I believe in God but don't you think people in Jesus time were a lot less intelligent than we are now?

Question

and they believed everything about anything?

Answer 1

It always troubles me when people see our civilization as brilliant and the past as stupid. The people of the past in that area invented mathmatics, writing, logic, science, they found ways to utilize ores to create brass and iron. Given the lack of foundation they had (our knowledge based on all they learned and taught and where it has lead us.) I think they were absolutely brilliant.

Pastor John

Answer 2

As a historian, I have to say that I find what you just said very funny. You really think that people don't believe "everything about anything" today? Hardly. If that were true, people wouldn't be wearing overpriced name brand clothing or voting along party lines. Look at the crap we watch on television. Try reading the juvenile scripts that are written for a lot of our movies. We have more knowledge today, it is true, than the people of the past, but knowledge and intelligence are two different things. With all the knowledge we have today, we seem to do some pretty stupid things on a regular basis. Look at the rate by which we kill ourselves doing things that everyone knows is harmful, like smoking or drinking and driving. Look at how many people do not even know basic geography or history or grammar. Look at some of the really bad questions that are asked on here every day. The people of the present are not really all that bright in many cases.

For further proof, go sit in on a history class in college and listen to the students try to read and interpret the writings from the time. Most of them are not capable of doing it, and the reason is often simply because they are not intelligent enough. The people of the past were very complex and sophisticated. Like today, some were very intelligent, and some were not so, but that has not changed in any way in the past 10,000 years. Human nature is relatively constant.

And as a final piece of evidence, look at your own grammar (or lack thereof) and the total lack of understanding of the past that you demonstrate here. I am not convinced you are as smart as you think you are. No offense, though. None of us are. But as Socrates said, a man who existed even earlier than Christ, the most intelligent person is the one that knows that he knows nothing.

Answer 3

That's a common idea today. But it is totally false. There's a huge difference between intelligence and having access to information. The ancient Greeks created jet engines, hydraulics, computers, mechanics, and much more. Yet today we have the audacity to say that we are somehow smarter. If anything, I'd say we're stupider these days, because we don't USE the intelligence we are endowed with.

Answer 4

No. I believe people were pretty much the same. Our technology and our increased knowledge about things don't change us all that much as people. We still are human beings, as they were human beings then. I think it's a myth that ancient people were less intelligent. Look at the pyramids, look at the architecture in the ancient world. There is little to equal it in modern times. People will always be people. They love, hate, yearn, they are sad, happy, despairing, they are jealous, needy, all those things, from beginning to end.

Answer 5

Yes, thats why the primitive bronze age tribesmen were duped into believing in all of this religious nonsense. I believe the evidence and writings point more toward extra terrestrial involvment that divine involvment.
even the bible claims the god of the christians lives in the deepest of the darkness, sounds like deep space to me. That is how jesus brought back the 'dead'. In our advanced, modern society, they wouldn't have been dead, just barely alive, in a coma like condition. All of jesus' 'miracles' can be explained with a little science. Admittedly, we do not have a high enough level of technology to reproduce all of them, but we're getting closer with every generation. Never forget that the level of 'common sense' a society has changes and increases with each generation. What is new and unknown to one generation is old and well known to the next.

Answer 6

There's a difference between intelligence and ignorance.

They were extremely intelligent. Look at the Pyramids of every culture.

Very ignorant though. Killing people that they believed were witches or sacrificing virgins for more rain.

I think thats the difference.

The Syko Ward

Answer 7

Hardly. Intelligence is not a function of knowledge. That those who lived 2000 years ago lacked much of the scientific and technical knowledge we have today has no bearing on their intelligence.

Would you say that Aristotle, Plato and others of that ilk were less intelligent than people today. Quite likely they would put the best and brightest of our generation to shame.

Answer 8

Less intrinsically intelligent? NO!

Less informed about their world? Yes.

Less technologically oriented and capable? Yes.

Believed in everything about anything? Not hardly. If that were so, then all of Jewry would have become followers of Jesus as soon as they heard the message.

Answer 9

Not Necessarily, you can be book smart and have a lot of knowledge, but have no wisdom.

Take My son for example, he is very intelligent, he has always had high grades in school and college, but has no wisdom, he is constantly making bad decisions.

The Bible actually speaks of people who are learn a lot and never come to the knowledge of the truth.

(2Ti 3:7 Ever learning, and never able to come to the knowledge of the truth.)

Answer 10

new stats say that 85-90 percent of Americans say they believe in God. So what, the devil believes in God and shudders! Salvation comes through Jesus Christ. Every knee will bow to Jesus. You are either for him or the devil. Jesus choose the plain men because you don't need a degree to believe in him. You don't believe with your brain, you believe with your heart, not the one that pumps blood, the one in your belly, your spirit.