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Believing
If one beleieves in oneself, then that is enough... then we found the God that we are all curious about...
" Past the seeker on the prayer rug, came the cripple and the beggar and the beaten. And seeing them, the Holy One went down, down into deep prayerand cried:'Great God! How is it that a loving Creator can see such things and yet do nothing about them?' And out of the long, long silence, God said, ' I did do something about them. I made you" (J. Chittister, Winds of Change)
posted by
1AMIHAN1
on October 19, 2008 at 8:16 AM
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Re: Re: Re: Transcendental_Child - I've long since stopped bothering with the
Fortunately I'm not tormented and I do not hold onto faith in what others teach either. For someone who has been educated in a Western Educational system, (which seems to be the case with you?) especially if you have not made a thorough study of the philosophy of knowledge and of science as well as Sufi, Hindu and Buddhist philosophy, the notion of two levels of truth is probably alien and will only become clear if you put in effort to get to know what happens in your own mind besides the usual obvious bits like thinking about thoughts, things and events.
Tormented people freak out about other peoples believes and use derogative language towards and about them and as I've mentioned before, I don't like it when people assume and imply that those who believe different from you are idiots as you and other regular writers here regularly suggest. To make such assumptions is in itself rather closed minded as far as I'm concerned. We were born neither atheists nor theists. You can only be either of these two once you can use words, that you have learned from others, as thoughts to relate to your experiences. Once you move beyond conceptual understanding to direct clear awareness, atheism and theism becomes irrelevant and they are therefore arbitrary choices in the light of absolute truth. There I go again. I often forget that we do not all share the same set of perspectives and ideas.
You should perhaps also keep in mind the millions killed under communist secular rule in the old USSR and Red China. These mass murders were committed in the name of absolute secularism and atheism and the victims were more often than not, religious people. All wars are driven by ideology and or greed, not only by semetic religions, although I have to agree they are especially prominent in this kind of setting. Buddhism, for instance has a pretty good record for not spawning wars and that is a religion too. All religion is not only about worshipping some imagined guy in the sky.
I was not really trying to convince you of anything but was just testing the water to get a better understanding of your particular stance. I appreciate your civil and non-insulting reply on my comments. Others can learn some manners from you.
posted by
AardigeAfrikaner
on October 15, 2008 at 12:48 AM
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Re: Sam Harris
Ahh... a rational mind. So very glad to meet you!!!!
posted by
Transcendental_Child
on October 14, 2008 at 4:08 PM
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Re: Re: Transcendental_Child - I've long since stopped bothering with the
Dear, dear, apparently tormented ...
Do you understand what an absolute oxymoronic claim you have made? What truth is there without proof? There is more scientific proof to back up my truth... than what the religious world claims to be truth. Faith is the fall-back reply... but it holds no water with those of us who hold the truth within our non-questioning minds. It is so very amazing that you talk about pre-determined notions of truth... none of us come into this world believing religious nonsense or breathing the hatred that is born of it.... it was fed to us...ergo... we were all born atheists. When I was a child I spake as a child... believed as a child... but this woman is a child no more.... my eyes have seen the truth.. such truths as the fact that every event in history that has led to the annihilation of lives... has had to do with this so-called god of so-called truth.
posted by
Transcendental_Child
on October 14, 2008 at 3:59 PM
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Re: Transcendental_Child - I've long since stopped bothering with the
Gomedome, you're an excellent logician and master of the use of words and I admire you for that. I have enjoyed this game of words.
Transcendental, WTF is wrong with me you'll understand if you can grasp the difference between absolute truth, that lies in the realm of direct experience beyond mere conceptualization (true transcendant experience), and relative truth, that is the domain of words bound to the limitiations of discursive thinking. It's got nothing to do with any old or dead person or legend and was merely a game of words but I'll go play somewhere were people are not as stuck on their predetermined notions about truth. If I appear completely mad to you, that is still fine by me, we all appear that way to some sectors in society.
posted by
AardigeAfrikaner
on October 14, 2008 at 12:21 PM
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Transcendental_Child - I've long since stopped bothering with the
inconsistencies found in some people's behavior on this site but . . .
When someone is making an objection to the very sentiments they have expressed towards others themselves and to behavior they have exhibited numerous times, it is difficult not to say something. All one has to do in cases such as this, is take some of the words that are being objected to and replace the subject with the word "atheist" . . . "feeble minded fundies" for example, expressed as "feeble minded atheists" and you can bet that our detractor would have no problems with it. For reasons that are obvious to everyone but people capable of proliferating this inequity, these people actually feel justified in their objections, while never being willing to examine their own behavior. In the end it is nothing more than the elevation of their own religious opinion above all others.
posted by
gomedome
on October 14, 2008 at 7:02 AM
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Re: AardigeAfrikaner - On what could you possibly be basing a remark like this?
Hello Gomes...
I do not have time to jump in on this debate at present... heated though it is. However, I will this afternoon. Off to my work out... shaking my head and wondering WTF is wrong with this guy. Of course we know the answer to that one... he found Jaysus or someone/thing like him.
posted by
Transcendental_Child
on October 14, 2008 at 2:37 AM
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Sam Harris
I just started reading the end of faith. I read letters to a christian nation-I agreed with a lot he said in that book.
posted by
mystiik
on October 14, 2008 at 1:23 AM
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Re: AardigeAfrikaner - On what could you possibly be basing a remark like this?
I may be overly sensitive and see insults were you don't intend them. I was also not necessarily referring to insults towards myself. I still don't like it when people bluntly refer to others who differ from them in some respect with unjustified judgemental phrases (even if I make the very same mistake sometimes) and a patronizing attitude but I'll try to ignore that in future. Block - unblock?, your choice.
posted by
AardigeAfrikaner
on October 13, 2008 at 11:02 PM
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Happiness is a state of mind
Its all in the mind. It is not a question of being self-reliant or self-sufficient. Mind flies if left unchecked, bringing joys and sorrows in its wake. Happiness comes with control on desires. That's why a poor man can be happy with his lot and a rich man unhappy with a lot of unfulfilled desires.
posted by
hardilaziz
on October 13, 2008 at 10:17 PM
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AardigeAfrikaner - On what could you possibly be basing a remark like this?
"If you dish out insults you should be able to handle receiving them too and you are not very proficient at that."
Seriously, what are you talking about? You know damned well that I have adhered to a policy of only insulting people in reciprocation to their insults. This is true of my entire time on Blogit with very few exceptions made. True of both Kooka's blog and my blog in this category, there are no other people on this site who have had to demonstrate our ability to "handle receiving them too" as we have had to. I not only do not routinely dish out insults as you imply, the list of people more proficient at handling insults from others on this site, is a decidedly short one.
Don't tell me you are still on the kick where you are refusing to admit that you began hurling insults first in every one of our failed dialogues? That's all it takes to get unblocked; an apology and a sincere attempt to not start up where you left off.
posted by
gomedome
on October 13, 2008 at 2:07 PM
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Re: AardigeAfrikaner - Re: Let me spin
Like you, I have preferences and just like you find feeble minded religious peoples "transgressions" annoying, I find feeble minded anti religious peoples insulting of others interesting and I like to react on that. I do not pretend for a second to be free from insults or beyond feeblemindedness either. If you dish out insults you should be able to handle receiving them too and you are not very proficient at that. Besides, discourse is not just saying "I agree with you" which is the only kind of comments you don't analyze and deconstruct with the intent to belittle. I cannot say I'm overly joyous for being blocked from commenting on your blog, since you sometimes make a lot of sense and I would have liked to comment on that, but that is your loss and no great loss either. Point is, I enjoy reading inflamatory articles and commenting on them in a similar manner. Beyond that, I frankly don't care what you think about me or anything else really.
posted by
AardigeAfrikaner
on October 13, 2008 at 1:40 PM
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AardigeAfrikaner - Re: Let me spin
The point you refuse to see is that you yourself are guilty of exactly the same behavior which you would admonish others for exhibiting. The fact that there are a great number of feeble minded people in this world that need to cling to improbable religious constructs; does not mean that anyone who does not need these things must endure their transgressions. It also does not mean that anyone must endure an unlevel playing field of consideration simply because they are not willing to support what a non believer will inevitably view as their delusions.
That is where you ultimately begin to spin out of control. When you get hit over the head with the reasonable expectaion of non believers for discourse on a level playing field, you simply cannot handle it.
posted by
gomedome
on October 13, 2008 at 1:12 PM
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Let me spin
a little more out of control. The two of you should be able to have long conversations about the feeble minded people that surround you. A match made in heaven!
posted by
AardigeAfrikaner
on October 13, 2008 at 12:54 PM
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Transcendental_Child - yeah, don't you know that you are not entitled to
your own beliefs and that you must endure the assumptions and transgressions of the faithful?
Don't feel bad, I got the previous comment almost word for word on one of my blogs awhile back, had to block him when he eventually spun out of control.
What I got from the similar diatribe aimed at me was that persons like you and I are apparently supposed to; extend considerations that will never be reciprocated to the feeble minded of our species because they need their delusions and will always have their delusions.
posted by
gomedome
on October 13, 2008 at 11:12 AM
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My last comment
is off the mark by one blog. Please read my comments in the context of the whole blogging environment. I think you did the right thing with the crippled guy. He needs someone who thinks like he does as do you. He has a vast sea of choice, you, I'm afraid don't. Good luck finding someone who can handle your venomous anti religious views.
posted by
AardigeAfrikaner
on October 13, 2008 at 6:30 AM
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Damn
Pardon me (or not) for being a bit off topic and even throwing a little tantrum of my own here, but I haven't read your damned blog before now. I see you're still damning and generally insulting those you consider damned. Nobody is going to get believers to stop believing and, by the way, if we are to find true happiness in ourselves, as per your blog description, where do you think the believers in supernatural helpers' believed helpers exist other than in their own minds? Are they then not actually (although admittedly in a very roundabouts way) finding happiness in themselves anyway? Meanwhile you, like many in the religion is bulls*t camp, seem unable to accept the fact that in real life there are people who believe things you cannot believe and that these people and their believes are as much a factual part of life as you yourself are and that no amount of whining is going to change that.
I know you're not really interested in hearing this but original Christianity (and what came before that) has never been about dreaming about some off-world stuff but about making life more worthwhile living right now, in life. Anti-believers and blind believers alike tend to get stuck on irrelevant little embellishments in the storyline and feel proud to have accomplished either verifying or ridiculing the myths while they miss the whole point of it all by miles.
Regarding this specific article: You seem to imply that only if the God of the people of the Book is always making every single person happy, can we label such a God merciful. La contraire; Only one who has the option to be cruel can have mercy. The God of the Prophets has never been portrayed by them as a goody two shoes god who feels obliged to continuously pamper little brats. That a way out of mental and emotional suffering, whilst alive in this not so pleasant life we are born into, has been given by these same Prophets is obvious to anybody who takes the time to find it. It has never been meant for every simpleton we come across. Some are born to die blind, whether you or the so-called saved like it or not. That is Real Life, my God. If you cannot handle Real Life as it is, your mental and emotional anguish will eventually drown you and help you to leave life to those who can.
posted by
AardigeAfrikaner
on October 13, 2008 at 6:18 AM
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