Too Taboo To Chew! (Religion) (Page 15 of 16)

why can't all examples be as fun as this one.

edit: oh i just thought about that: it's the measuring that changes the output!
that last night he wasn't measuring that phenomenon!

There's an unstated faith/belief in causality there.

Suppose I set up an experiment where I had a bunch of test subjects and I exposed them to one of those trick-images that perhaps appeared to look like an old woman or a young woman.

The 'object' of my study would be the subjective interpretations of the image by the test subjects.

Let me clarify a bit more what I mean through some comparative statements:

A subjective statement:
The drawing is of an old woman.

An objective statement:
The test subject said: 'The drawing is of an old woman'.

With the objective statement, it is true independent of what the speaker believes about the drawing.

Take a field like social psychology for example, and you have an objectification of subjective phenomena...assessment of subjective responses under various conditions.

Basically, the subjective experiences of some can be the object of the awareness of other parties...it is observable, measurable, etc.
The outward manifestation is the claim to a subjective experience itself.

-Rob

hmmm I usually think of the word "faith" in a religious context and use the word believe for other situations.

eg: I believe the chair will hold me up. He had faith that God did exist....

In any case, why not just say He believed that God did exist? Is there a difference between what you mean when you use faith or belief in english? or is it really just an issue of emotional reactivity to something that you subjectively and arbitrarily associate with religions that you don't agree with?

-Rob

So what is the difference? As far as I can tell, there's no difference in the function of the word, only in what it is applied to.

As for the rest of your story, I just don't understand what you mean by it...is it painting a philosophical scenario or an emotional picture?

Also, if you could describe whether belief in causality is an assumption(a matter of faith) or a conclusion(a matter of science?), that may help us to continue. If it is a dead end on the matter of faith, surely there are other topics we could pick up and continue to explore...and perhaps with an expanded knowledge base, we will eventually be able to return to the faith matter with new insights that may help us to forge onward.

-Rob

I attend a regular service (perhaps not regularly though) either at the Catholic church here, or at the United church here where my gf was raised. Neither is exactly aligned with what I believe, though I maintain that it is beneficial to attend...beneficial like meditation...not entirely necessary...and there are a bunch of different approaches to it...but in the end it's more about the spirit with which you do it than whether you actually do it or not.

and Buddhist, and Hindu, and Taoist, and Confucianist, etc. etc. I probably adhere to none of those faiths 'perfectly' in the sense of tradition or doctrine and what-have-you, though I find them all very empowering, educational and enlightening...not in conflict with one another the way that many insist.

It is a fact that Christians, Muslims and Jews all believe in the same God...they are called the 'Abrahamic religions'. Accordingly, they all believe in the God of Abraham. The religions themselves believe different things about that God...but it is the same God. Like all of us agree on the existence of Napoleon Bonaparte, though we may disagree on the sort of person he was and on our attitudes toward him and our attitudes toward each others' views about him. Ultimately though, each of us would be most satisfied to know the truth about Napoleon.

We are all sons and daughters of God in an Absolute sense. I accept that in order to get to heaven I will have to go through Jesus, though I don't think of that with the same meaning that most do, since I don't think Jesus meant we had to pass through his literal body...but through his essence....which is truth itself...totally beyond ego and separateness. I believe that we must pass through a unity, not through a singularity...that we must, in a sense, become one with the Trinity...which is totally in accord with the tenets of nondualism that are purported by eastern faiths and philosophies.

All my concerns are quite moderate in intensity...but to answer your questions in order:
1)My opinion of the bible is that it contains a lot of great wisdom.
2)Genesis is allegorical.
3)The New Testament (excluding the book of Revelation, which seems like a demonic dream) is an account(a series of accounts actually) of the life and teachings of Jesus...and Jesus taught using parables. So it is a mix of literal and historical fact and mystical/spiritual teachings which are often conveyed through parables. The Old Testament mostly conveys a God that was anthropomorphized and misunderstood by the people of the time...a moody, jealous, angry God that was more a projection of their own egos than it was an accurate portrayal of the Divine. However, Psalms, Proverbs and Genesis are still useful as they don't require the reader to sort out so much nonsense from the actual useful part.
I don't think any spiritual literature that I've encountered yet is totally infallible.
4)It's not of great concern that the Bible has undergone countless revisions and translations. There are some significant differences, which do lead people in different directions, but for the most part, even with all the changes, the Bible is still a good book.
Personally, I believe in Aramaic primacy. I prefer the George Lamsa translation on most points, as it keeps with Jesus' character best (it doesn't have Jesus asking God why he has forsaken him, but rather, a dialogue where Jesus states "for this I have been spared")...but it's really neither here nor there, as I'm not concerned with conflict. Forgiveness ends the dream of conflict...and my concern is less for the bible, and more for being like Christ; forgiving, unconditionally.

What do you suppose is the difference between 'reason' as it applies to sentience, and 'causality' as it applies to sentience? Say, the difference between the reason the wall eroded, and the cause of the wall eroding? they seem the same.
For me, when I'm pursuant of solid reasoning, I tend to look at it in the sense of being true to 'actual' causes. Like the reason a person 'thinks' they chose to eat froot loops instead of shredded wheat for breakfast is because of the taste, when in fact the reason is some previously acquired operant conditioning.
What the person 'thinks' is their rationalization but what is actually the case is what I would qualify as a reason. In this sense, I cannot distinguish between 'reasons' and 'causes'.

I think the greatest difficulty that people have in considering the non-reality of causality is due to the fact that they are so identified with the mind, which is the perceiver of causality/reason. If it's not an assumption or a conclusion, it is certainly a program that is innate to the mind.
At the core of things, this is why I believe that the question 'What am I?' is so important. Are you the mind, or are you that which is identified with the mind? One meditation exercise that is common is to simply observe the ramblings of the mind from a 3rd person sort of perspective. It may be noted that the mind usually just continues on, uninterrupted while we observe it. It begs the question though, who or what is doing the observing? and is it subject to cause and effect?

Add to that that 'time' is an artifact of perception as well, and you might make better progress.
The thing is, that as causation and time pertain to what is perceived (that is, to causation and time), prominent theories and ideas require no revision at all.

The dvd explanation is not one for us to 'understand', but rather, just for us to consider...to visualize, and to consider the position that one has to adopt in order to honestly visualize such a non-causal existence is the position of the unchanging Self...something permanent and not subject to the passing of time or to the acquisition of knowledge or understanding. The pure subjective...Awareness itself(not the content of awareness).

It all pertains to the mind, to mentation, which means that it pertains to perception...but not necessarily to reality. We must transcend perception(separateness, incompleteness) in order to arrive at what we are trying to perceive (truth/wholeness/everything).
No matter how accurate your perception of a dog, you cannot know what it means to be a dog until you are one with the dog. Duality cannot persist in the face of truth, for truth is verifiable only by identity with it, not by knowing about it.
If we are identified with the mind, we are identified with causality...we are identified with separateness. We cannot be identified with the mind and realize that causality is only an artifact of perception...we must observe the mind itself, from the point of unchangingness.

-Rob

I'm all about Norse Mythology. keeping it simpel.

Murder is unjust to those identified with bodies and suffering. You're not genuinely looking for the non-relative answer. You're looking for the answer that satisfies the level that you're at.
Murder aggravates the ego...and at our level (the level of being in the dream) aggravation of the ego prolongs the drama. It is just at our level to quell the influence of murder by outlawing it.
Once we are aware that we're not bodies though, we're no longer subject to murder as a phenomenon though, so it doesn't matter...it's not unjust to an infinite being that cannot be threatened by anything.
On the absolute level, that which is real cannot be threatened...such is the nature of heaven...perfect harmony, and nothing negative...anything less simply wouldn't be heavenly.
If you believe in things as threats, that's not the level of God/the Absolute you're talking about. An infinite, perfect, omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent being is not subject to the concept of just/unjust itself, for it cannot be threatened!
Way down on the level where we anthropomorphize God as 'judge', we infer that there is a character because we infer that there are states in time consisting of pre and post consequential...when in the Absolute, there is no state of pre judgment and post judgment...justice is God's nature.

Also, ignorance doesn't exist of itself, any more than the characters in our favourite tv shows do...in relative terms. We suspend disbelief with characters...that is, we adopt a position of non-awareness of who the person is in real life. With ignorance, it is the non-awareness of truth...not the presence of a thing called 'ignorance' that can be measured and quantified unto itself. There's nothing that can serve as the reason for its existence, because in the absolute sense, it doesn't exist. It is the absence of a thing. If you insist on a reason(a 'cause') it's not absolute, but relative...and relatively speaking, it's all quite entertaining stuff! tv shows and egos!

Also, anything less than circular reasoning means that one is leaving loose ends. Circular reasoning itself isn't bad...the important thing is that the loop encompasses the whole of the issue.
You cannot explain truth in terms of non truth, right? so it must be circular, truth can only explain itself.

I've been reading some articles on Wittgenstein's theories of language that are brought to mind upon reading this argument. They're quite complicated however, and they don't really amount to anything that might serve as persuasive.
In any case, God is an accurate term, in the sense that it refers to the ineffable absolute. Characterfulness or characterlessness is not something that can accurately be said about the absolute. Character itself is a mentation and conceptualization, as is the idea of an energy field...what the terms themselves denote, and what they mean in the context of a discussion about God are two different things, as our discussion is largely concerned with defining what God is. As such, it is difficult to make the accusation that I'm misusing the term, when the term itself remains undefined.

The idea of 'character' is relative to duality and its concordant 'relationships'. When referring to unity, it is not applicable.
For example, consider the Trinity...which is actually a unity, that we perceive in three forms, though its essence is not one of separateness. We consider different aspects of it, and our language effortlessly chops God up into bits. To consider God as having a relationship with himself is absurd, because it would require that the different aspects of God might not be in agreement with each other at times...which would imply that the separate aspects really are separate, and not rightly considered as a unity...more like a team or an organism than as a unity...

What 'will' means from our perspective is something that has influence over time...God's will is Reality...and it is total, complete, and satisfied to its conclusion already. We call it a will due to the limitation of our perception, and then we project our limitation onto God...we project that what the ego's will is, God's will must resemble...so we come to understand God's will as being influenced by a sense of lack...which in turn diminishes our understanding of God, since absolutely, God does not experience lack...and so on.
The downfall of the rational ego is that it projects that all other minds operate according to the same rules as it does. Unfortunately, it's neither the case with God, nor with the less aware...reason is not the dominant influence except to the reasonable ego.

-Rob

Not sure what you're implying there. you're talking about intention? but in reference to what exactly?

-Rob

Just felt like taking a break from responding...and I get discouraged when you make declarations about my world view that are wrong, and then proceed to argue why your misunderstanding of my world view is wrong. It's discouraging, and I like to take a break from things to see if there's a better way to explain myself...because having you argue against a world view that's not mine is a waste of your time and mine.

This is the first discouraging part, because there are different levels of understanding and relationship to the ego. It is not inherently 'bad' or unreliable...in fact, without it, we wouldn't survive long enough to have this conversation in the first place. It is capable of knowing truth as truth appears relative to the ego's function(which is self-preservation/survival -- we outgrew the need for it when the promise of eternal life was made available though). It is incapable of knowing the absolute though, and so in one context it is trustworthy and in another it is not.

I'll get around to writing more...but yeah, I hope that works as an explanation for my lack of quick response.

-Rob

Say the absolute is Light. The relative is not so much 'degrees of wrongness' but 'degrees of not-rightness'. You might think that's a silly distinction to make, however, it's critical to understand if you are interested in the essence of what I'm advocating for. I do not believe in evil. Relatively speaking, evil is just the absence of good and not the presence of bad, just like darkness is the absence of light and not the presence of some measurable thing called 'darkness'.
There are gradations only to perception(to the ego). To ask 'why' is to ask the question on behalf of the ego, and thus you are asking for a relative answer and not for an absolute one. From the absolute no questions arise, nor answers...the absolute is not dualistic(not light vs. dark), and thus, no lack(of knowledge, power, or presence) is possible for the absolute.

The difficulty seems to rest in the fact that a)it is the ego that is questioning, so b)the ego doesn't want to answer to truth, but to have truth answer to it.
It wants to perceive truth through the lens of its own beliefs(in causality for example)...when the lens of causality renders the absolute imperceptible.
It's like arguing against the possibility that the surface of a pond can be still, while one is standing in the middle of it flailing their arms.
So long as one's identity is separate from God(aka the Absolute), one can only know 'about' the absolute; they cannot fully 'know' it.

Now, why are most people identified with the ego instead of with God? there are a variety of reasons...none of which are absolute reasons(since the absolute doesn't answer to reason--it is the context within which reason is possible), all of which are relative reasons.
So, it goes back to the model of being...we look from the perspective of the ego, up towards God, or of God down towards the ego...the relative view or the absolute one...and there are infinite relative views...but only one absolute. Look from a world identified with form and causality and try to fit God into that, or identify with that which gives birth to the potential for causality and form to be experienced.

There was a sage that once said that upon approaching enlightenment, one finds himself only a step away from despair and a step away from God. When you realize that this world of form and attachments is meaningless one can either despair at the implications of that, or let go of all worldly attachments in favour of the absolute. Basically, despair is choosing to indulge the ego, and enlightenment is letting go. Letting go is obviously the better choice too, because even despair is pointless. What would there be to despair about in a perfect world, with no possible threats, and complete freedom to be happy without having to exert oneself against obstacles since there are no obstacles?
When you talk about this world view as being one of oblivion and voidness, you are actually encroaching upon an understanding of it, and then choosing a response of despair. It's true...Allness, Oneness and Perfection appears similar in many ways to Nothingness, Void, and Oblivion.
It's really the difference between emptiness and stillness.
God said: Be still and know that I am God.

Well, historically(a relative context) it's come up through many religions and religious figures. In an absolute context however, life is not extinguishable. The historical religious figures had a realization of this absolute truth, and told the people that by giving up sin(attachment to the ego, to worldly pursuits, to limitations) eternal life is realized.

The ego is motivated by self preservation. Eternal life is what the ego wants, but it is afraid that it is finite. Eternal life and a sense of having to survive are counter to one another. The claim of eternity can only arise from what is eternal(God) and it appeals to that which is limited(the ego), not to God, since God has no lack that would justify God being subject to appeals.

truth is conceivable from the view of the relative, but not knowable. The relative can know about. It doesn't render truth to be 'false' to all egos...it's just that maintenance of the relative and realization of the absolute are not compatible...so in the interest of the preservation of separateness, the ego does defend itself from completely surrendering to God...in the capacity that it does serve God, it does so from the perspective of duality...it thinks it can get eternal life from God, and not that eternal life is realized in God.

Of course...though I'm not sure how that's relevant to anything. It's easy to take issue with the authority of any object of authority. I find no greater sense of authority in the standard interpretation of Christianity either. The authority of a God that gets so upset at the failings of people that he'd wipe them out in a flood is not an example of something not to take issue with. I'd no sooner surrender to that than to a schoolyard bully. When it comes to authority, I trust in the absolute authority of truth itself...not according to any deeds or claims, but according to the fact that the truth is the only thing that can endure long enough for everyone to answer to it. No claims or covenants or anything are necessary...they're merely symbolic. I do not need to know the whole truth in order to know that I will eventually have to answer to it, right?

There's no lack of coherency between the relative and absolute except to the relative. The relative doesn't know the entirety of the absolute, so it can't see it as coherent.
As for binding authority...the bible can make no better claim than those of the experiences I'm referencing. The God of today doesn't make himself explicitly known via talking bushes of fire, or incarnate versions of himself that perform miracles...it's all taken on faith. I love a lot of the bible...but there's nothing that makes it particularly binding until the consequences of things are made explicitly apparent.
My subjective experience is the only thing that I'm actually bound to...and unfortunately it's not static, so you wouldn't go so far as to rely on it, lol.

-Rob

Sorry to just pick on one small point but its going to take me a month to try and catch up with what I've missed in 1 week lol.

I have to disagree that there isn't such a thing as evil and that there is only an absence of good. In someone who merely has an absence of good, they would be purely self centered and do things ONLY that benefited themselves in some way. They would not however go out of their way to be malicious.

What about people that do go out of their way to maliciously harm others, serial killers, murderers that torture victims etc. There probably aren't a lot of truly evil people running around but there are/have been some. I don't think it matters if they are mentally ill, the fact that they actively look to commit harm to others is the very definition of evil, if it isn't ...what is?