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Why Is Immortality/Eternal Life Desirable?

ToHoldNothing

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God has no origin. He is and has always been. He created everything out of nothing. Not worked with what has already existed in time. God created us all in His Image, and we were actually created to worship Him. He loves us so much, He created us to become one with Him by sharing in the Trinity's divine energies.
This sounds more and more like Hindu ideas, where you become one with the Brahman, world soul, by surrendering the individuality of your atman, individual soul

What is great about the Resurrection of Christ, is that we will be with Him once again. He restored us to what we were before the Fall. Meaning, we all have the chance to reach this summit in our lives or if not, after we leave it. We still grow spiritually after we leave his life on earth. Our spirits/souls go on growing until His Second Coming. This is why prayers of the Saints both earthly and in heaven are so paramount to us. At the Final or General Resurrection, when our souls are reunited with our bodies that were laying in the tombs reposed, Christ then will create a new heaven and earth, and we will be with Him forever. Forever growing and worshiping with Him in His Divine Presence (the Trinity actually) - love and joy. To try to totally dissect this and understand what this will exactly be like would fail. It's beyond our comprehension. :)

So even little old apostate me will grow in spirit, assuming there is an afterlife where my consciousness survives?
This sounds much more interesting, though again I wonder how you are to even relatively argue that either persistent existence in either a disembodied or embodied form for all eternity is appealing, and less pertinent, why growing and worshipping in God's presence is appealing, though that's more a personal thing than the former.
 
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ToHoldNothing

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The understanding of God as Trinity disincludes Modalism and Oneness doctrine (and is also the understanding that "God is love" per John
Only if by Trinity you try to have your cake and eat it, it appears. You want three separate but related things, but don't want to resemble Hindu theology of the Trimurti, Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma

There are three persons, One God, one in essence.
The Father cannot be a Father without a Son. Likewise the Son/Logos (eternally begotten) cannot be Son without Father. The Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father (thus shares essence) and is sent by the Son. IE all actions of God are Trinitarian actions.

This doesn't seem to defend anything like Trinitarianism that couldn't simply be explained in Oneness or Modalism in that it is essentially one entity with three functions or modes. Persons makes it sound too distinct, as if these are three separate personalities and consciousnesses, which then makes the problematic implication of three separate, but intertwined Gods, like the Trimurti in certain brands of Hinduism.
 
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T

Thekla

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Only if by Trinity you try to have your cake and eat it, it appears. You want three separate but related things, but don't want to resemble Hindu theology of the Trimurti, Shiva, Vishnu and Brahma
No, not three separate beings; perhaps your familiarity with Hindu theology and my inept description results in the impression you have concluded.
Nor does EO Christianity claim to have full understanding of Trinity, as it is beyond human ability.



This doesn't seem to defend anything like Trinitarianism that couldn't simply be explained in Oneness or Modalism in that it is essentially one entity with three functions or modes. Persons makes it sound too distinct, as if these are three separate personalities and consciousnesses, which then makes the problematic implication of three separate, but intertwined Gods, like the Trimurti in certain brands of Hinduism.
The meaning person is not the same as the meaning mode.
Nor is consciousness distinct ('I am in the Father and the Father in me/ the Father and I are one' are two of many referrent verses, as well as the opening passage of John.)

Are you familiar with the Christian Scriptures ?
 
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ToHoldNothing

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The concept of "logos" is actually quite rich and frankly hard to describe. It is used of course to describe Christ before His Incarnation, but it also has the meaning of the "created identity" of each thing. IE, each thing has a particular inherent identity - a logos - given to it at it's creation by God. The Gospel of John directly parallels the creation account of Genesis -- in this sense the Logos said creation into being. Thus form and matter has in a sense an "identity", and further form and matter is sustained by the action of God (would return to nothing without God). IE, nothingness is - in a sense - the absence of God, of life.
While this might appeal to a Buddhist's idea of conditioned genesis, it seems to make things too dependent on what seems within Buddhist metaphysics to merely be another consciousness and existence that must follow this greater law of conditioned genesis, that is, everything is conditioned by some other factor, in a web of cause and effect.

In our present situation, post-lapsarian, our relationships have become self-centered ie we do not actually relate (to God, to others, to self). Created for relationship (as relational beings), our identity (our created logos) can only "be" known to ourselves in relationship with God. Without realtionship with God, there is also no relationship or disordered relationship to self and others.
This again seems to reduce relationships to a far too narrowed understanding. Of course we can have relationships to ourself and others without God. Your argument would be more precisely that relationships with self and others are incomplete without God, which is another subject entirely.

To imagine eternity accurately in such a condition (a condition of disorder and without our true identity) is impossible, and it will indeed seem "hellish".
Eternity in either disorder or order is impossible to imagine as good or beneficial, though disorder could be said to be preferable, surprisingly enough, since there is the possibility of seeking out some order and working through trouble. Eternity of pure order is stagnant and static to me, which is why I continue to see it as unappealing and undesirable.

A speaker yesterday (who had practiced Buddhism for some time with eventual "success", at a large Monastery in Thailand or Cambodia) described the Christian faith I belong to as "Orthodoxy is paradoxy. You descend to ascend." The descent in the EO is reaching for humility, dying off from attachments if you will (as in our fallen state these will be disordered and false), of becoming empty -- in order to become filled with Christ. Thus filled, our true logos is discovered/regenerated and we become who we were created to be in Him; it is only in losing the self that the self is found in Him who created us in love for us.
Emptiness in Buddhism and emptiness or kenosis, if I remember right, from Christianity, are different. Emptiness or shunyata in Buddhism reflects metaphysics, nothing has a permanent self or identity to it, conditioned instead by everything around it.

Kenosis in Christianity is a personal receptivity to God, which has an interesting relation to emptiness in Daoism, where you become receptive to the Dao in a sense, though not like a communion with a person, but merely with nature, so to speak.

In this condition of relationship with God, our true self restored or discovered (and this typically over a long period of time), we will be relational: right relationship with God, thus right relationship with others, and right relationship with self. But also, we will be engaging in "right use"; ie we will see all through the eyes of God --- we will see the logos of each created thing. (In this condition, Adam was able to name the animals.)
Wouldn't seeing through the eyes of God be redundant or at least reduce the general appreciation of things from our own individual and perfected perspectives after the supposed resurrection of our bodies in heaven?

The present (sometimes horrifying) state of the world is evidence of human disordered relationship to all, and thus "wrong use" (including environmental degradation).
That could be justified from a Buddhist perspective, but then you involve God and would appear to complicate what is an already complex system where we have humans interacting and confusing their own psychology, etc.
 
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ToHoldNothing

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No, not three separate beings; perhaps your familiarity with Hindu theology and my inept description results in the impression you have concluded.
Nor does EO Christianity claim to have full understanding of Trinity, as it is beyond human ability.

Then any attempt to explain Trinity seems fruitless in any sense, since the understanding is incomplete and overall unsatisfactory in that there is no real experience of it, which is what Buddhism might be said to emphasize, experiential justification of beliefs. Trinity as experienced in metaphors is not a real experience and trying to make analogical ideas of God with a three leaf clover or water's phases is still insufficient, if I understand anything of Christian beliefs on Trinity as a full reality.



The meaning person is not the same as the meaning mode.
Nor is consciousness distinct ('I am in the Father and the Father in me/ the Father and I are one' are two of many referrent verses, as well as the opening passage of John.)

I never said person and mode were the same thing. Mode simply seems to communicate the ideas better. Person implies distinct consciousness. If the consciousness is not distinct, the term person is a misapplication and something else might be better substituted, such as...well, nothing else really comes to mind.

Even state or mode communicates the ideas better. If you say God and I are one as Jesus, it seems to imply a dissociative identity disorder in that Jesus and God are actually two halves of the same whole of some unified identity, which only seems to support Oneness all the more.
Are you familiar with the Christian Scriptures ?
Mere familiarity may not enable me to understand the nuanced and phenomenological aspects of your beliefs about the scripture. And raze can tell you that while I might know scripture to a fair degree, I am not a believer, so your use of scripture might be said to be a fruitless endeavor.

As a religious studies major, I am familiar enough with the scripture and can understand a decent amount of context and such of the Bible and its varied canonical structure, sometimes including, sometimes excluding apocrypha and the like. So a simple answer, however paradoxical, to your question is yes and no.
 
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razeontherock

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By opposite, do you mean Eastern Orthodox as opposed to Catholic or EAstern Orthodox as opposed to Protestant?

I wouldn't consider any of those to be opposite. She is of long established structure and aligns herself with it, I never have.

Maybe there isn't a contrast with theosis? I remember little things about it, and it almost, almost sounds like the regeneration you're talking about in some way.

I'm really not sure how broad or specific the term is, but if she'll engage us it could prove interesting.
 
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razeontherock

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It goes further than awareness to being mindful of things, recognizing them in themselves, kind of apart from your perception in some sense.

Yup, same concept. Your usage of 2 distinct terms wouldn't necessarily follow to a College Prof at IU ^_^

Seems to me Jesus attained something like a meditative state, where he could approach things calmly and tranquilly as he did. That's the closest parallel I could find in training. Buddhist objectives aren't really God centered like Jesus' is. there might be the parallel of Jesus as a bodhisattva like Jizou or Kanzeon, compassionate towards beings and teaching them the way.

I can't comment as to how He did it, but He clearly put others above Himself, and in the most literal of ways.
 
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ToHoldNothing

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Yup, same concept. Your usage of 2 distinct terms wouldn't necessarily follow to a College Prof at IU ^_^

Me being aware of something doesn't follow to insight into it, though. They are distinct, but related

I can't comment as to how He did it, but He clearly put others above Himself, and in the most literal of ways.
Again, this only strikes me as a Bodhisattva sort of behavior, which is what many Asians probably view Jesus as, especially under a Buddhist belief system.
 
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Dorothea

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This sounds more and more like Hindu ideas, where you become one with the Brahman, world soul, by surrendering the individuality of your atman, individual soul
Ah, I see how you'd get that out of my explanation. I think the difference is that the creature (human) does not lose their identify as a created being. They are still a created being, and God is still Divine and Eternal. But one can be filled with God through His Divine energies (grace) so that we become united as one through this means. But the creature is always the creature, and God is always God. HTH



So even little old apostate me will grow in spirit, assuming there is an afterlife where my consciousness survives?
This sounds much more interesting, though again I wonder how you are to even relatively argue that either persistent existence in either a disembodied or embodied form for all eternity is appealing, and less pertinent, why growing and worshipping in God's presence is appealing, though that's more a personal thing than the former.
Yes, you can, but one has to respond t0 Him in order to grow, is my belief and understanding. Incidentally, I do believe non Christians can grow in the spirit without having known God as has been explained from people here on earth. God could look or feel quite familiar to an atheist or one of different religions other than Christianity, without realizing when they were on earth that the God spoken about in Christianity was the God they see passing this life on earth.

Also, at the General resurrection, everyone's bodies are reunited with their souls, not just Christians. :)
 
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razeontherock

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This sounds more and more like Hindu ideas, where you become one with the Brahman, world soul, by surrendering the individuality of your atman, individual soul

There are similarities, and there are differences. In C there is no forfeiture of individuality; I find He actually loves us, and makes room for our personalities!

So even little old apostate me will grow in spirit, assuming there is an afterlife where my consciousness survives?

This is one thing I deeply respect about EO, that they don't pretend to sit so high as to be able to judge you.

This sounds much more interesting, though again I wonder how you are to even relatively argue that either persistent existence in either a disembodied or embodied form for all eternity is appealing, and less pertinent, why growing and worshipping in God's presence is appealing, though that's more a personal thing than the former.

We can dismiss the "eternal disembodied state" side of that statement, which could simplify things. I would suggest the idea of worshipping in G-d's Presence is of PRIMARY importance to this discussion!

(Psalm 34:8) "O taste and see that the LORD [is] good:"

Until you have done that, I don't see how there could be any appeal. To me, this is most easily recognized / experienced as those points I have focused on, whether regeneration and theosis are synonyms or not.
 
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razeontherock

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What? Where? I'm lost as to what you all are talking about. ^_^ Gee, I'm a big help. :p

As you can see, we have discussed a huge scope of things. Trying to maintain a focus is not easy or even always desirable, as the OP digs into a HUGE scope.

The context here, as defined by THN, is what is the difference between the Incarnation of Christ, and the believer. (Either in chrismated or perfected state)

I would say my original context was more nuanced, but this is an interesting starting point for me. This is not the only time someone I have explained this to has come up with this same understanding, which I feel is deficient, and find myself ill-equipped to set aright.

My best attempt might be that Jesus is our elder Brother, and gets double the inheritance we can expect. (Which seems like an outrageously good deal to me :D
 
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ToHoldNothing

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Ah, I see how you'd get that out of my explanation. I think the difference is that the creature (human) does not lose their identify as a created being. They are still a created being, and God is still Divine and Eternal. But one can be filled with God through His Divine energies (grace) so that we become united as one through this means. But the creature is always the creature, and God is always God. HTH
This is a distinction that's always important




Yes, you can, but one has to respond t0 Him in order to grow, is my belief and understanding. Incidentally, I do believe non Christians can grow in the spirit without having known God as has been explained from people here on earth. God could look or feel quite familiar to an atheist or one of different religions other than Christianity, without realizing when they were on earth that the God spoken about in Christianity was the God they see passing this life on earth.

Also, at the General resurrection, everyone's bodies are reunited with their souls, not just Christians. :)

Perhaps I wouldn't even recognize God as a God at all.

And doesn't the general consensus go that I'll get my body and then suffer eternally in hell?
 
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ToHoldNothing

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There are similarities, and there are differences. In C there is no forfeiture of individuality; I find He actually loves us, and makes room for our personalities!
Hindus might call you on that, considering there could be an understanding that our personalities are illusory in some sense within that understanding that everything is of an identical substance of sorts.




We can dismiss the "eternal disembodied state" side of that statement, which could simplify things. I would suggest the idea of worshipping in G-d's Presence is of PRIMARY importance to this discussion!

(Psalm 34:8) "O taste and see that the LORD [is] good:"

Until you have done that, I don't see how there could be any appeal. To me, this is most easily recognized / experienced as those points I have focused on, whether regeneration and theosis are synonyms or not.

So basically you think I can't make any judgment about whether worshipping God is good or not: fair enough. But what if we were talking about the general notion of immortality and eternal life? You still haven't even tried to explain why a person would find this desirable.
 
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Dorothea

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This is a distinction that's always important
:)


Perhaps I wouldn't even recognize God as a God at all.
You will. ;)

And doesn't the general consensus go that I'll get my body and then suffer eternally in hell?
You want me to guess what's going to happen to you after you leave this life? Sorry, can't do that. I wouldn't know because I do not know your heart. Orthodox judge no one and do not tell anyone where they are going because 1) it's not our place, and 2) we wouldn't know. Only God would know that.

But then you've raised this Protestant idea of "hell" that us Orthodox don't believe to be true. Once you pass on from this life, all that is around you is God. His light and love. Nothing else. There's no pit to fall into and writhe in agony for eternity. It's more of a state of being. So, God's love (which is called a fire and that He is in all), feels joyous and peaceful and warm to those who recognize Him and those who have followed Him from the beginning. To those who willingly reject Him, it will feel like "fire," in the other sense. Light too bright to withstand. So, there is the important part of that that one has to know Him to reject Him.
 
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Dorothea

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As you can see, we have discussed a huge scope of things. Trying to maintain a focus is not easy or even always desirable, as the OP digs into a HUGE scope.

The context here, as defined by THN, is what is the difference between the Incarnation of Christ, and the believer. (Either in chrismated or perfected state)

I would say my original context was more nuanced, but this is an interesting starting point for me. This is not the only time someone I have explained this to has come up with this same understanding, which I feel is deficient, and find myself ill-equipped to set aright.

My best attempt might be that Jesus is our elder Brother, and gets double the inheritance we can expect. (Which seems like an outrageously good deal to me :D
^_^ So, maybe there is some difficulty understanding the Two Natures of Christ and how we differ from Christ as human beings?
 
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ToHoldNothing

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You will. ;)
You underestimate my imagination. Some great entity that still follows certain laws about the world seems less powerful than you make it out to be.


You want me to guess what's going to happen to you after you leave this life? Sorry, can't do that. I wouldn't know because I do not know your heart. Orthodox judge no one and do not tell anyone where they are going because 1) it's not our place, and 2) we wouldn't know. Only God would know that.

A fair approach to things.

But then you've raised this Protestant idea of "hell" that us Orthodox don't believe to be true. Once you pass on from this life, all that is around you is God. His light and love. Nothing else. There's no pit to fall into and writhe in agony for eternity. It's more of a state of being. So, God's love (which is called a fire and that He is in all), feels joyous and peaceful and warm to those who recognize Him and those who have followed Him from the beginning. To those who willingly reject Him, it will feel like "fire," in the other sense. Light too bright to withstand. So, there is the important part of that that one has to know Him to reject Him.
In short, if I hate your "God" it will feel like hell. Is there any way of eventually loving God and being reconciled, I wonder, lol?
 
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razeontherock

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Hindus might call you on that, considering there could be an understanding that our personalities are illusory in some sense within that understanding that everything is of an identical substance of sorts.

Depending on what that sense is - I wonder if it can be aligned with string theory and it's 10 dimensions?

So basically you think I can't make any judgment about whether worshipping God is good or not: fair enough. But what if we were talking about the general notion of immortality and eternal life? You still haven't even tried to explain why a person would find this desirable.

True, I haven't gotten that far yet. So far I have tried to confine myself to conveying some understanding of what EL might be within C, in some sense that can be experienced now. I still think that's a good tactic ...
 
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razeontherock

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Is there any way of eventually loving God and being reconciled, I wonder, lol?

And this is the Gospel that I preach, that this is what C is primarily about. So many C's seem to lose track of this! Also, said reconciliation can be known, experientially. (Not sure how the EO view that) Anyway I find this to be the huge unstated point in the story of Cain and Abel; they KNEW one was accepted by the Lord. It wasn't just idle conversation, to them.
 
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