Eliezer_Yudkowsky comments on Mere Messiahs - Less Wrong

42 Post author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 02 December 2007 12:49AM

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Comment author: Eliezer_Yudkowsky 02 December 2007 03:42:19AM 11 points [-]

Well, I'm sorry if it seems like I'm beating on Christianity, but come on - it makes such a beautiful case study! The point isn't to deconvert people from Christianity, it's to point out how the same flaw that appears in Christianity powers the Superman comics and celebrity cults, and prevents us from thinking that we can do better ourselves. If I were doing a series on cognitive biases contributing to the horror of the Soviet Union, would you accuse me of beating too hard on Communism?

TGGP, Hyam Maccoby makes an interesting case that Yeishu tried to follow the Judaic apocalyptic tradition in detail, but never claimed to be the Son of God and would probably have been quite horrified at the paganism of the concept (like any educated Jew of that era). That part was added later, by an adventurer ignorant of Judaism, namely Paul, who successfully took over and wiped out the actual inheritors of Yeishu's movement, the Ebionites.