Who created God?

stranger said:
..are you saying there is a gradation to the willing of God? For instance, it could seem like closed doors opening at a certain point, willing a little here and a little there, and then graduate to a more complete willing, where the person is more and more in complete lockstep with that willing? It breaks through the conscious mind and floods the being with a more expansive willing.
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I wasn't really meaning that, but that is certainly something that I could agree with.

What I was referring to is . . . . . lost for words . . . . . uhhh . . . . . it is not a case of God choosing to guide us or not guide us in a sense that there is a "personal God" that decides this or that.

It is a case of comprehending God's attributes / Divine nature, and realising that being guided, is something to do with our own soul, which is from God / of God.

I find it difficult to communicate these types of concepts.To understand them, one needs to appreciate the Islamic concept of God, I suppose..
 
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muhammad_isa said:
I wasn't really meaning that, but that is certainly something that I could agree with.

What I was referring to is . . . . . lost for words . . . . . uhhh . . . . . it is not a case of God choosing to guide us or not guide us in a sense that there is a "personal God" that decides this or that.

It is a case of comprehending God's attributes / Divine nature, and realising that being guided, is something to do with our own soul, which is from God / of God.

I find it difficult to communicate these type of concepts.To understand them, one needs to appreciate the Islamic concept of God, I suppose..
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Thanks! If you would at any time like to expound more on the Islamic concept (personal experience, etc.), I think you would find me quite pliant and teachable. I like "knowing nothing", it means I can soak in good spiritual stuff like a sponge, just like a kid in the 1st grade.

Okay, I just thought of something. Suppose we could have the 99 names of God flow through us, directly from God to our spirit. Just in some small way I mean, not to say that we actually become Allah... but still in a significant and I think powerful way.
 
muhammad_isa said:
I just wondered what people's opinions on this were .. including polytheists and atheists. :)
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Oh GOOD LORD!? You still believe in things "created"? God created us, while we were creating Him, and this is been going on forever. ??? We all belong to an eternal "Intelligence", but we just forgot when we were born. So-In-So said, (About Jeremiah), "I knew you before you were in your mother's womb." I guess Rome and M. Luther forgot this? Rome damned St. Origen for teaching "preexistence." I think we were ALL up there? and decided to come down and play in this simulation, NOT knowing it turns into a Hell-Hole." And now we hope to God, it don't repeat itself the next round.
 
that's a real stupid "ontological" question... Outside of this Alice In wonderland lies a power-intelligence that has always existed. That's where and who we return to when we drop dead. Simple. You might question the exclusiveness of so-called creation science and leave g.o.d. out of the equasion
 
Welcome to the Interfaith discussion forums, @Navigius! Want to introduce yourself in the introductions subforum, so we all get a feeling where you're coming from, in terms of faith or spirituality, and to give you a proper welcome?

Navigius said:
If the locomotive pulls the carriage, then what pulls the locomotive?
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In mechanical terms, it is the friction of the locomotive's wheels on the tracks. Interesting parable, but I don't see where you want to go with it, yet.
 
Cino said:
Welcome to the Interfaith discussion forums, @Navigius! Want to introduce yourself in the introductions subforum, so we all get a feeling where you're coming from, in terms of faith or spirituality, and to give you a proper welcome?



In mechanical terms, it is the friction of the locomotive's wheels on the tracks. Interesting parable, but I don't see where you want to go with it, yet.
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If the wheels of the locomotive are turning by it's own power, then could we say the locomotive moves itself?
 
Navigius said:
If the wheels of the locomotive are turning by it's own power, then could we say the locomotive moves itself?
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In terms of the physical phenomena, the wheels need something to push against to generate traction. In empty space, the locomotive would be spinning its wheels without generating a forward force to move the train.

The energy to do the work of spinning the wheels is also going to be exhauseted at some point, the diesel or coal has to be replenished. Or it needs an electric rail or overhead to provide energy...

So the locomotive all by itself can't pull the train.

But this is a very narrow, high-school science class type interpretation of your parable. I'm interested in what you put into it.
 
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Cino said:
In terms of the physical phenomena, the wheels need something to push against to generate traction. In empty space, the locomotive would be spinning its wheels without generating a forward force to move the train.

The energy to do the work of spinning the wheels is also going to be exhauseted at some point, the diesel or coal has to be replenished. Or it needs an electric rail or overhead to provide energy...

So the locomotive all by itself can't pull the train.

But this is a very narrow, high-school science class type interpretation of your parable. I'm interested in what you put into it.
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The parable is given in light of the title of the thread. Could the locomotive be said to move itself with respect to the carriage?
 
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Navigius said:
The parable is given in light of the title of the thread. Could the locomotive be said to move itself with respect to the carriage?
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In the mechanical sense, it contains a source of energy, which the carriages don't usually have. (It also provides electrical energy to the carriages for lighting and A/C, heat energy for heating).

But there are circumstances when there is a source of energy available to the carriages, independent of the locomotive: On a downward slope, the potential energy of the carriages is available for motion. They can roll down the slope, moving by themselves, without the aid of a locomotive.

(This is all very nit-picky, I certainly do not intend to maliciously dismantle your parable, just my mind working in its ways. For example, my enjoyment of a certain sci-fi movie was irreversibly marred when it featured a "cold fusion bomb" which froze everything in its vicinity...)

I understand your parable as meaning that God is like a source of divine energy animating the universe, not unlike a self-powered engine pulling a train. Does that do it justice?
 
Cino said:
In the mechanical sense, it contains a source of energy, which the carriages don't usually have. (It also provides electrical energy to the carriages for lighting and A/C, heat energy for heating).

But there are circumstances when there is a source of energy available to the carriages, independent of the locomotive: On a downward slope, the potential energy of the carriages is available for motion. They can roll down the slope, moving by themselves, without the aid of a locomotive.

(This is all very nit-picky, I certainly do not intend to maliciously dismantle your parable, just my mind working in its ways. For example, my enjoyment of a certain sci-fi movie was irreversibly marred when it featured a "cold fusion bomb" which froze everything in its vicinity...)

I understand your parable as meaning that God is like a source of divine energy animating the universe, not unlike a self-powered engine pulling a train. Does that do it justice?
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Could the analogy at least show that God is not like natural things whose reason for existing is not accounted for by its nature?
 
Navigius said:
Could the analogy at least show that God is not like natural things whose reason for existing is not accounted for by its nature?
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If it expresses that for you, that's great!

What does the reason for existence stand for in your analogy? Motion? Or the source of energy? Or the concept of transportation?
 
Cino said:
If it expresses that for you, that's great!

What does the reason for existence stand for in your analogy? Motion? Or the source of energy? Or the concept of transportation?
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The common question is, 'If God made the world then who made God?'. The question starts with the observation that each thing we perceive does not account for its own existence. If things in the world inherently existed by their own nature, no one would even think to ask why they exist. The analogy suggests merely that God is not like that, like the locomotive rather than the carriage.
 
Navigius said:
The common question is, 'If God made the world then who made God?'. The question starts with the observation that each thing we perceive does not account for its own existence. If things in the world inherently existed by their own nature, no one would even think to ask why they exist. The analogy suggests merely that God is not like that, like the locomotive rather than the carriage.
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I think I understand you now.

In the spirit of interfaith dialogue, I'd like to say that for me, the corrolary to God not depending on a prior cause is that this appears to be the case for the universe itself. To me, things in the world do exist by virtue of their existence. That everything is transient and subject to arising, change, and decay, does not contradict their inherent, self-apparent existence. Tongue-in-cheek, I might say that the universe does not disappear when I stop believing in it: it did a fine job of existing long before we human beings started pondering these questions, and it will continue on existing (subject to its own arising and eventual passing) for a long time after we will be gone.

I'm saying this in the spirit of open discussion of world views, not to disparage anyone elses's faith.
 
Cino said:
Tongue-in-cheek, I might say that the universe does not disappear when I stop believing in it
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But for you, effectively, it ceases to exist when you die. And if you cannot perceive it, what does anything else matter? No Cino = no universe, as far as Cino is concerned in the matter?
 
You guys ask some of the most difficult questions.... and I never have the answers, but they are provocative and therefore good, I think. I like Ross's post #564. More and more I find myself thinking along those lines. As spirits, if we got suckered into a Hell-Hole, then we have to make the best of it...

I find life generally difficult and at times almost too hard (depression is a problem, chronic low mood, dysthymia), but I have been blessed with a safe harbor that I can come to from time to time when life gets too hard. This is an amazing find for someone like me and of course I am very grateful (perhaps eternally so). It's a place of non-judgement and still waters where I can dock my craft of life and enjoy, if only for a few moments, something which is a rarity for me: the soft touch of serenity.

Theological questions are all long lost there and I don't even care. If the answers were somehow conceptual and could be given through words, would it change anything? We'd still be in either our Hell-Hole or our safe harbor. I have a funny feeling I'll be seeing more of the former than the latter, but that makes the latter all the more sweet when I find it again.

Alas, having no conceptual answers, I look down and see one leg moving, then the other. Yes, I am stumbling forward it seems. HH or SH, rain or shine, here I go.
 
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