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OK, in that case, it's no different from dying without repenting any other sin. It's basically the same as choosing to remain a person of the world. Some people interpret that verse as saying that once you blaspheme the Holy Ghost you're doomed to Hell forever, no matter what you do. They then...

Well, you could kill someone and then ignore it or have it removed from your memory. I'm not sure if you're a proponent of linguistic relativism or if you actually believe there is no wrong doing without knowledge of it... If it's the latter case, then mssionaries are a scourge upon the earth...

To throw away your soul, figuratively speaking, just waste your life and become a man/woman wholly of the world. Terrence, I wouldn't say God is totally in control, what with the free will we supposedly have and all. Blazn, what is the point of quoting those passages? I think it would be...

OK thanks, jiii. That clears up a lot of things for me. Buddhism is sort of like the user's manual to achieving enlightenment I suppose, in that it doesn't bore you with extraneous details. I guess the closest it comes to a realm of unconditional existence is Nirvana (from a totally irrelevant...

Oh, I see. It's just not called sin before the revelation. I assume that they are still subject to original sin though, even though they don't know about it.

Yeah, I agree with that as well. You can't really give your soul to someone else, and even if you could, it's my understanding that the soul is the part of a person that animates the body. However, there are some people that dedicate themselves to other forces wilfully, which is more like...

OK, I wasn't sure if you were going for opposites or duality here. From your examples, I just assumed it was duality and was making this clear to people who are unaware of the relationship between love and hate, hot and cold, etc. I was referring to shadowman's hypothetical world, where no gods...

Then wouldn't the missionaries spreading the Gospel be doing something counterproductive? It's like they're making people sin by giving them knowledge of their sins. As for the natural man being a slave to sin, I think that is referring to the fact that as long as you are a part of the world...

Well, I don't have a link that specifically refers to it, i.e. primary source but I read it in a book by Stephan Hoeller (Gnosticism: New Light on the Ancient Tradition of Inner Knowing). This is the only source I can remember, as I moved on from my Gnostic readings a few months ago. I'll write...

Here is the stream thing, I guess the Buddha didn't actually say it though. It's from Wikipedia: "The Buddha emphasized that the atman is like a mountain stream, which flows fast and is forever changing. There is no being (sat), there is only becoming (bhava) in it. The arising (uppaada)...

What do you mean by conditioned existence? Is there unconditiond existence? By medium, I mean the "stream" down which everything flows. The thing in which everything is forever changing is not changing, or else things within it would cease to change for a time. Of course, if the Buddha meant...

Well, I meant that you can't run out of karma or give it to someone. So yeah, it is an action not an object or quantity of something. OK, then what about Nirvana and what about attachement to the fact that nothing is permanent? Nirvana is supposedly outside of samsara with no death, and saying...

Selling one's soul is not possession, but it can lead to it. Usually when one is possessed there are long stretches of time they do not remember, so you are most definitely not possessed. If you can touch crucifixes and holy water and all that, I would say there is no possession. However, it...

If Jesus hadn't died, and a few more people knew about it, Christianity would be Gnostic Christianity (well, maybe not). That would be awesome and there might have been less problems with Christianity throughout the ages. Since it was all about gnosis, the resurrection wouldn't matter. I think...

I fail to see the problem here. What's wrong with accepting a sacrifice? :confused: Surely it's better than rejecting it.

That's a more medieval definition IMO. Right now, I assume that incubi and succubi are thought forms or some other denizen of the astral realm that induce orgasm to extract energy from a host. Like a vampire, but with sex... But that has nothing to do with science, so I'll be on my way.

I don't think those are meant to be opposites per se, just different poles of the same thing. The opposite of love, and hate, is indifference, I've heard. I don't personally believe that God speaks in an audible fashion to everyone, but I do not think it is impossible either. I'm fairly sure he...

Also, why did you quote me? I haven't ever consciously met a supernatural being, as far as I know anyway.

I'm pretty sure karma is not supposed to be thought of as a commodity that can be stored or exhausted. I tend to think of it more like a pendulum or like the law of compensation in Hermeticism. Although I'm fairly sure that one cannot get around karma by simply not believing in it, even though...

Are you serious? You do realize that the DaVinci code is fiction. It's like the Necronomicon, in that it's more plausible and mixes history with fiction, although it's a little more conspiracy-ish than the Necronomicon. Doesn't the book also put forth that the origin of the Merovingians is a...