Lewis once wrote about people like this, in 'The Great Divorce' - describing them, he quoted Tacitus: "They terrify, lest they should fear".

Good observation, Orrin.

"The word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing." (I Corinthians 18a)

From the Toynbee article:

We need no holy guide books, only a very human moral compass.

Now, any regular reader of this blog is well aware of the pitfalls of this brand of thinking, but for crying out loud, cannot the likes of Toynbee see what the objections are? That the 'very human moral compass' has been tried umpteen times and found wanting?

None so blind as those who will not see.

Ms. Toynbee claims in her articles that "Disney may come to regret this alliance with Christians, at least on this side of the Atlantic. For all the enthusiasm of the churches, Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ bombed in Britain and warehouses are stuffed with unsold DVDs of that stomach-churner. There are too few practising Christians in the empty pews of this most secular nation to pack cinemas."

And yet a quick google search reveals that The Passion did quite well in Britain. The BBC reports "It's broke box-office records in Britain." (http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/3621819.stm). Perhaps neither she nor her editors know anyone who went to see it...

As for the rest of her little essay, one can only feel sorry for her.

Wow, what a bitter old shrew. Read the whole piece - I don't think I've seen anyone so completely miss the point of Christianity in a long long time.

Bryan:

Or does she get it and still hate it?

Bryan -

OJ is probably correct. She wants to be left alone, with no possibility of judgment.

b:

Yes, but Polly didn't KNOW anyone who saw it. Therefore it bombed.

Pauline Kael, white courtesy phone, Ms. Pauline Kael, white courtesy phone.

That the 'very human moral compass' has been tried umpteen times and found wanting?

So have the holy guide books.

Robert: When?

toynbee was duped by a nigerian email scam and even wrote about it several times before the episode was revealed. she is not one to be writing cinema criticism.

Oh, and by the way, it was Norman Vincent Peale, no relation to Emma Peel. He always seemed to be more of a motivational speaker than a "preacher"(you can almost see the curling sneer on her lip when she uses that word.)

She reads, but she does not comprehend. She hears, but she does not listen. She looks but she does not see.
To her all religion is superstition, and all faith is foolishness. "Adults who wince" like her are already too sick for the sickbag to be of any use. I pity that foolish lady.

b:

Robert means when individuals depart the book for their compass.

Is is correct to say that we are not where Toynbee would like to think we are, but we are getting there. We need to take back education from these pagan swine, and quickly.

Ms. Toynbee was perfectly described long ago: "Hear now this, O foolish people, and without understanding; which have eyes, and see not; which have ears, and hear not." (Jeremiah 5:21)

Posted by: jd watson at December 6, 2005 1:48 PM

Agree with most of you that Polly Toynbee is a twit and like many atheists (Madlyne Murray O'Hare, Richard Dawkins, etc.) is a nasty and bitter individual.

But what's with the "W the Lion" heading? Has OJ truely gone bonkers and now equates President Bush to Aslan/Christ?

Thank you, barnum's toe - I knew a famous journalist had been taken in by the Nigerian scam, but had forgotten it was Toynbee. That is just sad.

Anon-
I noticed that too. I think the president would be very much against such a comparison.

Bryan:

Why?

"According to Abbas, Bush said: 'God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East."

OJ:

Ever hear of 'Gaslight'?

If he said that in seriousness to Abbas, then we have all misread the man.

Well, I can't in good conscience call myself a Christian, I haven't read any Narnia, and would be inclined to see King Kong, if anything, this December.

But if 'Narnia' can set off the likes of Polly Toynbee to this extent, it's probably well worth contributing eight bucks to the general fund.

Funny thing is... that ain't sarcasm. I might very well go for the SOLE and entire purpose of pissing Polly and ilk off. Maybe I'll like it, who knows.

I wonder if she (they) have any clue of the extent of just that kind of reaction they are inspiring out there. I still think Michael Moore may have put Bush back in the White House. Keep up the good work, kids.

You ask why OJ?

Oh I don't know, maybe because its blasphemy to equate any mere human to the Son of God?

No wonder you are the only member of the religion of OJism.

b

Oh, during the enslavement of blacks by Christians, for one example. Do I really have to read the role?

People only follow the guide books to the extent that they agree with their moral compass. For better or worse, our compasses are all we've got.

Once I read Toynbee's screed, that settled it. I am so taking the kids to Narnia. Opening night. Evening show instead of the matinee so's we pay full price. And I'm dragging the mother in law along, too. Anything to bulk up the film's gross.

Robert: So you concede that "the holy guide books" as you call them have not in fact been tried. Nor can they be, of course, given man's nature...

I certainly wouldn't equate myself with Christ. Sounds like trouble.

Ok, so now it's clear that OJ worships Bush as his savior. That probably explains why OJ believes that God is not omniscient.

OJism? We really don't want to go there.

b

If you're saying that Man cannot transcend his nature, then I agree with you.

For the record, I find Toynbee's screed to be very puerile and bigoted.

Robert:

Has any ever been more annoyed by the fleas he's picjed up by lying down with the dogs?

Robert:

You're confusing ancient slavery, which is a moral and necessary institution, with chattel.

Anon:

Strange the way she seems to hate God and America for the same reason, that both save her without her asking.

jim:

Why?

Bryan:

recall that Christ made out awfully well on the deal.

Has any ever been more annoyed by the fleas he's picjed up by lying down with the dogs?

I need to buy a vowel. You're gonna have to draw a picture on this one.

Yes, chattel slavery as practiced by European and American Christians in the 16th through 19th centuries. They had full access to the Holy Guide Book, but it didn't make much difference. You can't fix a bad conscience with a good book. The conscience is the thing. The whole thing.

Robert:

Your ideal world is populated by naught but Toynbees.

It was because of the book that we ended chattel slavery--personal conscience allows everything. You keep proving the opposite of the case you're trying to make.

So the book can be used to justify either side of a moral question. Nope, sorry, the opposite remains unproven.

No, my ideal world is a very lovely place. Lots of good food, happy people, and Adam Sandler doesn't do movies. You are confusing me with that straw doll you are in the habit of talking to.

Robert:

No, it can't be. God having endowed blacks with human dignity they can't be treated as subhuman.

Of course, Darwinism encourages even their extermination instead of just their bondage, as a competing species.

No, it can't be.

It was.

Robert:

No, people, as you correctly pointed out, "rationalized". Scripture can't be used to support chattel slavery..

Robert D:

"The conscience is the thing. The whole thing."

For you? For Mengele? For John Kerry? For John Wayne Gacy? For Terri Schiavo?

How do you define a "conscience"? Is it just the 'ought to'? Is it the 'should have'? Is it the 'didn't mean to'? Is it the 'I won't do that again'?

Or is it something deeper? That strange co-pilot that we are never comfortable with, but cannot avoid, unless we cauterize it.

Nietzsche would say that to cauterize the conscience is the greatest act - indeed, it makes the uber-man.

Think of the people who boldly say (when questioned) that their conscience(s) are clear - do they strike you as being fully honest or truly selfless? Unfortunately, they are usually dissembling. Humility would lead one to give a different answer (when challenged).

But what makes one conscience better than another?

Jim:

So, from where did all the anti-Judaism come?

Strange the way she seems to hate God and America for the same reason, that both save her without her asking.

OK, so what is this comment supposed to mean?

Jeff:

Anti-Judaism stems from the Jews refusal to acknowledge the Messiah. Anti-Semitism is racial.

Anon:

Thus, the headline.

Anti-Judaism stems from the Jews refusal to acknowledge the Messiah. Anti-Semitism is racial.

So you're saying it's OK to kill a Jew in an Anti-Judaism pogrom but not OK to gas a Jew in an Anti-Semitic holocaust?

Thus, the headline.

Again, I don't follow except that you're equating Bush with Christ and blaspheming as you do so.

Anon:

It's acceptable to make minority religious groups conform to societal norms. It's not okay to kill them because you imagine them a subspecies.

Christ is a big man, he can take a joke.

You don't advocate making minorities conform to societal norms, you advocate killing them. Jews were killed in large numbers in pogroms in the centuries preceeding the Holocaust. Why are these pogroms any better than the death camps? Why do you approve of these killings but no the killings done by the Nazis?

If God can take a joke, there is no need for the first four commandments.

Anon:

No, mere conformity suffices. If a witch forsakes magic and accepts God they're capable of being a decent member of society.

Sarah laughed at God and He didn't seem bothered. It's you that's humorless, not Him.

And you want to enforce conformity by killing a few of the miscreants to scare the others into behaving in a way you want them to.

What does your Jewish wife and inlaws think of your approval of past pogroms that slaughtered so many Jews in order to enforce societal conformity?

Sarah wasn't worshipping false idols.

Jeff:

OJ is right about anti-Semitism, but the rejection of the Messiah is typically just an excuse - people hate the Jews because it is easy. Hating Muslims or Christians, or New Yorkers or Californians (to the same violent extent) takes more energy, and you might actually have to do something with your hate. Plus, it is not socially acceptable to 'hate' Muslims.

Why do people 'hate' Israel so much? I think it is because they are not passive. The Europeans (for example) are probably jealous, because passivity is their middle name. The Islamic world is (for the most part) backward and kept that way by its "leaders". So they hate the Jews. It's easy.

And with respect to conscience, what do we learn about things that are 'easy'?

Anon:

My people were killed and chased out of Europe too for refusing to conform. No big thing.

Jim

Yes, conscience is an inconsistent thing from one person to the next. Some people act if they have none. Even for those people whose conscience tells them what is right, it doesn't always win over that person's character flaws. So there is a problem with relying on the human conscience, it will never totally defeat evil.

But how is it that a man who will not heed his conscience can be expected to heed the words of the Bible? How is it that a man who can commit evil without a second thought can be expected to consider the 10 Commandments? How does the Bible set a man on the right path if he can through rationalization so easily reconcile his own acts of evil to it?

Robert:

The Bible won't make you do the right thing. You can read it and then, as you correctly point out., Reason your way out of its commands. But only the Bible can tell you whether your conscience is correct or not, whether you're merely rationalizing or obeying God.

Is she related to Arnold?

Robert:

Man will rationalize anything - that is why NAMBLA exists, why the KKK exists, why the UN exists, for that matter. Knowing the rules only makes us chafe all the more to evade them, or to just pretend to follow them.

That is why conscience is such a poor plumb line.

Now, people will use the Bible to justify a lot of evil. Anyone can take a single verse and build a theology on it - the Jehovah's Witnesses have done it, slave traders did it, rigid fundies do it all time, and so do liberation Catholic types. And not everyone is going to have the 'conscience' of John Newton.

Classic Christian thought would answer your question by saying that the conscience is dead until God vivifies it. Oh, there is fear of doing wrong, fear of punishment, fear of exposure, but that is not the same thing as the desire to do the 'right' thing for the right reason. And fear is not going to save - only love (and repentance) can do that. The plumb line must be impressed upon the heart, and then the conscience will live.

That is why the sharpest criticism in the Scripture is always reserved for the religious hypocrites. There are (I think) 8 warnings about homosexual behavior in the whole Bible - they are stern, but there are only 8. There are probably hundreds on religiosity. And we all know whom Jesus spoke most harshly to. Not the whores, not the Romans, not the Gentiles, not the lepers, not the losers.

But to those who fully believed that their conscience(s) were clear. Knowing the rules didn't help them. The thief on the cross went to heaven - the high priest went to hell.

Jim,
I wouldn't say that the conscious is dead, but is an innate capacity that requires development. Dennis Prager stated on his show once that all morality is based upon empathy. Once empathy develops within a child, he is capable of moral actions. The Golden Rule really is the source of all morality, I believe. You can't create a rule book to cover what is right and wrong in every situation. If you follow rules without empathy, without an internal sense of why the rule is right, then you are not acting morally. Morality is an active process of applying one's empathy, guided by the wisdom of experience, to concrete situations of human interaction.

There's nothing innate about it. No one is born with empathy for anything but themself. You have to be taught why you should have empathy for the rest of Creation.

So you subscribe to the Blank Slate school?

No. We have innate natures, they just aren't good.

No, we have both good and bad in our natures. If we were naught but bad, there would be no material for a moral teacher to work with.

We made wolves lap dogs (see above), and we're only creators.

You are a blank slatist!

Close enough for government work. I don't think it has anything to do with the senses though. No God, no good. We begin with the Word. For instance, we don't even know the difference between good and evil til we eat from the Tree and then God still has to come back later and give us the Commandments because we can't figure it out. We have to be told what to do to be good.