GENIUS FORUMS

Jason wrote:

David Quinn wrote:Don't mock the ALL. It is glorious and pure beyond measure, and everything that we are.

David, by your own reckoning, the All isn't really glorious or pure is it? Why do you choose to describe it with such attractive and impressive(but actually quite seriously misleading) labels?

Because, unlike myself, some people still like to read poetry.

Jason wrote:

David Quinn wrote:Don't mock the ALL. It is glorious and pure beyond measure, and everything that we are.

David, by your own reckoning, the All isn't really glorious or pure is it? Why do you choose to describe it with such attractive and impressive(but actually quite seriously misleading) labels?

It is pure in that nothing can ever stain it. It is glorious in that nothing can ever defeat or undermine it.

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David Quinn wrote:It is pure in that nothing can ever stain it. It is glorious in that nothing can ever defeat or undermine it.

Sophistry.

Dan Rowden wrote:

Jason wrote: David, by your own reckoning, the All isn't really glorious or pure is it? Why do you choose to describe it with such attractive and impressive(but actually quite seriously misleading) labels?

Because, unlike myself, some people still like to read poetry.

You realize I was responding to David.....but this is not mere poetry this is false advertising on a deep level.

With the "All" we're talking about one of, if not the, central objects and goals of QSR philosophy. Describing it using terms like "glorious" and "pure" is not just misleading and inaccurate, it is setting up massive false hope about what your philosophy offers. I think probably intentionally. It's a device used to further the QSR agenda, isn't it? If it helps to rope in new people it's cool, right? An ends justifying the means type of situation. I know you might think I'm just sniping, but I reckon I'm making a valid point.

Jason wrote:With the "All" we're talking about one of, if not the, central objects and goals of QSR philosophy. Describing it using terms like "glorious" and "pure" is not just misleading and inaccurate, it is setting up massive false hope about what your philosophy offers.

I don't know about the philosophy, exactly, but the terms "glorious" and "pure" are accurate.

Jason wrote:

David Quinn wrote:It is pure in that nothing can ever stain it. It is glorious in that nothing can ever defeat or undermine it.

Sophistry.

If pointing out the characteristics of the All is sophistry, then I'm happy to be a sophist.

For example, pointing to the purity of the All is a way of highlighting the fact that all things, without exception, are part of the All.

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"If a person is going to call himself a Christian, then he must behave like a Christian - that is, act like Jesus and develop a direct, personal relationship with God/the ALL. That is the bare minimum before one can begin to qualify for the lofty heights of Christianity. But of course, as soon as person does this he immediately ceases to be a Christian, in that he is no longer the follower of anyone at all, not even Jesus."

Again, you-all always fall into this mind-trap of absolutism when you couch your spirituality in such extreme terms. All sorts of people respond to the message and the meaning of Christianity (and any religion), enter into a spiritual relationship with a potency or potencies beyond themselves (mystical, psychological, psychic---who can really define it?) There is a whole gradation of Christians and Christian activity, and only a fool would even try to give it one exclusive label, or to redefine it out from under people, the social context in which it is taking place. Yet our foolish brethren feel they have the right to make all manner of arrogant assertions, defining 'bare minimums'. And finally, Christinity---what a Christian can or should be---is ripped out from under everyone except themselves (*genuflections, obeisances*) and some others whom they annoint.

It s my opinion that---my own poetical flourishes aside---whenever the Two Dees or the Kay (and certainly Hopalong Hindenmarsh) come into a subject, that the subject is utterly reduced to mediocrity. Mental absolutism tends to have this effect. It sets up certain ideas that are handled and managed by its adherents ('glorious, stainless, pure') and when you take a shot at the buffoon and his mediocre relationship to this marvellous thing, his empoverished definition, his artlessness and essential dryness of expression) he can only take it as an insult against what he holds sacred.

This is not much more than mental puritanism which, let's face it, is terrified of any other expressions than the linear theology and the grouchy, boring theologian who sit on top of religious and spiritual expression. This whole puritan thrust comes about, I think, because of psychological hang-ups that will have to be overcome before progress can be made. Some here nourish and maintain their hang-ups, and 'love' what removes them from their human context, indeed they set it up as a supreme value. (A game that has been played by successive generations of 'seekers'). Others are just beginning to be trained for this path which is mostly a boyish enterprise with occasional dysfunctional women. Again, none of it has to be like this, no one says it must be like this.

Life and spirituality can be an untying of knots, a relaxation of knottedness, and does not have to be a deliberate binding of oneself to destructive mental concepts...

Pay heed to what Artful Alex says to the Churches of the South!

DQ: Don't mock the ALL. It is glorious and pure beyond measure, and everything that we are.

Jason: David, by your own reckoning, the All isn't really glorious or pure is it? Why do you choose to describe it with such attractive and impressive(but actually quite seriously misleading) labels?

DQ: It is pure in that nothing can ever stain it. It is glorious in that nothing can ever defeat or undermine it.

Jason: Sophistry.

Oddly, though, this isn't sophistry, which is something intended to deceive. I do, however, think it mistaken. Philosophically, it is weak. You are giving the ALL traits (glorious and pure and invincible). It is the ALL and therefore cannot possess traits as opposed to the possession of the opposite traits.

What you are doing, David, is reporting your own reaction to the contemplation of the ALL. There is nothing wrong with this. Yet it is more appropriate to, and characteristic of, one's relationship with a personal god. Do not be fooled into thinking this is why mankind has "invented" personal gods; rather, it is evidence that a personal God exists (to use a human term which implies temporality, but it's the only word I can think of here) and that your reaction of deep respect is a natural one. Your mistake, and the good Buddha's, is limiting your own belief system by not including this personal God.

It is said that fear of God is the beginning of wisdom. But that is like the initial shock of cold that comes from diving into water: it is natural, and it passes. You cannot fear what you don't first acknowledge. Acknowledgement leads to knowledge, then the fear of the unknown passes. But you cannot get to the other side unless you are willing to jump in.

brokenhead wrote:

DQ: Don't mock the ALL. It is glorious and pure beyond measure, and everything that we are.

Jason: David, by your own reckoning, the All isn't really glorious or pure is it? Why do you choose to describe it with such attractive and impressive(but actually quite seriously misleading) labels?

DQ: It is pure in that nothing can ever stain it. It is glorious in that nothing can ever defeat or undermine it.

Jason: Sophistry.

Oddly, though, this isn't sophistry, which is something intended to deceive. I do, however, think it mistaken. Philosophically, it is weak. You are giving the ALL traits (glorious and pure and invincible). It is the ALL and therefore cannot possess traits as opposed to the possession of the opposite traits.

It does indeed have traits. At the very least, it possesses the trait of not being a part. Another trait is it that constitutes all things. And so on.

So no, you're entirely on the wrong track there.

What you are doing, David, is reporting your own reaction to the contemplation of the ALL.

No, I'm employing simple, straightforward logic. It is like recognizing 1+1= 2.

There is nothing wrong with this. Yet it is more appropriate to, and characteristic of, one's relationship with a personal god. Do not be fooled into thinking this is why mankind has "invented" personal gods; rather, it is evidence that a personal God exists (to use a human term which implies temporality, but it's the only word I can think of here) and that your reaction of deep respect is a natural one. Your mistake, and the good Buddha's, is limiting your own belief system by not including this personal God.

I think I'll leave the personal God to those who need him.

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brokenhead wrote: An uncaused cause is in no way a contradiction, and therefore it is possible.

Actually it isn't possible. A cause is only one side of the indivisible coin that is cause and effect. The two can not logically be seperated. Technically a cause is simply an effect from a prior cause.

brokenhead wrote: Nature most definitely has a cause, as it is neither God nor a god; I am aware that I am using the word "nature" differently from the QRSH usage.

If you are aware that you are using the word nature different from the way I'm using it, then why are you even metioning it in that way if you know that has nothing to do with what I said?

I also would still like to know exactly what your definition of God is.

"Verily, their spirit itself is the peacock of peacocks and a sea of vanity! The spirit of the poet craves spectators - even if only buffaloes.

"But I have grown weary of this spirit; and I foresee that it will grow weary of itself. I have already seen the poets changed, with their glances turned back on themselves. I saw ascetics of the spirit approach; they grew out of the poets."

But Deibert, this comes from a man who was very, very wrapped up in his use of language---his peacockery, if you will. Also, if there was not a man who more 'craved spectators', I have not read Nietzsche. It is true, mostly, that like Socrates discovered, the poets seem rarely to really understand their wonderful utterances, but are just vehicles of 'the spirit', the way I look at it is more like 'mediumship'. Sometimes the poets give utterance to things that are more sublime than anyone.

It is incorrect to slot me as 'a poet'. Language and the use of it is something that can be used for fun and, yes (even here) for entertainment. Also, I represent 'psychological compensation' and do it quite consciously.

Now, if you were to extend your analysis, what would you do with the merely 'bad poets'? When language, in a sort of Orwellian sense, gets more and more reduced, or when language is handled by boring theologians who seem to batter others over the head with it, like a dull club? You think I am exaggerating, for effect, but I am not. I am 'vitally concerned' about the use of dry, dead language that only deals in dry, dead subjects, because imagination is murdered!

When the German Romantics (for example) talk about 'the spirit' and the way the spirit can move through art and ideas in innovative and creative ways, and they demonstrate how it is done, do you see this as mere 'peacockery'? Just a vain self-glorification? I don't at all. Though I realize that certain forms of spirituality, ascetic spirituality, are rigorous and extremely one-pointed, I don't at all think that this approach is the only valid one in spiritual life. If we were to talk about 'the spirit' as a free-roaming thing, who would have the right to capture it, to hold it, to define it, to dole it out? No, the spirit moves and it pops up where it will. I hope at least someone here picked up the reference to 'the spirit mercurius' in the alchemical imagery. There are certain things you (we) are never going to be able to control, and there is something to be said for giving 'the spirit' the freedom to roam, to manifest as it will. Mostly what I get from people around here is this very, very stiff idea of spirituality as a terribly torturous renunciant's path, and the whole world is vilified, and in that sense (as I read it) the whole process of life---life!

I am quite capable of understanding absolutist philosophies and outlooks (descriptions of the world). I have been involved in one through Vaishnavism. I think I do understand the psychology, if you will, behind seeing the world as this raging and seething pit of lusty passion that can consume one. The futility of so many vain roads and activities. But when these absolutisms turn into confining puritanisms and when they seem to cut us off from our own vital center, what happens is rather pathetic: there is a closing off from life and vitality, and the path turns destructive, weakening. So, among many things, one attempts to rescue language itself from a dull, confining usage. To bring vitality back into the equation. To bring back the spirit mercurius that cannot be repressed. Some part of this is just simple, intuitive psychology.

AJ: "If you are happy with the products of Absolutism, and if these products are useful to you personally, I see no reason why they should be surrendered.

DvR: "You're talking about the caricature and so your dismissal becomes caricature."

No, sir. I dress it up as caricature, but the essence is not a caricature. The caricature is 'psychological compensation' and maybe also just for the fun of it, because it can be done. But the way that absolutist philosophies are handled by many, is genuinely reproachable, and repugnant. Someone needs to talk about it, to open a dialogue.

"You're just too much of an artist. So much poet still left in you, my friend. You're making the faces to ward of evil, don't you? Ah well, good luck with your ceremonies."

That is a convenient characterization on your part, but it is essentially a dismissive manoeuvre, just like Dan and David have recently used it. There is no part of any of this that I cannot discuss in simply prose, soberly and thoroughly. (Not that I lock myself into it mind you). I submit, on the other hand, that 'the forum' (the TBs of the forum, these boys) are incapable and in a sense afraid of a deeper analysis.

"I'm curious, could you try to point out an example of an idea and how the absolutism gets expressed and could you describe the rise of your boredom and predictability in more detail? The interesting thing is that the 'dingoes' seem to make a lot of people annoyed or indignant. Sometimes they cause a fever of counter-evangelism: people start anti-Genius crusades or watch-forums. David has been banned from open tolerant boards because of so-called 'poison'. I wouldn't call it boring unless you're looking for a different type of entertainment."

I think I have been making that effort since I first signed on here, Deibert. Sincerely, I am trying to work with these absolutist ideas, that inform me, and like so many of us come up with a practicable and realistic ethic by which to live. There is nothing easy about that, as it seems to me. The path of genuine asceticism can be excruciatingly difficult, and also 'rewarding' (from a Christian mystical perspective)(interesting to note that asceticism of this sort is rather absent from Judaism, a notable and interesting fact). I just read a few works of Tolstoy who certainly explores the theme of Christian asceticism and in so many ways reminds me of certain 'voices' here. He reveals value in asceticism but also sickness, as I see it.

(And the fact that the TBs have no personal, interconnected, emotive life that is ever talked about is a red flag if ever there was one. Repeat: Red Flag!)

In all my posts I describe my indignation, I don't know what more you are asking for? If I persist in the 'conversation' (continue to participate here) it is because all these issues are vitally interesting to me. Mockery is just a tool, just as 'artfulness' is a tool, or subterfuge.

Actually it isn't possible. A cause is only one side of the indivisible coin that is cause and effect. The two can not logically be seperated. Technically a cause is simply an effect from a prior cause.

What "coin" are you talking about? That there exists an uncaused first cause in no way is illogical. If it were illogical, you would be able to demonstrate that somehow. Go right ahead.

If you are aware that you are using the word nature different from the way I'm using it, then why are you even metioning it in that way if you know that has nothing to do with what I said?

So you would better be able to understand what I said. I guess it didn't work.

I also would still like to know exactly what your definition of God is.

I'm sure you would. You want something logically built up so you can kick it down. Even the notion of "defining God" should scare the hell out of you, if you really thought about it.

Alex Jacob wrote:"If a person is going to call himself a Christian, then he must behave like a Christian - that is, act like Jesus and develop a direct, personal relationship with God/the ALL. That is the bare minimum before one can begin to qualify for the lofty heights of Christianity. But of course, as soon as person does this he immediately ceases to be a Christian, in that he is no longer the follower of anyone at all, not even Jesus."

Again, you-all always fall into this mind-trap of absolutism when you couch your spirituality in such extreme terms. All sorts of people respond to the message and the meaning of Christianity (and any religion), enter into a spiritual relationship with a potency or potencies beyond themselves (mystical, psychological, psychic---who can really define it?) There is a whole gradation of Christians and Christian activity, and only a fool would even try to give it one exclusive label, or to redefine it out from under people, the social context in which it is taking place. Yet our foolish brethren feel they have the right to make all manner of arrogant assertions, defining 'bare minimums'. And finally, Christinity---what a Christian can or should be---is ripped out from under everyone except themselves (*genuflections, obeisances*) and some others whom they annoint.

You must really hate Jesus, then. He was very black and white about what constituted a relationship with God, and what didn't.

-

brokenhead wrote:

Actually it isn't possible. A cause is only one side of the indivisible coin that is cause and effect. The two can not logically be seperated. Technically a cause is simply an effect from a prior cause.

What "coin" are you talking about? That there exists an uncaused first cause in no way is illogical. If it were illogical, you would be able to demonstrate that somehow. Go right ahead.

It's illogical because a cause is a finite entity which has seperate effects. So in all actuality it's effects are also a cause, of the initial cause. Not to mention that, by definition, a cause is simultaneously an effect of prior causes. The only thing that is uncaused is The Infinite, and you will never hear me refer to it as the first cause, because of the reason I just stated.

brokenhead wrote:

I also would still like to know exactly what your definition of God is.

I'm sure you would. You want something logically built up so you can kick it down. Even the notion of "defining God" should scare the hell out of you, if you really thought about it.

I have already defined what God is, and believe me there is no fear involved. I can see why it scares you though, and rightfully so. I wouldn't want to have the delusions I built my life upon shattered either.

"You must really hate Jesus, then. He was very black and white about what constituted a relationship with God, and what didn't."

You really have to put on your thinking cap.

To speak as if 'Jesus' is a person who you mediate, who is out there listening to us, nodding his head in agreement or vehemently disagreeing (when I speak), is pretty absurd. You make yourself like a Church Father, defining and protecting a set doctrine.

No matter who we come in contact with, who we listen to or who we hear, either in life or in literature, it always is ultimately only ourselves who is doing the hearing, it's us who are going to reflect on something and then act. The most important thing, I think, is to have the willingness to come into contact with ideas, to let them work on you, but never to become a slave of them, never to sacrifice your person-hood. You have absconded the message of Jesus (whatever it is for you) and now you are going to wield it, interpret it to others, have your view trump any other?

If there is some person, some divine-man, or any man, who says it is a good idea to enter into a relationship with God, I am going to assume essential good-faith in that recommendation. More important than to enter into a doctrinal relationship with God or life, it seems more about being willing to simply jump into relationship, to have the relationship or to allow the relationship. Do you think that the experience (of God, of anything, of Life) is going to be the same for everyone? That it's a black and white issue and you either do it this way or you've gotten it wrong? What a strict mental master you work under!

You really have not exposed yourself to the full dimension of the question, most likely because you do not expand your horizons through reading. Across the centuries the possibilities of 'relationship to Christ' are infinitely varied, and infinitely rich. Rich...varied..implies color and depth, and also personal relationship. But for you it is 'black & white'. Your orientation is uniquely puritanical.

Nick Treklis wrote:It's illogical because a cause is a finite entity which has seperate effects. So in all actuality it's effects are also a cause, of the initial cause. Not to mention that, by definition, a cause is simultaneously an effect of prior causes. The only thing that is uncaused is The Infinite, and you will never hear me refer to it as the first cause, because of the reason I just stated.

Why is a cause necessarily finite?

Nick wrote:I have already defined what God is, and believe me there is no fear involved. I can see why it scares you though, and rightfully so. I wouldn't want to have the delusions I built my life upon shattered either

Quite so. Which is why you cling to them so desparately.

Alex Jacob wrote:"Verily, their spirit itself is the peacock of peacocks and a sea of vanity! The spirit of the poet craves spectators - even if only buffaloes.

"But I have grown weary of this spirit; and I foresee that it will grow weary of itself. I have already seen the poets changed, with their glances turned back on themselves. I saw ascetics of the spirit approach; they grew out of the poets."

But Deibert, this comes from a man who was very, very wrapped up in his use of language---his peacockery, if you will. Also, if there was not a man who more 'craved spectators', I have not read Nietzsche.

It seems you're side-stepping the whole age where his writing was born in. The 19th century after all was the age of appearances (and the destruction of those by over-folding) - it was Romanticism to the core. Nietzsche writes to and through that age, just like for example Baudrillard writes in the 20th century using postmodern deconstructing over-pregnant style to the degree that proves his thesis about the destruction of meaning only being worsened by any 'therapy'. In similar vein Nietzsche hides behind his style and philology, knowing his smile and clarity will get through. I think it's the best he could do at the time.

Nietzsche as prophet of nihilism knew about the age coming and that in the orgy of meaning the only sanity would lie in 'asceticism of the spirit'. That's why he sees them 'approach'. He's not claiming he was one himself - he didn't need to be.

It is incorrect to slot me as 'a poet'. Language and the use of it is something that can be used for fun and, yes (even here) for entertainment. Also, I represent 'psychological compensation' and do it quite consciously.

It was not meant in a literal sense. It's more the poet-child spirit, a romanticism which denies the real situation, the destruction of meaning or like Quinn wrote about the house burning down. Poets and drunks will always be there, expressing their age and rage. Once, Diebert was a poet too, climbing the heights and lows of his own volcanically active landscape.

Now, if you were to extend your analysis, what would you do with the merely 'bad poets'? When language, in a sort of Orwellian sense, gets more and more reduced, or when language is handled by boring theologians who seem to batter others over the head with it, like a dull club? You think I am exaggerating, for effect, but I am not. I am 'vitally concerned' about the use of dry, dead language that only deals in dry, dead subjects, because imagination is murdered!

That's already happening and it's exactly that age when the theologians, teachers and philosophers become boring, dull and predictable that the poets become bad, too.

When the German Romantics (for example) talk about 'the spirit' and the way the spirit can move through art and ideas in innovative and creative ways, and they demonstrate how it is done, do you see this as mere 'peacockery'? Just a vain self-glorification?

No, it's just what happened in that beautiful age. But you have to wake up and smell the radically different culture you're in know. It's tempting to live in the past through 'mausoleumizaton', picking dead morning glories in the almost barren fields. For the same reason it would be wise to avoid traditional teachings as authority on spiritual matters altogether but one has to be a Greek with the Greek I suppose and make the best of it.

There are certain things you (we) are never going to be able to control, and there is something to be said for giving 'the spirit' the freedom to roam, to manifest as it will. Mostly what I get from people around here is this very, very stiff idea of spirituality as a terribly torturous renunciant's path, and the whole world is vilified, and in that sense (as I read it) the whole process of life---life!

I"m not sure why you think anyone here would be opposed to your paragraph. It must be something you brought along, a shadow behind your left shoulder perhaps?

But when these absolutisms turn into confining puritanisms and when they seem to cut us off from our own vital center, what happens is rather pathetic: there is a closing off from life and vitality, and the path turns destructive, weakening. So, among many things, one attempts to rescue language itself from a dull, confining usage. To bring vitality back into the equation. To bring back the spirit mercurius that cannot be repressed. Some part of this is just simple, intuitive psychology.

Could you describe what you mean by 'life' and 'vitality'. Do you think people on this forum have a bad health, dull senses, depressive moods? Some might indeed have but I suspect with a lot it's quite the opposite. But I cannot know for sure.

Once understanding the problem we have created with meaninglessness in this age of communication, the problem with senselessness in the new age of personal, interconnected, emotive lives becomes obvious.

In all my posts I describe my indignation, I don't know what more you are asking for? If I persist in the 'conversation' (continue to participate here) it is because all these issues are vitally interesting to me. Mockery is just a tool, just as 'artfulness' is a tool, or subterfuge.

It's hard to come to the heart of the matter with your posts at times. At the Reasoning show forum I just saw a clear, brilliant post of yours about women and seduction. But about the absolutes, logic and emotions it's not clear to me yet why you don't find much of interest here or where your exact disagreement lies. And why it would be run-of-the-mill or boring to you, considering all context.

I can see your engagement in enthusiasm, elevating it to a Dionysian religion status almost. But I guess you have a hard time dealing with sylphs, air spirits and the abstract they bring into life.

Alex Jacob wrote:And finally, Christinity---what a Christian can or should be---is ripped out from under everyone except themselves (*genuflections, obeisances*) and some others whom they annoint.

Sometimes I feel this way too. Maybe we are being too sensitive, no?

Alex wrote:No matter who we come in contact with, who we listen to or who we hear, either in life or in literature, it always is ultimately only ourselves who is doing the hearing, it's us who are going to reflect on something and then act. The most important thing, I think, is to have the willingness to come into contact with ideas, to let them work on you, but never to become a slave of them, never to sacrifice your person-hood. You have absconded the message of Jesus (whatever it is for you) and now you are going to wield it, interpret it to others, have your view trump any other?

Whom exactly are you talking to here, Alex?

This is a forum where we exchange ideas. I for one do not go out and proseletyze. I do not go to church, so I don't even worship in public. I find public worship to be rather distasteful. Others do not.

Listen to what you are saying here, how contradictory it is. First you say the most important thing to do is to be willing to come into contact with other ideas, but to never become a slave to them. Then you criticize others else for coming into contact with Jesus' ideas, and when they try to share them, they are "wielding" them like they were a weapon. It is quite natural to hold some ideas higher than others as to their content and meaningfulness, is it not? And if you are so good at not becoming a slave to ideas, you shouldn't be reacting so violently to ideas shared in a public forum set up to do that very thing.

More important than to enter into a doctrinal relationship with God or life, it seems more about being willing to simply jump into relationship, to have the relationship or to allow the relationship. Do you think that the experience (of God, of anything, of Life) is going to be the same for everyone?

I agree with this whole heartedly and could not have said it better myself. But in a venue where ideas about the ultimate are expressed, you shouldn't be taken aback if someone sees things in black-and-white.

brokenhead,

That whole post was in response to something Dan wrote, which is quoted at the top and put in bold.

"Then you criticize others else for coming into contact with Jesus' ideas, and when they try to share them, they are "wielding" them like they were a weapon. It is quite natural to hold some ideas higher than others as to their content and meaningfulness, is it not? And if you are so good at not becoming a slave to ideas, you shouldn't be reacting so violently to ideas shared in a public forum set up to do that very thing."

Again, if you look at the top of that post I was referring to a statement, I was 'going on a rant' about it. I could try to write one in defense of 'one-pointedness' if you'd feel better...

;-)

Words, language, polemics, essays, debates, conversations, arguments---here we are in the exciting domain where men hash it out. On a woman's forum, of course, it would all take place according to women's rules of communication, and people'd be treading on eggshells all the time, I guess.

If you are trying to remove a huge rock from a field you can avail yourself of all sorts of tools: levers, tractors, cranes, wedges, or even dynamite.

Personally, I do think it important to play basically fair, and to have good faith.

brokenhead wrote:Why is a cause necessarily finite?

Because it is not the effect, it is inherently lacking something.

brokenhead wrote:

Nick wrote:I have already defined what God is, and believe me there is no fear involved. I can see why it scares you though, and rightfully so. I wouldn't want to have the delusions I built my life upon shattered either

Quite so. Which is why you cling to them so desparately.

I state what I know, and am able to logically explain why these things are absolutely true. You on the other hand are understandably afraid to put your faith on the line.

Alex Jacob wrote:"You must really hate Jesus, then. He was very black and white about what constituted a relationship with God, and what didn't."

You really have to put on your thinking cap.

To speak as if 'Jesus' is a person who you mediate, who is out there listening to us, nodding his head in agreement or vehemently disagreeing (when I speak), is pretty absurd. You make yourself like a Church Father, defining and protecting a set doctrine.

No matter who we come in contact with, who we listen to or who we hear, either in life or in literature, it always is ultimately only ourselves who is doing the hearing, it's us who are going to reflect on something and then act. The most important thing, I think, is to have the willingness to come into contact with ideas, to let them work on you, but never to become a slave of them, never to sacrifice your person-hood. You have absconded the message of Jesus (whatever it is for you) and now you are going to wield it, interpret it to others, have your view trump any other?

If there is some person, some divine-man, or any man, who says it is a good idea to enter into a relationship with God, I am going to assume essential good-faith in that recommendation. More important than to enter into a doctrinal relationship with God or life, it seems more about being willing to simply jump into relationship, to have the relationship or to allow the relationship. Do you think that the experience (of God, of anything, of Life) is going to be the same for everyone? That it's a black and white issue and you either do it this way or you've gotten it wrong? What a strict mental master you work under!

You really have not exposed yourself to the full dimension of the question, most likely because you do not expand your horizons through reading. Across the centuries the possibilities of 'relationship to Christ' are infinitely varied, and infinitely rich. Rich...varied..implies color and depth, and also personal relationship. But for you it is 'black & white'. Your orientation is uniquely puritanical.

My orientation is simply realistic. It is neither puritanical nor doctrinal. It is a recognition of the way things are.

If we go back to my example of the house burning down, the only way of escaping your destruction is by leaving the house. It is a very black-and-white scenario. If you don't leave the house, you will die. Afterwards, having left the house, you are free to sample the delights of the outside in all of its richness and variety. But if you don't leave the house, that avenue of experience is immediately cut off.

This is why Jesus said things like:

"Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it." Matthew 7: 13


"Those who want to be my disciples must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, but those who lose their life for me will find it." Matthew 16: 24


"If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters—yes, even his own life—such a person cannot be my disciple." Luke 14: 26


"Truly I tell you, no one who has left home or wife or brothers or sisters or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God will fail to receive many times as much in this age, and in the age to come eternal life." Luke 18: 29


"No one who puts a hand to the plough and looks back is fit for service in the kingdom of God." Luke 9: 57


"Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters." Matthew 12: 30


"What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight." Luke 16: 15


"Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only those who do the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name and in your name drive out demons and in your name perform many miracles?’ Then I will tell them plainly, ‘I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’" Matthew 7:21


"Truly I tell you, it is hard for the rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for the rich to enter the kingdom of God." Matthew 19: 23


"Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash." Matthew 7: 24

These are very black-and-white instructions. The experience of heaven itself is not black-and-white, but the path to getting there very much is. If you want to speak against this in favour of some kind of poetic sentiment which seeks experiential variety in the world of illusion, then you are speaking against the teachings of Jesus and the very foundations of Christianity itself.

It's your right to do this, of course, but just don't call it Christianity. Any attempt to water down the basic demand asserted by Jesus immediately destroys Christianity and turns it into just another form of worldliness. Which, of course, is what the religion of Christianity has become, the rot having started with St. Paul and the Church Fathers.

I basically agree with Nietzsche when he said that there has only ever been one Christian and he died on the cross. Except that I would throw in Eckhart and Kierkegaard as well. Aside from them, the Christian religion is a joke.

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DQ wrote:It's your right to do this, of course, but just don't call it Christianity. Any attempt to water down the basic demand asserted by Jesus immediately destroys Christianity and turns it into just another form of worldliness. Which, of course, is what the religion of Christianity has become, the rot having started with St. Paul and the Church Fathers.

I basically agree with Nietzsche when he said that there has only ever been one Christian and he died on the cross. Except that I would throw in Eckhart and Kierkegaard as well. Aside from them, the Christian religion is a joke.

I wonder where you put yourself, David. It is easy to criticize others. I agree with you that there is rot. I agree with you that it started with St. Paul and the Romanization of the Christian mesage.

But I would be much more careful than you with the judgements of men's souls. Nietzsche did not know every Christian. Therefore, his assessment is without merit. You have not known every Christian. You did not even know Nietsche, Kierkegaard, or Eckhart. It's questionable how well you even know yourself, but I give you a pass on that. Therefore, your assessment is equally without merit, unless you limit it to yourself, or at the very least, to those people you know.

I find the QRS view on Christianity to be very shifty. And this despite your comments about "black-and-white" above. Clearly, Christ was not advocating that one love everybody, at least not equally. His mandate was to love your neighbor, no small task, and to love your enemy. (The love your enemy command has practical value, which almost everyone besides Christ seems to miss. He exhorts you to do this because if the person is your enemy, you have a dispute with him. By loving that enemy, you win the dispute. It's a way to win.)

You do not recognize God, the Universal Father, as first (uncaused) Cause. QRS has stated - as in Poison for the Heart - that the very existence of an historical Christ is in doubt, and that if he existed, was not divine. This makes your quoting him blatantly spurious, or else meaningless at best.

brokenhead: Why is a cause necessarily finite?
Nick Treklis: Because it is not the effect, it is inherently lacking something.

You have just said absolutely nothing, Nick. So far, you haven't even approached answering my question. What makes a First cause, an uncaused Cause, logically impossible? If you have a circle and want to know the area, it is not a logical prerequisite that the circle includes the boundary. That is, a circle plus its boundary has the same area as a circle without the boundary. You cannot prove what you are claiming because it simply is not true. It is like you are saying that logically a circle must include a boundary. I am postulating a First Cause. It is logically consistent.

Nick: have already defined what God is, and believe me there is no fear involved. I can see why it scares you though, and rightfully so. I wouldn't want to have the delusions I built my life upon shattered either
brokenhead: Quite so. Which is why you cling to them so desparately.
Nick: I state what I know, and am able to logically explain why these things are absolutely true. You on the other hand are understandably afraid to put your faith on the line.

I am not afraid to put my faith on the line. I do it every day. You could not understand that, because you lack a corresponding faith, therefore the capacity to "get" what I am trying to say. You have logically explained nothing, except that you disagree with me. You are asserting you disagree with me. I understand that. But you have not proven anything. If you had, it would constitue a proof that God does not exist. That has never been proven. I, for one, do not believe it can be proven.

For someone who is too afraid to venture to have faith, it comes across as vacuous to accuse another person of being afraid of anything. I can no more prove God exists than you can prove he doesn't. Yet I dare to have faith and live by it as well as I can. Which one of us is the more fearful, then? You can think I am afraid of something, but this is meaningless and clearly no kind of logical demonstration of any truth or point whatsoever, even if it were true, which I have said it is not.

Question to David or Kevin: What exactly do you mean when you use the word "spiritual"? Dan, I don't recall you using this term, but feel free to jump in. I'm curious as to whether you think the corresponding noun to which this is an adjective has any inherent meaning, and if so, what that might be. It is clear QRS does not recognize any kind of afterlife except as the set of effects (which then become causes which then become effects, ad infinitum) which can trace their causes to actions committed by a person during his or her finite life.

I haven't erad every single post you guys have made over the years, but I am sort of going by Poison as sort of a manifesto.