Quoted from: Member A
And these signs shall follow them that believe;
In my name shall they cast out devils;
they shall speak with new tongues;
They shall take up serpents;
and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them;
they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.
Member B responds:
Ok two questions:
1. Christians always go on and on about evolution, noah, etc... but why is this ignored? Why isn't there a movement for christians to drink poisons and handle snakes. Here in America, there are a few minor sects that do such things, but shouldn't this be like a right of passage for young christians to prove their faith? Shouldn't they all be able to heal people automatically? Shouldn't going to hospital be proof of being a non-believer?
2. Ok, the whole passage is garbage, obviously. So why was it put in at all? What was the point? I know in acts, when Paul swims to shore onto Malta, a snake (bits him or just wraps around his arm - I wasn't clear on this) and it doesn't hurt him. Are these two passages related? I don't know if Ken has looked into this - was there a rival snake cult that claimed their followers could handle snakes and not be bitten, so christianity had to make the same claim?
Member C responds to Member A and B
It is a clear metaphore, like many other elements in the Gospels. In fact, the history of the gospels is cleary gnostic. Originally there were three ways to conceive or initiate them:
1. conceive as a literal story ("Christ for dummies")
2. conceive as a metaphore ("Christ for advanced")
3. conceive as a state of mind ("You are Christ yourself")
Basically what happened is that only the first concept survived and the other two were declared heretical in the age when the roman Church declared Jesus historical (note that was never the case originally: the first level of initiation was necessary to better explain the ritual).
However, the gnostic tradition has not completely died out. What you will get as a standard respons from every Christian is that this Marc 16:17 preaching is ofcourse a metaphore whereas other sayings refer to historic deeds. Christians sects are particulary flexible with this, taking only the elements usefull for their Faith as fact and regarding the rest as metaphore.
*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********
V responds to all of above:
1. conceive as a literal story ("Christ for dummies")
2. conceive as a metaphore ("Christ for advanced")
3. conceive as a state of mind ("You are Christ yourself")
Good points you have brought up Member C
Hermeneutics is a major problem with religious thought.
SEE:
(http...removed at the request of this site.)
There is such debate and disagreement as to what the scriptures really mean and the consequences of a 'bad' interpretation will mean everlasting torture and pain in hell? When deciphering code and hidden meanings becomes a life or death proposition, one has to wonder about a God that supposedly put his name on such a muddled up document. I can also tell you that destroying another being and causing them 'pain and torturing for eternity' will yield the provider of that pain and torture ZERO peace. This concept of pain, eternal hell and karma all smacks of the human touch of 'fear based' religious thought. We can see it in a quote from a Christian list member here:
JesusForgiveThem writes:
"Do you believe in eternal suffering? I surely would hate for anyone to consciously chose to spend an eternity in hell over some foolish pride that they can't get over ... as opposed to opening your heart to Jesus and see what he has to offer before writing Him off completely."
This brings up another problem. Which divinely inspired document does one follow as there are numerous books claiming to the word of God? And all the documents conflict with each other to a degree. It is with this overlap of these documents that I seek to find peace with. And anything that conflicts or cannot be substantiated I let go of as man's ego being injected into the equation. If God wishes to make things clear and without the need for hermeneutics then I am all ears. But until that time, we must each do the best we can and come to peace with this subject for ourselves.
But this problem of hermeneutics is not limited solely to the study of monotheism. It also encompasses the history of Buddhist thought as well. A favorite saying of the Mahayana is that of using 'skillful means' to achieve ones goal. Skillful Means = Put a Spin On It = LIE. Now, I am not just singling out the Mahayana as the bad boys. Lies and imperfections are widespread throughout all spiritual thought that was ever created my man. Man is imperfect and as such all his religious thought it also imperfect. But within these imperfections there are also many perfection's, as seldom is a thing all good or all bad.
With my own spiritual quest I have evolved into an empirical spiritualist. Or maybe a more detailed description of this would be an 'Agnostic Spiritualist Moralist Empiricist' From the tradition of religion telling massive lies intermingled with some truths (yes the spiritual traditions of the world contain some truth) I have learned to not believe anything that requires faith and cannot be tested and applied as a universal law to the whole of society. I apply this form of thought to all my spiritual traditions I draw from whether it be monotheism to Buddhism or Taoism.
Now some of these spiritual truths are 'lesser truths' and subjective in nature. The application of such relative truth is more or less unimportant and up to the likes or dislikes of the individual. But the larger truths that are universal in nature are what I try to distinguish and then follow. If a concept is not crystal clear and requires much speculation, I let it go. We can see what has happened in religious history when man gets too 'enthused' about interpretation:
How do we know we have made an honest effort at this decoding business? For one, we do not decode, we just think and test. Number two, we come to peace by giving it the 'hell test.' We work towards moral and ethical principles and develop what is called a good heart which also aligns us magically with the empirical basics of religious thought in the various documents. If we are successful at this quest and ethically and morally sound, when it comes time to die we can be at peace knowing we have done our best in this area. And if we find out that there is a hell and the entity 'claiming to be God' (for lack of a better name) has domed us to hell from 'not decoding it right' even with our best efforts, we can be at peace with knowing God is an unjust God and not a real God but an alien god bully of sorts.
And when it comes to the title 'loving God', we as imperfect humans that strive to develop a good heart will contain more of that Godly nature that this 'alien bully' claming to be God. As I write this, I am reminded of aliens in an old "Superman" movies that came to earth to tell us to 'bow down' to them or else? Yes, the aliens in the movie had great powers but they were not God...they were just gods to us humans. Seek truth, seek inner peace, seek the development of a good heart and put your best efforts into finding it and you too can be at peace with this subject. Of course, if one has never found inner peace all that I am telling you is unmanageable to you? Always remember...a wise mans knows what he says and a fool can only say what he knows. Learn to say what you know and you can be at peace with your life as well. In one word...authenticity.
"Wherefore, O judges, be of good cheer about death, and know this of a truth - that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death." ~ Socrates when condemned to death.
One last point. If you look at the name of the Christian I quoted above it is JesusForgiveThem. If a God needs to be told by us humans what to do and what is right or wrong and we can sway an omnipotent and perfect God just by begging...then that is one scary God. For we can see what has happened on earth when human demigod have been in power.
See:
(http...removed at the request of this site.)
V (male)
And these signs shall follow them that believe;
In my name shall they cast out devils;
they shall speak with new tongues;
They shall take up serpents;
and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them;
they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover.
So then after the Lord had spoken unto them, he was received up into heaven, and sat on the right hand of God.
Member B responds:
Ok two questions:
1. Christians always go on and on about evolution, noah, etc... but why is this ignored? Why isn't there a movement for christians to drink poisons and handle snakes. Here in America, there are a few minor sects that do such things, but shouldn't this be like a right of passage for young christians to prove their faith? Shouldn't they all be able to heal people automatically? Shouldn't going to hospital be proof of being a non-believer?
2. Ok, the whole passage is garbage, obviously. So why was it put in at all? What was the point? I know in acts, when Paul swims to shore onto Malta, a snake (bits him or just wraps around his arm - I wasn't clear on this) and it doesn't hurt him. Are these two passages related? I don't know if Ken has looked into this - was there a rival snake cult that claimed their followers could handle snakes and not be bitten, so christianity had to make the same claim?
Member C responds to Member A and B
It is a clear metaphore, like many other elements in the Gospels. In fact, the history of the gospels is cleary gnostic. Originally there were three ways to conceive or initiate them:
1. conceive as a literal story ("Christ for dummies")
2. conceive as a metaphore ("Christ for advanced")
3. conceive as a state of mind ("You are Christ yourself")
Basically what happened is that only the first concept survived and the other two were declared heretical in the age when the roman Church declared Jesus historical (note that was never the case originally: the first level of initiation was necessary to better explain the ritual).
However, the gnostic tradition has not completely died out. What you will get as a standard respons from every Christian is that this Marc 16:17 preaching is ofcourse a metaphore whereas other sayings refer to historic deeds. Christians sects are particulary flexible with this, taking only the elements usefull for their Faith as fact and regarding the rest as metaphore.
*********** REPLY SEPARATOR ***********
V responds to all of above:
1. conceive as a literal story ("Christ for dummies")
2. conceive as a metaphore ("Christ for advanced")
3. conceive as a state of mind ("You are Christ yourself")
Good points you have brought up Member C
Hermeneutics is a major problem with religious thought.
SEE:
(http...removed at the request of this site.)
There is such debate and disagreement as to what the scriptures really mean and the consequences of a 'bad' interpretation will mean everlasting torture and pain in hell? When deciphering code and hidden meanings becomes a life or death proposition, one has to wonder about a God that supposedly put his name on such a muddled up document. I can also tell you that destroying another being and causing them 'pain and torturing for eternity' will yield the provider of that pain and torture ZERO peace. This concept of pain, eternal hell and karma all smacks of the human touch of 'fear based' religious thought. We can see it in a quote from a Christian list member here:
JesusForgiveThem writes:
"Do you believe in eternal suffering? I surely would hate for anyone to consciously chose to spend an eternity in hell over some foolish pride that they can't get over ... as opposed to opening your heart to Jesus and see what he has to offer before writing Him off completely."
This brings up another problem. Which divinely inspired document does one follow as there are numerous books claiming to the word of God? And all the documents conflict with each other to a degree. It is with this overlap of these documents that I seek to find peace with. And anything that conflicts or cannot be substantiated I let go of as man's ego being injected into the equation. If God wishes to make things clear and without the need for hermeneutics then I am all ears. But until that time, we must each do the best we can and come to peace with this subject for ourselves.
But this problem of hermeneutics is not limited solely to the study of monotheism. It also encompasses the history of Buddhist thought as well. A favorite saying of the Mahayana is that of using 'skillful means' to achieve ones goal. Skillful Means = Put a Spin On It = LIE. Now, I am not just singling out the Mahayana as the bad boys. Lies and imperfections are widespread throughout all spiritual thought that was ever created my man. Man is imperfect and as such all his religious thought it also imperfect. But within these imperfections there are also many perfection's, as seldom is a thing all good or all bad.
With my own spiritual quest I have evolved into an empirical spiritualist. Or maybe a more detailed description of this would be an 'Agnostic Spiritualist Moralist Empiricist' From the tradition of religion telling massive lies intermingled with some truths (yes the spiritual traditions of the world contain some truth) I have learned to not believe anything that requires faith and cannot be tested and applied as a universal law to the whole of society. I apply this form of thought to all my spiritual traditions I draw from whether it be monotheism to Buddhism or Taoism.
Now some of these spiritual truths are 'lesser truths' and subjective in nature. The application of such relative truth is more or less unimportant and up to the likes or dislikes of the individual. But the larger truths that are universal in nature are what I try to distinguish and then follow. If a concept is not crystal clear and requires much speculation, I let it go. We can see what has happened in religious history when man gets too 'enthused' about interpretation:
How do we know we have made an honest effort at this decoding business? For one, we do not decode, we just think and test. Number two, we come to peace by giving it the 'hell test.' We work towards moral and ethical principles and develop what is called a good heart which also aligns us magically with the empirical basics of religious thought in the various documents. If we are successful at this quest and ethically and morally sound, when it comes time to die we can be at peace knowing we have done our best in this area. And if we find out that there is a hell and the entity 'claiming to be God' (for lack of a better name) has domed us to hell from 'not decoding it right' even with our best efforts, we can be at peace with knowing God is an unjust God and not a real God but an alien god bully of sorts.
And when it comes to the title 'loving God', we as imperfect humans that strive to develop a good heart will contain more of that Godly nature that this 'alien bully' claming to be God. As I write this, I am reminded of aliens in an old "Superman" movies that came to earth to tell us to 'bow down' to them or else? Yes, the aliens in the movie had great powers but they were not God...they were just gods to us humans. Seek truth, seek inner peace, seek the development of a good heart and put your best efforts into finding it and you too can be at peace with this subject. Of course, if one has never found inner peace all that I am telling you is unmanageable to you? Always remember...a wise mans knows what he says and a fool can only say what he knows. Learn to say what you know and you can be at peace with your life as well. In one word...authenticity.
"Wherefore, O judges, be of good cheer about death, and know this of a truth - that no evil can happen to a good man, either in life or after death." ~ Socrates when condemned to death.
One last point. If you look at the name of the Christian I quoted above it is JesusForgiveThem. If a God needs to be told by us humans what to do and what is right or wrong and we can sway an omnipotent and perfect God just by begging...then that is one scary God. For we can see what has happened on earth when human demigod have been in power.
See:
(http...removed at the request of this site.)
V (male)
