Putting ''Immanuel Can'' In The Religious Spotlight Part 2

[Dontaskme]

What do you mean "be known"?

At least intuitively, you seem to know yourself. You seem to believe I'm here as well, and you seem to be convinced there's a world in which you can perform actions such as typing on a keyboard or reading off a screen. All of that is premised on knowledge of a kind.

Is that what you mean? I suspect not, but I'll await your answer.

Well not what I mean exactly, no...

I'm thinking, how can the 'knower' know itself? how can the 'knower' be directly pointed to, claiming, look, there is the 'knower', that's the 'knower' right there, I can see the 'knower'? . So I'm asking you, can the 'knower' be physically seen to exist as a physical object of seeing and knowing?

Although, It is perfectly clear that Knowledge is known as and through symbolic images, and through concepts that appear to be outside of the actual seeing physical eye-ball. And yet, the seer and the seen object are inseparably one in the exact same instance...in that there is no division between what is looking and what is looked at...right? so there can be no such place as inside or outside, there's just everywhere and nowhere all at once.

But I guess what I'm asking you is can the 'knower' of all concepts, be an actual literal object that can be seen with the physical eyes? can the ''you'' that sees and knows, be seen and known with physical eyes, is the 'you' aka the 'knower' a physical object?

I'm saying the 'knower' cannot be found or seen or known to be in the objective world. . If you believe differently, then would you be able to explain the difference to me? could you pinpoint the exact location of the ''knower'' ...thanks.

Let me know if you are not sure of what is being asked, and I will try using a different approach to the question I'm posing to you.

It seems to me IC, that there is no absolute truth. There's just temporal and transient appearances of truth.

And that these transient truths have been weaved and formed into many elaborate stories that the mind brain mechanism has taken hold of as beliefs that are real.

But how can what is real die.
I guess nothing really dies, it's just innactive, doesn't mean dead, surely death cannot be known anyway. So I guess I'm now stuck with the idea that if nothing is actually dead, that's what Jesus means by eternal life...right?

.

[Immanuel Can]

Well, here's what you wrote:

Well not what I mean exactly, no...

I'm thinking, how can the 'knower' know itself? how can the 'knower' be directly pointed to, claiming, look, there is the 'knower', that's the 'knower' right there, I can see the 'knower'? . So I'm asking you, can the 'knower' be physically seen to exist as a physical object of seeing and knowing?

Although, It is perfectly clear that Knowledge is known as and through symbolic images, and through concepts that appear to be outside of the actual seeing physical eye-ball. And yet, the seer and the seen object are inseparably one in the exact same instance...in that there is no division between what is looking and what is looked at...right? so there can be no such place as inside or outside, there's just everywhere and nowhere all at once.

But I guess what I'm asking you is can the 'knower' of all concepts, be an actual literal object that can be seen with the physical eyes? can the ''you'' that sees and knows, be seen and known with physical eyes, is the 'you' aka the 'knower' a physical object?

I'm saying the 'knower' cannot be found or seen or known to be in the objective world. . If you believe differently, then would you be able to explain the difference to me? could you pinpoint the exact location of the ''knower'' ...thanks. ...

Before I even attempt to answer, I have to point out how totally you've relied on the belief in external objects, even in the framing of your question. Look at all the red: every expression indicated thereby requires me, as the recipient of the question, to believe already in the distinction between the delusions of the mind and the facts of a fixed, external reality.

So even though you're asking me to doubt all of that, the question itself cannot even be framed by you, apparently, without resorting to the very concepts you seem to wish me to doubt.

And, of course, in framing all those questions, you are assuming the existence of a ME who can answer them...indeed, whom you want to answer them.

So again, you are presupposing a YOU, a ME and an external reality. And then you want me to think you've got some explanation why I ought to doubt them all?

So I ask again: how can you ask anyone to believe you're asking an intelligible question, when everything you're doing denies the truth of your own claim?

It seems to me IC, that there is no absolute truth. There's just temporal and transient appearances of truth.

Let me ask you this, then: Is what you just said absolutely true?

If it is, then your "seeming" is wrong. There IS one absolute truth: namely, that no absolute truths exist...which is the absolute truth, so it means that an absolute truth exists...unless it's only a partial truth...in which case it's only partially true that there is no absolute truth...which means that it's partially false, and there IS an absolute truth...and 'round and 'round we go.

There is not even a coherent way to believe a statement like, "There is no absolute truth." It's actually self-contradiction. It's actually non-sense.

But how can what is real die.

You don't believe anything is real, remember? So how can you even ask such a question?

I guess nothing really dies, it's just innactive, doesn't mean dead, surely death cannot be known anyway. So I guess I'm now stuck with the idea that if nothing is actually dead, that's what Jesus means by eternal life...right?

Well, according to what Jesus Christ said, it's very clear that even in the eternal state, there's identity, individuality, an external world, and an objective distinction between God and others. Once we are given distinct identity, personhood, that is never taken away from us again.

That's actually one big difference between the Western traditions and certain Eastern ones: in the Eastern, God is just a big force into which all things are absorbed, like a drop of water into an ocean, or even like a candle being snuffed out (as in Buddhism, for example). In Christianity, God is a distinct Person, and his Creation is not "part of him" but is rather made to be distinct from Him, with its own identity, purposes and roles. And so it remain eternally, in the Western view. The Creation is never "reabsorbed" into the Creator. Instead, it stands in a relation of eternal felicity to Him.

[Belinda]

DAM is talking to another person, to Mannie; not to Brahman or Atman.

I-Thou language is appropriate to talking to another person or to a transcendent deity.

[Dontaskme]

Before I even attempt to answer, I have to point out how totally you've relied on the belief in external objects, even in the framing of your question.

Thanks for your response...and for helping me out here.

The reason I've been able to mention the external world of objects is because the external objective world is KNOWN in relation to what's knowing it, in relation to what's seeing it, but in no way are the two - the looker and the looked upon are separated, is what I'm trying to say...do you get that?

Look at all the red: every expression indicated thereby requires me, as the recipient of the question, to believe already in the distinction between the delusions of the mind and the facts of a fixed, external reality.

I'm not really understanding what you mean by this, but it doesn't matter.

So even though you're asking me to doubt all of that, the question itself cannot even be framed by you, apparently, without resorting to the very concepts you seem to wish me to doubt.

But I'm not doubting you at all, and more to the point, what was it that you thought I was trying to get you to doubt what I was asking you?

I was merely trying to describe how the 'knower' cannot be found within the objective world because the objective world is inseparable from the knowing looking which cannot be seen or known. ( does that make sense to you? )that's all I'd asked of you, ok.

And, of course, in framing all those questions, you are assuming the existence of a ME who can answer them...indeed, whom you want to answer them.

IC questions can be answered, else there would be no such thing known as a question...this is what is happening when language / knowledge is involved. It happens to appear that there are concepts existing as real actual things. Surely that's not too difficult to understand.

So again, you are presupposing a YOU, a ME and an external reality. And then you want me to think you've got some explanation why I ought to doubt them all?

No, I'm not ...doing what you think i'm doing. Never mind, it doesn't matter...

So I ask again: how can you ask anyone to believe you're asking an intelligible question, when everything you're doing denies the truth of your own claim?

IC...all I'm doing is questioning the truth as to who the claimer of knowledge is..ok? it's just so easy to say I am, but can the I am been seen and pointed to as a physical object? ...if i am not a physical object then who or what and where am I ?
This is why I keep saying to you that we are not understanding each other.

It seems to me IC, that there is no absolute truth. There's just temporal and transient appearances of truth.

Let me ask you this, then: Is what you just said absolutely true?

I'm saying the absolute truth whether there is such a truth cannot be known by a temporal transient appearance.

If it is, then your "seeming" is wrong. There IS one absolute truth: namely, that no absolute truths exist...which is the absolute truth, so it means that an absolute truth exists...

Yes, but that's the point, it only seems that there is an absolute truth, when in fact all truths are relative, they are illusions...I know you dislike that word.

unless it's only a partial truth...in which case it's only partially true that there is no absolute truth...which means that it's partially false, and there IS an absolute truth...and 'round and 'round we go.

Well of course, that's what I'm trying to point out, the absolute truth cannot be pinned to be directly known, simply because of the circular opposite reasoning effect that comes with the dual nature of knowledge.

There is not even a coherent way to believe a statement like, "There is no absolute truth." It's actually self-contradiction. It's actually non-sense.

ok, but remember, the one who questions implies there is a self there that can question, but this self is just a conceptual idea within knowledge. The idea there is a separate self is just knowledge, appearing within what is always whole in every instant.

But how can what is real die.

You don't believe anything is real, remember? So how can you even ask such a question?

Now haven't you forgotten that I've always stated that nothing is real nor is it unreal, and that such concepts are known by the only knowing there is which is consciousness...which is unknowable. No person has ever been able to figure out what is consciousness, except that it is.

I guess nothing really dies, it's just innactive, doesn't mean dead, surely death cannot be known anyway. So I guess I'm now stuck with the idea that if nothing is actually dead, that's what Jesus means by eternal life...right?

Well, according to what Jesus Christ said, it's very clear that even in the eternal state, there's identity, individuality, an external world, and an objective distinction between God and others. Once we are given distinct identity, personhood, that is never taken away from us again.

Well I can understand that in the context of what I've been talking about when I say the observer is inseparable from the observed world, and that each concept known is fixed, in the sense an apple will never be an orange.

That's actually one big difference between the Western traditions and certain Eastern ones: in the Eastern, God is just a big force into which all things are absorbed, like a drop of water into an ocean, or even like a candle being snuffed out (as in Buddhism, for example). In Christianity, God is a distinct Person, and his Creation is not "part of him" but is rather made to be distinct from Him, with its own identity, purposes and roles. And so it remain eternally, in the Western view. The Creation is never "reabsorbed" into the Creator. Instead, it stands in a relation of eternal felicity to Him.

Yes, IC... I can understand that clearly. I've never really thought or heard about it that way, so thanks for that view of it.

The Nondualists call God nothing and everything...nothing in relation to everything...forever eternal.

Christianity /Christians call God the avatar agency through Jesus the man.

I think I'm starting to understand your view of it better now IC

Do you understand my view of it, even though it differs to yours, I think we may be seeing the same God, albeit in a different way ?

Thanks for being IC

[Dontaskme]

DAM is talking to another person, to Mannie; not to Brahman or Atman.

I-Thou language is appropriate to talking to another person or to a transcendent deity.

Yes, very good, thank you for that, for helping me out here. I agree.

[Immanuel Can]

Before I even attempt to answer, I have to point out how totally you've relied on the belief in external objects, even in the framing of your question.

Thanks for your response...and for helping me out here.

The reason I've been able to mention the external world of objects is because the external objective world is KNOWN in relation to what's knowing it, in relation to what's seeing it, but in no way are the two - the looker and the looked upon are separated, is what I'm trying to say...do you get that?

I get it. But in saying so, you've killed your claim "all is one." You've now said "the looker and the looked upon are separated." "Looker" is Me. "Looked upon" is YOU, or your message, if you prefer. "Separated" means "separate in the real world." (If it's not a "real" separation, then nothing is separate at all; for then, nothing "separates" anything from anything else.)

So again, you've denied your own creed. That's my problem with what you're saying.

But this idea you have of "knower" is even itself problematic. For "to know" means "to know about something, or of something." So if you even think there's a knower, who knows, you think there's a something he/she knows. And if you think you can ask me about "knowing," there's a me as well... and you're back to that same threefold distinction.

So what I can see is that, no matter what you may say, you believe there's a YOU, a ME, and a REALITY." Three things, not "one."

Look at all the red: every expression indicated thereby requires me, as the recipient of the question, to believe already in the distinction between the delusions of the mind and the facts of a fixed, external reality.

I'm not really understanding what you mean by this, but it doesn't matter.

It actually does, and very much. Because it shows that this idea of "all is one" is simply incoherent. There's no chance it's true.

I was merely trying to describe how the 'knower' cannot be found within the objective world because the objective world is inseparable from the knowing looking which cannot be seen or known. ( does that make sense to you? )that's all I'd asked of you, ok.

Actually, UNLESS the knower is separate from the known world, the alleged "knower" cannot know anything at all.

Try this thought experiment. Imagine yourself in a white room, wearing white clothes, and with white skin, as well. then imagine that everything that is white is made of the same thing, and no lines exist between the room, your clothes, your body, or even the air around you.

Now, open your eyes. And what do you see? What do you know? Absolutely nothing. Since all is white, and not even a shadow exists to signify a difference between one thing at the next, you are a non-entity, a blank. There is no "you," either. There is nothing, because we can't even use the concept "exists" except for things that exist as different from the big whiteness of which all things are composed, in this thought-experiment.

Do you get it? If "all is one," then NOTHING exists. Nothing. And there is no "knowing" or "knower," or anything else at all.

IC questions can be answered, else there would be no such thing known as a question

Right. And that's further proof that "all is one" is a falsehood. All is not one.

if i am not a physical object then who or what and where am I ?

Your problem is in your "if."

You are a person. You live in a physical reality. And I am a "me." So the "if" there is a false hypothetical. You are a physical object.

It seems to me IC, that there is no absolute truth. There's just temporal and transient appearances of truth.

Let me ask you this, then: Is what you just said absolutely true?

I'm saying the absolute truth whether there is such a truth cannot be known by a temporal transient appearance.

Then you have the same problem.

It means that DAM doesn't know the truth. Because, as she says, she is incapable of knowing whether or not there is any absolute truth. She says she's just "a temporal, transient appearance" herself. So why is DAM trying to say that she does know the truth, and IC should be believing her?

it only seems that there is an absolute truth,

Are you absolutely sure?

...there is a self there that can question, but this self is just a conceptual idea...

If you're using normal language here, the first and the second phrase actually contradict one another, and thus form nonsense. For "is" is normally taken to mean "actually exists."

Christianity /Christians call God the avatar agency through Jesus the man.

"Avatar" is Hinduism. Jesus Christ is never called that or presented as only that. Avatars don't die.

Do you understand my view of it, even though it differe to yours,

I have understood it from the start, I would say.

I think we may be seeing the same God, albeit in a different way ?

I think not. Not by the descriptions you've given, anyway.

The "god" of which you speak is merely a vague and impersonal "force" that Hinduism holds is the real nature of all things...though Hinduism is terribly incoherent on that point as well, but I'll set that aside for the moment. Hinduism claims, at once, one God and billions of avatars.

Christianity and Judaism claim one True God. And it denies that we, or the created realm, are any "part" of God. We are instead His creatures, not His arms and legs, and far less his avatars.

[Immanuel Can]

DAM is talking to another person, to Mannie; not to Brahman or Atman.

I-Thou language is appropriate to talking to another person or to a transcendent deity.

Yes, very good, thank you for that, for helping me out here. I agree.

Right.

But no I-Thou language is permissible if "all is one." There is then no "Thou" to be spoken to, and no "I" to do any speaking. This is why the end of Buddhism is "Nirvana," the total silence and end of existence.

[Dontaskme]

DAM is talking to another person, to Mannie; not to Brahman or Atman.

I-Thou language is appropriate to talking to another person or to a transcendent deity.

Yes, very good, thank you for that, for helping me out here. I agree.

Right.

But no I-Thou language is permissible if "all is one." There is then no "Thou" to be spoken to, and no "I" to do any speaking. This is why the end of Buddhism is "Nirvana," the total silence and end of existence.

That's what the nondualists are meaning when they say awakening from the dream of separation is the ''end of knowledge''

The end of existing as a separate self.

IC..is that why god didn't want us to eat from the tree of knowledge?

[Dontaskme]

Do you get it? If "all is one," then NOTHING exists. Nothing. And there is no "knowing" or "knower," or anything else at all.

I get it, thank you.

And I understand all your views and responses to me in your previous post ..so thank you.

Honestly IC .... I see what you are saying now so much more clearly, but only because I think you are able to explain these things very well. Unlike me. But I do try

I'm going to keep reading over the responses you've left today just because you have a knack of helping me to understand things more clearly.

[Immanuel Can]

The end of existing as a separate self.

There are a ton of problems with that view. One is, "If we were always "one," then how did we become "separate selves"?" It's incoherent again.

IC..is that why god didn't want us to eat from the tree of knowledge?

"The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may freely eat; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat from it you will certainly die.” (Genesis 2:16-17)

Or as the serpent puts it, "...on the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will become like God, knowing good and evil.” (Gen. 3:5)

So no. There was no "tree of knowledge." Knowledge per se has never been forbidden. It's the knowledge of evil, in specific, that's forbidden. Of course, there was no specific meaning to the term "good" without knowledge of any contrary either, since there was nothing "not good"; so with the knowledge of evil came also the realization that they should have done the good, but hadn't.

[Immanuel Can]

I'm going to keep reading over the responses you've left today just because you have a knack of helping me to understand things more clearly.

Nice of you to say. I think we're both trying.

[Dontaskme]

I'm going to keep reading over the responses you've left today just because you have a knack of helping me to understand things more clearly.

Nice of you to say. I think we're both trying.

I had this sudden realisation around the age of 20 which literally just came out of nowhere.

It was a thought that came to me, that said to me, if I'm here now, which I was, am...then I must have always been here. That's when I started to think about the eternal ...but I have no idea why that thought would even come to me.
And then after that thought came, I then thought I must have always existed, how could I have never not existed, because I'm clearly existing. .

I then started to be drawn to nondual esoteric teaching, but I had no idea why.

The thing is, why do the nondualists deny the existence of a separate self, and why do they keep saying that nothing is happening? when it's clear something is happening. That's what I've never been able to understand, And is why the more I listen to the IC messenger I then begin to realise that nonduality really doesn't make any sense. And I would love to know how they can say what they say and make sense out of what they are saying.

I've always tried to make sense of the nondual message, but feel there has to be more to it than they are saying...IDK, I guess I just think too much.

.

[Dontaskme]

The end of existing as a separate self.

There are a ton of problems with that view. One is, "If we were always "one," then how did we become "separate selves"?" It's incoherent again.

IC..is that why god didn't want us to eat from the tree of knowledge?

"The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may freely eat; but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for on the day that you eat from it you will certainly die.” (Genesis 2:16-17)

Or as the serpent puts it, "...on the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will become like God, knowing good and evil.” (Gen. 3:5)

So no. There was no "tree of knowledge." Knowledge per se has never been forbidden. It's the knowledge of evil, in specific, that's forbidden. Of course, there was no specific meaning to the term "good" without knowledge of any contrary either, since there was nothing "not good"; so with the knowledge of evil came also the realization that they should have done the good, but hadn't.

Very good, I totally understand all this, so thanks for the reminder.

[Immanuel Can]

I had this sudden realisation around the age of 20 which literally just came out of nowhere.

It was a thought that came to me, that said to me, if I'm here now, which I was, am...then I must have always been here. That's when I started to think about the eternal ...but I have no idea why that thought would even come to me.

Well, it does make sense that it's hard for us to think of a universe without ourselves in it. After all, for every second you and I have ever known, there has been a "self," a "me," or what you call "a knower." But as you also point out, there is no recollection of any time before that -- and yet the universe must have existed before we arrived in it, since without a universe, we'd have had no place to arrive at all.

But it's hard to think about. It's like trying to think of "after my death." Nobody really finds it easy to conceive of that. Even when somebody we perhaps know and love dies, and we see the world going on without them in it, we still can't really feel the truth that one day, it will also be us who are in the ground, and the world will go on.

The Bible says this, though:

"He has made everything appropriate in its time. He has also set eternity in their heart, without the possibility that mankind will find out the work which God has done from the beginning even to the end." (Ecclesiastes 3:11)

That's an interesting statement. Mankind has a sense of "eternity," something that is deeper even that man's knowledge. And the Bible says the reason for all this is that we were created that we should be eternal beings; but we were not eternal in the past, since we are created beings. So both our completely lack of awareness of what came before us, and our difficulty understanding what will be after us are natural.

We have no experience with eternity, and yet a longing for it rests in our hearts, because we were created for eternity.

So your intuition isn't wrong, in one sense. There is a time when we were created, and things began for us; but by way of the nature of the kind of beings we were created to be, they're not to end.

[Greatest I am]

become a parent and you will

This means nothing to me, sorry.

a parent worth his salt will sacrifice himself to preserve his child

I agree with this.

The Jesus myth is showing that your god is not even up to par morally with humans as he sent the son to die instead of stepping up himself. What a p****. Right?

Regards
DL