I relate to this. I was like 99% sure it was all BS when I was a teenager but that fear of hell stayed with me for a long time. I ran from religion for years but couldn't get away. It was only when I ran back towards it and studied it that I finally was able to break free. It was only after reading 'Who Write the Bible' and 'How Jesus Became God' did my fear of hell finally go away.
Maybe sometime around his book release?
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Joe Rogan had guy from the University of British Columbia that wrote a book about alcohol recently. He talks about how alcohol could have lead to civilization.
Drunk: How We Sipped, Danced, and Stumbled Our Way to Civilization - the book
I recommend Against the Grain: A deep history of the earliest states. By James C. Scott. You'll learn what archaeologists know about these questions, how they figure it out, what the evidence is, and so on. Here's the link to the Amazon listing.
/u/brigantus provides a very good answer in this thread that corresponds pretty closely to this book. As far as I know, there is no competing theory, although the experts still debate some of the details.
Avon Books. This is the Amazon page. The Necronomicon https://www.amazon.com/dp/0380751925/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_glc_fabc_HTaaGbBWTQ5GN
I actually secretly bought mine when I was a teen (so help me if my mother saw it xD) from the book store Borders back when it was still open
If all it says is get a necronomicon, then get a necronomicon.
I did. Full of juicy horrors and gruesome details on how to summon them.
Best of luck
It is great that you are interested! If you would like to read more, I would recommend the book Destiny Disrupted by Tamil Ansary. It gives a good overview of Islamic history up to the modern day. Amazon link
I didn't read it yet. It was recommended by Muslimmatters.org: http://muslimmatters.org/2014/07/30/book-review-lost-islamic-history/
Here is another book:
Most of us have been in your shoes at one point in our lives and all I can say is it sucks. Turning your back on religion means turning your back on your community but even worse it feels like you are killing a part of your childhood. On the other hand, it's nice to be part of a group with a book that claims to have all the answers.
Here's the hard truth --- Once you open your eyes and see a religion's flaws they are impossible to unsee. Of course you can pretend nothing has changed but deep down you know the truth.
And it sucks.
Lots of people pretend to be religious. I bet most of the people that go to church know it's BS but they go because their parent's did and know it's expected of them. They know what they are supposed to say and recite passages by memory with little thought given to the words. They immerse themselves in the church hoping the doubts will go away. But they won't.
Is that how you want to live?
Every person's road to non-belief is different. For me, it took 10 years to purge the fear of hell from my heart. For a long time, I was sure my parent's religion was made up but a very small part wondered -- but what if it's true? Once I was able to get past that the rest was easy.
As for pushing back against dubious claims -- all I can say is part of your journey to non-belief. The only real way to free yourself of religion is to research its flaws and that takes work.
A good place to start is to learn about the 'Documentary Hypothesis' and for that I really like a book by Richard Friedman called Who Wrote the Bible?
I wish you well on your journey.
A good (recent) book on the subject:
https://www.amazon.com/Drunk-Sipped-Danced-Stumbled-Civilization/dp/0316453382
And a podcast talk with the author:
TLDR: Before hard liquor, alcoholic beverages were low alcohol content, so maybe? :-)
For more on debt jubilee, look up Dr Micheal Hudson and his book, "...and Forgive Them Their Debts"
https://www.amazon.com/forgive-them-their-debts-Foreclosure/dp/3981826027
Lots of interesting interviews on YouTube.
This economist is extremely insightful. I can recommend no one more highly.
I'm a pretty anxious person, and introverted.
There's a great book by Edward Slingerland called <em>Drunk</em>, which goes into the historical importance of alcohol, how it influenced society. And he also goes into how two people would sit down, beit diplomacy, business, etc., and share a drink. What function did it have? It is cognitively expensive, Slingerland maintains, to maintain a lie. Even more so when in the sweet spot of impaired frontal cortex, but still coherent.
So he would disagree with you, and I would too. He also raised the fact that spirits, wine, and even rising beer ABV have turned this ritual into an unhealthy treadmill. If people could enjoy a couple 3-5% beers or other alcoholic beverages a day (though not every day), e.g. at dinner, we'd be better off. Cancer studies support this, the difference between one modest drink a day, and abstinence, is negligible.
I could go on but I doubt you're looking to have your mind changed.
Yes! Very accessible place to start: Richard Friedman’s “Who Wrote the Bible?”
Debt forgiveness has a historical basis. Ancient civilizations had regular debt jubilees to reinvigorate their economies. Leaders realized that crushing debt would kill civilizations.
Economist Michael Hudson explains in his book:
https://www.amazon.com/forgive-them-their-debts-Foreclosure/dp/3981826027
What Biden did should have been done in 2009 and it should have been done on a much greater scale.
Obama and the Dems screwed homeowners and threw them on the streets. They bailed out the Wall Street bankers instead.
Nina should be criticizing the Democrats for being their usual day late and a dollar short.
I second this. It is well-written and a good introduction.
"World histories" have been criticized as being too Eurocentric. I agree.
Two books can help correct this myopia.
Destiny Disrupted: World History Through Islamic Eyes
Big History by David Christian. This history starts with the origin of the universe. This views human history in the biggest perspective. I listened to the author's Great Courses lecture series on the topic.
You should get into some history mate it'll sort things out..I recommend Dan Carlins podcast hardcore history.
Also he wrote a book the end is always near..which I think answers your question..
https://www.amazon.com/End-Always-Near-Apocalyptic-Collapse/dp/0062868047
Bottom line, if you can't reign in your alcohol consumption to somewhere in the realm of 7-14 drinks a week, you're likely to die early from it. Whether that's liver damage, heart disease, or stomach cancer, there's going to be a cost. This codependence you're feeling is alcoholism. You should wean yourself off alcohol, maybe try weed instead for a while.
At low abv, alcohol is awesome and actually has a lot of benefits. But it's also very addictive both inside a day, and the next day, and it sounds like you're experiencing both - that's alcoholism. If you're interested in this topic check out the book Drunk
Drinking 1 beer a day (which they classify as 12oz 5%, almost no beers match this today) is basically negligible to health and mental wellbeing. But it ramps up quickly from there. I would qualify "healthy spirited drinking" as no more than 4 drinks a day, and no more than 4 days a week. I'm more of a 2 drink a day, 5 days a week, and one of those days (a weekend) might have 4-5 drinks. You gotta figure out what works for you, without becoming an alcoholic.
I recommend reading Destiny Disrupted.
Europe didn't catch up to the middle east and China until about the 16th - 17th Century.
You should give this book a read. Who Wrote the Bible by Richard Elliott Friedman
Once you "see" how human and political the bible is, you can't "unsee" it.
The book is better the more of the bible you remember and have studied
https://www.amazon.com/Wrote-Bible-Richard-Elliott-Friedman-ebook/dp/B07M7S79BT
Trying to understand things beyond human consciousness with human consciousness is a bit difficult, but not impossible.
Have you ever read The Necronomicon? It's a pretty stimulating read.
Well, you're right that it is not possible for Genesis to be literally true. It is contradicted on almost every front by science, archaeology, history, etcetera.
If you look at the history of the text, I think the only reasonable conclusion is that the redactor didn't think it was literally true. This requires a view of the text shared by critical scholarship, though, which may find faith-destroying. The basic story of Genesis/Exodus/Leviticus/Numbers/Deuteronomy is that they were copy-pasted together from pre-existing sources during or after the Exile, very possibly by Ezra. This created "Judaism" as a religion, and the Torah is the founding mythology of the religion. In truth, though, the Torah may not have been complete even until the 3rd century BC...the evidence for it before then is very scant. Books like Who Wrote the Bible? (Friedman) go into some of the theories for the authorship. https://www.amazon.com/Who-Wrote-Bible-Richard-Friedman/dp/150119240X And subs like /r/AcademicBiblical discuss this kind of idea regularly.
Because the New Testament doesn't tell us who wrote any of it. Authorial attribution is a function of Christian tradition.
See? This is why it is completely pointless to argue about what's in the New Testament -- the oldest book can only be dated to several decades after Jesus's lifetime at the earliest (with most dating to even later) and there is zero credible attribution for any of the authors. We don't know who wrote any of it, precisely when they wrote it, and what motives they might have had. But we do know that a number of the books in the New Testament are clearly pseudepigraphic works, which raises a whole host of concerns on its own.
This is a fundamentally pointless exercise where the important information is entirely unknowable and therefore the conclusions we can draw are limited at best and worthless at worst.
If you haven't already, I would recommend reading Who Wrote the Bible to give you a base understanding in historical biblical criticism. Its pretty eye opening.
> In this model, the only thing that can create strong people is suffering.
What model? I read this article four times, I don't see any "model" being offered, just a bunch of one dude's opinion. Which is fine but...meh, dude (not you OP, the author).
Somewhat relatedly:
I just finished a book about this from one of my favorite podcasters, Dan Carlin: The End Is Always Near: Apocalyptic Moments, from the Bronze Age Collapse to Nuclear Near Misses
The entire premise of the book hinges around a topic that comes up in the very first chapter "Do tough times make tough people".
My takeaway was that Dan's answer to this is "not really, tough times just breed a different kind of people in relation to different (assumed to be later) times".
Good book. Worth reading if you're into that kinda discussion analyzed through the lens of examined history.
There's a good book that talks about the influence of alcohol on society and how it's contributed to the civilization we know today. I'm not saying alcohol is all good or anything lol, but it wouldn't be accurate to say that our ancestors didn't enjoy it. Many say beer was a big contributor to why we even have agriculture. Not trying to spark a whole discussion, just wanted to mention it since it's an interesting and informative read.
You should read his book on the subject - "Who Wrote the Bible?"
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07M7S79BT
By the way, I'm not necessarily saying I agree with either perspective (who wrote the Bible or the Exodus) - but these are very interesting takes on the subjects.
Looks like they were taken directly out of that cheap Necronomicon book that every group of pagan/wiccan/metalhead group had two or three of being passed around in high school. https://www.amazon.com/Necronomicon-Simon/dp/0380751925
I'm a history noob. This book has been great:
The History of the Ancient World: From the Earliest Accounts to the Fall of Rome https://smile.amazon.com/dp/039305974X/ref=cm_sw_r_apan_glt_fabc_C5PJMK0KD405JAP2AEHX?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1
<em>Destiny Disrupted: A History of the World Through Islamic Eyes</em> by Tamim Ansary is neat and gives a good overview of Middle Eastern/Islamic history up to the modern day. Not sure about books on the caliphate(s) specifically though.
There's also Tim Mackintosh-Smith's <em>Arabs: A 3,000-Year History of Peoples, Tribes and Empires</em>, but that starts out before Islam even. Still really fascinating, but a little dense.
In the bottom right I see the Yellow Sign, from Robert W. Chambers' "King in Yellow" stories.
And I'm not sure, but in the center, I think that's the pentagram from the cover of Simon's Necronomicon.
The rest, I'm not so sure. In any case, you should be worried that they threatened the school, not that they're doodling occult symbols in class. The latter is just normal edgy teen behavior. The former is a very real concern.