Are theists arrogant?

reply to post by madnessinmysoul


To be honest madness i really do not see, what´s the point of this thread. On your opening post you saying

I'd be inclined to say that, on a personal level, no theist is any more or less arrogant than a deist, pantheist, atheist, or other nontheistic individual. We are all human and we all have our own share of negative tendencies, destructive urges, and distasteful behavior.

And yet your thread title is "Are Theists arrogant?". Why are you keep targeting Theists? Everyone has it´s own beliefs, that makes him/her somehow to feel "Special".

Peace

reply to post by Seed76


The point of this thread is that I proposed a question, put forth my personal opinion, and hope to see if anyone disagrees. Of course, there is an obvious reference to a wretchedly bigoted thread of a similar title against atheists and I was making the point that nobody is arrogant based solely on religious beliefs or lack thereof, even if specific beliefs themselves are bigoted.

It was an attempt to show that we should all just get along and move the discourse to specific theological, philosophical, and other idea-based discussion rather than personal attacks against any group.

reply to post by madnessinmysoul

The point of this thread is that I proposed a question,

Yes, you did proposed a question "Are Theists Arrogant?"

put forth my personal opinion,

Which was

I'd be inclined to say that, on a personal level, no theist is any more or less arrogant than a deist, pantheist, atheist, or other nontheistic individual. We are all human and we all have our own share of negative tendencies, destructive urges, and distasteful behavior.

and hope to see if anyone disagrees.

With the thread title or with your personal opinion.?? If you wanted to have a discussion you could have chosen a better title. For example "Are humans arrogant, when it comes to personal beliefs?". That could possibly have stimulated some actual discussion.

It was an attempt to show that we should all just get along and move the discourse to specific theological, philosophical, and other idea-based discussion rather than personal attacks against any group.

Yes, but i think that this thread gonna stimulate more personal attacks than an actual discussion. Anyway thanks for the reply madness.

Peace

It varies with the person, of course, but I would say that the more evangelical a person is, regardless of what they are evangelical in favour of, the more arrogant that they will tend to be, because they are constantly having the door slammed in their face, so they need a pretty thick skin, and that skin often comes from an exaggerated sense of confidence in their being right and the opposition being wrong.

That said, I consider myself to be a reasonably humble person, but I know that I come off as arrogant here and there, which bugs me, so I've thought it through. In general, in a conversation that you and I might have about baseball or computer languages or some other mundane topic, I might argue that Objective-C is superior to C++ or that Bill "Spaceman" Lee was an underrated pitcher, but I'm not all that passionate about it, so I can see your point of view on such matters and acknowledge that your appreciation of C++ is as valid as my dislike of it and you might even convince me that Lee had his due, and there are far more underrated pitchers in the game, so you are right and I am wrong.

So, though I am a theist, I can say that I'm not inherently arrogant. I don't believe that my opinion holds any great sway, simply because it is mine.

However, when we move into the realm of faith, a different "me" emerges, and that's where I struggle. I've thought about the Jewish "chosen people" thing in the past, and how that certainly comes off as elitist and arrogant, but I come back to the nature of faith, and the nature of reality -- there can only be one truth. Either the Jews are the chosen people of the creator God, or they are not. If they are, then it isn't elitist or arrogant for a Jew to call himself "chosen", it's simply stating a fact.

But the fact of the matter is that, for a person who is a strict adherent to that belief system, it IS a fact. It IS right. If it wasn't right, they wouldn't be a strict adherent of it. This doesn't change reality, whether there is or isn't a God and whether he has or hasn't chosen a certain people, but it moulds this person's reality, and how they see themselves in the world.

As I've said before, I am a Christian because I believe that Christianity is right. If something came round that convinced me that I was mistaken, and Christianity is wrong, I would no longer be a Christian. But it has not, and enough things have come round to convince me that it is right, so that's where I stand. That seems so simple, and yet it's a fact lost on people who try to sway others to their faiths. The reason that I don't try and convert a non Christian, such as yourself, is that I recognize that you believe that your views are right, that's why you hold them, and trying to convince you that you are wrong is simply disrespectful of you.

However, that "I'm right, you must be wrong" perspective that results from this conclusion of faith all too often comes off as arrogance, when it is likely closer to a (possibly inflated as a defence mechanism) sense of self confidence that we have made the right decision and that our belief is the right belief.

Combined with the fact that a theist views faith as of paramount importance, not a mundanity like sport or computers, I think that you'll find almost anyone who is passionate on the matter will seem arrogant. The question for Christian theists, then, becomes whether they are arrogant in themselves (which is decried in the Bible) or arrogant in their faith (which is not.)

Hope that helps.