Weird and Religious
In 7th century Arabia, poetry was so culturally important that public recitations could raise or destroy a tribe’s reputation. Poets were seen as having almost supernatural verbal power, and verses could function like political weapons long before written law was widespread.
Religious image of the day.
In the name of religion
1975, Lebanon civil war phase. Christian and Muslim militias attacked civilian neighbourhoods in sectarian cleansing campaigns. Leaders justified operations as protecting their religious communities, defending holy identity, and preventing domination by rival faith based factions.
Fact
In Jainism, karma is understood as a kind of subtle matter that attaches to the soul, and Jainism teaches that actions bind the soul to cycles of rebirth.
Belief in the absurd
Religion does not merely ask for belief in the unseen. It demands belief in the absurd. At its core, it requires people to accept stories (like Noah's Ark and the Great Flood) that collapse under the most basic scrutiny and then treat acceptance as virtue, a demand that was not accidental or symbolic at the outset. For long periods of history, these claims were insisted upon as literal truth precisely because they astonished uneducated audiences and reinforced authority. The more implausible the claim, the greater the demonstration of power required to believe it.
Quote of the day
“The whole conception of God is a conception derived from the ancient Oriental despotisms.” Bertrand Russell.
Ask the right question
Why should ancient testimony about supernatural events be trusted when we reject similar modern claims as unreliable?
Religious Crooks
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad’s case is highly contested and usually treated as a theological dispute rather than fraud, so instead a clearer example is Wayne Bent, leader of the Lord Our Righteousness Church, who claimed prophetic authority while controlling followers’ lives and finances, later convicted on charges related to abuse of minors.
For more information, google the name.
Almost all of the crooks appearing in this section have their own wikipedia page.
If a real God existed, would he allow crooks to act on his behalf?