'The right side of history' = 'God is on our side'?

[RainWithSunnySpells]

I'm sure that this isn't an original thought (it's probably been suggested before) however once I thought about this it made a lot of sense of the weird phrase TRSoH.

I always wondered how anyone can be on TRSoH in the present. Surely it is the people in the future who will judge that when they look back at the past? Therefore, does TRSoH essentially mean or is an equivalent to 'God is on our side'?

I think that’s a fair point.

you can hardly accuse Jewish scholars over the centuries of trying to stick to a kind of modern literal approach to the texts, and avoid metaphorical or symbolic ones!

I have spoken to Jewish people about this, and their argument is that while their religion did make non literal use of texts, this is like a special additional purpose. It doesn't cancel out the plain meaning of the texts, in the way that Christian theology tries to do.

So they were very insistent on the literal meaning, and that Christianity was incompatible with it, and misusing the texts.

They all, even the very unorthodox ones, involve a kind of special action by God into the historical timeline, rather than something like the Progressive-Marxist view of history.

I did mention the post mill position above, which involves a kind of human progress in history viewpoint, even if it's supernaturally assisted human progress.

Also presumably Marxism could still be a little bit influenced by the Christian eschatology idea of a goal to history, even if they invented the stuff that it would happen on the level of human progress?

Yes, this is exactly what I've just argued. Marxism takes this Christian sense of history and removes God as an end, and makes historical progress an entirely historical-material phenomena.

There are modern Christians would argue the same thing, but it's probably not a particularly accurate historical viewpoint, from a Jewish or Christian standpoint. Tbh I am not sure how anyone could read the history of Jewish commentary on the Scriptures and maintain that position.

That isn't to say that no parts are ever seen as having a straightforward sense, in some cases an important one, and sometimes these have been understood differently during different historical periods too, but that is rather different than what modern people mean when they talk about a literal reading of the text. The Jewish people of the ancient world and patristic Christian church were not miles apart in their approach to this, compared to the way modern people tend to approach texts.

@Rudderneck

The Jewish people of the ancient world and patristic Christian church were not miles apart in their approach to this, compared to the way modern people tend to approach texts.

Well imagine if anyone had tried to build on, and supersede, the Christian religion in the way that the Jewish religion was superseded by Christian theology.

I'm pretty sure, that Christians would have a strong commitment to the literal meaning of the text in fighting against such a heresy.

They aren't going to allow widespread "spiritualizing" of texts to overturn their core doctrines.

Also, I think we should respect modern methods of interpretation, unless perhaps someone could argue that such and such a style of interpretation works well within their religious framework and worldview.

What I would think, is not that we should be more charitable towards Christian use of texts, but rather that they simply weren't rigorous enough in their thinking, and overlooked internal inconsistencies in their religion when it came to their use of building on the Hebrew Bible.

This just doesn't make sense as a historical analysis, or a theological analysis either - whether of Christianity or Judaism. That's not what happened historically, and I am not even sure why you would think that would be the most logical or inevitable response.

Christian and Jewish theology, over the past 2000 years, have often influenced each other. In some cases both sharing certain ways of thinking or insights between them, or both being influenced by other historical groups or changes, or in other cases seeming to diverge in order to differentiate themselves. There was also not only one stream of Jewish thought before the emergence of Christianity, nor was that the case afterwards.

It's not like there haven't been any groups who emerged historically to build on Christianity, either, so no need to imagine, and the response hasn't particularly been to a greater degree of literalism. I also think you will find the Jewish and Christian scholars of the ancient world were not sloppy at noticing "inconsistencies."

Interesting thread, thanks op. Anyone need their glass topping up?

Here are some thoughts about parallels between the phrases:

• they assume a moral judgement in favour of the person and their group, against another person or group
• the source of this moral judgement is an inaccessible powerful other (either a supernatural being or people in the future)
• the judgement helps the person or group to feel more convinced of their righteousness (and perhaps justify certain actions)
• the judgement can be used to shame or threaten those in the outgroup. I read a while back that sex differences have been observed in susceptibility to shaming, with women being more susceptible than men but that's another topic. Sadly for the scolders, not all women...

This ☝️☝️

Yes, that all makes sense to me. Basically it's an appeal to authority.

Specifically, An appeal to anonymous authority.

@Rudderneck

It's not like there haven't been any groups who emerged historically to build on Christianity, either, so no need to imagine, and the response hasn't particularly been to a greater degree of literalism. I also think you will find the Jewish and Christian scholars of the ancient world were not sloppy at noticing "inconsistencies."

I didn't mean that Christians would suddenly become strict and consistent literalists.

I mean that they would understand the importance of using the plain meaning of the text, when it was valuable to their purpose, in defending their religion.

As for Jews and Christians noticing inconsistencies, well the inconsistencies that I'm talking about were certainly noticed by Jews; that's why they rejected the Christian use of the Hebrew Bible.

And yes, a lot of the arguments would depend on the importance of the plain meaning of the text. So Christians are taking things out of context when they claim prophecy fulfillment. Or Jesus didn't fulfill such and such scriptures that Jews understood to be about the messianic age.

Here is an early Christian source responding to heresy, which deals with how they twisted texts:

https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0103108.htm

Just seen this one now. Great observation 👍👍

And yes @ArabellaScott , the anonymous authority being key. An omnipresent all knowing. Right now Stonewall, WPATH et al seem to think that they hold the pen on how it all gets written down in the secular gospels of the Bible equivalent. And they did.... but it is being snatched off them continuously now by the EHRC, Kemi Badenoch and others. There are some who keep passing it back (looking at you Gillian Keegan) but they are becoming fewer and fewer in number.

You know that many early Christians were Jews, right? In fact the earliest Christians were all Jews. And that there was not a unified view of things like the meaning of different prophesies even before the Christian period, there were different schools of thought who were often quite loudly opposed to each other.

It's not like a bunch of random people came along with no connection to Judaism, grabbed the scriptural texts from the final authorities who were in charge of them, and started making crazy attempts to "twist" them. What happened was the emergence of a different school or tradition of interpretation, which very much drew on the traditions that were already there, but was also driven by historical events that meant that some started to see them from a different perspective. Initially they were seen as another sect of Judaism, rather than something wholly new or separate. (Much as Islam was initially seen by many as a sect of Christianity.)

I really don't see what your point is or why you think it relates my argument that political progressivism adopts a primitive, materialist version of the Christian sense that there is an end of history.

It's an academically illiterate turn of phrase that is built more on the premise of "History is written by the winners" rather than "God is on our side" but shows a stunning lack of understanding of how those writing the History books actually work now. Long gone are the days of history being a celebration of the winning side and a demonisation of the losers. Historians will go to significant lengths to properly investigate both sides of a dispute and think in great detail about the merits of the cause of the eventual "losers" if there was a clear winning side.

Studying History will sometimes disturb or upset you, or make you furious. If studying history makes you proud and hoppy then you probably aren't studying history.

A social history of early 21st century culture, as formulated in the late 21st or early 22nd century, will certainly have a lot of material to disturb upset and make people angry if either side of the current standoff "wins" and xrushes/obliterates the advances made by the other side. The least embarrassing side to be on is probably the peacemakers in the middle trying to square the circle and find acceptavle compromises but that's a difficult balance to find when one side considers anything short of total capitulation and obedience to be tantamount to genocide.

@Rudderneck

I really don't see what your point is or why you think it relates my argument that political progressivism adopts a primitive, materialist version of the Christian sense that there is an end of history.

My point, is that "modern literalism" isn’t a bad thing, and that early Christian and quite likely early Jewish use of texts was probably not sensible sometimes.

And I didn't say it related to your argument, "that political progressivism adopts a primitive, materialist version of the Christian sense that there is an end of history".

I just commented on your mention of modern literalism. Let us not think that people, especially religious groups, were always sensible in the past.

You know that many early Christians were Jews, right?

And they were in a first century cult, very arguably an "end times" cult that turned out to be a false expectation.

Such people are not always sensible when using religious texts.

And as that religious movement develops over time, of course we can assess whether it's genuinely consistent with the earlier religious texts that it used.

Jews historically have made that assessment, and noticed that this offshoot of their religion is completely inconsistent with the Hebrew Bible.

If you say that the new offshoot religion was using texts kind of like some other Jews did at the time, you can still end up with bad results.

And that there was not a unified view of things like the meaning of different prophesies

Oh sure, maybe just like today, when you have chaos in the different Christian interpretations.

And while some of the Hebrew Bible may still be difficult to interpret today, the general message about the Torah commands and the promises made for Israel, that kind of Jewish view of future progress isn't going to fit with Christianity, and you need extreme manipulation of texts to try to pretend that it works.