₦airaland Forum

Tazdroid:
Greeks and the origination of almost everything

Yes ancient mediterranean was pretty amazing lol

And is that Zuma? lol

Why exactly do so many Nigerians hate homosexuals so much? I don't understand this. There are other countries with a Christian majority who realise how backwards hating on homosexuals is so why does Nigeria always top the polls in this regard?

Is there really a problem with two men loving one another? Apparently it is a sin against god for men to love men or women to love women, but it is not a sin against god according to some Naijas to abuse, threaten, bully and even kill these people!?

Just let people love one another, it doesn't harm others at all

The word "atheist" - meaning "godless" - originated in ancient Greece as a derogatory term, and later as a criminal offense for those who did not acknowledge the Greco-Roman pantheon. Certain philosophers, pagans and early christians were also known as 'atheists' in the Roman Empire, at least where law and order were concerned.

This does not, however, mean that all accused atheists in the ancient mediterranean were actually just mislabeled followers of other religions. Far from it, actually.


Diagoras of Melos was an ancient Greek sophist and skeptic from the 5th century BCE, 400+ years before the birth of Christ , ~2500 years ago, and is widely considered to be one of the first known true atheists in history. While the large majority of his life, beliefs and writings have been lost to history, it is known that he was one of the students of the famous philosopher Democritus (often regarded as the 'father of modern science' for his ideas regarding an atomic theory of the universe - also a true atheist accused of atheism), who paid 10'000 drachmas to free Diagoras from prison as he was one of many Melians held captive after Athens' invasion of Melos. He was also known to be openly against religion and religious mysticism, to the point where he might even be considered an anti-theist.

He continuously challenged his peers on matters of religion, which he would ridicule in public, and would commit a series of actions that infuriated the temples and religious orders of Athens.

In the first century BCE, the Philosopher Cicero in his De Natura Deorum, writes of how Diagoras' friend attempted to convince him that gods existed by showing him ancient pictures telling stories of sailors who survived great storms by veneration of the gods, to which he replied "there are nowhere any pictures of those who have been shipwrecked and drowned at sea." A similar back-and-forth, Cicero writes, occurred when Diagoras was aboard a ship in a great storm, and the crew believed that they were experiencing bad weather because they had brought an atheist on board. Diagoras then 'wondered if the other boats out in the same storm also had a Diagoras on board'.

Diagoras constantly declared that there was no god at all, would often interrupt temple initiation rites, chopped up a wooden statue of the Greco-Roman god Hercules and used it as firewood to cook his turnips, and, much to the fury of the temples, leaked released sacred, secret religious rites such as the Eleusinian Mysteries to the wider public, to de-mystify them and spark debate.

Eventually, Athens placed a bounty on his head and accused him of atheism and impiety, but Diagoras fled the city. Although a decree was issued to bring him in dead or alive throughout the Athenian empire, meaning that his capture/death was considered a serious matter, Diagoras was never caught. Many historians believe that there was a political motive beneath the religious accusations, and that Diagoras was being targeted because he was an ethnic Melian.

Jennifer Michael Hecht, on Diagoras, wrote:

The poet Diagoras of Melos was perhaps the most famous atheist of the fifth century. Although he did not write about atheism, anecdotes about his unbelief suggest he was self-confident, almost teasing, and very public. He revealed the secret rituals of the Eleusinian mystery religion to everyone and "thus made them ordinary," that is, he purposefully demystified a cherished secret rite, apparently to provoke his contemporaries into thought. In another famous story, a friend pointed out an expensive display of votive gifts and said, "You think the gods have no care for man? Why, you can see from all these votive pictures here how many people have escaped the fury of storms at sea by praying to the gods who have brought them safe to harbor." To which Diagoras replied, "Yes, indeed, but where are the pictures of all those who suffered shipwreck and perished in the waves?" A good question. Diagoras was indicted for profaning the mysteries, but escaped. A search was out for him throughout the Athenian empire, which indicated that the charges were serious, but he was not found.

Diagonas was one of many free-thinkers of ancient Greece who challenged and probed various social institutions of morality, religion, nature and physics, and was the legacy of early Greek intellectuals, like Democritus, who increasingly explained natural phenomena by observation of nature instead of relying on religious claims of divine intervention. Democritus explained natural occurrences through cause and effect via his philosophy of an atomic theory of the universe, and dismissed the intervention of an almighty being for these occurences. Democritus believed that widespread religious belief was as a result of fear towards unusual natural phenomena that were difficult or challenging to explain.

Keep in mind that this was 2600 years ago, a time in which speaking out loud these incredibly ingenious and remarkable ideas in most parts of the world would result in torture, rape, and/or execution.

Athens at the time, had a large number of people dedicated to free thought in a world largely marred by religious fundamentalism, not unlike the world we live in today.

According to the fashion of the sophists, "[Diagonas] substituted the active powers of nature for the activity of the gods; and some isolated statements that have come down to us render it probable that he did this in a witty manner."

Gombs:
Rom 9 AMP
20 But who are you, a mere man, to criticize and contradict and answer back to God? Will what is formed say to him that formed it, Why have you made me thus?
21 [size=16pt] Has the potter no right over the clay, [/size] to make out of the same mass (lump) one vessel for beauty and distinction and honorable use, and another for menial or ignoble and dishonorable use?


God designed sex for a Man and Woman (married)...that's why he gave Adam, Eve. Man outta perversion decide to go after same sex as he. God created sex and gave users manual...why would anybody wanna go against the manual?
Animals (without intelligence as man) do NOT go after same sex...why then humans?


Romans 1 TLB

25 Instead of believing what they knew was the truth about God, they deliberately chose to believe lies. So they prayed to the things God made, but wouldn’t obey the blessed God who made these things.
26 That is why God let go of them and let them do all these evil things, so that even their women turned
against God’s natural plan for them and indulged in sex sin with each other. 27 [size=16pt] And the men, instead of having normal sex relationships with women, burned with lust for each other, men doing shameful things with other men and, [/size] as a result, getting paid within their own souls with the penalty they so richly deserved.
28 So it was that when they gave God up and would not even acknowledge him, God gave them up to doing
everything their evil minds could think of. 29 Their lives became full of every kind of wickedness and sin, of greed and hate, envy, murder, fighting, lying, bitterness, and gossip.
30 They were backbiters, haters of God, insolent, proud, braggarts, always thinking of new ways of sinning and continually being disobedient to their parents.
31 They tried to misunderstand,[h] broke their promises, and were heartless—without pity. 32 They were fully aware of God’s death penalty for these crimes, [size=16pt] yet they went right ahead and did them anyway and encouraged others to do them, too. [/size]

Actually, there are thousands of animals that practice homosexual behaviour and intercourse, including the world's most intelligent animals (Dolphins, Chimpanzees, Bonobos, Humans a.k.a. us).

Why does God restrict homosexuals from marriage? I have met homosexual couples before and their love is clearly true - truer than married non-homosexual couples that I have met. Yet God will torment them so?

Joshthefirst: Alright then, since you choose to bring it up;

What has the extinction of a kind got to do with the changing of a kind to another?

Or do you believe dinosaurs actually became birds?

Eh?

Not all Dinosaurs evolved into birds. Only a select few of the group Theropoda, which included dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurus and Velociraptor, survived the great extinction event 65 million years ago. Those did over time evolve into birds.

The same happened with us Mammals. A few hundred million years ago and we would've looked something like this

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5e/Dimetrodon_grandis.jpg

Inshallah surely they make difference between islam of the peaceful and loving and the false bloodthirsty islam of the extremist? It is like saying all christians are columbus the murderer!

I understand their reasons but find this unfair to us muslims who are not terrorist.

Salaam Aaleikum. Shi'a Moslem here.

naijaborn001: What is this IDEOT saying

I am asking why god thinks gay people are bad?

So I get to reading the bible and God calls Soddom and a man lying with another man an 'abomination'.

But why does he think that? What is his reason? Does he just not like men who sleep with other men? I do not understand.