[Trinidad]

 mgoetze, on 2013-January-04, 12:40, said:

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-02, 17:16, said:

-do you also produce something similar to this feeling when someone passes away?, no need to explain the rationality behind the feeling, just curious if you experience it or not.

How do you plan to answer such a question without knowing what's being asked?

I didn't think it was very difficult: I described what I felt -all feelings for which I can find a rational explanation. After that, there was nothing left to describe.

So, either I had no spiritual experience or Gonzalo thinks that some mixture of the feelings that I described deserves to be branded as "spiritual".

Furthermore, I think that you are wrong in your assumption that there must be a clear definition for everything. Look at an impressionist painting: dots and small stripes only. Is reality full of dots and stripes? Not the last time I looked. But if I would show you a Monet, you would recognize immediately what he painted. But if I asked you to point out in detail where the contours of this object are, you will not be able to pinpoint them accurately.

Most people, when asked what the meaning of "spiritual" is, would think that it is a vague concept, but they would know roughly in what direction they should look. And let's face it: Science is full of this kind of vagueness. And scientists can cope with that just fine.

Rik

[ArtK78]

So what you are saying is that spirituality is like pornography - you know it when you see it.

[Trinidad]

 ArtK78, on 2013-January-04, 13:38, said:

So what you are saying is that spirituality is like pornography - you know it when you see it.

Pretty much.

One difference for me between these two is that I have seen pornography. (Pretty hard to avoid when you grow up in The Netherlands.)

Rik

[kenberg]

And I largely agree with this. When I teach mathematics, I insist to students that they really cannot expect to be able to prove that a continuous real valued function defined on a compact subset of the reals takes on a maximum value unless they know the meaning of continuous and compact. And maximum, for that matter. But that's mathematics. And even there it is not absolute. There is the old story of an analyst complaining about the lack of rigor shown by students, and a logician replying that the analyst had never proven anything with full rigor. Anyway, life is not mathematics.

If, that's if, we wish to construct a rigorous theory of the spiritual, whatever that would consist of, then I suppose we have to come up with a definition. But surely it is possible to have useful if not rigorously conclusive discussions of spiritual matters without beginning Definition: The word spiritual will mean....

Possibly such discussions will end inconclusively. So? Inconclusive does nt mean that nothing has been developed, it just means that we don't need to insist that everyone agree that our own conclusion is the only possible conclusion. When it comes to spiritual things, that sounds fine to me.

[Fluffy]

I wanted to know if thinking about souls or reincarnation or something like after a loss is innate to humans or something I learnt. Before my mother passed away it was unclear if I was religious or agnostic, but I becam a lot more religious after.

Nobody answered the second part question: when a tragedy happens: is your first though empathetic towards victims or egocentric towards how it matters to you?

[dwar0123]

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-04, 17:23, said:

Nobody answered the second part question: when a tragedy happens: is your first though empathetic towards victims or egocentric towards how it matters to you?

I think its empathetic but that is probably just my egocentric nature trying to make me feel better about myself.

[PassedOut]

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-04, 17:23, said:

Nobody answered the second part question: when a tragedy happens: is your first though empathetic towards victims or egocentric towards how it matters to you?

It differs from case to case.

My brother Ray's wife Kathy got cancer when their daughter was in elementary school, got treated right away and had six good years before the cancer returned with a vengeance. Their daughter was then in high school and it was clear that her mom would not see her graduate from high school, nor from college, would not see her be married, and would not have the opportunity to see what she made of her life. We traveled around with them some after she got sick again, and Kathy was usually upbeat, but she became quite emotional toward the end of her days -- as did all of us around her. I'm sure that all of us felt tremendous empathy for Kathy both before and after her death. But I'd be surprised if Ray and his daughter didn't think about the effect of Kathy's death upon them.

Of all seven of us siblings, only Ray has never been divorced. He met Kathy at the University of Wisconsin and they were devoted to each other until her death. When she died, Ray said, "That clinches it, there is no god."

After a few years, Ray started dating again, found another wonderful woman and is happily married again. And Ray's daughter is a fine, well-educated young woman (a redhead, like her grandmother).

When my father died, it was a different story altogether. He had lived a long life and had done many of the things he had set out to accomplish. We got to spend time together, and I got a chance to thank him for a number of things (mostly personal, but also for things like his service in WWII). In our last conversation, he asked me if all of his affairs were in order (they were), and told me he was ready to go. When he died shortly after that, my grief was definitely self-centered. I missed his presence on this earth and still do.

[Trinidad]

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-04, 17:23, said:

I wanted to know if thinking about souls or reincarnation or something like after a loss is innate to humans or something I learnt. Before my mother passed away it was unclear if I was religious or agnostic, but I becam a lot more religious after.

Nobody answered the second part question: when a tragedy happens: is your first though empathetic towards victims or egocentric towards how it matters to you?

My father died of a heart attack while in the hospital recovering just fine from a previous heart attack. According to himself, he didn't suffer during the first attack and according to the surgeon he probably didn't suffer during the second, fatal one.

I do not see him as a victim. His life was over, he is not there anymore (or anywhere else), he stopped existing. Why would I be empathic towards someone who doesn't exist?.

My first reaction was of sadness and astonishment. I called my wife for 15 minutes and cried. I never felt that this was particularly egocentric in the bad sense of the word. First you will need to cope with the tragedy before you can help others. That is a simple fact of life. But I suppose you could regard it as egocentric.

Then my reaction was one of empathy for my mother and brother, who were at the hospital with me. How would they be able to cope? Finally, I thought of my children. How would I explain to them that the grandfather they loved so much had died?

Rik

[mikeh]

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-04, 17:23, said:

I wanted to know if thinking about souls or reincarnation or something like after a loss is innate to humans or something I learnt. Before my mother passed away it was unclear if I was religious or agnostic, but I becam a lot more religious after.

I find that interesting. It strikes me that the only explanation for this would be a desire that your mother not be really 'dead': that there is an afterlife.

I have long thought that this wish-fulfillment is a major factor in the religious belief of most and that many of the more 'sophisticated' arguments in support of religious belief are just smokescreens or rationalizations.

We actually have no reason, founded in fact or observation or even logic, to think that there is anything 'out there' that even knows we exist, let alone gives a damn about us. Even if we accept some form of divine explanation for the creation of the universe, there seems to be no reason why we should think that such a divinity would in any manner provide for a life after death for any of us, let alone a heaven, a hell or purgatory.

No, even if there can be a logical basis for assuming that 'something' must have 'caused' the Big Bang, and that we may as well label that explanation 'GOD', that carries within it no reason to think that any human religion has 'got it right'. We like our religions because they console us with respect to death.

I mean no disrespect and certainly mean no criticism of anyone's reaction to personal tragedy when I say that turning to religion reflects an attempt to avoid reality. Sometimes reality sucks.

A long time ago, a friend told me that she used marijuana on a daily basis because it took the edge off the bad things in life. It seems to me that religion can serve the same function. And if a belief in the afterlife helps get one through the day, and doesn't cause one to hurt others, then who are we atheists to say that the believer is being an idiot?

I don't smoke dope, but I am definitely in favour of legalization. I don't believe in any religion, but I wouldn't support it being made illegal. As humans, we all need help dealing with the ***** that happens, and so long as our tools don't cause harm to others, then use whatever works.

As for Gonzalo's 2nd point, I suspect that the extent to which one's thoughts turn to oneself or to others will depend on the nature of the tragedy, the impact the tragedy can be expected to have on one's life, the relationship one had with the person concerned and so on.

I once had reason to fear someone very close to me was about to die, and I remember thinking very selfishly. It was odd, because one of the alternative outcomes would have been a stroke with significant quality of life issues, and I remember thinking about how horrible that would be for the person. So I was sort of thinking selfishly and unselfishly at the same time. That makes sense to me rationally, in that the dead person doesn't experience anything: there is no person 'left'. All there is are the memories held by others. But I don't think I was thinking rationally at that time: my memory is of my mind racing and dancing from fear to hope and back.

In short, I don't think any the less of Gonzalo because of the selfish nature of his immediate reaction. Indeed, I respect him for being aware of that nature and of questionning it.

[blackshoe]

I think we all handle grief in different ways. In the end, it's still grief.

[Fluffy]

 mikeh, on 2013-January-04, 19:12, said:

I find that interesting. It strikes me that the only explanation for this would be a desire that your mother not be really 'dead': that there is an afterlife.

I have long thought that this wish-fulfillment is a major factor in the religious belief of most and that many of the more 'sophisticated' arguments in support of religious belief are just smokescreens or rationalizations.

We actually have no reason, founded in fact or observation or even logic, to think that there is anything 'out there' that even knows we exist, let alone gives a damn about us. Even if we accept some form of divine explanation for the creation of the universe, there seems to be no reason why we should think that such a divinity would in any manner provide for a life after death for any of us, let alone a heaven, a hell or purgatory.

Yes, I know all of these, because it is the third time you tell me about it, that's partly why I asked others, it seems Rik and others don't agree with you, they don't get any need for feeling their close ones are still alive.

BTW you didn't answer my last message more than a week ago.

[Winstonm]

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-04, 17:23, said:

Nobody answered the second part question: when a tragedy happens: is your first though empathetic towards victims or egocentric towards how it matters to you?

I can only tell you my personal experience and my interpretation of events, not what actually happens. When I worked it was as a hospice nurse, and later my own wife became ill and expired, so I have seen an inordinate amount of death up close. The overriding lesson to me is how alike each death was - to the point of being fairly predictable as far as time left, etc. Regardless of the life experiences of the persons involved, each death appeared to be simply a biological event, x, y, and z occurred in a fairly straightforward and predictable pattern.

My feelings in each case was the same - but always self-centered at first. It angered me. Death sucks.

It is no wonder that belief systems have evolved to assuage the feelings that arise when faced with the finality of death. I cannot fault anyone for adopting such a belief system, as we are all capable of different levels and amounts of psychological stress. What I can bear is not necessarily the same as what you can bear, and that only makes us equally humans, not one better than the other.

Selfish, angry, and then sad. That is how death makes me feel.

[mikeh]

 Fluffy, on 2013-January-05, 04:23, said:

BTW you didn't answer my last message more than a week ago.

Your last message to me indicated, as I read it, that you haven't any desire to think about the subject: you know what you want to believe, so you believe it. Moreover, you have now several times publicly belittled all atheists. A reference to 'atheist giberish [sic] we all know' was the last straw for me. It is abundantly clear that even if you know the words written by atheists, you have no clue to the meaning of the words, and you are frankly obnoxiously certain that your incoherent choice to believe in religion is right.

If you want to have a discussion in which you at least indicate that you are prepared to 'think' or at the very least put forward a logical argmument, then I'd be happy to have that discussion. But so far the evidence suggests the opposite.

[Fluffy]

Ok, I realice my language might not have been best, but please, note that I am heavilly out numbered on some debates so I tend to use some sort of self-defence. I might attack atheist stereotype, but its kind of silly of thinking there is one, in fact I think on all members of the forum independently. As said before I don't understand why any of you should feel identified with a stereotype either, at least not fully.

[Codo]

 mgoetze, on 2013-January-04, 12:40, said:

Oh, he can feel whatever he likes, that's fine with me - as long as he keeps it to himself. As soon as he tries to convince us of anything, however, he needs to say things that make sense if he wants them to count as arguments - especially when he is insinuating that what I might say is "atheist gibberish" at the same time:


How do you plan to answer such a question without knowing what's being asked?

Why did you write something if you better had kept it to yourself according to your own standards? Or do you think that your words makes more sense then Gonzalos?

I usually enjoy your input, but if I take the stadards you claim for yourself, you better don't write here anymore- nor should I or anybody else of course.
Just because you deny the existence of things does not make this true for the rest of the world...

[32519]

Due to often inadequate translations of the New Testament, much of the beauty of what Jesus said or what Paul wrote is all but lost to the reader. Then added to this you have fictitious characters that have somehow managed to creep into the Bible. An example of these fictitious characters is Satan, the personification of all evil. Click on this link to get the full story http://www.realdevil...vilcontents.htm
Personally I do not agree with everything this guy wrote, but I certainly do agree with a hell of a lot when measured against what I read in the Bible. To get more tongues wagging on who Satan and the devil really are, go and read what Jesus said in Matthew 13:24-30 and the explanation of the parable in Matthew 13:36-43. Nearly every translation in verse 28 says that “an enemy” sowed the weeds among the wheat. The original Greek uses two words here; “echthros” (NT:2190) and “anthropos” (NT:444). “Echthros” means hateful or hostile. “Anthropos” means human being. Jesus actually said that a hateful hostile human being sowed the weeds. In verse 39 he identifies the hateful hostile human being as the devil.

First the good news:
It matters not what YOU believe, ultimately every single person who ever walked planet earth will be saved. This includes Hitler, Stalin, and anyone else who YOU consider unworthy of salvation.
Some gems from the Bible:
Approximately 300 copies of Paul’s letter to the Romans have been recovered. The oldest and most reliable of these copies places the doxology found at the end of chapter 16 (verses 25-27) at the end of chapter 14. Later copies have tried to ink out these 3 verses or omit them altogether. So what is it about these 3 verses that others have tried to delete? You can look it up for yourself as to how it has been translated in your Bible. A better translation would read something like this: "25 Now to him who is able to establish you according to the good tidings as I proclaim it as the herald of God's plan of providing salvation through Jesus Christ, which has been kept in silence before time began, but now is revealed; 26 brought to light by the advent, life, death and resurrection of Jesus, as prophetically announced through the scriptures, according to the command of the eternal God, and is being made known to all the nations to bring about obedience of faith 27 to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory forever. So it is."

The bit in verse 25 “before time began” was confirmed about 35 years later by John in Revelation 13:8 “the lamb was slain from the creation of the world.” The lamb was slain for the wrongdoings of Adam and Eve (and everyone else) even before they ever existed.

There is more in many of Paul’s other letters. My guess is that institutionalised religion tried to delete the 3 verses above. Why would they do that? Institutionalised religion often tries to control people through fear of eternal damnation and so get the people to live more moral lives. William Tyndale was the first person to challenge institutionalised religion. He was murdered in 1536 for his efforts. You can read his story here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyndale

Now the bad news:
The lake of fire described most notably in Revelations is real. But it is not for eternal damnation. It is for PURIFICATION! Eventually all will be saved; some the easy way, others the hard way.

[kenberg]

Well, to quote Jim Croce, I have done it the hard way every time.

I must say I find your post one of the most interesting that I have seen on the various religious threads. It probably will not surprise you that I am not panning a re-evaluation of my beliefs, but I may well go to a couple of your references.

[mgoetze]

 Codo, on 2013-January-06, 07:15, said:

Or do you think that your words makes more sense then Gonzalos?

Which word do you have a problem with? I will be happy to explain it to you, even in German.

[mikeh]

 32519, on 2013-January-06, 08:19, said:

Due to often inadequate translations of the New Testament, much of the beauty of what Jesus said or what Paul wrote is all but lost to the reader. Then added to this you have fictitious characters that have somehow managed to creep into the Bible. An example of these fictitious characters is Satan, the personification of all evil. Click on this link to get the full story http://www.realdevil...vilcontents.htm
Personally I do not agree with everything this guy wrote, but I certainly do agree with a hell of a lot when measured against what I read in the Bible. To get more tongues wagging on who Satan and the devil really are, go and read what Jesus said in Matthew 13:24-30 and the explanation of the parable in Matthew 13:36-43. Nearly every translation in verse 28 says that “an enemy” sowed the weeds among the wheat. The original Greek uses two words here; “echthros” (NT:2190) and “anthropos” (NT:444). “Echthros” means hateful or hostile. “Anthropos” means human being. Jesus actually said that a hateful hostile human being sowed the weeds. In verse 39 he identifies the hateful hostile human being as the devil.

First the good news:
It matters not what YOU believe, ultimately every single person who ever walked planet earth will be saved. This includes Hitler, Stalin, and anyone else who YOU consider unworthy of salvation.
Some gems from the Bible:
Approximately 300 copies of Paul’s letter to the Romans have been recovered. The oldest and most reliable of these copies places the doxology found at the end of chapter 16 (verses 25-27) at the end of chapter 14. Later copies have tried to ink out these 3 verses or omit them altogether. So what is it about these 3 verses that others have tried to delete? You can look it up for yourself as to how it has been translated in your Bible. A better translation would read something like this: "25 Now to him who is able to establish you according to the good tidings as I proclaim it as the herald of God's plan of providing salvation through Jesus Christ, which has been kept in silence before time began, but now is revealed; 26 brought to light by the advent, life, death and resurrection of Jesus, as prophetically announced through the scriptures, according to the command of the eternal God, and is being made known to all the nations to bring about obedience of faith 27 to the only wise God, through Jesus Christ. To him be the glory forever. So it is."

The bit in verse 25 “before time began” was confirmed about 35 years later by John in Revelation 13:8 “the lamb was slain from the creation of the world.” The lamb was slain for the wrongdoings of Adam and Eve (and everyone else) even before they ever existed.

There is more in many of Paul’s other letters. My guess is that institutionalised religion tried to delete the 3 verses above. Why would they do that? Institutionalised religion often tries to control people through fear of eternal damnation and so get the people to live more moral lives. William Tyndale was the first person to challenge institutionalised religion. He was murdered in 1536 for his efforts. You can read his story here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyndale

Now the bad news:
The lake of fire described most notably in Revelations is real. But it is not for eternal damnation. It is for PURIFICATION! Eventually all will be saved; some the easy way, others the hard way.

Thank you for this post. I may well do as Ken suggested he would do, and look at some of your references.

However, while I am prepared to accept that parts of the 'original' holy writings are as you say, that begs the question of why anyone would actually believe that any of what it contains is, in any sense, true. So there is a description of everyone being 'saved': why is that more 'true' than the FSM? Why is it any more true than that Zeus inhabits Olympus? Or Odin Valhalla?

Why do you actually believe in a lake of fire in which we will be purified? What evidence do you have for its existence, other than a reference to it by an uneducated (by today's standards), superstitious man who lived in an age when the supernatural was a logical explanation for the numerosu events that could not otherwise be explained due to the prevailing state of ignorance in which everyone lived?

Religious belief seems to me to require the refusal to think critically. Certain axioms are assumed to be true: god exists therefore god exists. The bible is true so what it says is true.


Step back for a moment and ask 'why do I think the bible is true?'. See if the answer always distills into some form of 'I was raised to believe it is true' or 'I want it to be true'. It is known, beyond doubt, that the bible is a heavily and not always accurately translated collection of ancient stories with no real historical validity (OT) and long-after-the fact and often contradictory hagiography (NT). Even true believers like you have to pick and choose what you believe. Why believe that Paul got anything 'right'? So he wrote letters.

Look to the universe external to the bible and ask: is there evidence that points to the existence of the Xian god? There is the as-yet unexplained 'fact' of the existence of the universe, but the bible doesn't contain any plausible explanation either. 'God did it' is a statement devoid of content.

[32519]

To answer all your questions will need an extremely lengthy post. I can offer bite size chunks for you to consider. What you choose to do with them is up to you.

The incredible story of salvation for all begins in Genesis chapters 1 through 3. These 3 chapters are perhaps the most misunderstood and misquoted of everything else you read in the Bible. Yet they set the tone for everything else that follows.

Reading chapters 1 and 2 there are many significant differences. Some of these differences are so significant that many think that Moses erred when he wrote Genesis as it was given to him. Genesis chapter 1 is all about the “spirit man.” Genesis chapter 2 is all about the “natural man.” In chapter 1 the word “create” is used throughout. Create is the Hebrew word “bara” which means create out of nothing, to speak into existence. In chapter 2 when applied to the natural man, the word “made” is used. The Concise Oxford Dictionary defines make or made as follows: construct, create or form from parts or other substances. The Hebrew Bible uses the word “asah” in Genesis 2 to refer to everything that God made or formed.
A table setting out these differences may help to recognise and understand them –

NATURAL MAN:
1. Made before or on the beginning of day 3 (Genesis 2 v 5 – 7)
2. Limitations were placed on the natural man
a) Limited to eat only from the trees from the garden in Eden (Genesis 2 v 16), excluding
b) The tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Genesis 2 v 17)
3. God placed the natural man in the garden in Eden to tend and keep it (Genesis 2 v15)
4. The first Adam become a living soul (1 Corinthians 15 v 45)
5. The natural was first (1 Corinthians 15 v 46)
6. The first man was of the earth, made of dust (1 Corinthians 15 v 47)

SPIRITUAL MAN:
1. Created on day 6 (Genesis 1 v 27 – 31)
2. No limitations were placed on the spirit man
a) Was given all the seed and fruit of all the trees over the whole earth (Genesis 1 v 29)
b) No restrictions placed on the tree of the knowledge of good and evil
3. Instructed to be fruitful and multiply, replenish the earth and subdue it, have dominion over every living thing (Genesis 1 v 28)
4. The last Adam became a life-giving Spirit (1 Corinthians 15 v 45)
5. Afterward the spiritual (1 Corinthians 15 v 46)
6. The second Man is the Lord from heaven (1 Corinthians 15 v 47)

Adam was made before or on the beginning of the third day. The truly amazing thing about this is that Adam stood side by side next to God when He caused every plant of the earth and every herb of the field to grow (day 3). Adam stood next to God when He created the sun, the moon and the stars (day 4). Adam stood next to God when He created the animals, the birds and the fish (day 5).

If Adam and Eve never transgressed the Bible as we currently have it, it would only have 4 chapters; Genesis chapters 1 + 2 and Revelations chapters 21 + 22. Everything else recorded between these four chapters is God’s incredible plan of salvation for all.

But the question that needs to be asked is this: “Why on earth would God create a spirit man and a natural man?