Philosophy Now Forum

There is nothing in life that is more superior than something else. Except what the mind puts there albeit illusory as in the story.



Advaita Vendana is not a religion.

Hinduism is a religion.

All religions are man made.

Advaita Vendanta is the understanding by no one that religion is a fictional story told by no one, Advaita is not a religion it is that which does away with all religion.

ALL man-made religions not just Hinduism are pointing to the Vedanta tradition that posits the eternal, unchanging metaphysical reality. That which is not man-made, aka the unknown. These pointings will differ in their approach. But the message is basically saying the same thing albeit in many different approaches.

All that is happening is source desiring to seek itself..in the form of infomational knowledge. What is of source is only source, there is nothing outside of source.

This phenomena is unique to the mind that has evolved as and through the body mechanism that is a human mind.

Metaphysical reality is both knowing and not-knowing - two sides of the one reality that cannot exist independenly of each other. The two are indivisibly all inclusive as one reality.

Advaita means life is ‘as it is’. The word advaita meaning ‘not two’ comes from Sanskrit. Advaita also means ‘non-duality’. Advaita signifies not only that life is light, because the essence of everything in life is light, but also indicates that light ‘as it is’ is ‘not two’. This implies that advaita is light. The two or many in life appear real to the mind, but nevertheless are a reflection of light.

Dvaita means ‘two’ or ‘duality’ and duality is real to the human mind. The two or many are due to colours, and colours are a reflection of light. Light ‘as it is’, however, is one and not two. Therefore, the real in the mind, which is dvaita, is an illusion of light and not real.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Fri Aug 17, 2018 1:28 pm Hinduism is far superior to Christianity and Islam in its teachings
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L5_xDaXAbXY

Abrahamic religions, unlike Hinduism, often make exclusive Truth claims, stating that unless we subscribe to their faith we will be condemned for eternity. This video explores the strikingly obvious problems when making such absurd claims.

The issues can be summarized as the:

• 1. The Problem of an Unfair Test
  2 The Problem of Virtue and Human Experience
  3. The Problem of Insufficient evidence

In analyzing these problems, we will see how Christianity and Islam have theologies which are forced on reality, while Hinduism has a philosophy utterly in tune with the way life actually is.

In general I agree but there are optimal points to consider.

Your views?
Pls listen to the video before commenting.

interesting thread, i too welcome input.

Greta wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 12:36 am The critiques of Abrahamic religions, especially their claims of exclusivity, were fair and grounded. However, he glosses over Hinduism's incongruities enough to make the presentation more polemic than convincing, despite fair critiques of Abrahamic faiths.

Also, I think you'll find that both Hinduism and Abrahamic faiths are today largely more political movements than spiritual ones.

What these creeds claim at their cores appears to have become irrelevant. Each of them is now just a giant institution that is jostling with many other giant organisations for a share of the spoils that they are ALL extracting from individuals at a rapid rate.

I agree politics has clouded theology allover.

for me it is only important to know of theologies - and ignore politics when it concerns religions.

Hinduism (there is no Hinduism - just Hinduisms) is what the Western World would have inherited had Greek/Roman Polytheism had triumphed - instead of Christianity (Judaism is irrelivant and would never had taken over the "Western World" modern culturally speaking).


there are many Hindu works from Texts of Mani, to Rig Veda, to Muhabarat, and Bagivad Gita.

i'm sure they are not in accord and many hindus worship thier city gods (like Tamil Nadu goddess? - others do not).

in general "Hinduism" (s???) - not sure, not a Hindu scholar sadly............just a layman.................affirms "the seven encarnations of God" (basically Seven Christlike figures - born from "God" (Vishu? Indra? - not sure which - maybe another God?).

I can name only two myself (but welcome any Hindus here to inform me of the other 5 i do not know the names of); Krisha and Rama.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 6:55 am

Dontaskme wrote: ↑Fri Aug 17, 2018 2:12 pm What theological example can you give which are forced on reality?

You did not listen to the video?

Something like the Abrahamic religions claim their texts are from a real God, is immutable and thus are forced upon believers to follow regardless of and against what is justifiably real.
Note the belief that genesis is real, earth is not more than 6,000 years old, creationism against the reality of evolution theory.

there are many interpretations of Genesis.

my own is opposite of the conventional Judiac/Christian view - though the text is the same for them and me to read/re-read.

there was no fall, just a rise to semi-godhood.

there was the other tree - the one of imortality (which is not Christ - which is the conventional view today) - that "god" removed before man could become his equal.

Genesis is a polytheistic work - all the "we" and "us" - is due to its Summarian origin, and no "we" and "us" are not YHWH and his angels (conventional Judaic/christian view today and the last 2000 yrs), "We" and "us" refer to YHWH, his brother BAAL, and his other siblings Mot and several names now lost to history, and probably God's daddy El.

Asheria - YHWH's wife is probably in there too.

gaffo wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 12:25 am

Greta wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 12:36 am The critiques of Abrahamic religions, especially their claims of exclusivity, were fair and grounded. However, he glosses over Hinduism's incongruities enough to make the presentation more polemic than convincing, despite fair critiques of Abrahamic faiths.

Also, I think you'll find that both Hinduism and Abrahamic faiths are today largely more political movements than spiritual ones.

What these creeds claim at their cores appears to have become irrelevant. Each of them is now just a giant institution that is jostling with many other giant organisations for a share of the spoils that they are ALL extracting from individuals at a rapid rate.

I agree politics has clouded theology allover.

for me it is only important to know of theologies - and ignore politics when it concerns religions.

So you are saying in essence that we have the original texts and ideas as societal assets but forget the religions as practiced. The law of averages means that at least some theists will think and live in accordance with their faith's intents rather than the faith's words, but they would be a tiny and non-influential fringe minority.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 7:07 am

Reflex wrote: ↑Fri Aug 17, 2018 6:57 pm I wonder what VA hopes to gain by his vitriol?

Stupid video, BTW.

Why the suspicion when this forum is a place for discussion of relevant topics.
I do a lot of exploration in my continual research. I happened to come across this video which I thought is interesting for a discussion.

It is important to show Christianity and Islam [especially] their place to dilute their false arrogance.

Christians are demanding to study only creationism in schools and reject the theory of evolution. Muslims [a very significant SOME] are making all sorts of demands from non-Muslims in the belief their religion is the greatest and most superior over all other religions, to the extent they have the divine God given right to enslave and kill non-believers.

Hinduism [in general and specific schools] also has weaknesses but on average is far more superior than Christianity and Islam. The comparison is like 7/10 to 4/10.

not sure of your claims of superiority/inferiority.

clearly monotheism by its nature tends toward arrogance, but the humble amoung us can still remain so as Jews,Christians, Muslims - but with more work (more inner character needed maybe).

polytheism allows more humility - "your city god/my city god?/etc...............so agree.

but an ass is an ass and there are plenty of fundie hindus that wish death to non-hindus also.

sadly.

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 7:57 am
The caste system has been condemned by many Hindus and it is slowly being weaned off.

Good, India (I like indians - known several) will become a world power in the next century, and she values universal humanism (due to Brit colonialism cultural inheritance) - we will need her to limit the nationalism of China - who i fear wishes to rule most of the world without regard to humanism.

gaffo wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 12:46 am

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 7:57 am
The caste system has been condemned by many Hindus and it is slowly being weaned off.

Good, India (I like indians - known several) will become a world power in the next century, and she values universal humanism (due to Brit colonialism cultural inheritance) - we will need her to limit the nationalism of China - who i fear wishes to rule most of the world without regard to humanism.

Due to global influences I think the next generation of Chinese will be much more reasonable than their previous seriously hardarse forebears. I've been seeing positive signs in Chinese youth movements in recent years. Once you have enough well educated people they start making up their own minds - seemingly opposite to what's happening in the US, weirdly.

Also, Indians are getting harder, no doubt because their living conditions are so chaotic and overcrowded. Consider the "humanity" of the Indian cricket board when touring teams are collapsing and vomiting in Indian pollution. The "human" Indian response is "Hey, we're not complaining. Handle it!".

Consider the humanity of Hindus as women in some areas are basically servants for men who just sit around and talk. Or the humanity of their corrupt politicians who are doing nothing to clean up the pollution enveloping their cities.

Pack enough of any kind of people in tight enough and they become hard and relatively inhuman.

HexHammer wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 8:48 am Both quran and bible has been heavily rewritten to fit the preachers dictatorial ways,

there is no evidence that most of the works of the bible have been re-written.

esp the OT - which via finding the Kumran Scrolls - show a damn good re-writting of the Torah over the centuries.

less so of the NT - not out of gile, but just becuase early Christians were barely literate being born from Judasim via a cult of the poor.

the early chrstian scribes bascially sucked, as christianity become more mainstream, more literates came into their fold and then took up the pen to transcribe the less litterate earlier works.

its prob no coincidence that Mark is simple in it writting (though the earliest and most accurate per original theology).

most editing (for personal ego) was done not by latter scribes, but original authors of first works.

like:

Matt/Luke original authors - who decided that John the Baptist should not be over Jesus (as it is in Mark's Baptism of Jesus) - so rewrote it.

same with "Virgin Birth" author of mark had no problem with Jesus being born the normal way with a human daddy - Matt/Luke had a prob, thus "adoption theology not good enough" - thus we have "virgin birth bullshit"

then a few yrs later "John" had a prob with Jesus being "only the son of God" - and so he wrote a book that claim he WAS god the father!

..........................

as said, latter scribes did a good job just re-writting what the original authors wrote.

------------

and yes the Koran's current form is not its original. there were four early versions - Egyptian capliph in 700 ordered the burning of the three varients (yes Muslims deny this - but i ignore their historical ignorance).

Koran was written in Eastern Jordan/Western Iraq too (not in Saudi Arabia) - this too Muslims deny. and again i know history, they do not (willfully? - prob.) they chose tradition over reason.

as most joe ave Christians/jews do.

HexHammer wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 8:48 am also that the quran is the book of satan

utter bullshit. Koran is pretty Othrodox - it includes references to many mainline Christian and Jewish works that latter "church fathers" perged from their works.

many references to christian proto-gnostic works (that all Christians of the 7th century affirmed in Iraq) - Infancy gaspel of Jesus/proto gospel of Adam and Eve/etc.

HexHammer wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 8:48 am which is apparent in older versions of the quran in the "satanic verses" that has been removed in newer versions.

??????? no clue what you are refering to.

welcome any clarificaton/providing "satanic verses" for me to read.

HexHammer wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 8:48 am Bible went from monotheism to polytheism, where both god, spirit and son are worshipped, and now mainly the son.

you observation is not accurate.

Torah/OT went from polytheistic to monotheistic (after the Asserian conquest of 750 BC or so).

but monotheistic of you view the Holy Spirit - which the Jews affirm since 750 BC - (we could re-view that and view it the same as the Christians do (its the same Holy Ghost) - so "two gods"/ or "Two aspects of the one god/etc............like Christians do.

as for christians:

they too had their theology change:

1st, there was YHWH, who adopted a mortal good guy who was around 30 as his son (Mark)

2nd there was YHWH, who impregnated a mortal woman with his son.

3rd there was an angel of YHWH, who adopted a mortal good guy upon his death (Saul's letters)

4th there was YHWH, who existed from the beginning of time, and was never born, and a part of him walked the earth as a man known as Jesus.

HexHammer wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 8:48 am When Jesus/Isa/Eisa/Kalki returns he will undo religion which is heavily suggested in the bible, and muslim prophecies and hadiths.

Bible, Book of Revelation: "and i saw no temple in New Jerusalem"

Bible, Book of Revelation: "The Whore of Babylon" is Mecca, The Kaaba Stone which is the manifestation of Isis (goddess)

nope, the whore of Babylon was Rome (Essenes hated the Kittem - author of Rev was an Essene converted to christianity - his fixation was hatred of Rome, who raised the Temple and killed thousands of his brethren - the greek in that work is poor because the author did not know it well - why? because he was an Essene that knew Aramaic and Hebrew natively.

why was he an essene? because he hated the Kittem which is what his work centers around, and mentions and angel of wrath called Appolyion (which is the same being as Abbaddon - which is ONLY refereneced in this work AND many of the Kumran schrolls).


the AntiChrist was Nero BTW - the "Seven horns" refer to the seven roman emporiors that rules after Nero up to the time of the writting of The Apocolypse (during the reign of Domician)

ignoring the brief rule of Galba, Otho (Piso - 6 days?), Vitelious..all within less than 2 yrs.

we have an understanding of "Seven horns" reference of what and who the author was talking about!

HexHammer wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 8:48 am Prophecy of the Popes - it foretell of 112 popes where the last pope is "Petrus Romanus", the current pope Francis's father was Peter and was from Rome.

Muslim hadith/prophecy: "Isa bin Maryam will break the cross"

the popes are irrelivant and did not even EXIST when the author "john" wrote his work.

Islam is equally irrelivent (nor did it EXIST) WRT to the work The Apocalypse.

Greta wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 12:42 am

gaffo wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 12:25 am

Greta wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 12:36 am The critiques of Abrahamic religions, especially their claims of exclusivity, were fair and grounded. However, he glosses over Hinduism's incongruities enough to make the presentation more polemic than convincing, despite fair critiques of Abrahamic faiths.

Also, I think you'll find that both Hinduism and Abrahamic faiths are today largely more political movements than spiritual ones.

What these creeds claim at their cores appears to have become irrelevant. Each of them is now just a giant institution that is jostling with many other giant organisations for a share of the spoils that they are ALL extracting from individuals at a rapid rate.

I agree politics has clouded theology allover.

for me it is only important to know of theologies - and ignore politics when it concerns religions.

So you are saying in essence that we have the original texts and ideas as societal assets but forget the religions as practiced. The law of averages means that at least some theists will think and live in accordance with their faith's intents rather than the faith's words, but they would be a tiny and non-influential fringe minority.

I'm saying, for me - as one that values objectivity, and a personal undertanding of theologies, it is VITAL to read each "bible" (koran/Hindu/eskimo...) texts (i.e. there is "no bible" - there are 40+ texts (and many parts inside of some works too - Isaiah for example is actually THREE WORKS - 2 additions (Gops o fMark is 2 works - last part was added decades later).

Koran is no different - it is claimed to be recited by Mohammed (as the Jews claim the Torah was by Moses) - both notions fail the commen horse sense test of READING them - different parts have different themes, even sometime contradict!

why? because there were many authors of the Koran/torah.

-----------

ignoring tradition.

.............

for Christianity it even EASIER - for they do not demand one author (just that all the 40" works comform to one work of God without contradiction).

in this case, just ignore the bullshit notion of "one work" - there are 40+ of them, some conform to "othredoxy" - others clearly do not.

Hell just read Saul's works:

Jesus was born via normal intercouse ("of a young women" - no mention if any mericulous birth), and he was nothing while alive (all Saul fixates upon is the Ressurected Christ (just from reading his works you know he views the prior mortal jesus as nothing important - and litterally not worth writting about - and so he don't!!!!!!!!!!)- the post death/russurected being christ is a fully other being for Saul and all he cared to write about.

- as for the 4 Gospels - see above - there are 3 "jesus" in those works - not conformable in nature theologically.

2 of the three affirm a literal Son of God - but not his the nature of his birth.

1 denies the other Gospels as literally heresy for not viewing christ as god himself.

......Matt/Luke have the same theology concerning the nature of Christ, but even they have differing views of Satan. Matt affirms Marks view of "death on the cross" as a mission mandated by God. Luke dissagress, denies "the mystery of the cross" mythos, and instead views the death of Christ as a temporary victory of Satan over god, who is then thwarted by Jesus' ressuraction.

--------------

all this is viewable/readable if one reads each work with the time/place and the theme that the author wished to address - separate from the rest of "the bible".

probably me being an atheist helps in this mentality.

who knows.

thanks for reply


---------we can go into "mission creep" of Satan too (I like Belial myself),

in his earliest forms - first mentioned in Zarchariah (450 BC) - Belail did not exist in Judiasm prior to the second exile - they imported him upon thier return in 490's BC - prob Persian Deity Ahraman (why did they renamed him?).

in Zach's work he is a good guy - not kind to man but to God he serves - as a "tester/procicuter" of faith in god.

same in Job - but note this work is 2 centuries newer and Belial, though not an enemy of God, not really a good servant either............Belial is starting to "Evolve" theologically.

by Jesus's time Belial was no longer just a tester of faith - nor just an enemy of man - but an enemy of god himself!

(personally suspect the evolution of Belial's character traits was to explain why the Jews were subject of foriegn occuption - first Babylonions, then Persians, then Greeks - then briefly independance via the Maccabees for a century or so, then re-occupied by the Romans.

BTW Book of Job IMO is a written reply to the question "Why are we still occupied" - around 250 BC - so for 2 centuries by Persians (i think the jews thought the Persians would free them from the Babylonians - Zach mentions this theme and fixates on Zarababbel (who dies! - prob tried an uprising and persians killed his ass (this is all lost to history - just conjecture on my part).

Job's repyl is "ask not" "to ask is prideful"....................not a "hapy answer, and to explain why "Evil exists" - it was easier to change Belial into the scapegoat, than to think their YHWH might be evil.


BTW the person "Job" - in that work is the nation of Israel personified as the ideal Israel - faithfull. etc..............

it so clear.

why it seems that i've never read this interpretation from anyone else - instead think Job is an actual person that the author is writting about is beyond me.

Greta wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 1:17 am

gaffo wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 12:46 am

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sat Aug 18, 2018 7:57 am
The caste system has been condemned by many Hindus and it is slowly being weaned off.

Good, India (I like indians - known several) will become a world power in the next century, and she values universal humanism (due to Brit colonialism cultural inheritance) - we will need her to limit the nationalism of China - who i fear wishes to rule most of the world without regard to humanism.

Due to global influences I think the next generation of Chinese will be much more reasonable than their previous seriously hardarse forebears. I've been seeing positive signs in Chinese youth movements in recent years. Once you have enough well educated people they start making up their own minds - seemingly opposite to what's happening in the US, weirdly.

i hope you are right in your observation, i'm not so hopeful veiwing that State's ability to erase history (and so many Chinese pleabs not knowing of 1989 - so many fine with historical ignorance as long as they can have finiancial properity).

i hope your faith in mankind proves me wrong WRT to China.

Greta wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 1:17 am - seemingly opposite to what's happening in the US, weirdly.

what is happening here at home these last 2 yrs has me scared shitless.

i know of the 1920's histroy of Italy, Germany, and Japan.

and "it can't happen here" is bullshit.

Greta wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 1:23 am Also, Indians are getting harder, no doubt because their living conditions are so chaotic and overcrowded. Consider the "humanity" of the Indian cricket board when touring teams are collapsing and vomiting in Indian pollution. The "human" Indian response is "Hey, we're not complaining. Handle it!".

Consider the humanity of Hindus as women in some areas are basically servants for men who just sit around and talk. Or the humanity of their corrupt politicians who are doing nothing to clean up the pollution enveloping their cities.

Pack enough of any kind of people in tight enough and they become hard and relatively inhuman.

Modi is a an ass. but a good speaker and charizmatic.

India is backsliding, like Turkey, Poland, Hungry...................but all those nations have an earlier history of "westernism" India via the brits, Turkey via Attaturk, Poles/Hungrians via post iron curtain freedom.

hopefully there idiocy is temporary and their decades longer traditions of liberalism will prevail and they will return to their better natures.

- god i hope so.

America is not nor should be an island.

I value liberal traditions in all lands - and if america falls - i will need to move to one of those other lands that values it.

gaffo wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 2:27 am

Greta wrote: ↑Sun Aug 19, 2018 1:17 am - seemingly opposite to what's happening in the US, weirdly.

what is happening here at home these last 2 yrs has me scared shitless.

i know of the 1920's histroy of Italy, Germany, and Japan.

and "it can't happen here" is bullshit.

I had chills when the crowd chanted "Nobel! Nobel! Nobel!" because I could see a complete disregard for reason. It is scary how reason and mercy are not only being disregarded but seen as weaknesses. Not looking good at the moment.