Zzyzx wrote:...promoters of religion ...have not presented anything more substantial than unverifiable tales, testimonials, opinions, and conjectures (ancient or modern). ... Why should one of them be any more, or less, convincing than others?
Why indeed.
My working hypothesis is this:
if a parochial collection of folk tales is all one has,
one has no perspective,
no basis on which to form a question like
'Why is Job like so many other tales?'
Instead one finds oneself awed by it
as by a revelation.
To such (formerly myself too I should add)
the narrative has a 'wow'/'brain fiz' effect.
We do much the same when giving quotes (theist or otherwise)
they're like 'magic' words,
a shorthand used for 'semiotic' purposes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semiotics
like saying 'Goldiocks Zone'
instead of explaining all that that means.
Pearls of great price are sown before us
as if the Question Posed (eg. by the book of Job -
'Why do bad things happen to good people?'
or Isaiah53's "Who has believed us?")
were of itself an Answer;
as if the simple Wonder of the poetry
implied the existence of Goldilocks.
As it were.
Are we, perhaps, being dreamed at?
Does a lack of curiosity not tell us that,
in terms of empathy at least,
such individuals are asleep?
