So what's the story to be?

[Snoopy]

I agree.

Dang! You were supposed to disagree! Maybe we'll manage to rub along OK.

s.

 

[Snoopy]

I will also state things as a matter of fact so that people will be riled up enough to refute what I say.

...even though you yourself may know that what you say is subjective?

s.

 

[shawn]

thanks for the responses, except for the religious propaganda which as wil pointed out there is an appropriate section for such debates.

I accept that there is much contained within all religions which has value and has stood the test of time and so should be kept.
But what I am suggesting is that there needs to be a spring clean-up of our stories and we need to determine what to keep and what to toss in the bin.

Whatever "story" we decide upon should be simple and practical so that all can understand (no unnecessary complications just to create employment and make it easy to generate loopholes).

Maybe you can suggest some of the basic elements which such a "story" should (not "ought" to) have.

 

[nativeastral]

The only lies come from people twisting its words and combining it with Pagan rituals, ideas, and philosophy.

This is why Jesus Christ is referred to as the "Word" or Logos (an idea or plan manifested) by John and why Jesus refers to himself as the "Alpha and Omega" in Revelations.

This manifestation of the Lord is spoken about by Christ himself when he says "the Father and I are one" (one in goal, mind, spirit; not literally the same being) and further expounded to his apostles on the Mount of Olives when he says "I am in the Father and He is in me" just as "I am in you and you are in me." If you manifest Christ, you manifest the Father.


Thank you.

so dear John has been twisting and combining pagan ideas?

you know of course that the 'logos' is derived from stoic philosophy which first appeared in Athens 301 BC? logos spermatikos, the animating principle controlling the universe and even previous to that Heraclitus circa 500BC from Ephesus. It was used in many other philosophies before christianity used it in their early apologetics. I
'It is considered 'the active rational and spiritual principle that permeates all reality. Philo [the jew] of Alexandria [20BC-50AD] equated it with wisdom, intermediary between god and the cosmos, both agent of creation and agent through which the human mind can apprehend/
comprehend god' or the divine [britanniana.com].

some stoic aphorisms [surprisingly buddhist]
'every man has perfect freedom, provided he emancipates himself from mundane desires'
'nor can l be angry with my kinsmen or hate him, for we have come into the world to work together' [m.aurelius]
'virtue is nothing else than right reason' [seneca]
'all people are manifestations of one universal spirit and should live in brotherly love and readily help one another'
'to accept even slaves as equals of other men, because all alike are sons of god'.

they were materialists, which should fit in nicely with all the naturalists here

Stoicism [Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy]

but to extend further [since whatever one says religion will get an edge in on this 'story] take a look at this somewhat long but interesting article for a different take

Feminist Philosophy of Religion (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

 

[wil]

This is my story and I'm stickin to it.

"So Dad, why are we here, how did it all begin, how did we get here, what happenned before, what happens when we die, and why can't I slug my sister?"

Son these are questions asked by kids from the beginning of time, and questions I don't know the answers to. But you can't slug your sister or I'll slug you.

"When was the beginning of time? At school Kamil says Allah knows all because Mohamed told him, and Antonio says Mother Mary was with God and had Jesus and we need to know him, and Sasha talks about Moses and Abraham, and Aradika closes her eyes and says home. Why do their Dad's know and why are all the stories different?"

They are all different because they came from all over the world.

"But where did the stories come from?"

From Dad's who grew tired of their sons asking why, and they came up with reasons.

"Why?"

Yes, exactly.

"But I still want to know why, how did they get their little boys to quit asking?"

Quite simple actually, you make up a really big story, you tell them God said it was so, and then devise some punishment if they are bad or if they ask any more questions. Sort of the same reason you can't slug your sister.

"Can I go play now?"

Yes, exactly.

 

[shawn]

Well Shawn, if there is another story there will be a religion that forms around it. I think CZ points us in the best direction.

I mean that for the moment, for the sake of this discussion we should put aside the idea of religion and just focus on the fundamental core "story".
Then we can move on to other ideas.
One step at a time.
Provided we are not hijacked by proselytizers along the way.

 

[nativeastral]

well as you say there is value in religion [otherwise why does it exist in reams] so l suppose we have to look at the commonalities of them all and extrapolate them into the 'core' story; l presume it will have nothing 'super natural' or 'metaphysical' pertaining to it [if religion is disallowed?], only natural here and now stuff with an eye to the future health wealth and happiness of all sentient beings.
so what is the baby in the bathwater?
will it posit an origin meaning and purpose to our existence that sounds true [to us all]?

 

[nativeastral]

from feminist article previously posted


'The school of thought known as process philosophy rewrites philosophy of religion in a radically revisionist mode that accents evolution, organismic connectedness, and the primacy of becoming. Its theism is termed “panentheism,” or all-in-god. Process philosophers of religion were preeminent among those who labored in the twentieth century to construct a coherent philosophy of God that would also be consistent with scientific cosmology and evolutionary theory. They produced, in addition, a model relatively free of sexism and androcentrism. The underlying values of the process worldview are organic, relational, dynamic, and embodied. Whitehead's elaboration of the idea that “it is as true to say that God creates the World as that the World creates God” (1929) anticipated the themes of interrelatedness and mutual conditioning that feminist philosophy has developed in multiple ways in recent decades.
In the process paradigm everything comes into being by grasping or “prehending” antecedently actualized things to integrate them into a new actualized thing, its own self. Supplanting substance philosophy's idea that it takes an agent to act, process philosophy proposes a model whereby agents are the results of acts and subjects are constituted out of relations. Quantum units of becoming achieve momentary unity out of a given multiplicity in a never-ending rhythm of creative process whereby “the many become one and are increased by one” (1929).
Creativity within each occasion is spontaneous, the mark of actuality, and free, within the limits determined by its antecedent causes. Creativity unifies any many and is creative of a new unifying perspective which then becomes one among the many. In a process ontology, creativity is ultimate reality not in the sense of something more ultimate behind, above, or beyond reality, but in the sense of something ultimately descriptive of all reality, or what the biologist Charles Birch and the theologian John B. Cobb, Jr. call “the Life Process” (1984). As a category, creativity is the “ultimate of ultimates” in Whitehead's words, but as such it is an abstraction, the formal character of any actual occasion. Creativity as concrete, however, signifies a dynamism which is the very actuality of things, their act of being there at all. Everything exists in virtue of creativity, but creativity is not any thing, according to process feminist philosophers of religion.'


so life, creativity, evolution, interconnectedness [and yeh somewhat dysfunctional!]

 

[citizenzen]

well as you say there is value in religion [otherwise why does it exist in reams] so l suppose we have to look at the commonalities of them all and extrapolate them into the 'core' story;

compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom... phew!

Isn't that enough? Or do we need to put it to music?

 

[shawn]

Isn't that enough? Or do we need to put it to music?

I like that idea and I like that post CZ.
Compassion and wisdom are fundamentally important values to have, but they don't really answer the 2 questions.

With this thread I am not saying I have an answer or a solution already figured out.
This has been something I have thought about somewhat over the years, but I see that with the kinds of problems we are all facing this is a specific area which should be worked on so as to provide a basic framework of a solution.
If a religion grows out of it, then so be it.
People are nutty for religions and some can't imagine life without so they can fill their boots.
But you can't have fruit without a tree and the tree is the core story from which things like religions grow.

 

[nativeastral]

compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom, and more compassion and wisdom... phew!

Isn't that enough? Or do we need to put it to music?

definitely yes else we wont tune into it

so what about the seed that made the tree?

 

[wil]

so what about the seed that made the tree?

wot you din't like my story for that?

 

[shawn]

wot you din't like my story for that?

I thought it was very cute.
Elders getting tired of trying to give youngers the answers to the unanswerable and so they make somethings up is the jist of it.
Reminds me of that dinosaurs sitcom where the answer was "I said so".

 

[Dream]

so dear John has been twisting and combining pagan ideas?

you know of course that the 'logos' is derived from stoic philosophy which first appeared in Athens 301 BC? logos spermatikos, the animating principle controlling the universe and even previous to that Heraclitus circa 500BC from Ephesus. It was used in many other philosophies before christianity used it in their early apologetics. I
'It is considered 'the active rational and spiritual principle that permeates all reality. Philo [the jew] of Alexandria [20BC-50AD] equated it with wisdom, intermediary between god and the cosmos, both agent of creation and agent through which the human mind can apprehend/
comprehend god' or the divine [britanniana.com].

I really like the story in John 1 and do not think it is of mixed pagan origin.

Jesus life is possibly the best story you could hope for, and it is pro interfaith. The complex 'logos' explanations and comparisons are a way of relating the story with pagans, but the expression 'In the beginning' is probably a 100% Jewish mystical usage. The beginning of Jesus ministry is considered a new creation, characterized by light coming into the world. The light, itself, judges darkness, as opposed to a human judge doing it. This really is an amazing interfaith paradigm. I don't know much about other religions, but I think from what I've seen this is pretty much a giant piece of tape connecting them all.

I sense there are many religions out there which can respect and benefit from this. This new creation of John 1 is created through Jesus, so he is the author and finisher of that creation in a sense -- though not the author of the word, nor of the creation in Genesis though he and 'his creation' is included as part of that creation. He is the light in John 1, which comes after the word. His followers consider themselves prizms of that light. Rather than being the word he is called 'the word made flesh'. Instead, the word dwells in us as the lampstand in a tabernacle. It is similar to the gnostic 'Divine spark' but not exactly. This word concept, while captured in Greek with 'Logos' actually is Jewish I suspect. Hark back to Genesis 1 where the creation was finished by seven spoken phrases. Despite the fact that we are all here, the end of our lives is included in the words spoken in Genesis and we are part of that 'Finished' creation from heaven's perspective. Similarly, Jesus is a new creation, part of the larger creation, of which christians are a part, a creation that is already finished though we humans do not yet perceive the end of it.

 

[wil]

Reminds me of that dinosaurs sitcom where the answer was "I said so".

Gary Larsen's answer to: "Daddy, why did the dinosaurs go extinct?"

Now some think he meant smoking...but I wonder...

See how they are looking around furtively, was it three on a match?

 

[ARMyers]

I really like the story in John 1 and do not think it is of mixed pagan origin.

Jesus life is possibly the best story you could hope for, and it is pro interfaith. The complex 'logos' explanations and comparisons are a way of relating the story with pagans, but the expression 'In the beginning' is probably a 100% Jewish mystical usage. The beginning of Jesus ministry is considered a new creation, characterized by light coming into the world. The light, itself, judges darkness, as opposed to a human judge doing it. This really is an amazing interfaith paradigm. I don't know much about other religions, but I think from what I've seen this is pretty much a giant piece of tape connecting them all.

I sense there are many religions out there which can respect and benefit from this. This new creation of John 1 is created through Jesus, so he is the author and finisher of that creation in a sense -- though not the author of the word, nor of the creation in Genesis though he and 'his creation' is included as part of that creation. He is the light in John 1, which comes after the word. His followers consider themselves prizms of that light. Rather than being the word he is called 'the word made flesh'. Instead, the word dwells in us as the lampstand in a tabernacle. It is similar to the gnostic 'Divine spark' but not exactly. This word concept, while captured in Greek with 'Logos' actually is Jewish I suspect. Hark back to Genesis 1 where the creation was finished by seven spoken phrases. Despite the fact that we are all here, the end of our lives is included in the words spoken in Genesis and we are part of that 'Finished' creation from heaven's perspective. Similarly, Jesus is a new creation, part of the larger creation, of which christians are a part, a creation that is already finished though we humans do not yet perceive the end of it.

I agree with most of your statements Dream. We have minor disagreements on a few issues which I will not discuss here because I will largely be ignored or battled against. I just wanted to say that I never said John's statement was pagan. I was making the point that the entire Bible is about Jesus Christ which is why he is referred to as the Word or Logos. I just wanted to clarify for everyone. I will now contain my comments to the appropriate forum.

Thank you.

 

[wil]

I agree with most of your statements Dream. We have minor disagreements on a few issues which I will not discuss here because I will largely be ignored or battled against. I just wanted to say that I never said John's statement was pagan. I was making the point that the entire Bible is about Jesus Christ which is why he is referred to as the Word or Logos. I just wanted to clarify for everyone. I will now contain my comments to the appropriate forum.

Thank you.

I believe that...the first section of John in the beginning was the word... is not found in our earliest texts and has been found to have been an addition after the fact....much like some of our other favorite stories...

 

[Dream]

I agree with most of your statements Dream. We have minor disagreements on a few issues which I will not discuss here because I will largely be ignored or battled against. I just wanted to say that I never said John's statement was pagan. I was making the point that the entire Bible is about Jesus Christ which is why he is referred to as the Word or Logos. I just wanted to clarify for everyone. I will now contain my comments to the appropriate forum.

Thank you.

Understood, and I don't think anyone really should assume you are saying otherwise unless you directly say otherwise. I wasn't sure whether to clarify, but I should have. Sorry.

I believe that...the first section of John in the beginning was the word... is not found in our earliest texts and has been found to have been an addition after the fact....much like some of our other favorite stories...

That is a curiosity, but I'd leave it in as it makes more sense.

 

[citizenzen]

ARMyers, sorry for the double post... but I was wondering if you could address my questions...

What are your views on Islam? Are Muslims able to connect with God? If not, what are they connecting to when they pray? Are Buddhists able to be one with God? If not, what are they in one with when they meditate.

 

[Snoopy]

they don't really answer the 2 questions.
But you can't have fruit without a tree and the tree is the core story from which things like religions grow.

Sorry, I gotta say this: thick boy at back puts hand up...

Whatever this is, I don't see it as a story (ie a narrative)...Does that make sense?

So I'm kind of at a loss.

s.

PS I like your location, shawn.

PPS Just discovering the joys of yellow tea.