Glad to see you back & sharing your beliefs Bandit. Before you left a while back I had always wanted to hear you share more of your beliefs, (I didn't think you had done that enough
) & I see you doing that now. Would be interested in hearing more of your views. earl
I feel the same about you. I got tired of the train wreck and have been much happier away from religion. I keep my deeper beliefs with explanations to myself and have become very agnostic and nauseated with all institutionalized religion. I can see not much has changed but then I did not expect it to.
Let's see, I have a bit of pantheism, Christian druidry, Christian Science, Celtic, a pinch of Islam, a pinch of Judaism, a lot of native american Indian with some Hindu, a tiny bit of Tao, a little New Age and some other stuff that may not be good for me but wont kill me. I also feel the gnostics and mystics have some things that make sense with a tad bit of Apostolic (but not in the religion Apostolic).
After much pondering, I still believe the Christ (second Adam) is the same man as the first Adam, made again (reincarnated as some call it) to follow through and succeed with the commandments that as the first Adam failed and then exalted into the godhead thus there is a God who can see through the eyes of a righteous obedient man who also knows what it is to be limited and make mistakes- a perfect union of infinite meeting finite. This union is reconciliing, making reconciliation and has reconciled all that is wrong. This is the beginning and the end, the first and last, the alpha and omega and there will not be another just like that with this particular purpose. This is of course my own personal belief and will cherish to death do us part. It has also been refreshing to know that others around the globe understand/believe a rare thing could be true before I ever say it. Yet it is important that certain things remain a mystery and not turned into dogma.
I reject most all the Christian/Islam/Jewish mainstream explanations of the Christ and Calvary and am quite content with that, though feel the blood was necessary/required and it tends to pick up again in some other religions. I think this is where some of the Bahai comes in.
I could write pages but am not real interested in doing details here. The Parsha was the great with the girl from Hawaii. I will never forget Poh.
I always felt it a little odd how the wisemen made it into the NT with no second witness among other scriptures with no second witness that are extremely too debated to be original yet that story picks up in another writing. You can put several other passages into that. Also learned that some of the original Buddhists did believe in God and that religion is different from mainstream today. That was a relief for me.
And yes, there are identical/other writings of the Christ in other world views that cannot be denied. I feel all the sacred writings from the Vedas to the most recent findings have some validation and have also been tampered with to a small degree for political agendas, called whatever they call it.
...and have become very tuned to nature, the Creation and the the elements while somehow God must be literally attached to every atom making all the things we cannot explain work and this is another way the Great Spirit has revealed itself. It is real awesome.
Take care, Earl.