General musing about Christianity and idolatry

[Mike Cl]

I don't know what people you have spoken to.

Besides that; I based my comment on the personal reading of core texts of different religions.

peace

I would imagine, Pops, that I have spoken to as many people as you.  I realize that for you there is a known will of god.  That's what I said--each believer knows what that is for them.  "Core texts"--just what is that?  What is core for you may be an add-on for somebody else.  You keep wanting to make a universal law about many of your beliefs.  You don't want to understand that in the world of beliefs there are no universal laws; just beliefs that differ, one person to another. 

[popsthebuilder]

Every person would have a different answer.  God or g-d or whatever fiction you want to deal with, is different for every person.  That's like asking me what do you think Bugs Bunny would do?  Or the Tasmanian Devil--or any other fiction.  Clearly, the christian god is not pro-life.  He simply does not give a shit--all he wants is that the people alive stoke and stroke his fragile ego.

That is a wholly false statement.

GOD is indeed pro-life as, as all existence or rather, creation is.

All existence strives to live. If GOD didn't want life to exist then it would not, nor would it have been formed with the capacity for life.

The bible, that book that Christianity is pretty much based off of commands it's followers to love one another indiscriminately.

That's rather benevolent and seemingly pro-life to me.

peace

[popsthebuilder]

Yeah I get that. But from my point of view, unless Jesus is God, which I don't think he was; it seems to me you are taking yet another (hypothetical) material representation and embueing with the personality of a God and making him out ot be him (albeit in part) no different from any other idolatry.
Now, I understand you don't see it that way. Neither does the man worshipping the golden calf. To him the calf is a holy representation of the will of his God. Worshipping that totem or statue is worshipping the spirit or very being of his God. It's not idolatry to him, because to him that statue is as Christ is to you; a (partly) manifestation of God in the physical realm. He may see a Christian's worship of christ the same way as a christian might see the canibalistic pelegostos worshipping captain Jack Sparrow in Dead man's chest; falsely claiming a non-god object or person is god made material in this physical world.
From my point of view the worshipper of the calf, the pirate or the carpenter are all committing idolatry by what we agree constitutes idolatry.. I'm just saying; that's how it is from my point of view. I know it's not yours. It's mine.

You don't quite understand what Christ is to me.

Again slippery ground, but I do not only see it as not worshipping a man, but I do not worship Jesus the Christ of GOD. Praise and thanks for Jesus the Christ of GOD is not worship of Jesus the Christ of GOD as if the utter fullness there of.

I get what you are saying, but for me personally, that is not the case.

peace

[popsthebuilder]

Good question.  I once read a book titled "God is a Verb", written by a Rabbi.  It was about mystical Judaism, Kabbalah, and while I don't remember most of it, the suggestion of the title stuck.  If what this Rabbi suggests is true, then God wouldn't have a will, but would be will itself, the will to goodness I presume.  I suppose you then have to determine if there is objective good, which I think there is, and work from there.  So yes, I think God is pro-life.

I know you weren't asking me, but what an interesting line of thought.

ðŸ'

[Mike Cl]

That is a wholly false statement.

GOD is indeed pro-life as, as all existence or rather, creation is.

All existence strives to live. If GOD didn't want life to exist then it would not, nor would it have been formed with the capacity for life.

The bible, that book that Christianity is pretty much based off of commands it's followers to love one another indiscriminately.

That's rather benevolent and seemingly pro-life to me.

peace

If everybody agrees on what god is and wants, then why are there literally hundreds of different bibles in existence????  Why does the Baptist church have at least 10,000 different sects?  I have never found two people who believed in god in exactly the same ways.  I doubt you have either.

So, god created all those diseases of the new born?  All those pests that can and do cause birth defects?  If so, then you god is worse than any devil man can make up. 

And your blinders are firmly in place when you pick out one statement god is supposed to have made in the entire bible and pronounce god pro-life.  What of the stonings and deaths called for in the commandments of the OT????  Not even Jesus can be said to be all loving and peaceful.  You pick and chose what you think supports you personal belief and shove it out to the world as proof of this or that.  Blinders.  You are just too willfully ignorant to read anything that causes you to reason about anything.  Your empty beliefs are enough for you. 

[popsthebuilder]

I would imagine, Pops, that I have spoken to as many people as you.  I realize that for you there is a known will of god.  That's what I said--each believer knows what that is for them.  "Core texts"--just what is that?  What is core for you may be an add-on for somebody else.  You keep wanting to make a universal law about many of your beliefs.  You don't want to understand that in the world of beliefs there are no universal laws; just beliefs that differ, one person to another.

No universal laws friend. Just universal truth.

Core texts is rather vague and not very accurate perhaps. It would include nearly all I have read, but I haven't completed all of them to be certain, so I'll list the ones I am certain of.

Zend Avesta, Torah, Qur'an, Bible, much if not all of the writings of the Bab and Baha'i faith, book of Enoch, particular writings of the Christian father's that are not in the bible, Bhagavad-Gita, upinashads (sorry for spelling), even Jainism, Taoism, Confucianism.

To be honest a haven't read the complete fullness of some of these but the vast majority of all of them.

That is a start

peace

[Mike Cl]

No universal laws friend. Just universal truth.

Core texts is rather vague and not very accurate perhaps. It would include nearly all I have read, but I haven't completed all of them to be certain, so I'll list the ones I am certain of.

Zend Avesta, Torah, Qur'an, Bible, much if not all of the writings of the Bab and Baha'i faith, book of Enoch, particular writings of the Christian father's that are not in the bible, Bhagavad-Gita, upinashads (sorry for spelling), even Jainism, Taoism, Confucianism.

To be honest a haven't read the complete fullness of some of these but the vast majority of all of them.

That is a start

peace

If that is how you want to spend your time, go for it.  Universal truth???! :))))))  What silliness!!  You read all that crap and you come up with universal truth?!  Just one--or are there many?  Would you like to share it?  Or them?  And I'm sure all who have read the material you have will come up with the same universal truth?  Of course!  I find more truth reading my statistical baseball reference than you do in all of your airy-fairy books.  But to each his own, I guess.

[popsthebuilder]

If everybody agrees on what god is and wants, then why are there literally hundreds of different bibles in existence????  Why does the Baptist church have at least 10,000 different sects?  I have never found two people who believed in god in exactly the same ways.  I doubt you have either.

So, god created all those diseases of the new born?  All those pests that can and do cause birth defects?  If so, then you god is worse than any devil man can make up. 

And your blinders are firmly in place when you pick out one statement god is supposed to have made in the entire bible and pronounce god pro-life.  What of the stonings and deaths called for in the commandments of the OT????  Not even Jesus can be said to be all loving and peaceful.  You pick and chose what you think supports you personal belief and shove it out to the world as proof of this or that.  Blinders.  You are just too willfully ignorant to read anything that causes you to reason about anything.  Your empty beliefs are enough for you.

Ok...I didn't say everyone agreed. I said the books or writings do in multiple ways.

As far as diseases are concerned; I'm pretty sure they are to the extent we have e today due to man. Many were probably created by man in some way. This is die to mans general misdirection which is inturn partly due to their freedom.
Past that; if all mankind was unify under under one common will....the will of life to advance as a whole peaceably, then these diseases would have most likely been taken care of in one way or another.

As far as the teachings of the ot; though it is full of right guidance, it too has some misdirection. This was again from man, and was corrupted. it is literally spoken against within the ot and in the nt.

It isnt using blinders when it is clearly stated that the Jew was misdirected, and that the law is now written om the hearts through the conscience or holy spirit.

Using blinders is repeatedly referring to individual parts of an individual book when the actual discussion is based on many books in their wholeness.

All I'm saying is that if you want to say that the will of GOD is negative then you should attempt to support it with more than such a miniscule percentage of the actual writings of the faithful unto GOD.

I'm sure you get this. Playing the fool at this point would be dishonest as you seem quite bright.

peace

[popsthebuilder]

If that is how you want to spend your time, go for it.  Universal truth???! :))))))  What silliness!!  You read all that crap and you come up with universal truth?!  Just one--or are there many?  Would you like to share it?  Or them?  And I'm sure all who have read the material you have will come up with the same universal truth?  Of course!  I find more truth reading my statistical baseball reference than you do in all of your airy-fairy books.  But to each his own, I guess.

Yes, any who read, without preconceived bias, the books I listed, with the capacity to comprehend them even in part will conclude the same things I have. I'm sorry the word truth offended you somehow. I could almost see how it could to someone of a wholly materialistic mindset.

As far as stating that truth or truths here; I will not attempt such at this time as I still wallow in hypocricy and the fullness of the truth is far from me.

peace

[popsthebuilder]

If that is how you want to spend your time, go for it.  Universal truth???! :))))))  What silliness!!  You read all that crap and you come up with universal truth?!  Just one--or are there many?  Would you like to share it?  Or them?  And I'm sure all who have read the material you have will come up with the same universal truth?  Of course!  I find more truth reading my statistical baseball reference than you do in all of your airy-fairy books.  But to each his own, I guess.

You don't have to read anything.

But you can't justifiably state that I am wrong based simply on the opinions of others who may or may not have read them without bias if read them at all.

[Baruch]

Pops ... you will have to get used to impurity ... by the time you finish with your bath water, it is no longer clean, it is dirty.  This is why the Church invented penance, to deal with minor lapses.  Otherwise nobody could take communion.  But you only get that if you go to a High Church ... Low Church is ok with sinners (unless it is Calvinist).  The question remains, are you predestined clean, clean once and forever, or clean/lapsed/clean/ ... and then there is that pesky Donatist question of the efficacy of the sacrament of lapsed priests.  Or you could just become Jewish or Buddhist etc.

With all sincerity, I think you need to drop some more Christian theology, and take up a personal relationship with G-d, who is neither Christian nor judicial.  A doctor goes to the sick, not to the well ... unless it is the well of Jacob ;-)  Religion and theology makes the simple, complicated.

[Mike Cl]

You don't have to read anything.

But you can't justifiably state that I am wrong based simply on the opinions of others who may or may not have read them without bias if read them at all.

Yeah, Pops, I can and will say you are wrong.  You are not able to give any evidence that you are right.  You can have your own personal opinion all you want.  But you cannot prove anything.  And why is that Pops?  Because your god and every other god is simply fiction; and you are powerless to prove otherwise. 

[popsthebuilder]

Yeah, Pops, I can and will say you are wrong.  You are not able to give any evidence that you are right.  You can have your own personal opinion all you want.  But you cannot prove anything.  And why is that Pops?  Because your god and every other god is simply fiction; and you are powerless to prove otherwise.

What? No. I have evidence for the will of God being of many notes making up the harmonious accord of GOD. I have evidence that even those who refute my findings can be shown to wrong with whatever book they are relying on.

You can guess there isn't a GOD, but there is no evidence for that of any sort. In fact scientific endeavor seams to be slowly leading more and more to a creative force.

At least I have had a personal experience that instantly changed me, giving me my initial faith. And I also have the fact that all the core texts of the faithful unto GOD only further verify what I had been shown, and agree, each one, on the will of God as it pertains to man, and what is percievable of the nature of GOD through the resources of the pious and the negation of greed.

You can continue to pretend that I am making baseless claims, but we both know it just pretend.

peace

[Baruch]

Pops - I accept your testimony, if not your full analysis.  You had a cathartic experience, which many religious never have, let alone the non-religious.  You interpreted this as something revelatory ... and this I accept as a real psychological phenomenon.  Unlike Mike, I accept people's psychological experience as a form of reality, a POV like more than one person looking at a statue from all sides.  Two people who have similar experiences can understand each other.  People who have fallen out of their former view, if the former view was religious ... are just as "changed" by it as you are.

[Mike Cl]

What? No. I have evidence for the will of God being of many notes making up the harmonious accord of GOD. I have evidence that even those who refute my findings can be shown to wrong with whatever book they are relying on.

You can guess there isn't a GOD, but there is no evidence for that of any sort. In fact scientific endeavor seams to be slowly leading more and more to a creative force.

At least I have had a personal experience that instantly changed me, giving me my initial faith. And I also have the fact that all the core texts of the faithful unto GOD only further verify what I had been shown, and agree, each one, on the will of God as it pertains to man, and what is percievable of the nature of GOD through the resources of the pious and the negation of greed.

You can continue to pretend that I am making baseless claims, but we both know it just pretend.

peace

You are the only one pretending anything here.  You claim mountains of evidence; but you fail to show any at all.  You had a personal catharsis of some sort and you want to make it universal--that's all this is.  Your ego is so huge that you figure if it happens to you, it must be universal and planned.  Once again, a theist puts the cart before the horse.  I don't make any claims at all.  Then you show up and tell me to prove that god does not exist.  That is like asking me to provide proof that the Tooth Fairy does not exist.  What should happen, is you provide me with evidence that your god exists.  If you can do that, then I'll accept that your god exists.  Until then, you are just blowing smoke and calling it clear thinking.  You only have belief; you have no evidence.  Why keep pretending that you do?   I don't care if a billion people believe the world to be flat; and I don't care about their sincerity in that belief; the world is still not flat.  And you are simply just another pretender claiming that your god is the Truth!  That is called self deception, my friend.