Philosophy of Religion Question

Jesus Christ is a gift from God who shed his blood for mankind. However, if God created us, then don’t we “deserve” Jesus Christ? Doesn’t he “owe” us that much after creating us and throwing us into such a chaotic world? It sometimes seems odd to be praising Jesus Christ for his death as it seems we deserved as much…???

Well, technically you don’t even deserv to exist : it’s already seen as a pure gift. But the thing is, if you postulate JC, enters the sin : on one side you don’t “deserv” to live on the other, you’re nasty with the one who made you that gift… As he’s a very very very nice guy, he’ll come anyway… Well, I don’t know what to say about the problem such as earthquake : we can’t be hold responsible for anything, there… But the question would then be : did we become nasty “before”, “somewhere else” ? Hehehe… dunno. But JC’s message deals mainly with te responsibility stuff and, as far as I know, does not contain a lot about earthquakes… Open question, from that point of view ?

Hi P G

This may be true if the universe and specifically the earth were here to serve us. But I believe the opposite and that we are here to serve the earth. This changes everything. From this perspective, we are not owed anything but just serving a lawful necessary purpose as does all organic life on earth.

We can have our lofty opinions of ourselves and our philosophy but if our real value is serving the earth, it is done through breathing, pissing, and shitting, and other life processes providing the necessary material transformations. We may screw this up and the ecological balance through technology and our attitudes but nature always compensates allowing for our continual service.

Christianity suggests we have the potential for more and offers help in that direction. I would say this is worthy of appreciation.

Life as a gift is a kinda shoddy deal. Afterall, whom did he give this gift too? How can we be grateful for a gift we cant imagine being without?

Also, gratitude should probably be in proportion to the sacrifice made. Hence Jesus was more impressed by an old lady giving a fruit, the only thing she had to give, rather than all the rich folk giving a small portion of their riches.
As God is kinda rich in the power department, how much gratitude can we show him when it took no effort on his part, and it would take no effort to give us so much more?

I’m with the PhilosophyGirl, we are a creation, not a gift, and as such he has a responsibility to me, and certainly not my gratitude. Forgiving us is all well and good, but when he controls the circumstances (and mayhaps the act) of our sin, is doesnt seem all that impressive.

Well, if he does control our actions and sins, all this is a just a stupid but quite complex comedy, or drama, depending on you sense of humor…
Anyway, I feel grateful to my parents, and as a simple guy like me thinks, if god is something of that kind in a more powerful way, I guess I’ll tend to thank him too.
From another point of view, if christianism is about love, in my optimistic mind, there is something like gratuitousness behind the scene that should be taken into account.

Marc

your parent metaphor is awesome, for me that is. :slight_smile:

if god is your parents, then he is incredibly powerful and rich, and he gave birth to you quite deliberately. Built you a whole play pen, and he built it quite deliberately to be a complete death trap.
Then he left you in this ghetto, and only helps you (if at all) in really abstract and undectable ways, or so people say. ‘Aloof’ doesnt even come close; the guy is a positive recluse and he lets his children crap all over the place, including on you.

You would expect Social Services to take a hand and lock him, but cos hes so rich and fanciful Social Services happen to be in his pocket, and demand that you’ll get more help if and only if you praise him often and ask his forgiveness for anything Social Services say. Of course, Social Services say its because your parents demand you to worship and be good, but since he doesnt deign to contact you directly, who knows? You best take their word for it.

Seeking your parents affection, you follow various rules, but find there are lots of them, and no one is sure what your parents really want and the different branches of Social Services disagree. Oh yeah, and if you choose wrong, the other branches of Social Services say their gonna take you away and burn you for a VERY long time.

Somehow, you are grateful for all this. Afterall, they gave birth to you didnt they?

EH?
Unfortunately, anyone who is all-powerful can crap solar systems full of babies, but i would only be grateful to someone who craps me a nice one. You dont appreciate your parents for having sex, you appreciate them for looking after you after that, those that dont are called bad parents.

Really really quite a bum deal. :slight_smile:

Oreso,

very funny ! :smiley:

It really is a bum deal though. I mean the option of suicide isn’t even an option because it is possible you might burn in hell for all eternity or experience some other creepy punishment for it. So you are left with only the choice of living a possibly miserable existence and being told to be grateful to your creator for it.

Ok, the only other possibility I can think of is that perhaps one who hates life just doesn’t get it. In other words, they don’t understand that life is truly a wonderful, magical, lemon drops experience and is worth having for all eternity and that it is much better than death or nothingness. I certainly do not feel this way but maybe I just don’t get it…???

The one holding the power ultimately decides what is ‘owed’

Well, that’s only one very specific version of the afterlife. Buddhism posits reincarnation. Early Judaism didn’t posit any afterlife at all despite the existence of God. And of course, even the Christian Hell may be interpreted as not knowing God or just not being with him in paradise after you die… in other words, just nothingness.

Hard to quantify over humanity as a whole. You will get lost in conflicting generalizations. Sure, most people probably don’t have the ‘lemon drops’ experience, yet fewer of these still will wake up in the morning longing for the nothingness. Probably lots also simply don’t think very often about it. Like worker bees. It’s all about the honey. No time for existential angst. Those like you seem to be a particular breed - not necessarily rare, or special - especially not special. And even if you were special, I would still be saying right now, with a perfectly straight face, that you’re not. Because it’s not about unique or not unique - both refer back to generalized points of reference.

You seem to be the kind of person who is never quite able to escape the suspicion that they are living a lie. What they feel in their throes of angst and woe is, I think, no more than the echo of a pre-fabricated, ideal other which they torment themselves with - in a kind of neverending, sadistic foreplay.

Perhaps on some level it is about ‘not getting it’, even though many happy people, in this sense, would not be ‘getting it’ either. Beneath this though it is probably more accurate not to confuse some intensional description of why you are unhappy with the arguably greater influences of physiological configurations which you neither wholly ‘willed’ nor are wholly responsible for.

In other words, I would sooner say that the reason for your decided lack of ‘lemon drops’ experiences is not some lofty, intentional or philosophical ‘argument’, but something perhaps which a neurophysiologist would be most equipped to describe and explain.

But this is only really a hypothesis, not a reductive statement of the fundamentality of physiological states in determining emotional dispositions. Some people, I well imagine, wield a greater degree of (immanent) control of these processes than others, and so can speak more validly about the force or power of what they describe in intensional terms as ‘willing’, ‘self-controling’, etc. Other people though are closer to animals, and function differently. In any case, we are together capable of movement here, also.

On another note, this is also why it is dangerous to generalize in this context. Also understand that my emphasis on ‘generalization’ - on this theme - is not some oddity or peculiarity in my outlook - but something which I may or may not have correctly identified as being in need of addressing in yours.

In any case, I hope this says something to you. :slight_smile:

Regards,

James

"If God wants to reveal himself in human form and provide a direct relation by taking, for example, the form of a man who is tweleve feet tall, then that imaginatively constructed party goer and captain of the popinjay shooting club will surely become aware. But since God is unwilling to deceive, the spiritual relation in truth specifically requires that there be nothing at all remarkable about his form; then the party goer must say: There is nothing to see, not the slightest. If the god has nothing whatever that is remarkable about him, the party goer is perhaps deceived in not becomming aware at all. But the god is without blame in this, the actuality of this deception is continually also the possibility of the truth. But if the god has something remarkable about him, he deceives, inasmuch as a human being thus becomes aware of the untruth, and this awareness is also the impossibility of the truth.- Kierkegaard

Uh huh, so you’re telling me to take drugs, got it.

Ah… I love these responses.

You are already taking ‘drugs’. All the chemicals in your head are ‘mind altering’, by definition. There is no ‘chemical-free’ state. You will never be ‘clean’. However, in order to adopt the rhetoric which cries ‘drug addict’
whenever someone expresses a desire to ‘be happy’, you would have to be able to show me a person who was not a ‘drug addict’, in order to quantify the distinction being made. That this can’t be done without either begging the question or allowing for a legitimate happiness after all (which amounts to more or less the same thing); indicates to me that such an argument is misplaced and does not belong in this discourse. In which case it becomes legitimate to say both that you are, in a sense, already clean; and, moreover, that there is nothing in itself which is inherently unclean about taking such drugs that are already produced in your body, and which you may have an ‘imbalance’ in.

If you want to argue though that every so-called ‘imbalance’ is really just a political or ideological ‘fiction’; and every bio-chemical configuration is as ‘balanced’ as the next (a kind of crude physiological relativism), then you will immediately note that this relativism seeps into other areas of your own argument which you might not want it too; namely it renders happiness as ‘honest’ as unhappiness, and all the rest of it.

If you accept that there is such a thing as an ‘honest balance’ (perhaps you even want to argue that what you have is such a balance) - then we can return to what I said earlier concerning the supposed ‘inauthenticity’ of happiness. Namely that it is confused and based on assumptions applied selectively and in contradictory manner.

In any case, to summarise; I do not necessarily prescribe that you ‘take drugs’.

Perhaps you want to believe that your unhappiness is wholly the result of some monumental ‘decision’, in which case, all else being equal, you should be able to ‘decide’ your way back to happiness just as easily. The fact that, at the same time, you seem to want to bemoan your predicament in some quasi-fatalistic manner, tells me that you are in the midst of perpetually hiding from you own attempts to ‘have your cake and eat it too’.

Blah blah, yippedy yada, abracadabra, shazam, etc. I could even do a little dance, if that will make my arguments seem more impressive. Or perhaps you would prefer if my arguments were more ‘theological’? ‘If there were no sin, would we still have to die?’… anon anon. ‘But yes we live after the Fall and so, given the reality of sin, are not entitled to be happy.’ Maybe that’s the argument which keeps you tied to your own melodrama. Yet your adherence to it, in my eyes, would be misinterpreted.

But sure, let’s go another round. For our next installment, expect me to part the Red Sea or some such thing. Or maybe I will have a seance and start gibbering in Aramaic. What’s Aramaic for ‘It’s not too late!’? (said Luke to Darth Vader)… I don’t know. Maybe it’s your diet. You should eat more chocolate.

:slight_smile:

Regards,

James

i want to see you stand at the gates of heaven and throw the gates behind you closed stopping anyone else to enter heaven for the remaining time you are there i want to see you walk past the vast population of angels making there wings burn with the fear of your coming i want to see you look into the eyes of “god” and tell him that he should listen to you or die but how do you plan to destroy such a selfish being of your own spiritual essence tell me how do you plan to manifest the highest power how do stop other humans from judgment let alone waking inside a coffin and losing their breath yet the gates of heaven are sealed so you send them back have you achieved your goal yet can you contnue when your “god” hasnt even siad anything to you yet to make you leave his kingdom canh you do all these things just to tell “god” he is wrong.

Here.

The Old Philosophical Problem.

The dispute on the divisibility of a particle has been conducted from ancient times.
There were two opposing views:

  1. a particle can be divided infinitely,
  2. the division of a particle comes to an end when it reaches the ultimate particle
    They began by splitting a body into finer and finer parts: to molecules,
    molecule to atoms, atoms to electrons, protons and neutrons.
    Then they constructed accelerators. They began see if protons and neutrons
    could be divided into other elementary particles and in the process,
    creating so many particles that it is even difficult to list them.
    But physicists do not believe that there is a true initial particle.

If you have time and desire, I ask you to visit my site
socratus.com
Best regards.
Socratus.

In listening to their explanation of the situation in the microcosm, one is reminded of a madhouse. Only there is it possible to learn that the part is more than whole.
When physicists began to study the macrocosm, they were sure that
in using the formulas, equations and laws they relieved the
consciousness of man from prejudice. Therefore the physics was considered
an ally of common sense. But when they began to study the microcosm,
they began to complain of paradoxical devices. Then physics became an enemy
of common sense.
Can physics be paradoxical? Can nature be paradoxical? Is it the
laws of nature or the thinking of the physicist?
A Simple example.
From the time of Newton–Huygens, the dualism of light was known
and debated. To set the question:
If we ask how can the wave become a particle, the question will be paradoxical.
But if we ask how the particle can create waves, the question will be logical.
For over 300 years there has been no one that formulated such a question.

are you people really that blind?
timecube is the answer and if you cant accept it you are
stupid and evil but if you share truth all will be better
i cant be brainwashed by jewish belief because i am truley saved
all the better without a liar,queer,ficitious,false,stupid,and evil word-god
in my way i say follow those who follow nature :smiley:
if you dont want to a stupid and evil philosopher than follow
the final truth.

Heaven, hell…I have to wonder, what is the fascination with indefinately remaining a conscious, self identifiable entity?

From one moment to the next, we’re never “the same”. There was also a time, though we breathed and had life, we were not conscious (gestation, infancy). And there was a time when we were in no sense existant, in so far as we can possibly have knowledge.

With that said, why is it so difficult to accept that there will be a point where we will once again “not be”? I think the real answer is that this is a prospect that terrifies people. However, I think if one looks at it rationally, there is nothing to fear at all.

Should I die, and it turns out there is no survival beyond the grave… well, I’m never going to know am I? “I” will be completely serene, because “I” will no longer exist.

OTOH, let us say that there is some sort of survival after death - that some part of us continues. For example, maybe some sort of impression of our being remains, a “ghost” or what have you. Besides the fact that I do not know this for certain it is worth considering that even if this is so, who is to say that even this form of existance is permanent? What is to say that this to, perhaps this “spiritual body” or whatever one wants to call it, will not eventually dissolve, like the more dense body? Of course, I’m disinclined to the dualism of spirit/body, but let us just suppose…

In any case, while I can understand the desire to continue indefinately, I’ve also come to realize that if one dissects this desire, it is really pointless - it’s a compulsive, irrational desire founded upon baseless fear. If anything, it can actually stunt our growth, and become the enemy of courage in this life.

As for “heavens” or “hells”…while anything is possible, I don’t see how either is probable; I suppose one would have to accept any number of other things first before such notions could be taken seriously. Though, I don’t see the point of creating beings who one has to know are going to be fit for nothing save a never ending molten lava bath or some other form of unending misery. I know there is more to this topic than what I’m putting forward, but I fail to see this as being something “reasonable.”

We all have our moment, we all have our role to play, and I in the end we all end up doing/being precisely what we need to do/be, particularly in relation to the whole. While some may find such deterministic views to be fatalistic and apathetic, this is not so - for our efforts, our decisions as such, are also all a part of this. It is like in the story told by Epictetus (I think), about a slave of his who misbehaved. Just as he was about to discipline the slave with a few lashings, the slave cried to his master “but master, was it not always ordained that I offended as I did?” To which Epictetus replied “yes, just as it was predetermined that I scourge you for so offending”.

Thus, we are all parts of one another, in so far as we are all parts of a far greater whole.

Am I the only one that finds the above “post” objectionable?Let’s hope not!