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Posted by dsego 10 hours ago

Early Christian Writings(earlychristianwritings.com)
154 points | 100 commentspage 2
ArchieScrivener 7 hours ago|
Who cares? It. Is. Not. Real. Time to stop coddling religion. All religion is politics and all politics require force to power. Stop caring about nonsense.
WarOnPrivacy 7 hours ago||
> Who cares? It. Is. Not. Real.

Early Christian writings are real.

> All religion is politics and all politics require force to power.

Politics in religion - this is how we know those adherents have lost their way.

johnjames87 9 hours ago||
[dead]
mortoc 9 hours ago|
Why is this being presented to the HN community?
tptacek 9 hours ago||
Because it's interesting as hell. I'm Catholic, and clicking around in here there's practically nothing religious in it to me at all. No part of my own faith engages with Celsus Description of the Ophite Diagrams. But it sounds like something out of a Clive Barker book --- and, behold, it is like something out of a Clive Barker book:

    He is the Demiurge of this world, the God of Moses described in his creation    
    narrative. Of the Seven archontic demons, the first is lion-shaped; the second 
    is a bull; the third is amphibious and hisses horribly; the fourth is in the 
    form of an eagle ; the fifth has the appearance of a bear, the sixth, that of 
    a dog ; and the seventh, that of an ass named Thaphabaoth or Onoel.
This is like a weird parallel of Greek mythology. But it's got a little extra charge because it ostensibly plugs into a modern religion. Super fascinating.
bossyTeacher 7 hours ago||
Can I ask why do you identify as "Catholic" and not as "Christian"? I have seen that a few times and it does seem like attempt from you to essentially state that you are making your own religion. How much splintering off can you do and still call yourself Christian?

I am asking this in a purely curious way, btw!

siliconpotato 1 hour ago|||
I often experience this. I saw that a co worker had written something about God in their Twitter bio. "Are you a Christian?" "I'm a Catholic" they replied. Any other denomination would say "yes I'm a Christian" (there are no denominations in heaven, nor was there in the early church).

To understand this behaviour, it should be known that Catholics have introduced man made rules that they have additionally decided are not up for discussion (infallible) even if the Bible appears to say otherwise. Catholics teach that there is no salvation outside the church. By definition, this makes sense - the church is by definition a body of people who belong to Christ. However what the catholics actually mean is "the Roman Catholic church". Whether your average Catholic realises this or not it's debatable, but the common clarification "I'm a Catholic" is because they have absorbed a corrupt teaching that only catholics can be saved. Read this and the linked article at the bottom https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/is-there-re...

tptacek 50 minutes ago||
I was never taught anything like this and am "Catholic" rather than "Episcopalian" the same way a Baptist isn't "Episcopalian".

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ANNX_XiuA78

f30e3dfed1c9 2 hours ago||||
Can't speak for anyone else, but it is not unusual (nor new) for someone to describe themselves as "Catholic." Briefly, they usually mean that they are a member of the Roman Catholic Church. Wikipedia will provide a great deal of reading about it.

Neither is it unusual for someone to describe themselves as a particular Protestant denomination: Lutheran, Baptist, Methodist, Presbyterian, Episcopalian, et al. Again, Wikipedia is a good starting place.

People who simply describe themselves as "Christian" are what, in my experience at least, is relatively new. Going back, say, fifty years, it was somewhat unusual in many parts of the US to find people who described themselves that way.

In my experience, most of these people belong to one or another of what might be called non-denominational Christian churches. My preferred term for many of them is "contemporary American fundamentalist Christian," but that is not a widely used term, at least not that I know of.

Your question is strange enough that I'm honestly not sure whether or not you're trolling. If you are, as it seems you might be, a member of a contemporary American non-denominational Christian church, it is very weird, whether you know it or not, to suggest that a church that has existed for roughly two thousand years and has many more than a billion members wordwide is "splintering off" and "making [its] own religion."

tptacek 7 hours ago||||
That's weird to me because most Catholic people I know (Chicago is a very Catholic city) would identify themselves as "Catholic", not as "Christian". If you ask us "are you Christian", we'll say "yes", but it's not the word we use.

Maybe that's totally different for evangelicals or some other mainline denomination. I wouldn't know.

zozbot234 7 hours ago||
"Catholic" is just a Greek word that means "general, universal", derived from "kata holou" ("in accordance with the whole"). It's the opposite of a splintering off, though there is a viable argument that they splintered off of Orthodox Christianity (due originally to the filioque controversy, and arguably with broader differences relating e.g. to the worship of graven images, and the like).
tptacek 7 hours ago||
Right, I was taught that in 4th grade by the nuns.

What I was not taught was the archontic ass-demon Thaphabaoth.

kasey_junk 5 hours ago||
Standards have dropped.
_DeadFred_ 6 hours ago|||
Edit: Nevermind apparently this is incorrect. This is just my take from trying to understand why we were Catholic and not Christian, and then avoiding being mistaken for 'Christian' later in life and not clarifying and staying in my lane. But I guess there is something else I don't understand going on.

'Christians' in the US don't consider Catholics 'Christians' (using quotes to show it's a group identifier based not solely on following Christs teachings). They (Christians) are also the newer splinter group. So Catholics have taken to identifying themselves as Catholics to 'stay in their lane' or to self identify to the 'Christians' that they aren't part of the accepted/in group. Catholics were lower status historically, look at the talk around Kennedy. Also Christians might not want to be friendly with Catholics but they would with Christians, so you out yourself as Catholic from the start to avoid that bullshit (so back to 'stay in your lane').

The two have very different approaches to religion, with Catholics following the 'love they neighbor' 'care for the poor' live Jesus' teachings and Christians building mega churches and following prosperity gospel. Or most upsetting to my grandma, the Christian holy roller stuff. Or more upsetting to the Christians Mother Mary in the Catholic church.

When I was a kid there was also a huge racial element. WASPs versus Catholic congregations made up of Italians, Irish, Filipinos, Latin Americans, Middle Easterners and Germans.

But from my experience it's largely the 'stay in your lane' thing. I've had people be friendly with me because since I was christian they assumed I was Christian christian, and when they found out I was Catholic they stopped talking to me (past tense as I'm not really religious).

tptacek 6 hours ago||
I don't think any of this is really true? If I was Lutheran, I assume I'd just describe myself as "Lutheran".

This whole subthread is pretty weird. There's no deeper meaning to my describing myself as "Catholic". It's how any Catholic would describe themselves.

trash88 9 hours ago|||
This is not an online bible, it's an archive of the surviving material from a movement that has had unimaginable reach and impact on the world we live. You can see first hand how diverse their thelogy was prior to canon and orthodox enclosure.
gespadas 9 hours ago|||
Why not? It's a wonderful summary of writings. I'm so glad I found this resource on HN.
nephihaha 9 hours ago||
As I said there, I've used this particular website many times. It's a great historical resource in some ways.
qarl 9 hours ago|||
Why not? They're nice stories. People like stories, even if they're entirely made up.

I guess maybe it does feel a bit like gross proselytizing. Hm.

DennisP 9 hours ago||
The link includes all sorts of stuff that modern Christians generally consider heretical, so I don't think it's proselytizing.

Most people underestimate the diversity of beliefs in early Christianity. A lot of that was violently suppressed by Constantine, to the point that some of it was only dug up in the last century.

qarl 8 hours ago||
Please. Spare me.

This is about as appropriate as putting compiler optimization notes in your church flyer.

The only people who are saying "This is so interesting" are Jesus freaks trying to spread their mind virus.

kokanator 8 hours ago|||
Or perhaps those who are saying otherwise are trying to spread their own mind virus.

It is interesting how derisive your comment is compared to those who are in support of interesting and diverging content.

I am, however a bit confused by your comment as I have read several posts this week that had absolutely nothing to do with software/technology and most interestingly only two having to do anything with a compiler. Are you saying we should only post about compilers.

I am waiting to be enlightened by your list of acceptable topics and content.

qarl 8 hours ago||
Well, actually, my culture doesn't program me to "bear witness", so no.

I mean, you guys don't even try to hide it.

DennisP 1 hour ago||||
If you think the Jesus freaks want to propagate ancient gnostic texts, then you really don't know your Jesus freaks.
kokanator 8 hours ago||||
@qarl but you ARE bearing witness. The beliefs you have accepted or you believe you have chosen has compelled you to bear witness here.
qarl 8 hours ago||
You're a riot. Thank you for assisting me in proving my point.
krapp 8 hours ago|||
I am absolutely not a Jesus freak and I find it interesting because I find ancient culture, sociology and mythology interesting.

But I do get where you're coming from. Whenever a topic like this comes up a Christian will inevitably show up to proselytize (it should be considered a corollary to Godwin's Law.)

qarl 8 hours ago||
Yes, I agree, it's entirely possible to find random links interesting. That does not mean they are related to "hacker news".

The only reason these stories get upvoted is because of that audience you mentioned.

krapp 7 hours ago||
Don't make me tap the sign:

    On-Topic: Anything that good hackers would find interesting. That includes more than hacking and startups. If you had to reduce it to a sentence, the answer might be: anything that gratifies one's intellectual curiosity. 
This satisfies people's intellectual curiosity, therefore it's "Hacker News."
nephihaha 9 hours ago|||
Why not? I have been on this particular website quite a few times, but there have been other pages linked on here which I haven't been to so much. It's good to have a variety of interests. I am getting a broader range of websites and articles off here than mainstream media.
SilverElfin 9 hours ago||
Are there other such archives for other religions or cultures?
irishcoffee 8 hours ago|||
Are you looking for a yes/no answer, or for someone else to do the legwork for you?

I'll save you some time, the answer to you question is unequivocally: no. There are no other such archives for other religions or cultures. Just this one website.

See how silly that sounds?

SanjayMehta 8 hours ago|||
Dharmapedia

https://en.dharmapedia.net

There's the sacred texts archive.

https://sacred-texts.com/index.htm

misiti3780 9 hours ago||
I, also frequent this sight to avoid religious dogma.
BigTTYGothGF 9 hours ago|||
Considering how often, say, lesswrong.com gets posted that may have been unwise.
DiggyJohnson 9 hours ago|||
That’s not a reason to visit this site.

One of the current top 100 posts relates to western religion. It’s easy to avoid if uninterested. I enjoy that every now and then we have an ancient history, archeology, theology, literature, futurism or etc. post make the front page.