When setting sails towards the infinitely unfathomable unknown
Maybe he came in quest to finding God?
But if he was only looking for that one God, and nothing else, would he not miss, perhaps, two or three other gods, which did not look like what he had expected?
Spiritual expectations, are basically limits. Dare they be placed on the unlimited?
“And they came to Earth, beings of enormous comparative power who falsely represented the creators of the Universe itself”
Nobody should ever do anything ever again.
Do you have, like, philosophical bipolar?
No, just the regular kind. But what does that have to do with anything?
^ that reply is a mad polarization.
A little bit, isn’t it?
But not as bad as you think. I actually do have a point, it's not a complete spazz out. My point was that if somebody is going to look for anything, they have to have motivations and expectations, or else you get apathy. So if we're really fated to overlook the truth because of our expectations, there's no hope or reason to bother looking for anything. I wrote what I did because in a cynical frame of mind, it seemed to me it would be a waste of time to bother explaining it all out- since really, I feel like I've said this same exact thing over and over and over until the keys are worn out on my keyboard.
I mean really, this is just a repeat of the same old "People who do religion the normal/usual way are wrong because blah blah blah", and my same old response is "Everybody else on earth is making that same 'mistake', we just don't feel the need to point it out for some reason.
To put it another way, yes- but people looking for God (or people who think they've found Him) aren't the only ones in this situation. Either you think human faculties can get you someplace and you use them, or you don't and you don't.
Right there. I would have been more specific, if I had said, in my words:
“Prejudge” – instead of “Expect”.
But if an explorer went into the jungle, trying to find a unicorn, not paying attenstion to – or remembering anything else, he may just miss out on allot of new understandings about other new interesting sorts of animals, plants, etc. And I am saying, this is also a theological problem.
You’re right.
Ponce de Leon didn’t do anything in Florida, did he?
Dan~
Sure, I'll grant that that could be a problem, but you're doing the same thing in your analogy. You've set up an example in which there is a jungle full of animals that the unicorn-seeker is overlooking on his narrow-minded quest. In the case of theology, that might or might not be true- it looks to me like that's a pre-judgement you've brought into the situation. Theological truths could be as barren and singular as the Moon- there's like one kind of rock, one kind of no-atmosphere, and then you've seen all there is to see.*
Now, on the other hand, sure it's true that a person can see Presbyterianism or Shinto as the truth, and therefore ignore or miss anything that doesn't line up with that in advance. And honestly, I don't have a problem with that, as long as the person identifies themselves as a lay-person or follower, and not as a truth-seeking intellectual, and I think that's how it usually pans out. Is Joe Churchpew blind to the truth of anything that contradicts what his pastor tells him? Yeah, probably- as it should be. Is the pastor himself equally blind? I think you'd be surprised- but in any event, I'd agree with you that he[i] shouldn't[/i] be.
*- Not scientifically accurate, probably, but you get my point.