Zeitgeist Reaction
Monday, January 12, 2009
A Lutheran student in the UK recently brought this to my attention, although I had heard much contained within this video before.
Here is the link: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-594683847743189197 (ZeitgeistI)
I don’t think I could actually recommend someone watch it, but it exists whether you watch it or not. It is the ‘spirit of the times’ (Zeitgeist).
I watched it. What I usually don’t hear too often is a denial that Jesus never existed, that everything was made up--because there were other similar stories to Jesus’ life (someone in Egyptian mythology, e.g., was born on 25 December, did miracles, died, and was resurrected). That’s a bold statement!
The video I watched connected this anti-religious view to an anti-authoritarian view. The video’s message was that those in authority are not to be trusted; people should think for themselves. Specifically 9/11 and the US Federal Reserve were brought up. I remember hearing some of the same statements about the Federal Reserve already in the seventies. The sixties must have been a significant change in the view of authority within both the US and the UK.
As with many statements, there is some good to them and some bad. The importance of things needs to be weighed. To do that a person needs an accurate tool of measurement. The video praised human thought, what a person thinks in the hear and now. Certainly this should be done, but certainly within limits.
Here are some final thoughts:
The video’s depiction of Christianity was unfair, but I shouldn’t have expected anything else. Society is unfair. God is often unfair. People are given a wide variety of things. These things are then usually taken away.
The video’s depiction of religion was accurate. All false religions have been made up by people in an effort to control others, in a desire for power. The fall into sin was also an uprising against God, an effort to take him out of the picture.
God has the power. Sometimes he gives it to some people. That’s called authority. He’s certainly the author of it all. That’s not a bad thing.
Christianity is something different than 'religion' though. The wonderful thing was that Jesus gave away his power on the cross as a sacrifice for sin. That’s a story you don’t hear of in legends or myths. Why would God die in the place of people? Why would God love his people so much? In other stories, gods die and come back to life. In the Christian story, Jesus did this for us and for our salvation.
That fact is something worth ‘watching’ again and again.
Here is the link: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-594683847743189197 (ZeitgeistI)
I don’t think I could actually recommend someone watch it, but it exists whether you watch it or not. It is the ‘spirit of the times’ (Zeitgeist).
I watched it. What I usually don’t hear too often is a denial that Jesus never existed, that everything was made up--because there were other similar stories to Jesus’ life (someone in Egyptian mythology, e.g., was born on 25 December, did miracles, died, and was resurrected). That’s a bold statement!
The video I watched connected this anti-religious view to an anti-authoritarian view. The video’s message was that those in authority are not to be trusted; people should think for themselves. Specifically 9/11 and the US Federal Reserve were brought up. I remember hearing some of the same statements about the Federal Reserve already in the seventies. The sixties must have been a significant change in the view of authority within both the US and the UK.
As with many statements, there is some good to them and some bad. The importance of things needs to be weighed. To do that a person needs an accurate tool of measurement. The video praised human thought, what a person thinks in the hear and now. Certainly this should be done, but certainly within limits.
Here are some final thoughts:
The video’s depiction of Christianity was unfair, but I shouldn’t have expected anything else. Society is unfair. God is often unfair. People are given a wide variety of things. These things are then usually taken away.
The video’s depiction of religion was accurate. All false religions have been made up by people in an effort to control others, in a desire for power. The fall into sin was also an uprising against God, an effort to take him out of the picture.
God has the power. Sometimes he gives it to some people. That’s called authority. He’s certainly the author of it all. That’s not a bad thing.
Christianity is something different than 'religion' though. The wonderful thing was that Jesus gave away his power on the cross as a sacrifice for sin. That’s a story you don’t hear of in legends or myths. Why would God die in the place of people? Why would God love his people so much? In other stories, gods die and come back to life. In the Christian story, Jesus did this for us and for our salvation.
That fact is something worth ‘watching’ again and again.
Labels: Christianity
