/lit/ - Literature

>>21312188

>>21312188

>>21312377
Thanks non

>>21312377
>fr seraphim rose

Unbelievably based and seconded

>>21312377
> Sheldrake
> the guy who worships the Sun and calls it christianity
> also telepathetically communicates with kids in Bangladesh to make them better at math

>>21312377
Only read the last 5. The rest are Satanic

>>21312188
>left
>not a single act of charity or mission

>>21312188
Orthodoxy and the religion of the future, the philokalia

>>21312188

>>21313405
laughable. no summa.

>>21313602
Look in the bottom left

>>21313405
Should add this

>>21312188
The only book you need as a Christcuck.

>>21312377
>someone made this unironically, someone else posted it unironically, and yet another someone will order all of these from Bezos unironically, and none are going to go to church

>>21313405
came here to post this
kino chart

>>21312188
I read the bible front to back once (skimming the begets)
Largely unfounded claims and incoherent rambling in large sections
Can't recommend it

>>21315032
Opinion noted and discarded.

>>21315032
it's better if you consider the old testament as a kind of appendix to give the teachings of christ some context. Take it with a very large pinch of salt.

>>21315146
Bro, just gotta read the first 39 books
Totally worth it dude

frfr no hate
but I'll get my ethics from Singer before Christ

>>21315300
>singer
>avoiding a restrictive religion like christianity only to become a self-denying vegan sissy
It blows my mind that secular types are drawn to people like singer. All that self denial and no salvation, what's the point?

>>21315032
>read
strong term for going in extremely biased and just skimming. age old story of "yeah i read the Bible" where the one saying it didn't understand a single word.

study it properly and you'll be converted.

>>21315323
>blake in protestantism
>seraphim rose in Orthodoxy
>eckhart in Catholicism

what a terrible chart.

>>21315323
>>21315446
and i hadn't even looked down. what even is Hamlet doing there? in what capability could it even be theological

>>21315355
If you actually want to know why, the world is in an intolerable state and I want to change it toward something less intolerable. Simple as.
https://mindingourway.com/see-the-dark-world
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AnaQXJmpwM4

>>21312188
The bible itself and commentary.

>>21315458
skimmed through that. nonsense.
it seems the people they've spoken to were the less knowledgeable kind, who believe out of some fear.
i've never seen anyone who conducts those kinds of questionnaires or questions ask a studied theologian, curious, isn't it?

a Christian knows the world is an awful, dark place, and is trying to shine God's light into it.
terribly, people prefer to close their eyes, and claim you merely think you have light. they try to throw your light down, so that you can both be wallowing in darkness.
everyone wants that light, but the ones shining it are persecuted for trying to spread it.
alas, people cling to their own ideas of how to make light, and imagine a spark in whatever nonsensical belief they choose.
all of them try to look like the blindingly bright light of Christ, by trying to cover their lies with parts of God's word.
see the quran copying several parts of the Bible, mythology having similar stories to the true Biblical ones.


my light analogy might've fallen apart halfway through.

>>21315492
You aren't going to change my belief on religion and I'm not going to change yours. Consider this view
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Unt9iHFH5-E

>>21315503
you realize everything you're showing, namely making the world a better place, helping people, giving them a better life, and such are parts of what the word of God preaches, and goals of spreading the Gospel?
there are countless examples of God commanding people do so. (Deuteronomy 24:19 for an example, leaving food for the needy).
read Acts, and see how the Christians behaved.

>>21315531
>read Acts
I did
I just don't believe
https://www.lesswrong.com/posts/CqyJzDZWvGhhFJ7dY/belief-in-belief

>>21315602
very well. in your own words, why not?

>>21315626
nta but a lack of belief is the default position toward any proposition. desu I'd like to believe in a god, but I just don't. I don't find any of the arguments persuasive and I wasn't raised in the right kind of environment to feel deep-seated faith in a god without that kind of persuasion.

>>21315643
tell you what, i've seen convict atheists convert after they truly picked up the Bible and studied it in absolute depth.
i, myself, was wobbly on my belief before i picked up my Bible and studied it. i asked all the same questions i see around, the same atheistic "gotchas", all of it. and, guess what? i found the answers for the questions that were proper. saw through the fallacious ones.

>>21315626
Succinctly, insufficient evidence for a claim of that magnitude.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Efficacy_of_prayer
I suppose an argument could be made that believing in God has an instrumental value of Pray 10 times get 1 answered (void if measured), but I'll pass.
Influencing reality on that level would be extremely useful, but there's a reason the Pentagon doesn't have a prayer department.
I know what it's like to believe. I know the warm feeling, but Occam's razor suggests it's all in my head instead of an extra-dimensional supernatural being is sending me good vibes my way.
Also not down with how weirdly selective about God curing someone in a first world country of cancer, but letting millions die of painful deaths every year. 0/10 would no worship

>>21315663
If you're thinking of "convicted" atheists who use "atheistic gotchas" to deny the existence of a god, you're coming at it from the wrong angle. I'd probably be happier if I believed in a god, but I can't just decide to believe in something because I want to. At any rate, I am doing the "read the Bible in a year" thing next year so we'll see if your prophecy comes true, I guess.

>>21315685
Don't forget the Koran, the Mahabharata, and The Gospel of the Flying Spaghetti Monster

>>21315696
Come on, now. I'm reading the Bible because it's one of the most influential texts in the culture I inhabit. No need to be sassy about it. I do want to read the Mahabharata though.

>>21315685
i seem to have used the wrong word.
staunch would be more appropriate. that's what i get for hastily trying to mix languages because i don't remember the proper term.

anyhow, i mean i've said the usual gotchas of your 4chan fedoras aswell, but i'm by no means saying atheists are like that. i mean the proper, reasonable men. when they put that reason into God's word, the truth shows itself.
wish you a good read!

>>21315713
No sweat, I wasn't trying to nitpick your use of language. Thank you!

>>21315707
not that anon

>>21315685
also, would you like a little reading order suggestion? i see the Bible in a year as a very nice project, but it seems a bit slow.
might be better than my suggestion, anyhow. lol.

>>21315724
I don't mind doing it in a year. It'll give me more time to mull over what I'm reading. Anyway, I'm a fan of timeline-oriented projects like that.

>>21315682
look into it.

why are you so focused on the material gain?
your whole point in this post is that because God doesn't give you everything you pray for, then you shouldn't believe.

you don't know what it's like to have a relationship with God. you know what it's like to be similar to one of the people interviewed for posts like the site in >>21315458
it's not belief, it's a warm fuzzy feeling that you're clinging to out of fear.
that is not true belief, it's trying to get merely comfort from God without knowing Him.

on the world being bad, that's the same old fallacious question of how could God exist if evil does. it's a result of free will. and we've chosen this.
ask away about this last point. there's no blanket statement to explain it, and it is an extremely complicated point.

>>21315738
ah, very well. i like how it is structured to move you around so it makes sense of everything.
few tips, always look for an explanation of passages you found complicated or didn't understand. also, check the original greek/hebrew for better understanding.
Biblehub is a great resource, having commentaries, original language, several translations, and such.
i've been able to really understand a few very complicated passages by looking through a lot of commentaries there and checking the originals, for example.
for a few more resources, check out Bible Project. they do some nice videos on the meaning of words and whatnot. careful with their theology though, it's a bit shoddy.
and, also, the one for israel channel. from what i've seen so far, very good; Christian jews discussing theology, and they have an extremely nice series where they take rabbinical questions and objections about the Gospel, and explain them in depth. curiously, the same points made by people trying to question your faith everywhere.
here's one of my favorites:
>https://youtu.be/pRDjAv3SKrU

the Bible is full of proof like this.
another example is the inscription atop Christ's cross (John 19:19-22). 'Jesus of Nazareth, the King of the Jews' has only one way of being written in Hebrew, and the first letter of each word spells out the divine name God gave to Moses back in Exodus 3:14.
that's why the jews were trying to have Pilate change what was written. the name of God was written in the notice over Christ.

>>21315766
As a hard determinist, I can't take free will seriously as an excuse. Even pretending we have souls that somehow interact with our brains from another plan of existence just means we understand less that we thought, not that the universe isn't mechanistic and our behavior is the product of the culmination of genetics and environment. Hitler was a terrible person, but I wouldn't put him in hell for all eternity even if he killed a trillion people. There's no gain.
It's been done to death, but God can be Omnipotent or Omnibenevolent, but not both.
The cop out that we don't know what's for our own good, but God still loves us would imply that the current state of affairs is the BEST possible way of achieving the optimal outcome that God desires.
If that's true, God is an incoherent madman (or the simpler explanation, not real).

>>21315830
https://www.islamreligion.com/articles/562/miracle-of-iron/
I'm sure this story seems pretty silly to you (because it's not from your religion) and you can think of a bunch of explanations for why it's probably not meaningful evidence.
Just apply that mode of thinking to what you already believe.
What do you think you know, and how do you think you know it.

>>21315882
>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_Plantinga%27s_free-will_defense
so overdone, there's analytical philosophy about it. this defense is widely accepted by all scholars.

>>21315904
very well.
Daniel 9 then. written half a millenia beforehand, and gets the date correct down to the dot.
the veracity of its age and contents can be proven by findings like the dead sea scrolls, which contain it, perfectly equal to our current writings, and showing that Daniel had been written long before.

i've told you, i was wobbly in the faith. don't you think i've asked myself all of those questions?
and again i tell you, i found the answer.

>>21315882
and, furthermore, determinism doesn't make sense.
why would have God made men if they were just little clockwork machines, fated to some end?
why do you call yourself a determinist too, if you're not even faithful? do you believe yourself to not be among the "elect"? hah.

>>21315964
apologies for the last line.
unnecessary aggression and offense from my part.

>>21315944
Is it literally just that humans sin by nature of "being human". Sure why not
Why make humans than? Why not Humans 2, ones that don't choose sin.
You've just removed the one qualifying reason why we deserve suffering (having chosen sin).
It all goes in a circle of excuses.

>>21315964
The biggest confusion I see is people using the single word Free Will to mean 2 entirely separate things. There's Free Will 1, which means the freedom to choose X. You have more Free Will 1 if you live in a democracy with citizen freedoms. Clearly Free Will 1 is real. Free Will 2 on the other hand implies that the universe is entirely mechanistic, except when it comes to human decisions. Those somehow work by a nature that is entirely undefinable and supernatural in a way that's unfalsifiable, but doesn't provide any evidence.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_determinism
When I use the word determinism, it's not a comment on fate in the literary sense. It's a comment on the mechanistic nature of reality.

>>21316025
It might be easier to think of it from the perspective of God. Able to see into the future and past, able to instantiate any 4 dimensional spacetime block, but choosing this one?
Simply incompatible values with humans (at least me)

>>21315997
because giving choice, and making one of the choices unavailable is illogical. Plantinga's free will defense, even in its summed up form, addresses that.
it's that humans sin because they can choose to do so. playing the victim of that is trying to blame God for our actions.

>>21316025
well, said "free will 2" needs a reason for existing. the only logical conclusion is the existence of God.
for a much better explanation of this exact question, i'd suggest Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis. he starts the book discussing from a point of neutrality, and discusses exactly why the existence of God is a certainty, goes on to discuss why it has to be the Christian one, and keeps building on that. his book will do a much better job at explaining it.

the mere notion that i can do anything within my possibilities disproves hard determinism.

>>21316037
funnily enough, describing the exact problem with your thinking.
there's a verse on that: Isaiah 55:9

why did God make us specifically, and many other 'why's. God has a reason for doing it. we simply cannot know it.
it's like trying to understand the Holy Trinity. or how Heaven is described in the Bible.
all we can have are approximations, because there isn't a proper example, nor a way to convey it.

>>21312188
>Fasting
>Prayer
>Vocations
>Sacraments
>Studying patristics
None of these are required to be a Christian. All you must do is put your faith in Christ.

>>21312629
Dude, seriously don't do this schizo chart. I am a practicing Bible teacher, I'm southern baptist. I am on 4chan because I struggle with distraction, but while I am here I will give you an elongated effort post for Jesus Christ my Lord's sake.
Pray, this is first and foremost. God is more than the Bible. Get in the habit of praying and beggin God for mercy and revelation. (Revelation is the revealing of God, when you ask for revelation you are asking for God to reveal Himself to you). Without Gods grace we are nothing as it is written in Ephesians 2.
With that said here is my reccomended reading
Bible- this should be read from beginning to end. Though you do not have to go in order. You should aim to start a specific book and finish it before going to another. This should be read devotionally, as in you should pray before you read, ask for mercy, grace, and give thanks. then read, everyday.
Ok, so then I would reccomend Learn the Bible in 24 hours by chuck missler. This sounds childish and self helpish but be humble. I would also reccomend chuck missler commentaries on youTube or off of his website K-house.com
J vernon Mcgee's walk thru the Bible
Dr. Iron side's commentary on the Bible

This is the elementary phase of learning the bible. There are other guys who are good, but first and foremost you need to have a general knowledge of the Bible. I would reccomend KJV and ESV. KJV because it is the most quoted by puritan schoalrs, which we will get into, and esv because it is the favorite text of modern scholarship because it deveates from the masoretic text and uses translations from the dead sea scrolls. (As far as I can tell it only matters in deuteronomy 32:8, but it is significant).

After you are familiar with the Bible and growing in faith you will be able to go onto the fathers.
Augustine, confessions, city of God
Aquinas
Ireneaus agaisnt heresy
eusebius's church history (if you read this you can skip Foxes book of martyrs)
Early Chrsitan Writings: The apostolic fathers (Penguin)

After that we get into modern scholarship. I will just list the names of imporatnt people.
N. T. Wright
Michael Heiser
William Jarvis
John Piper
R. C. Sproul
John Mcauthor
Just listen to their sermons and read their papers on Jstor. You pick up stuff as you go

Philosophy
Plato
Aristotle
Descartes
Herman Bavinck
C. S. Lewis
the guy who wrote everlasting man, I can't remember his name
William Lane Craig

Christian Authors worth mentioning
A W Tozzer
Leonard Ravenhill
Horatious Boanrd* Very good this is a must

Puritans
The puritans were the highest intellectual epoch of Christianity, they will enlighten your mind, but do not be afraid of them because the world has painted them as stuck up. You will never read of such detailed beautiful descriptions of God's love as you will with the puritans.
John Owens
John Edwards
Timothy Rogers (He actually only wrote one book-- its worth it though. I am out of space now. Hope this helps someone

>>21316105
To be saved yes, but if you are saved these things will naturally occur. God's spirit dwells in you after salvation, so it will express itself through by good works. Read 1 and 2 Peter. We are saved by faith not by works, but true faith produces works brother. God bless you.

>>21316105
This

>>21315430
>study it properly and you'll be converted.
No you will not. Most people who read the Bible carefully are decidedly _NOT_ converted by it. If anything, it takes thwm closer to atheism.

This is unlike the NDE literature, since, as one NDE researcher said that he does not know anyone who has read the literature on NDEs who has not been convinced by it.

Of course, nothing gets normies and NPCs more uncomfortable than the idea that NDEs are ACTUALLY real, and that there are valid reasons to think that they are and that we should take them seriously.

Here is an extremely persuasive argument for why NDEs are real:

https://youtu.be/U00ibBGZp7o

It makes a huge deal about the fact that NDErs are representative of the population as a whole, and that when people go deep into the NDE, they all become convinced. As this article points out:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/mysteries-consciousness/202204/does-afterlife-obviously-exist

>"Statistics collected show that the "deeper" the NDE the greater the percentage of those who come away certain of the existence of the afterlife. Among those with the deepest experiences 100 percent came away agreeing with the statement, "An afterlife definitely exists"."

Since NDErs are representative of the population as a whole, and they are all convinced, then 100% of the population become convinced that there is an afterlife when they have a sufficiently deep NDE themselves. And so would you, me, or anyone, including the most dogmatic atheists and skeptics, because it is VASTLY more self-evidently real than this brief little experience of life on Earth we have now. When you dream and wake up, you instantly realize that life is more real than your dreams. When you have an NDE, the same thing is happening, but on a higher level, as you immediately realize that life is the deep, deep dream and the NDE world is the undeniably real world by comparison.

But pseudoskeptics never actually read the literature on NDEs, they refuse to, since they are ideologically convinced that there can not be something to it. And when people have their heads that deeply into the sand, there is no way to ever reach them. Just like how religious fundamentalists can not be reached with arguments for evolution, they do not need to read about it, because the Bible just is and has to be true

>>21317460
there are several testimonies of people saying they wanted to disprove the Bible once and for all, who proceeded to study it and ended up converting.

why did you go in this nonsensical tangent?
to address the last paragraph, we have heard of it, and know it's a wrong theory.
you see, there is adaptation, like bacteria gaining resistance and Darwin's different beaks on the archipelago birds, but it's only intraspecies.
Darwin himself points out the theory of evolution is that; a theory, which he gies to say is hard to convince someone of.
if you look into it, you see that the extrapolation of intraspecies adaptation into some sort of interspecies evolution makes no sense. Furthermore, fossil records and such do not back it up.
lastly, man hasn't been able to recreate it through extremely selective artificial selection; the so called natural one is much less rigorous. creatures could not have changed like that.

>>21312188
tfw you'll never hear a new episode of CF again....

>>21312188
best bet is to go to goodread and check the lists to find the the notable stuff.

>>21315446
Pardon me, how is Fr. Seraphim Rose being in Orthodoxy incorrect?

>>21315944
>Daniel 9 then. written half a millenia beforehand, and gets the date correct down to the dot.
The date of what? And Daniel 7-12 was written in the 160s BC, there's no evidence that it actually dates to a Daniel who lived during the exile. Oldest manuscript of those chapters is 150 BC at the absolute earliest, possibly as late as c. 75 BC - http://dssenglishbible.com/scroll4Q114.htm

>>21312188
Here's a pretty comprehensive list I found. I've read around 60% of these since 2011. Not one book I can say I regret reading.

>>21312188
>Does /lit/ have a chart of Christian books worth reading?

This is a list, not a chart, but the books are worth reading, or at least skimming.

>>/lit/thread/S18199553#p18203584

>>21315446
Blake is clearly in the Protestant because he wouldn’t fit in any other category and England of his period was Protestant and he constantly referenced Milton.
Even if he was technically none of the above, he belongs in that one the most accurately.
A prot can read Blake and at least accept his reading, a Papist never could.

>>21319623
His work on translating texts is valuable; his actual writing is an embarrassment and is basically like the distilled essence of interacting with every obnoxious aggressive e-ortho you've ever encountered

>>21316313
Do not listen to this person, his suggestions are terrible and will completely repel you from Christianity. Lewis, Heiser, and Wright are good but stay the fuck away from the Puritans, they're actual maniacs and their philosophy is two steps from Aztecs cutting people's hearts out on altars to appease the bloodthirsty sun deity.

>>21320023
From the excerpts I've read, he is highly intelligent and his sermons are wonderful however. Which part is incorrect on it? Also, how does this make him not an orthodox? Also, I've never met an e-ortho, whatever that means

>>21320269
I don't deny that he's smart, but when taken in full the main thrust of his entire worldview and the axiom that all of his arguments hinge on is that if you don't adhere to his specific brand of Christianity you're automatically wrong and you should basically just go fuck yourself because you're probably possessed by demons or something and you're never going to go to Heaven unless you prostrate before the glory of Eastern Orthodoxy, grow a beard, and deny all geological and astronomical data that blatantly implies that the world is billions of years old

His tone persistently drips with the presumption that anyone who disagrees with him must be harboring secret ulterior motives, that clearly every worldview besides his own is not only mistaken but actively diabolical in nature; it's tautological

Orthodoxy is the One True Church (nevermind that every other Christian denomination claims this with equal fervor), any religious experiences or visions outside of this specific tradition are automatically demonic (why his own religion is exempt from this qualification is unclear), nothing about modernity is good and it was so much better in ancient times when you got tortured and immolated for disagreeing with a bishop and lived as a serf toiling in disease-ridden filth all day, and the answer to the Problem of Evil is to shut up and trust the plan and that you're probably just a whiny American, just pull yourself up by your boostraps bro (yes, it's totally necessary for the greater good for children to be trafficked and tortured for years and for hundreds of genocides to occur, God is totally absolved of guilt for this somehow)

Teenagers and immature young adults who spend too much time on social media will be seduced by the vapid glamour of tradLARPing and approve of ridiculous outlandish shit being spouted as "based" because it gets rid of the need to actually make intelligent arguments when you can just act aggressively retarded and post a heckin' epic gigachad meme in an orthodogs hat as a substitute for making any kind of case for your position

>>21315032
The genealogy of Jesus in Matthew is unironically one of the best parts of that gospel.

>>21312377
kek

>>21319623
>>21319744
it's because all three are fringe, almost over the edge almost nonsense.
blake has his own little theological system for poems, and is quite nonsensical for theology;
rose has the nonsense in his books, and again, not really any theology besides shilling orthodoxy;
and eckhart barely avoided excommunication for his weird "mysticism".

>>21313405
lmao Christians don't even read the Bible, what's the point of this?