higherlearner84

who says you have to beleive in something? thats not an enlightened thought at all.

SweetSativa

Who is to say what is and is not an 'enlightened' thought? Who judges who is and is not 'enlightened'? If I were done learning, I would be done living... and I just love this life thing too much for that.

The way that I see things, I can only say the way that I view things and testify as to my experiences and philosophies/ theories and cannot in any logical way tell another that (s)he is wrong. And anyone who disagrees is just... unenlightened. hehe

__________________
"Why is it that when people talk to God, we call it praying but when God talks to people, we call it crazy?"- Touched by an Angel
http://www.youtube.com/user/immelody.../0/DDRj93dQ0O0

zoltron

Why thank you....that was extremely enlightening.

__________________

ziplock

I care about what other people believe. Beliefs can and do fuck up a lot of stuff.

__________________
Insanity is the only sane reaction to an insane society.

Sugar420

^do you really believe that, ziplock?

higherlearner84

beleifs just create your own personal reality

ziplock

Sandman, you should look into some Taoist and Buddhist philosophies. Balance out that Christianity. Or actually considering "I never thought anything up. I was enlightened with the truth." you might be interested in Sufism. Or maybe check out some Native American spirituality and ancient greek philosophy (socrates, plato and the like). It'll give you much more to associate your experiences with and may perhaps lead to a more fulfilling conscious understanding of them.

v3d4: Yes, I do believe it. It would appear to me, through other discussions and comments such as highlearners, it's a popular opinion that the influence of beliefs does not extend outside of their own subjective reality. That it's rather inconsequencial which beliefs they hold, as holding them has little to no effect on their ability to interact.

While this opinion does hold water, it has, imo, mismeasured the extent of beliefs influence individually and collectively. Our whole society for instance, is simply a matter of belief. There's no tissue connecting society together, Nike isn't a large biomass resembling a lung. Government isn't a nice big purplish grey brain. However, the behavior of society is much like that of a body. Only difference is one's physically manifested, another exists in our mind. If I break the law, a big creature called "Law" isn't going to punish me for what I've done. Instead, individuals who subscribe to a belief of law and that have organized themselves in a way to enforce it will carry out that action. If they did not have this belief in law, they would not enforce it. To make sure that even if they don't believe it they follow protocal, we pay them.

The worth of money is another belief. Some believe money's worthless. Give a tribesman 100$ bill. To others, money's worth killing over.

Considering belief is pretty much the fundamental construction material for our socities, erected prior to any building, we're faced with the full extent of it's influence.

This is obviously a complex system and topics that would further clearify the explaination are association, belief acquisition, belief verification, belief transmittance, belief's influence on interaction, the development and interaction of social bodies due to belief, culture, observable characteristics/behaviors and their relation to belief, belief and it's uses in communication, cross boundary (as in differing beliefs) communication, the individuals identity of self, the individuals relationship and role in society, etc. Basically, the anatomy of society.

Man I really need more time to address all these posts... anyways I gotta jet and blaze, but yeah, I really believe beliefs can fuck shit up.

__________________
Insanity is the only sane reaction to an insane society.

Waves

Why do murders commit their crimes?

They believe what they are doing is right.

__________________
On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

Woods

Of course they do. More people have been murdered in the name of god, particularly a christian god, then anything else.

__________________
Kishar steals his aunt's morphine patches because he has the moral sense of George Bush

Prisons are built with stones of Law. Brothels with bricks of religion.

zoltron

Yeah, Jeff Dahmer knew it was perfectly fine to eat homos after dismembering them & keeping their skulls in the fridge for a midnight snack.

__________________

Sugar420

oh i dont think thats really true.

but why is it that people seem so horrified by killing in the name of religion while killing in the name of the nation-state is ok? how is it that they are so easily decieved?
how is religious belief different from political or ecconomic ideology?
i think they are not really

Woods

I'm not saying that one is worse then the other, but historically the numbers have been far worse for religion, and the methods more extreme.

__________________
Kishar steals his aunt's morphine patches because he has the moral sense of George Bush

Prisons are built with stones of Law. Brothels with bricks of religion.

Sugar420

well i have heard that claim before, but what are the numbers?
and how do you count, and what is counted as "christian killing" since Jesus taught nonviolence?
even as far back as the "religious wars" of 16 century europe, the reformation had more to do with powers and principalities than any religion. for the main instigators of the killing, the doctrinal differences were at best second to their intrest in the creation or destruction of the centralized state

but since then there have been these huge secular wars with bigger guns and bombs than ever before, all over the world ongoing, and still going.

but Jesus taught nonviolence, we are commanded to love eachother

Woods

Jesus has nothing to do whit Christianity, and hasn't since his death.

__________________
Kishar steals his aunt's morphine patches because he has the moral sense of George Bush

Prisons are built with stones of Law. Brothels with bricks of religion.

Sugar420

i do understand that some people have re-defined the word "christian" for their own purpose, but i reject those false definitions.
putting on a black turtleneck and a beret and reciting bad poetry doesnt make one a beatnik any more than wearing a cross while misquoting out of context bible verses makes someone a christian.


and he's not dead

zoltron

Trying to convince an atheist that there really is a God is the same as trying to tell us Christians that there isn't.
Nobody will convince the other. So it's basically a 'Mexican stand-off'.

__________________

Sugar420

this little light of mine
im gonna let it shine
this little light of mine
im gonna let it shine

SweetSativa

On the 'Christian' thing. You know, it's sort of funny how we talk about either 'Christian' or 'non-Christian' without hardly realizing that there are SOOOO many other religions in this world. That aside, I think I had a 'Christian phobia' and have recently (I am quite certain more to learn about myself and the world around me... was directed to) became employed as a teacher at a Christian education center... where within my curriculum I am required to teach the children about Christ. Although I've quoted the bible on occassion (and even now in my sig), I take the bible with a grain of salt. I read what calls to me and avoid that which does not. Sometimes it is the Bible (the King James version of the Christian bible is what I have) and sometimes it is Seth material, etc... The words of Jesus call to me because His spirit can be felt within the pages, within the ink. I do not believe or read it in a way in which he was/ is saying that WORSHIPPING him is a way to God. I believe that He was speaking with His Fathers' lips when he said, "I AM the way, the truth, and the light." and his Father was Love..... the spirit of, an intelligence that is also an emotional energy... THE emotional energy of creation and behind every other emotional energy. Of course, it's all a theory... you cannot 'make' another (wo)man have faith in anything. I am just waiting for the day when I'm confronted about not going to church or asked what church I go to... I will not be persuaded to go to a temple to pray. I do not need an audience nor do I feel the need to be influenced by the ministers' interpretations of the Bible, God, and reality. When I have my "Jesus time" I am very careful to only read stories and leave the interpretations up to the children. I was delighted one day when one of my students piped up on his own and said, "I AM GOD". I said, "You are? How is that?" He said, "God is inside of me and I am God"... hey, can't argue with that. My son has mentioned several times that when this body gets old, you get a new one. I just don't argue or tell them 'how it is' ... if I could remember and document 'how it is', then I figure that I would have the authority to tell them. From what I read and feel, I do believe that the Kingdom of Heaven is within and that the only way that any person can find 'themselves', their true and higher selves is through gaining the knowledge through experience.

Just thinkin' out loud this morning.

"Love is a good thing"

__________________
"Why is it that when people talk to God, we call it praying but when God talks to people, we call it crazy?"- Touched by an Angel
http://www.youtube.com/user/immelody.../0/DDRj93dQ0O0

Waves

do you really believe jesus is not physically dead?

__________________
On this life that we call home
The years go fast and the days go so slow

Sugar420

physically? im not sure i know what you mean