tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19925757.post8740080773218460965..comments2023-08-19T05:04:44.652-04:00Comments on LifeoftheMind: Theoretical Overstretch and Oligarchic GnosticismLifeoftheMindhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08332328377169650229noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19925757.post-34428478647147982352011-03-07T12:27:30.680-05:002011-03-07T12:27:30.680-05:00I was catching up on your blog posts this evening ...I was catching up on your blog posts this evening and this struck a chord ~<br><br>"Despite temptations and lapses the expounders of esoteric doctrine in<br>Judaism and Christianity have tended to lose influence over time. The<br>reasons for this disparity need more investigation."<br><br>I wonder if this doesn't have something to do with the longstanding<br>Western tradition of doubt?<br><br>Islam, insofar as I understand it, does not allow for doubt, whereas<br>the ancient rabbis and church elders were willing enough to confront<br>doubt and even seemed to thrive on it, even became stronger for it,<br>because they they were unafraid to be tested, to be tempted.... Islam<br>appears to be strong but I suspect it is brittle at its core, in fact,<br>much as the idea appalls me, because of the necessarily attendant loss<br>of life, I've no doubt at all that if that rock in Mecca were to be<br>destroyed, all our problems with Islam would end. The Islamic world<br>would be thrown into a kind of mass ineptitude deriving from a<br>fundamental confusion. I say this because I am no stranger to fatalism<br>and pagan sympathies - my great-grandmother was a strega from Buccino<br>in southern Italy and I was schooled in her world-view as a young<br>child - and Islam is as pagan and ritualistic as it gets.<br><br>So even though this willingness to confront doubt is a strength, (at<br>least insofar as as you and I may look at things) the appearance of<br>certainty in Islam gives thinkers of the leftist persuasion the<br>impression of an unanswerable certainty. This is largely reinforced by<br>the left's prejudice in favor of the outsider. The more foreign, the<br>better. The closer to home, the worse. For all their crying about<br>matters of principle, in the end it's really more about aesthetics,<br>and pretty shallow ones at that.<br><br>~ marymclstormcrowhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13342548201911544177noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-19925757.post-79237176248616530222010-09-29T04:02:56.013-04:002010-09-29T04:02:56.013-04:00I was catching up on your blog posts this evening ...I was catching up on your blog posts this evening and this struck a chord ~<br /><br />"Despite temptations and lapses the expounders of esoteric doctrine in<br />Judaism and Christianity have tended to lose influence over time. The<br />reasons for this disparity need more investigation."<br /><br />I wonder if this doesn't have something to do with the longstanding<br />Western tradition of doubt?<br /><br />Islam, insofar as I understand it, does not allow for doubt, whereas<br />the ancient rabbis and church elders were willing enough to confront<br />doubt and even seemed to thrive on it, even became stronger for it,<br />because they they were unafraid to be tested, to be tempted.... Islam<br />appears to be strong but I suspect it is brittle at its core, in fact,<br />much as the idea appalls me, because of the necessarily attendant loss<br />of life, I've no doubt at all that if that rock in Mecca were to be<br />destroyed, all our problems with Islam would end. The Islamic world<br />would be thrown into a kind of mass ineptitude deriving from a<br />fundamental confusion. I say this because I am no stranger to fatalism<br />and pagan sympathies - my great-grandmother was a strega from Buccino<br />in southern Italy and I was schooled in her world-view as a young<br />child - and Islam is as pagan and ritualistic as it gets.<br /><br />So even though this willingness to confront doubt is a strength, (at<br />least insofar as as you and I may look at things) the appearance of<br />certainty in Islam gives thinkers of the leftist persuasion the<br />impression of an unanswerable certainty. This is largely reinforced by<br />the left's prejudice in favor of the outsider. The more foreign, the<br />better. The closer to home, the worse. For all their crying about<br />matters of principle, in the end it's really more about aesthetics,<br />and pretty shallow ones at that.<br /><br />~ marymclmarymclhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13342548201911544177noreply@blogger.com