Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sat Nov 05, 2022 7:44 pmYou'll find that it's not my argument. It's the Bible's. And Jesus Christ's. I happen to take that side. That's all.
At this point, for a group of sound and intelligible reasons, I reject the story-line of the Christian narrative. I regard the narrative similarly to how I regard the Hebrew narrative generally: a conscious creation by a priest-class. It is a mixture of different things of course. It must be sorted through.
I cannot be completely sure who *Jesus* was and, as I am sure you are aware, it is impossible to know given the issue of a
historical Jesus and a
Jesus of history. And I cannot referto Jesus as if he is a disincarnate entity somewhere listening in to this conversation, frowning here, smiling there, agreeing here and disagreeing there.
The idea becomes
absurd.
And what I mean is what I have been painstakingly explaining: I do not reject everything it alludes to, but each of those things has to be better seen and better understood, and that means understanding them in other terms. I have a strategy in this: to reduce them into metaphysical terms and assertions and then to see if they still apply.
Every assertion that is made -- we can take the existence of a hell-realm and a heaven-realm as examples -- has to be carefully thought through. It has to be looked at again but from our present situation and perspective. And I believe that one can and one should work down the line from that examination and examine all declared tenets.
When I say "your argument" I mean the argument or the set of assertions which you have allied yourself with. In my case I have not, and never did, abandon (much of) what is alluded to through the metaphysical assertions -- and this is the core distinction between us. You are invested to an extreme point. That point results in a species of fundamentalism and in fanaticism. You are bound by the religious tenets you subscribe to to deny the validity of other conceptions and other paths. I understand this and I understand how this imperialism functions and why. I do not blame you or condemn you for your chosen species of commitment, nor for the millions and millions of people who think and see like you. That is not what I am after when all is said and done.
You-plural exist, you cannot be dismissed or avoided, and the vision that you impose on the world, or the results of your visualizing (for example in regard to present 'end of world' phantasies that are playing out today) or what you seem to invoke by your beliefs, this is all beyond any power of mine to change. But I can try to *see* it. What is the utility of this *seeing* I refer to? I do not know except to say that seeing and understanding are interesting objectives in and of themselves.
AJ: I suppose that man's awareness is part of or extends from the soul, and I also would suggest that the soul is connected to what is divine.
Immanuel: I would suggest that's wrong. The soul is disconnected from its rightful connection to the Divine. And the evidence is that it thinks, desires and does evil.
In response to your statement I suggest that you do not have enough experience with, and understanding of, other conceptual orders that refer to a similar condition. So you will inevitably get lost in semantic issues because you must undermine any other concept that is not your own.
And I do not have to suggest as possible that within your specific religious fanaticism you simply cannot conceive that these other descriptions have validity, since this in truth the way it is (and by your own admission). But this is your problem, not mine.
The Vedantic concept, which I refer to as a countervailing idea and for purposes of illustration, is that the soul or the internal kernel is overshadowed or covered over by
avidya = ignorance. The material condition or the *material entanglement* tends to augment the separation or distance from 'true self'. In this way man's 'fallen condition' is alluded to but in a different way. The allusion is the same, or very similar, but the descriptive picture is different. The issue then becomes In what way can man awaken? Or come more into harmony with divinity both inside oneself and, I suppose, outside oneself?
Man's situation is seen,
realized and in relation to that condition, that unfortunate situation, remedies are proposed.
To say that man "thinks, desires and does evil" is truthful, in many ways, but I think the error within the Christian system is to place far too much emphasis on it. Also, the idea of believing in a salvific event is, I think, conceptually wrong. Or
debilitating is perhaps the word I am looking for. If man thinks and does evil he can also think and do evil's opposite -- and this becomes an issue of choice and personal decision.
Point by point, unintentionally certainly, you have helped me to work through the absolutist assertions that no longer serve
me. It also appears that they do not serve others as well. You know as well that I think you do more harm than good in your twisted apologetic work. This is a result of the *imperiousness* I refer to. Yet what you do you do for your own reasons and it is you who will have to accept the consequences of your actions and choices.
im·pe·ri·ous (ĭm-pîr′ē-əs)
adj.
1. Arrogantly domineering or overbearing. See Synonyms at dictatorial. Domineering in a haughty manner; dictatorial; overbearing.
[From Latin imperiōsus, from imperium, imperium; see empire.]
