Arrianna

Yes it is necessary to go in depth. You made an general broad sweeping statement with no perspective or understanding of the foundations of the religions involved to back you up.

Let me get specific for you.

The societies that used head shaping were Ancient Egypt and parts of Africa. Drug use is common among pantheon and animistic religions (which does make sense in a way) such as Ancient Greece, Rome, and Egypt, many aborigine and some Native American religions. While the Catholics did (and still do in a reduced degree) have their corporal mortification it was not practiced by those who founded the religion or set the cannon or lead the church at any time. It is a personal option only and is not practiced by most other Christian religions.

Now consider for a moment, the most common religions which you just claimed may have been lead by mentally ill prophets are Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Buddhist, and Hindu. Yet there is no actual culture of drug use, head shaping, or mortification that existed when any of those religions were founded, their scriptures written, or among those who have had other revelations that shaped the churches.


That is why I said there is no factual evidence to back up the speculation. That is also why it is such an insult because in the absence of said evidence you are saying that anyone who sees something you can't explain must be mentally ill just because you don't believe it.

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basilisk888

Now its on I'm angry you have made me determined to win this >.<
can you prove "god"
your agruement is as good as mine. so I'll say it again can you prove there is a "god"
I use what I hear and what I learn over the years of my life unlike you who will go and research all of this... I wanted to be clear in saying that I'm not saying this about one or another religon. If you want to say that I do not care but its not true... Also I'm saying that if there was a person who founder a religon who did have a mental illness well do you think that anyone in that time would say to him or her "oh your a mentally ill person so I should not believe you." no they did not know of that type of thing back then. I'm also not saying that all of the people were mentally ill but if one of the starters was then the people who follow him or her will be following under a crazy person. Look at history and Hitlar (who I hate >.<) well he was mentally insane, but look he was a person who could lead a great number of people. It does not say that he was not crazy but it does say that he could lead a great number of people and lead them to believe in what he said.

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ILikeApples5520

For one thing, no one can prove there is a God. That's why religion itself exists. To have faith in God (or gods in some cases) and the religion's ideals to beceome a better person.

And personally, I doon't know why you have the nerve to bring mental illness into this discussion. Insanity was realized even back then you know.

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basilisk888

well if you want to know the reasons I think you sould go back to page one...

anyways: so you think that they just said to each other "you want mental illness" some of the people back then did not even think that your mind was in your body (or something like that) so they really fully understood it and knew who was mentaly insane... wow (that would be a new one...)

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Arrianna

Actually I combine personal experience with what I research and learn. Part of that personal experience is observing and getting to know other people and learning from their lives as much as my own.

As for your argument being just as good, sorry no. All you have done is created a circular argument where the one depends on the other. What I am talking about is providing actual evidence of something that was known to exist at the times we are discussing.

False.

The belief of what caused mental illness was debated but they knew full well it existed and treated people for it. Empedocles (490-430 BC) taught it was caused by an imbalance in the "humors". Hippocrates (460-377 BC) taught that it had fully natural causes. Plato (427-347 BC) believed it could either be prophetic or disease. Aristotle (384-322 BC) believed it was completely physical. Asclepiades considered them emotional disturbances and was followed by Cicero (106-43 BC) who taught that the emotional disturbances could cause physical illness. Lastly Arateus (ca AD 30-90) diagnosed the difference between mania and depression and that one person could be both, bipolar. Add to that the fact that the first known asylums were built in the 7th century in Islam countries, that at the same time in Christian countries it was considered the work of the devil and was treated gently by clerics, and it can safely be said that those with mental illnesses could easily be diagnosed and treated rather then put on a pedestal.

Theories of depression before the twentieth century...

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basilisk888

mybe this is a circular argument, thats why this is so much fun we can go on that this for day and days ^.^

well look at it this way do you think that Schizophrenia:

they were aware of it but they did not know what it did and how to exactly stop it. Also what our "young adult hood" would be to us it would be in middle years for people back then (well most of them) and in that time they are respected by people and stuff... (HI ^^)

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Arrianna

Exactly. Schizophrenia was not diagnosed as a separate mental illness but lumped in with general madness. Once you know that you have to look at how the culture treated mad men.

In Early Roman times they considered many of them to be sent from the gods due to their Etruscan beginnings. The Romans had medicine but no doctors however so when they conquered Greece the Greek Dr's took over medicinal practice completely. The Greeks rejected the idea of a divine origin and placed it completely in the realm of the physical as imbalances or disturbances of some kind if not disease. Thanks to the Romans Grecian medicine spread completely throughout the "known world" Including to India. Once that occurred the belief of divine origin was never returned to though a demonic origin was believed for some time in medieval/early renaissance Europe.

In returning to the current major world religions we thus remove both Christianity and Islam from the list of possibility. Judaism believed that mental illness was actually a sign of problems between the person and God rather then a sign of favoritism. The founder of Buddhism was actually a physician and included in his teachings how to treat mental illnesses. I can't speak for Hinduism however, (perhaps someone else can fill that in), all I do know is that the Grecian medical views were embraced there and that having someone with mental illness in your family in predominantly Hindu countries is considered shameful.


In conclusion the belief of mental illness being a sign of divine favoritism can really only be traced in polytheist and animistic societies (as I mentioned earlier) and in all current main world religions there is no evidence of the same but rather the opposite. Hence without wittings that would support said mental illnesses or historical records of their actions that would imply the same it can reasonably be concluded that there is simply no evidence of schizophrenia as a cause for the founding of any of those religions.



So there. *laughs manically*

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Descended From Darkness

Arrianna is right. Mental illness or how it is treated varies from society to society, culture to culture. I do know a Hindu and I can ask him how his religion deals with mental illness.

But I do know of people who would say that if you are schizophrenic that you are being possessed by the devil and an exorcism can "save" you. Ie the power of seizure poke..or seizure touch as it is called by some of my friends. That kind of thing is just amazes me. It shows how people are really afraid of the unknown and how they are so naive and are willing to trust these so called healers. Then again I am a skeptic of exorcisms and the ones I have seen on TV specials looks like the people are just acting up for attention. Its a scam.

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Corvus

This is not to say that relegion is true but this is to say that we are subjects to a power higher then human intelligence and possibly the source of everything even "chance" and the chaotic nature of the univers upon which we base our pinciples.

Those exact same principles which are proven solely by our existence support this.

Let's put things into perspective.
-We are each of us, 1 of about 6-8 billion people on the face of this planet.
-This planet is one of (an arguable) 13 known planets within our system.
-Our system is one of innumerable stars within a galaxy and our galaxy is one of an infinite number of galaxies.
-If we try to comprehend the sheer size of the univers we gradually get a headache... that's because to the universe each of us individually is actually less in size then one electron of one atom in relation to our size, to the universe (which could then be part of a larger thing of which we can't possibly fathom)
-Basically we know nothing.

Now suppose I were to take just one atom from your body from anywhere. That's all it is an atom. More specifically it's a cluster of matter and energy which is so impossibly small that we can't see them with our normal eyes. This atom has no mind no desire it simply exists.

Then, what is it that causes all of the atoms which make up your body to do so? They aren't being pulled together by any known attraction. There is virtually nothing stopping them from all flying off in different directions instantaneously. Some will argue the principle of attraction and so forth but this is rubbish because in all actuality the universe is expanding and everything within it is being propelled to do so as well. So really we shouldn't exist. We are some sort of exception to the principles upon which we found our knowledge and understanding.

Do you see the paradox yet? We justify our laws of nature by things which we experience but our experience is actually a flaw to that system.

In our feeble minds, some are optimistic and to them it may seem that something (or someone) has willingly caused our existence. Then there are those who refuse to accept the "truth" as such and hide behind a flawed science or some other form of pure ignorance, commiting the same heinous crime as "relegion."

There are the few who have merely accepted that science is not complete enough to say that there isn't/ is some supreme being because that's like a child calling his/ her parents imaginary. It just doesn't make sense because there isn't any proof to back it up. At the same time realizing that there is a possibility that there might not be a "god" or anything at all. In which case these people ask themselves, "which way do I stand to lose more?" (we've already determined that there isn't anything to gain from our lack of knowledge, only hope) Then they choose according to their heart finding their path in this confusing existence.

The rest are ignorant and scared. They are those who have not yet arrived at any conclusion so they accuse everyone around them of being fake. Creating unnecessary wars and strife and dividing people by the same confusion that they themselves have.

Relegion is not fake because it's representative of the confusion that the whole world shares; the fact that noone really knows for 100% sure about anything even the true nature of their own existence. However to say that a person is wrong for bettering themselves, is a flaw which our entire society shares because of a lack of confidence in the strength of the individual. The only truth that we can achieve in this world stems from our existence itself, that people exist for progression. Exemplified by our curious nature. We progress the most when we are unified. Erego, acceptance is the key to the knowledge which we all seek.

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Haruko Haruhara

True no matter who we are or what our religion we always seek knowledge for the
unknown and what we have no comprehension of understanding and we could live
forever and maybe not truly understand everything, because there is just to much out
there to possibly understand. And no matter what religion true they do use science
but just don't try to combine it with religion except for maybe scientology(if i'm not right
please correct me), but even God uses science. And yes mental illness in ancient
times were depictated as many different things in many differebt religions i'll
probably sound like a hypocrite but i will agree that sometimes those exorcisms
do seem fake.