your behavior, your thoughts are all in the shape of the idol. The idol is "graven" because you are graven. You can have statues without it being idolatry.
Feels weird to see someone throwing around Less Wrong in a religious context.
I'm not sure I understand. But... The modern state of religion, including and perhaps especially Christianity, is the result of constant narrowing of definitions, to the point of absurdity and contradiction. IIRC Paul had some words about this, even in his early time. Some portion of your energy must always be dedicated to understanding the original meaning and pushing back against both accretions and the flattening of meaning that develop through the centuries of purity tests.
Less Wrong is a community that has tons of content about rationality. It is where I first came across the "map and territory" idea as a formalized concept.
It isn't written with the goal of being atheist content but atheism definitely leaks through.
Oh interesting. I'll search that in a sec. I first the "map and territory" concept from the podcast "simply bitcoin" and I had the impression that bitcoiners used this concept, which doesn't appear to be the case.
Anyways, I "got" bitcoin and religion at the same time. It was quite a shift. Idk which came first. Interesting tidbit I found in my religious delvings : the Romans criticized the Christians as "atheists" - on one level, that's because Christians rejected the Roman and pagan gods ("pagan" means "rural" and they were distinct from the Roman pantheon) ; but on another level, they were called atheists because of exactly the argument I wrote above - that is, rejecting the material world, rejecting assumptions, rejecting judgements, and instead assigning importance to "the most high," which is God, but that's very different than the "spiritual" experience that arises from placing importance on material circumstance. In other words, Christianity was necessarily a philosophy before it decayed/corrupted into a religion. I am quite convinced that ancient Christians had more in common with modern atheists than modern Christians. But don't get carried away - there would still be differences. The similarity is in the focus on understanding **_what's really going on,_** while the difference would be, again, rejecting the assumptions made by modern atheists. The OF atheists - the Christians - were better at the game.
Edits... my phone aggressively edits what I write into junk. I think its designed this way on purpose.
Agreed.
People stealing or vandalising some public property should not even be worth talking about outside of the local area it happened in.
A stolen statue isn't some global issue.
At this point it's just distracting people from WAY more important things
Wait, 'following something before God'? Thats the literal definition of false idol
