Supreme Fascist

[75gitane]

Paul Erdös, mathematician, referred to god as the supreme fascist.

for a full list of erdosisms, see
http://www.paulerdos.com/5.html

quote from http://www.geocities.com/ilian73/erdos.html
Erdös chafed at being pushed around by an omnipotent being he called variously the Supreme Fascist, the Number-One Guy Up There, or God. He claimed that He tormented him by hiding his glasses, stealing his Hungarian passport, or, worse yet, keeping to Himself the elegant solutions to all sorts of intriguing mathematical problems.

quote from http://home.earthlink.net/~djmp/MyBrainIsOpen.html
God was "The Supreme Fascist". He said that God keeps "The Book" which contains the best and most elegant proofs of all the mathematical theorems. You didn’t have to believe in God to believe in "The Book". If he saw a proof that he especially liked he would say that "it came straight from The Book".

[hasbeen99]

fas·cism n.

1) A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism.

2)A political philosophy or movement based on or advocating such a system of government.

3)Oppressive, dictatorial control

I find it difficult to see how someone can make such an assertion with the broad spectrum of free will being observed in the world today.

[75gitane]

maybe we can get someone w/ a low Erdös number to comment on whether Erdös was serious ... or just having a little fun.

i've read hoffman's book and it's an interesting read. judging by other Erdösisms, i would say Erdös called god the supreme fascist with a twinkle in his eye.

[hasbeen99]

maybe we can get someone w/ a low Erdös number to comment on whether Erdös was serious ... or just having a little fun.

i've read hoffman's book and it's an interesting read. judging by other Erdösisms, i would say Erdös called god the supreme fascist with a twinkle in his eye.

Doesn't matter if he was serious or not. He was wrong. And that kind of remark is highly offensive to many who do believe in God.

[75gitane]

several things come to mind.

does god have a sense of humor? i think god does have a sense of humor and that god can take a joke too ...

who would make a better next door neighbor ... a religious person or a spiritual person? give me a spiritual person every day of the week ...

and finally ... a quote from leonard pitts' column in last weeks newspaper:

" ... Some people live in a world of stark either-or, this or that. Bound by ideology, they lack the flexibility, imagination and intellectual agility to reason their way through life's contradictions and complexities.

Limbaugh and others have made piles of money from the existence and cynical exploitation of such people.

But what gives me optimism is my conviction that most of us are not rigid ideologues. Most of us are reachable by reason. Most of us willingly work to figure out what the right thing is. ..."

[hasbeen99]

several things come to mind.

does god have a sense of humor? i think god does have a sense of humor and that god can take a joke too ...

I'll agree that He has a sense of humor (look at the platypus -- how could He not?), but 'joking' at God's expense is an attempt to put us way too close to His level, or more accurately bring Him down to ours. You can be comfortable and still reverent. I can't imagine how anyone could call God a Facist (even jokingly) and retain any sense of reverence. It's in poor taste. :nono:

[ECILAM]

I'll agree that He has a sense of humor (look at the platypus -- how could He not?), but 'joking' at God's expense is an attempt to put us way too close to His level, or more accurately bring Him down to ours. You can be comfortable and still reverent. I can't imagine how anyone could call God a Facist (even jokingly) and retain any sense of reverence. It's in poor taste. :nono:

You can say you think God has a sense of humor if it gives you comfort to believe that, but in all my years of Protestant Christianity I never came across an indication of such in the Bible. The God of the Bible strikes me as a vindictive sourpuss.

[hasbeen99]

You can say you think God has a sense of humor if it gives you comfort to believe that, but in all my years of Protestant Christianity I never came across an indication of such in the Bible. The God of the Bible strikes me as a vindictive sourpuss.

I can see that, to an extent. But the thing you have to keep in mind is that Jesus and the God of the Old Testament are one in the same. And Jesus drank wine and went to parties. And again, there's the whole platypus thing. :D

[slydevl]

You can say you think God has a sense of humor if it gives you comfort to believe that, but in all my years of Protestant Christianity I never came across an indication of such in the Bible. The God of the Bible strikes me as a vindictive sourpuss.

I don't know. When you look at the Bible there are a lot of instances of irony that could be interpreted as God having a sense of humor. Look at Moses. He was saved by Pharoah's daughter and then went on to free the slaves. Kinda funny when you think about it.

[hasbeen99]

I don't know. When you look at the Bible there are a lot of instances of irony that could be interpreted as God having a sense of humor. Look at Moses. He was saved by Pharoah's daughter and then went on to free the slaves. Kinda funny when you think about it.


Good point. He definitely has a sense of irony. I think whatever sense of humor God has is more subtle than not. Wouldn't you agree?

[slydevl]

Good point. He definitely has a sense of irony. I think whatever sense of humor God has is more subtle than not. Wouldn't you agree?

Yep

[ECILAM]

I don't know. When you look at the Bible there are a lot of instances of irony that could be interpreted as God having a sense of humor. Look at Moses. He was saved by Pharoah's daughter and then went on to free the slaves. Kinda funny when you think about it.

Point taken. However, irony and humor are not the same thing. To me, humor and true reverence in traditional terms are not compatable with each other. True, there are down-home preachers who open sermons with clean humor, but even the lightest joke is an attempt to make light of its subject. Sincere faith calls for a "time out" to that sort of thing, and genuine religious devotion requires a certain degree of solemnity.

My point is that humor is a human trait, and in Biblical terms, that trait does not carry over to the Divine.