Christianity

[Alexiev]

...she uses humans themselves as a lower (and proxy) means of communicating with them in order to inform them of her existence.

Here's the bit I don't get: if she can communicate directly with some humans, why can't she do so with all of us? I really hope you have a better answer than the self righteous and woefully unsubstantiated whinge of certain Christians that their god does speak to us and it is our fault, those of us who don't hear, for not listening.

Maybe she doesn't want to speak to you. Maybe she'd prefer speaking to Joan of Arc. "Can't"? Or "doesn't"?

[Will Bouwman]

Maybe she doesn't want to speak to you.

Well yeah, that's a possibility. Does she speak to you?

[Alexiev]

Maybe she doesn't want to speak to you.

Well yeah, that's a possibility. Does she speak to you?

Not so far. Nor am I holding my breath. I did read somewhere that when God appeared to Moses in a burning bush, the quote, "I am what I am" is better translated as "I will be what I will be", which suggests God may be subject to change, which may suggest a lack of perfection.

[Belinda]

Maybe she doesn't want to speak to you.

Well yeah, that's a possibility. Does she speak to you?

Not so far. Nor am I holding my breath. I did read somewhere that when God appeared to Moses in a burning bush, the quote, "I am what I am" is better translated as "I will be what I will be", which suggests God may be subject to change, which may suggest a lack of perfection.

God is made in the image of humans' most valued desires and needs. Those change so God changes. Please note I am not talking about any of the gods of established religions.

[MikeNovack]

Not so far. Nor am I holding my breath. I did read somewhere that when God appeared to Moses in a burning bush, the quote, "I am what I am" is better translated as "I will be what I will be", which suggests God may be subject to change, which may suggest a lack of perfection.

My Hebrew isn't good enough to give a proper translation but please be aware of two things.
a) Hebrew is written consonants only, so you have to know which vowels, by context or oral tradition. The root meaning is in the consonants, but fine details in the vowels.
b) Hebrew verbs have more "tenses and moods" than in English. So for example more than one "future" (regular future and future intensive). The latter would translate "will always be" so not implying change.

"a" means that if I am preparing to chant a portion of the Bible I have to prepare using study medium that indicates the vowels (and chant melody). I have to remember the vowels and the notes for when up there reading from a scroll with just consonants. There are only a couple bits I have done so often over the years I could just get up and do. Several times more than that where I just need one or two refresher reads. But a reading I haven't done in a decade or two is almost like learning from scratch.

"b" means that the phrase ehyeh asher ahyeh not going to be easy to translate to capture the meaning ehyeh is the verb to be 1st person IMPERFECT (continued over time), That's where the future sense is coming from. That future sense means could translate "I am which I will continue to be". The root for "to be" HYH. If what was meant "I am which I will become" (change implied) would be different. I'd have to look up to get the vowels right and for first person but the consonants probably LHYH

Does this sort of problem help explain why Muslims believe al Quran can't be translated (certainly not to a non-Semitic language). Translating within language groups can be hard enough but between language groups very difficult, especially between groups entirely unlike in fundamentals.

[seeds]

Doesn't it strike you as fishy that omnipotent gods have to communicate with us via humans?

Come on now, Will, even our own pop culture has given us hints as to why the Gods cannot risk giving humans the "Full Monty," so to speak.

In other words, I suggest that the Creator of this strange and opaque dimension of reality we momentarily reside within, employs a sort of Star Trekian "prime directive" so as not to disrupt the integrity and functionality of what is, in truth, a grand "cosmic womb" that is designed to awaken new eternal souls into existence.

Furthermore, in practical terms, if the universe is indeed the "womb" of a higher Being,...

(and, yes, I realize that that's a big if)

...then it would be literally impossible for this higher Being to reveal her [his/its] true and ultimate form to the "womblings" (to her embryos) while they're still held within the fabric of her being,...

...thus, she uses humans themselves as a lower (and proxy) means of communicating with them in order to inform them of her existence.

Are you a member of the "twin two" group of humans in my little soap opera -- https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/fuck- ... -%E2%80%A6 -- or are you somewhere in between?

Anyway, as I keep trying to point out (make that - humbly suggest), the truth of reality is far more "natural" and "organic" and "wonderful" than what this temporary "gestation" period leads us to believe.
_______

Why? Why can't they reveal Love?

First of all (and speculatively speaking, of course)...

...I suggest that there is no "they" when it comes to the Creator of what we call a universe, for just as your own mind has only one "I Am-ness," likewise, the same applies to this closed bubble of reality in which we momentarily reside,...

...for it (our universe) is simply the unfathomably advanced and ordered mind of a singular* lifeform (in whose image we [our minds] have been created).

*(Again, there is no "they" in the makeup of God's being.)

This thread is about "Christianity," and what most Christians fail to understand is that if humans are indeed "...created in the image of God..." then, logically, what we are can be turned around and applied to God.

Does anyone see or sense the presence of, for example, a "Trinity" in the makeup of your mind?

No, we don't, for it is a false concept that was arbitrarily conjured up by a bunch of confused and smelly old men in a council that was convened 325 years after the death of Jesus.

The truth is that we and God (and Jesus) are each sovereign and autonomous entities unto ourselves, and who are each in possession of our own private and autonomous universe (mind).

And, of course, what we truly are has nothing to do with our physical bodies, for they are discarded (like placental afterbirth) at the moment of death.

No, what we (and God) truly are, are minds that are owned and presided over by living, conscious, self-aware "agents" (again, "I Am-nesses") who are each capable of willfully shaping the infinitely malleable (holographic-like) fabric of their minds into absolutely anything "imaginable" (take the near infinite features of this universe, for example).

How much more obvious can the parallel between our minds and the mind of God (the universe) be?

You highlighted this...

...then it would be literally impossible for this higher Being to reveal her [his/its] true and ultimate form to the "womblings" (to her embryos) while they're still held within the fabric of her being,...

...and asked "Why?"

It is for the same reason that we could not literally see (or consciously apprehend) our human mother's "...true and ultimate form..." while we were still held within her womb.

We needed to be born out of the fabric of her being and into the "higher level of consciousness" and the higher (outer) context of reality where her true form was presented.

Well, I suggest that the same scenario applies to our second and final birth into "true reality" where God's true and ultimate form, along with our own ultimate form (the same form as God) will finally be revealed to us.

"...it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is..."

In other words, even though God can make her (his/its) presence and existence known to us right now through various means, nevertheless, until we are literally "born into" the higher context of, again, "true reality" and into the "higher consciousness" that comes with that second** birth,...

...we are simply (and literally) not capable of seeing (or apprehending) what God's (and our) ultimate (and eternal) form truly is, or what it truly looks like.

**"Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?

Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water [via the human womb] and of the Spirit [via death], he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit....

...Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again."

(Marvel not that I use ^^^quotes from the Bible^^^ in a thread dealing with "Christianity." And, yes, I have no problem with the issue of cherry-picking the verses that support my arguments. )
_______

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Come on now, Will, even our own pop culture has given us hints as to why the Gods cannot risk giving humans the "Full Monty," so to speak.

In other words, I suggest that the Creator of this strange and opaque dimension of reality we momentarily reside within, employs a sort of Star Trekian "prime directive" so as not to disrupt the integrity and functionality of what is, in truth, a grand "cosmic womb" that is designed to awaken new eternal souls into existence.

Furthermore, in practical terms, if the universe is indeed the "womb" of a higher Being,...

(and, yes, I realize that that's a big if)

...then it would be literally impossible for this higher Being to reveal her [his/its] true and ultimate form to the "womblings" (to her embryos) while they're still held within the fabric of her being,...

...thus, she uses humans themselves as a lower (and proxy) means of communicating with them in order to inform them of her existence.

Are you a member of the "twin two" group of humans in my little soap opera -- https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/fuck- ... -%E2%80%A6 -- or are you somewhere in between?

Anyway, as I keep trying to point out (make that - humbly suggest), the truth of reality is far more "natural" and "organic" and "wonderful" than what this temporary "gestation" period leads us to believe.
_______

Why? Why can't they reveal Love?

First of all (and speculatively speaking, of course)...

...I suggest that there is no "they" when it comes to the Creator of what we call a universe, for just as your own mind has only one "I Am-ness," likewise, the same applies to this closed bubble of reality in which we momentarily reside,...

...for it (our universe) is simply the unfathomably advanced and ordered mind of a singular* lifeform (in whose image we [our minds] have been created).

*(Again, there is no "they" in the makeup of God's being.)

This thread is about "Christianity," and what most Christians fail to understand is that if humans are indeed "...created in the image of God..." then, logically, what we are can be turned around and applied to God.

Does anyone see or sense the presence of, for example, a "Trinity" in the makeup of your mind?

No, we don't, for it is a false concept that was arbitrarily conjured up by a bunch of confused and smelly old men in a council that was convened 325 years after the death of Jesus.

The truth is that we and God (and Jesus) are each sovereign and autonomous entities unto ourselves, and who are each in possession of our own private and autonomous universe (mind).

And, of course, what we truly are has nothing to do with our physical bodies, for they are discarded (like placental afterbirth) at the moment of death.

No, what we (and God) truly are, are minds that are owned and presided over by living, conscious, self-aware "agents" (again, "I Am-nesses") who are each capable of willfully shaping the infinitely malleable (holographic-like) fabric of their minds into absolutely anything "imaginable" (take the near infinite features of this universe, for example).

How much more obvious can the parallel between our minds and the mind of God (the universe) be?

You highlighted this...

...then it would be literally impossible for this higher Being to reveal her [his/its] true and ultimate form to the "womblings" (to her embryos) while they're still held within the fabric of her being,...

...and asked "Why?"

It is for the same reason that we could not literally see (or consciously apprehend) our human mother's "...true and ultimate form..." while we were still held within her womb.

We needed to be born out of the fabric of her being and into the "higher level of consciousness" and the higher (outer) context of reality where her true form was presented.

Well, I suggest that the same scenario applies to our second and final birth into "true reality" where God's true and ultimate form, along with our own ultimate form (the same form as God) will finally be revealed to us.

"...it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is..."

In other words, even though God can make her (his/its) presence and existence known to us right now through various means, nevertheless, until we are literally "born into" the higher context of, again, "true reality" and into the "higher consciousness" that comes with that second** birth,...

...we are simply (and literally) not capable of seeing (or apprehending) what God's (and our) ultimate (and eternal) form truly is, or what it truly looks like.

**"Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?

Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water [via the human womb] and of the Spirit [via death], he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit....

...Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again."

(Marvel not that I use ^^^quotes from the Bible^^^ in a thread dealing with "Christianity." And, yes, I have no problem with the issue of cherry-picking the verses that support my arguments. )
_______

Riiiiight. OKayyyyy. Keep taking the tablets.

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Well yeah, that's a possibility. Does she speak to you?

Not so far. Nor am I holding my breath. I did read somewhere that when God appeared to Moses in a burning bush, the quote, "I am what I am" is better translated as "I will be what I will be", which suggests God may be subject to change, which may suggest a lack of perfection.

God is made in the image of humans' most valued desires and needs. Those change so God changes. Please note I am not talking about any of the gods of established religions.

No, they are graven in stone. And written down in frozen texts to be read literally by all believers to one degree or another: All believers are fundamentalists. I prefer Shakespeare.

[seeds]

Why is it so difficult for people to understand that? Maybe they don’t want to. Maybe they’d rather pretend it was about personal animus than face the reality that it’s just about facts.

Maybe pretending it’s personal is the only way they can keep believing the illogical things they long to believe, and not confront the facts.

I feel your pain, brother!

“Facts” like The Original Mating Pair, Noah’s Ark, The Parting of the Red Sea …

Why WHY are people incapable of grasping simple facts? It forever baffles me.

(Der mentch iz meshuggener …)

Alexis, I share in your frustration of having to deal with the unwashed heathens who invade this hallowed cathedral of thought and fail to recognize the depth and beauty of your prose and wit.

Seeing how logic and sound reasoning have no effect on them, then I'm afraid we may have to rely on incense to help veil the stench of their ignorance.
_______

[Alexis Jacobi]

Alexis, I share in your frustration of having to deal with the unwashed heathens who invade this hallowed cathedral of thought and fail to recognize the depth and beauty of your prose and wit.

Seeing how logic and sound reasoning have no effect on them, then I'm afraid we may have to rely on incense to help veil the stench of their ignorance.

You are too kind! I also marvel at my wit. Did I tell you that my wife removed all mirrors from our home because I spent all day preening in front of them …
________

In so many areas Immanuel’s ideas and values are on the money. (I do point this out often). Over-zealousness is like drug.

Immanuel, brother: Sign up for The Course!! I am begging you.

[Alexis Jacobi]

Stephen Meyer

Wilbur Boneman: you are getting closer …

In the merch section we offer an ingenious heater ($149.00) that is gUaRanTeEd to stave off universal Heat Death.

Check it out …

[Will Bouwman]

Stephen Meyer

Wilbur Boneman: you are getting closer …

Gus, don't you understand that any man who mixes a brown jacket and tie with a cream shirt is wrong?

[Martin Peter Clarke]

Stephen Meyer

Wilbur Boneman: you are getting closer …

In the merch section we offer an ingenious heater ($149.00) that is gUaRanTeEd to stave off universal Heat Death.

Check it out …

Isn't Meyer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stephen_C._Meyer the honest YECist? Apart from being a helplessly pathological liar. Didn't he somewhere say, to the effect, that evolution is the only rational explanation for life, implicitly including mind, but that his belief in YEC, because Jesus, comes first? I'll have to ask ChatGPT.

Good Chat. We're closing in on Dembski https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_A._Dembski.

Yeah, it's Dembski.

[Belinda]

Come on now, Will, even our own pop culture has given us hints as to why the Gods cannot risk giving humans the "Full Monty," so to speak.

In other words, I suggest that the Creator of this strange and opaque dimension of reality we momentarily reside within, employs a sort of Star Trekian "prime directive" so as not to disrupt the integrity and functionality of what is, in truth, a grand "cosmic womb" that is designed to awaken new eternal souls into existence.

Furthermore, in practical terms, if the universe is indeed the "womb" of a higher Being,...

(and, yes, I realize that that's a big if)

...then it would be literally impossible for this higher Being to reveal her [his/its] true and ultimate form to the "womblings" (to her embryos) while they're still held within the fabric of her being,...

...thus, she uses humans themselves as a lower (and proxy) means of communicating with them in order to inform them of her existence.

Are you a member of the "twin two" group of humans in my little soap opera -- https://www.ilovephilosophy.com/t/fuck- ... -%E2%80%A6 -- or are you somewhere in between?

Anyway, as I keep trying to point out (make that - humbly suggest), the truth of reality is far more "natural" and "organic" and "wonderful" than what this temporary "gestation" period leads us to believe.
_______

Why? Why can't they reveal Love?

First of all (and speculatively speaking, of course)...

...I suggest that there is no "they" when it comes to the Creator of what we call a universe, for just as your own mind has only one "I Am-ness," likewise, the same applies to this closed bubble of reality in which we momentarily reside,...

...for it (our universe) is simply the unfathomably advanced and ordered mind of a singular* lifeform (in whose image we [our minds] have been created).

*(Again, there is no "they" in the makeup of God's being.)

This thread is about "Christianity," and what most Christians fail to understand is that if humans are indeed "...created in the image of God..." then, logically, what we are can be turned around and applied to God.

Does anyone see or sense the presence of, for example, a "Trinity" in the makeup of your mind?

No, we don't, for it is a false concept that was arbitrarily conjured up by a bunch of confused and smelly old men in a council that was convened 325 years after the death of Jesus.

The truth is that we and God (and Jesus) are each sovereign and autonomous entities unto ourselves, and who are each in possession of our own private and autonomous universe (mind).

And, of course, what we truly are has nothing to do with our physical bodies, for they are discarded (like placental afterbirth) at the moment of death.

No, what we (and God) truly are, are minds that are owned and presided over by living, conscious, self-aware "agents" (again, "I Am-nesses") who are each capable of willfully shaping the infinitely malleable (holographic-like) fabric of their minds into absolutely anything "imaginable" (take the near infinite features of this universe, for example).

How much more obvious can the parallel between our minds and the mind of God (the universe) be?

You highlighted this...

...then it would be literally impossible for this higher Being to reveal her [his/its] true and ultimate form to the "womblings" (to her embryos) while they're still held within the fabric of her being,...

...and asked "Why?"

It is for the same reason that we could not literally see (or consciously apprehend) our human mother's "...true and ultimate form..." while we were still held within her womb.

We needed to be born out of the fabric of her being and into the "higher level of consciousness" and the higher (outer) context of reality where her true form was presented.

Well, I suggest that the same scenario applies to our second and final birth into "true reality" where God's true and ultimate form, along with our own ultimate form (the same form as God) will finally be revealed to us.

"...it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is..."

In other words, even though God can make her (his/its) presence and existence known to us right now through various means, nevertheless, until we are literally "born into" the higher context of, again, "true reality" and into the "higher consciousness" that comes with that second** birth,...

...we are simply (and literally) not capable of seeing (or apprehending) what God's (and our) ultimate (and eternal) form truly is, or what it truly looks like.

**"Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.

Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?

Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water [via the human womb] and of the Spirit [via death], he cannot enter into the kingdom of God. That which is born of the flesh is flesh; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit....

...Marvel not that I said unto thee, Ye must be born again."

(Marvel not that I use ^^^quotes from the Bible^^^ in a thread dealing with "Christianity." And, yes, I have no problem with the issue of cherry-picking the verses that support my arguments. )
_______

"this closed bubble of reality in which we momentarily reside,..." claimed Seeds. So why do you claim to be outside the bubble?
You have a formed narrative to tell which as far as I can tell is all your own, and not absorbed passively from some established doctrine. For that I congratulate you; many don't actually think much at all ,and many others who do think are all at sea as to the nature of God.
May I recommend that you imagine yourself as born and reared in twelfth century Christendom , and how you would tell no story about God apart from the doctrine the priest told you .

The "bubble of reality" is the story of man's past, and you are as much a creature of history as anyone else. You are a better story teller that those who lack imagination.

[Belinda]

Not so far. Nor am I holding my breath. I did read somewhere that when God appeared to Moses in a burning bush, the quote, "I am what I am" is better translated as "I will be what I will be", which suggests God may be subject to change, which may suggest a lack of perfection.

God is made in the image of humans' most valued desires and needs. Those change so God changes. Please note I am not talking about any of the gods of established religions.

No, they are graven in stone. And written down in frozen texts to be read literally by all believers to one degree or another: All believers are fundamentalists. I prefer Shakespeare.

But The Bible and the works of Shakespeare are different genres.

The Bible tells the history of God as love and as such is the development of one and only one big idea. Shakespeare's works are commentaries on the human condition and contain lots of ideas some of them entertaining and some of them sad.

"And written down in frozen texts to be read literally by all believers to one degree or another:" (Martin(
But as a modern you are enabled to read the Bible against a background of history and anthropology. The editors of The Bible understood that myth and poetry are acceptable ways to write about God.

What Shakespeare and The Bible do have in common is that myth and poetry are acceptable ways to tell a story.
.