Living in a broken world

Seems to me that if we substitute the term "What Exists" for the word "God" all of these questions evaporate. The real questions ... with answers that matter ... for me concern my attitude towards God ... er, i mean my attitude towards what exists. Is anthropomorphizing something that is on an entirely different plane than our human lives, the right attitude for humans to take to understand it? No, i think not ... sorry, me, i will not participate in bringing down everything that exists to the level of my limited experience. I have far more respect for it than that.

What exists is Great!

One of the reasons i like this way of talking is that it makes a mockery of the age old question people always ask each other .... "Do you believe in God?" ..... i mean come on, a person who does not believe in what exists *is* a FOOL ! Shouldn't their doubts be mocked?

I think my word substitution cuts the confusion out of theological doubt.

Comments

Eiamyme says

Eiamyme 2015-01-30 23:51:41 18103

Eiamyme 2015-01-30 20:32:11 18103

Yeah, like I've said many times, that which is, IS!

(*)

God reasoning never made sense to me. Some like to do that though. Enjoy.

Anti-religionists will approve your mememe, Bozo. From the Wikipedia what religion is:

source: ...

A religion is an organized collection of beliefs, cultural systems, and world views that relate humanity to an order of existence.[note 1] Many religions have narratives, symbols, and sacred histories that aim to explain the meaning of life and/or to explain the origin of life or the Universe. From their beliefs about the cosmos and human nature, people may derive morality, ethics, religious laws or a preferred lifestyle. According to some estimates, there are roughly 4,200 religions in the world.[1]

Many religions may have organized behaviors, clergy, a definition of what constitutes adherence or membership, holy places, and scriptures. The practice of a religion may include rituals, sermons, commemoration or veneration (of a deity, gods or goddesses), sacrifices, festivals, feasts, trance, initiations, funerary services, matrimonial services, meditation, prayer, music, art, dance, public service or other aspects of human culture. Religions may also contain mythology.[2]

The word religion is sometimes used interchangeably with faith, belief system[3] or sometimes set of duties;[4] however, in the words of Émile Durkheim, religion differs from private belief in that it is "something eminently social".[5] A global 2012 poll reports 59% of the world's population as "religious" and 36% as not religious, including 13% who are atheists, with a 9% decrease in religious belief from 2005.[6] On average, women are "more religious" than men.[7] Some people follow multiple religions or multiple religious principles at the same time, regardless of whether or not the religious principles they follow traditionally allow for syncretism.[8][9][10]

... ZZ v.3 p.343 ssq. gives the gist of evolution of the word God or scores of names of such etc.

Similar to the words/concepts/etc. infinity, everything, nothing, & being the word God is not grokable in physical writing. Enjoy making your own mememe for it.

Seth says

Eiamyme 2015-01-30 20:32:11 18103

Yeah, like I've said many times, that which is, IS!

(*)

Yeah sure, an equation with the same thing on both sides is always true: a=a, 1=1, and that which is = what is.

But what i have said here is quite different. In essence I am saying A = B. God = that which is. Linguistically it is a definition of God which anchors belief in something that the heart can feel and the mind cannot deny.

It is what my heart accesses, thinks about, when i say i believe in God. It is a clear feeling: that which is happening here is Great, I love it.

Phillip Yancey's questions in the article,

Is God competent?
Is God really so powerful?
Is God fair?
Why doesn't God seem to care about pain?

simply evaporate when God is simply that which exists.

So in this way of talking feeling and acting, God does not stand apart from that which is, perhaps creating it ... perhaps dinking with it ... no, God is that which is. If your faith is based upon believing God is just everything, then those questions seem childish confusions.

Eiamyme says

Eiamyme 2015-01-30 20:32:11 18103

Yeah, like I've said many times, that which is, IS!

(*)

God reasoning never made sense to me. Some like to do that though. Enjoy.

Seth says

source: mark

Anti-religionists will approve your mememe

Well those who base their faith on what history has told them will viciously discard what i am saying here ... while those who want to base their faith on what they can actually experience and feel will see that i am pointing at that which is.

Seth says

Eiamyme 2015-02-02 09:27:28 18103

seth 2015-02-02 08:57:58 18103

source: mark

.. ZZ v.3 p.343 ssq. gives the gist of evolution of the word God or scores of names of such etc.
Similar to the words/concepts/etc. infinity, everything, nothing, & being the word God is not grokable in physical writing. Enjoy making your own mememe for it.

Well writing, of it's nature, is never the thing written about. That is especially true when the things written about are unknown, unexperienced, and unfelt.

i am not sure what you refer to with your prhrase "physical writing" ... and i am curious how it is different than just writing. It bring to my mind the contemplation of not physical writing ... what would that be?

incidentally when i use the word writing here i am talking about the whole semantic process: the thing itsself, the symbol of it, and a person's association (interpertation) of the symbol to the thing.

Maybe performed music or maybe Eurythmy ... I was thinking mainly of ordinary text & speech between humans without anything special. Try expessing in language who you are to another who does not know you & the problem becomes more clear.

ok, yes of course ... the more dimensions available for expression, the deeper and subtler the things that can be expressed and frequently the less ambiguous. but while the bandwidth of communication increases, the semantics of the situation remain the same.

Seth says

Eiamyme 2015-02-02 08:25:28 18103

seth 2015-02-02 08:20:07 18103

source: mark

Anti-religionists will approve your mememe

... or just pointing!

yep, that is what writing does

. It is over there, not where you are looking.

Seth says

this item was actually provoked by Kristen's Harris's post of the article on facebook.

Here is some of our dialogue ...

Re Living in a broken world

Seth: hmmmm ....

Kristen: Seth, you gotta give me a little more to go on. Food you read the whole article? He wrote wonderful books

Seth: I'm not criticizing what he wrote ... it's pretty traditional theology. I just have a totally different attitude. I wrote more about it here ... http://fastblogit.com/permalink/?item=18103

Kristen: Your observation about what exists is duly noted. There is a certain figure that existed in carefully recorded history, Jewish history, Josephus' writings, the Koran

Kristen: we've chatted on the subject and you know my tone. Honestly, I would love a response since you are open minded to what exists. What do you do with the news that Jesus existed?

Seth: well thanks, Kristen for caring. For me Christ Jesus refers to us ... it points to our humanity ... to your children and my children and our growing and loving and and living together. My faith in that ... in humanity ... in us ... in Christ .... is not based upon the hearsay of history ... i can feel it in what i do say and love. You see i am just trying to point to the thing itself ... not the words about it, not the gossip abut it, which has evolved down through the ages.

Note i am trying to use words to point to actuality .... changing the words ... not the things themselves. Sometimes when we use words we are just reciting pleasant sounds by habit forgetting what they actually point to.

What i can feel is that what people are really talking about when they use the word "Christ" is our humanity itself and what we do when we feel most human. And what i can feel when people use the word "God" is all that actually exists.

Seth says

Eiamyme 2015-02-02 13:39:41 18103

seth 2015-02-02 12:37:28 18103

source: mark

I have something different for those words which you are not likely to dislodge.

... well which words in specific are you talking about and what do you have associated to them this is all that different than I ?

Useful dialogue is what we do to get our words aligned so that we understand each other.

God & Christ. I hold the Anthroposophical views [& "something irrelevant to understanding each other"]

ok, the question is how they differ.

The major difference that i have noticed is that the anthropological (and also traditional religion) view seems to assume that there are beings called "Christ" & "God" who exist outside of humanity itself and all that exists. Me, I just think that presumption is a confusion of reference. I believe the same beings exist, i just like to point to them as directly as i can. The duality inherent in the traditional view, does not help me grock these existances nor become a better person ... rather the duality just serves to confuse what i am thinking about or feeling.

Seth says

Or said differently, I don't believe that a human being is capable of distinguishing all that exists from God, or of distinguishing Christ from humanity itself. I cannot do it. I have not heard anybody else do it either. People just make those assumptions ... er, maybe because they have not conceived that they might be just be the same things. They are beings which do not stand apart from what they themselves are.

Seth says

Well i am thankful for what is too

Seth says

for the realization that humanity is up to us.

Living in a broken world

Tags

Comments

See Also