Comments on: Would King Solomon have blogged erotica?

By: froylein

froylein — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:40:48 +0000

Would Muffti be having fun proving his biconditionals?

By: Grand Muffti

Grand Muffti — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:28:16 +0000

Are you having fun or engaging your commenters?

By: froylein

froylein — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 17:21:07 +0000

Well, Muffti probably knows that in the religious sphere neither Muffti nor I dwell in the accusation of having committed a sacrilege is a serious one, and since in that sphere sacrilege is a terminus technicus, I made my case accordingly. The dictionary entry Muffti quoted is apparently not taken from a theological dictionary; analogously, I will find references on e.g. “Stoic” and “logics” in a common language dictionary that have got only a very low common denominator with what those terms refer to in philosophy, and unless I’m severely mistaken about Muffti, I dare say he’d have a hell of a lot of fun in responding to people that use philosopical termini technici in a sloppy and inaccurate way particularly if those people try to base their argument on the sloppy and inaccurate use of those terms.

By: Grand Muffti

Grand Muffti — Sun, 14 Jun 2009 16:54:30 +0000

Muffti thinks it is safe to say that Lori was using it in the loose and popular way, not in the technical religious studies manner. The dictionary doens’t ‘clash’ with waht ou are saying but it doesn’t support it – it provides sufficient conditions for sacrilege that are less stringent than the ones you provide.

anyhow, this is as they say, much ado about nothing.

By: froylein

froylein — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 21:38:44 +0000

Taken from the Latin “sacerdos” = “priest”; adopted in early Christianity, but sacraments being genuinely Christian. Actually, the dictionary entry you quoted doesn’t clash with what I stated above, namely that “sacred” is a past participle referring to something that has been made sacred. Then the entry goes on defining the common usage (not so much modern usage, as the usage of “sacred” resp. “holy” as technical terms is just as modern) of “sacred”, but not its theological implications. “Sacred” and “holy” are two different matters even though the words get used synonymously in common usage, but in the field of theology / religious studies, you have to use those terms more accurately than in a common usage way. If people want me to take matters more serious, I will.

By: Grand Muffti

Grand Muffti — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 21:04:18 +0000

Fair enough, Froylein, though Muffti will point out that modern usage does not connect sacred with any particular origin on the property:

Main Entry: sa·cred
Pronunciation: ’sA-kr&d
Function: adjective
Etymology: Middle English, from past participle of sacren to consecrate, from Anglo-French sacrer, from Latin sacrare, from sacr-, sacer sacred; akin to Latin sancire to make sacred, Hittite saklAi- rite
1 a : dedicated or set apart for the service or worship of a deity b : devoted exclusively to one service or use (as of a person or purpose)
2 a : worthy of religious veneration : HOLY b : entitled to reverence and respect
3 : of or relating to religion : not secular or profane
4 archaic : ACCURSED
5 a : UNASSAILABLE, INVIOLABLE b : highly valued and important – a sacred responsibility.

By: froylein

froylein — Sat, 13 Jun 2009 04:03:49 +0000

Sacred has lost it’s active voice; things are made sacred through sacraments, which don’t exist in Judaism. Holiness is inherent, so to speak, to the person or object in question, but like sacredness it is not originated by the person that is sacred / holy. So just because people are sloppy at choosing their words does not make their words and the theologies they deduce from those any more proper; this may all be good and nice on a layman’s level, but since I got reprimanded for (alleged) joking, I’ve taken matters to a more serious level applying some basic theological knowledge, which I assumed all of our readers possessed. So there’s holiness but not sacredness in Judaism, but the concept of holiness also is way more restricted in Judaism. A tzadik is a righteous / just person, the Commandments are holy because they are believed to have been given by god, and that was extended onto the entire Torah later on when it got codified around 200 BCE. The Song of Solomon on the other hand has never been doubted to have been authored by a man sharing his reflection on some matter or another; when more than one thousand years after it was written, rabbis were confronted with the accusation that the Song of Songs was just a piece of filthy erotica (one of the main reasons why pornographic habits established as an anti-Semitic prejudice early on) – Judaism had so far not had any issues with erotica – they came up with the allegorical interpretation. Anyone who has read the text and has tried to understand what the respective expressions imply and how they would be expressed in today’s language would find such an interpretation rather absurd. The speaker allegedly being god even gets into a physical description of himself! That, as Solomon would most certainly have known, would have been blasphemous had he really been talking about god. This is to just give one example of how the allegorical interpretation clashes with core beliefs of Judaism as stated in the Torah. So, in a nutshell, the rabbis either under the impression of Paulinic prudery and / or to save their brethren from prejudices, came up with an explanation for the meaning of the Song of Solomon. Probably they were hopeful it would work for the illiterate anti-Jewish masses. That this interpretation has become the norm among those that consider themselves the norma normans of religious Judaism today shows that either they have not read the text or that they are okay with blasphemy rather than the thought of erotic scripture.

Je t’aime… moi non plus.

By: Grand Muffti

Grand Muffti — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 22:50:56 +0000

Claiming tuna with custard was a sacrilege would be very strange – since, by the definition, either tuna or custard would have to at minimum be holy – but perhaps not impossible to imagine that some group finds that to be plausible. Muffti’s point was so long as there are sacred things in Judaism, there can be sacrilege. Maybe it’s not so bad from a jewish point of view but that doesn’t mean it can’t happen.

By: froylein

froylein — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 21:01:20 +0000

Common use for sure, just as I could claim tuna with custard was a sacrilege, but in the terms of religious studies – the context making it such if really considered in all sincerity and seriousness – it’s a Christian concept that clashes with the Jewish concept of creation and men’s role therein (and in its detailed varieties has been a hot topic of controversy among Christian theologians for centuries already). Still, I wouldn’t eat tuna with custard.

Terminus technicus, Muffti.

By: Grand Muffti

Grand Muffti — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 20:36:21 +0000

According to the dictionary:

sac·ri·lege (skr-lj)
n.
Desecration, profanation, misuse, or theft of something sacred.

(thefreediction...)

That’s the common use, Froylein, and just because it comes from the Christians doesn’t mean it’s now a christian concept (this is often referred to as the ‘genetic’ fallacy).

Nonetheless, Lori, lighten up! Jeez…