GENIUS FORUMS

One way to define 'mysticism' is that of an intuitive, speculative, symbolical, imaginative, allegorical interpretation of life, being, God, gods, angels, and all the rest. I think of the mystical poets when I think of mysticism. One can have a mystical relationship with life generally which can be interesting, beautiful, satisfying and fruitful. But, if mysticism loses its bearings and its foothold, it can drift off into unreal clouds.

One can define 'magic' as a sort of proto-science, even if it is misguided or incorrect in its scientific presumptions. Magic can be defined as activity one engages in that with the intention of effecting reality or the world around us. The ideal of magic is to discover some method, some activity, that will give one an advantage, even if it is a small one, to get from the world the things one needs or wants.

The issue of 'true religion', at least as it is defined in Judaism, is very, very strict. Whatever it is that is speaking through these Prophets is asking for something very definite, something that is spelled-out down to the last letter, something about which there is no doubt. But at every opportunity---following the biblical narrative---these people simply do not want to obey. The disobedience arises as stealing, cheating, murdering, going to excesses, plotting to take others land and goods, being seduced on all the different levels, sexually, psychically, socially, avoiding responsibility, falling in with the practices of others, avoiding the strictness of a special sort of 'ethical religion', forgetting one's obligations, putting too much emphasis on luxuries, etc., etc. The closest to that Jewish ethical religion is more than likely the Protestants who went back and read the texts without intermediary, to extract its 'spirit'. With that in mind it is not hard to see why they would eschew mysticism, divination, idols, ease, luxury, excessive sex, perverseness, etc.

The predominant 'energy', BTW, of our own dearly beloved QRS is a sort of religious extremism, at least I think so:

'Listen to this
you cows [women] of Bashan who live on the hills of Samaria,
you who oppress the poor and crush the destitute,
who say to your lords [your husbands], 'Bring us drink':
the Lord God has sworn by his holiness
that your time is coming
when men shall carry you away on your shields
and your children in fish-baskets.
You shall each be carried straight out
through the breaches in the walls
and pitched on a dunghill.
This is the very word of the Lord'.

---Amos, 4.3.3

"The problem is, and I think this is the real problem of religion, especially Christianity, is that it is mystic at the core, and this mysticism is absolutely the goal and purpose of the Christian life, yet the church cannot convey it to the people."

You could say that at the core there is no way to look at existence except through a metaphysical lens, an intuitive lens, a spiritual-interpretive lens. If you have, say, a typical materialist's viewpoint, the common viewpoint of so many, it is a sort of null viewpoint that really does nothing. It is like being drugged, or unconscious. In that structure of view, you would never ask certain questions, like What is all this? How did this come about? Why am I here in this? Those can be mystical questions I guess, since they beg to be answered. But how can they ever be answered? The farther you go into the question, the more abstract, allegorical and mystical becomes the answer.

I think I agree with you that the whole purpose is to go into the most serious questions, the most loaded questions, and to provoke answers, and if that is the mystical, then we have some agreement. But, at least in prophetic Judaism---which really is what Christianity is if you asked me---there is not a great deal of emphasis on the mystical aspect, maybe because it is en endless realm of speculation. So, the entire focus is placed on our waking reality, one the specific things we do. Protestantism, it seems to me, inherits that strict and sober quality from Judaism. (I know of course there are mystical branches in Judaism, it's just that they were never emphasised and when they were, it was seen as aberration, c.f. medieval Cabala).

"Mysticism is what people want, the real fruit, the enlivening of one's own soul so that it can attain wisdom and be connected to life, but it is something real, like enlightenment, it just is not easy to give away. You can pray and eat wafers and study catechism and sacrifice doves till the cows come home, but it is all a vanity and vexation of spirit."

You think? It is hard to refer too much to 'people' and what they want, but what they (we) want is really a very complex question. The real fact of the matter is that what 'people' want in the sense of long-for is endless diversions, sexual adventures, gluttony, violence, self-serving goals and ends, etc., etc., etc. They want to be seduced and carried along by their appetites from one indulgence to another in a succession of blissful waves, and if they could choose they'd only specify that there would never be a price to pay, that they'd never have to come down, there'd never be a hangover or a bill, that their bodies would never decay and disintegrate.

To be interested in what you imply is 'inner fruit' is far more rare as a desire or a want. I agree with you that 'enlivening of the soul' is a real thing, a worthy thing, but it is interesting to me that the real enlivening only seems to arise in cultural circumstances where there has been a very real temperance-endeavor. When people are seduced away from 'seriousness' toward life and divinity, those pleasures simply carry them to the trash-heap (or the 'dung-heap' if you wish). It is when a culture puts its nose to the grindstone and resist hedonism that 'noble things' arise in the spirit of man. To be truthful 'people'---like children---don't seem to have any sort of clear idea what they want, and allowed to chose, they will choose immediate pleasures that lead to dissolution. Oddly enough, or appropriately enough, it seems one needs the discipline of 'true religion' in order to control one's impulses.

And that is, of course, how I understand the Biblical Yahweh.

Even so-called Christian love would have no ground to function in if it were not for a severe base in ethics, self-control, willingness to avoid hedonism, to set one's goals on higher things. That love would---as it is today---degenerate into something extremely wishy-washy, sloppy, dreamy, sensual. That Christian love can only arise in a very principled circumstance. Without the principals, it really can't perform.

"I am not in pro of a judeochristian agenda, unless and until I can reform it. Sadly, I find that most of what is wrong with Christianity is the Old Testament. This has to be looked at. It is time for people to stop justifying the warlord Jehovah and just realize that some of the stuff in the Old Testament has nothing to do with a good being or a divine being at all, but a petty warlord who abused the Hebrew people unmercifully, and caused such local psychic trauma, that none of the middle eastern people, and by infection the west, have yet recovered. This is serious stuff."

I see your point about a warrior-god, a war-lord, and all that. But I also think a description like this misses an important point. The world we live in, in fact, is a terrible world. It can rise up at any moment and take us out. There are circumstances that arise for living things that are simply terrible and hard to come to terms with. Like it or not, we exist in a terrible world, and 'God' (even if it is just the 'effect' that the QRS talk about) is always acting, moving, creating and destroying in our world.

The Biblical view of Fate is peculiar:

'Fools who long for the day of the Lord, what will the day of the Lord mean to you? It will be darkness, not light. It will be as when a man runs from a lion and a bear meets him, or turns into a house and leans his hand on the wall, and a snake bites him. The day of the Lord is indeed darkness, not light, a day of gloom with no dawn'.

---Amos, 9

The implication is that if you are out of sync with the kosmos, no matter what you do, where you turn, there will be calamity. This 'terrible fate' for those who won't get their shit together runs equally through Judaism and Christianity. It is no less severe in Christianity, in my opinion, except where it becomes 'Christianity'.

I think one would have to spend a lot of time carefully examining this Biblical Yahweh but within the historical context before one could make any definite statements. It is a very, very involved issue and is not amenable to simple reductions.

I do not myself see contradiction between the Hosean prophecy within the context of Old Testament prophecy and the teachings of Jesus, to tell the truth. One does not nullify the other, as I see things, and the 'better' interpretations of Jewish religion---that is, protestantism---are still working the same angles. The message is to wake up, get sober, avoid druggedness, don't fall into vain ceremonialism, don't worship 'false gods', be disciplined and righteous (but not at all unjoyful).

Mass culture is drunk, perverse, sloppy, unconscious, dis-empowered, and (as some say) careening toward disaster. Whatever reacts to that is very unforgiving, don't you think?

maestro wrote:

Carl G wrote:Secondly to say that "in a normal human the intellectual part is asleep" is inaccurate.

What I meant was that the highest sub-part in each center is asleep.

Yeah, I got that. I'm just not sure it's true that the brain in each center is what's asleep. As I said, there is usually one center in a person which predominates. And we say the person is asleep. All parts of all centers are functioning but not in concert because the central "I" has not been established. There is no central consciousness involved. But we're getting pretty technical here with what's going on in each of the nine sub-centers. Surely it varies according to type. I guess I'm going to have to re-visit those specifics.

Gurdjieff's classification is an interesting way to look at things, and provides a lot of insight into puzzling questions.

Agreed. Quite useful.

PS: Forgot to say, in answer to your question, that I have had lucid dreams, and I always found the state intriguing, yet I am not convinced that the practice is relevant for 'bona fide spiritual life'.

Alex,

PS: Forgot to say, in answer to your question, that I have had lucid dreams, and I always found the state intriguing, yet I am not convinced that the practice is relevant for 'bona fide spiritual life'.

I think it useful, as a demonstration of the funny workings of consciousness and unconsciousness, and as a serious clue about what 'waking up to one's true self' might mean or be like.

One way to define 'mysticism' is that of an intuitive, speculative, symbolical, imaginative, allegorical interpretation of life,

No, you see, mysticism arises first and foremost from experience. After that, we may have our interpretations.

I think of the mystical poets when I think of mysticism.

They wrote of their experience, and of their interpretation of all things based on that experience, which alters their thoughts and perceptions about everything.

I'm not quite sure why you drifted off into magic...

The issue of 'true religion', at least as it is defined in Judaism, is very, very strict. Whatever it is that is speaking through these Prophets is asking for something very definite, something that is spelled-out down to the last letter, something about which there is no doubt. But at every opportunity---following the biblical narrative---these people simply do not want to obey. The disobedience arises as stealing, cheating, murdering, going to excesses, plotting to take others land and goods, being seduced on all the different levels, sexually, psychically, socially, avoiding responsibility, falling in with the practices of others, avoiding the strictness of a special sort of 'ethical religion', forgetting one's obligations, putting too much emphasis on luxuries, etc., etc. The closest to that Jewish ethical religion is more than likely the Protestants who went back and read the texts without intermediary, to extract its 'spirit'. With that in mind it is not hard to see why they would eschew mysticism, divination, idols, ease, luxury, excessive sex, perverseness, etc.

There is some good in the Old Testament and in the prophets. You ask the right question: Who spoke through them? Was it chaneled? Were they on strong psychedelics? What it certainly was NOT, was the creator of the universe, speaking vebatim in a lonely desert death threats, and boasting of himself as a man of war, and killing in the hundreds and thousands his own people who were utterly unfree to reject his tyranical rule. This shit just hasta stop. That misanthropist known as Jehovah - perhaps he was more than one character during the one to two millenia that the assorted books were compiled. But the case cannot be made of a coherent, ethical, merciful being. That humans can be so duped by a book of such wandering, inconsistency and which presents its god as little different from a Saddam Hussein or similar type, is discouraging.

This is what must be addressed if Judaism, or Christianity is to be salvageable and have merit. Otherwise, they are as lost as the code of Hamurabi.
Perhaps old Judaism is strict and has little time for mysticism because it really was never a spiritual pursuit. It was about a local god, in an eastern mediterranean world filled with such gods, who gave laws and little of spirit. And many of those gods, such as Ishtar, were mentioned in the bible, and of course the people from time to time went and worshiped them. After all, the Hebrews were not monotheists, they were henotheists. Nor does Jehovah, for the most part, really speak of himself as other than a god among gods.

Frankly, Alex, something happened to the world a few thousand years ago, and that something involved greatly technologically superior beings establishing civilization in the old world - India, Persia, and Egypt. And South America. All of it the same, all the tales of the local people the same. All say the same thing - the gods brought us civilization. The footprints of this, no different from the ancient Greek and Roman gods, are all over the Old Testament. If you remove the creation account in early Genesis, and stop thinking of the Bible as a spiritual book, you'll note that it is not about that. It's about history, conquest and the like.

Why the hell should the people have been loyal to Jehovah? Would you be? If your answer is yes, I daresay you need to read more of it.

You could say that at the core there is no way to look at existence except through a metaphysical lens, an intuitive lens, a spiritual-interpretive lens. If you have, say, a typical materialist's viewpoint, the common viewpoint of so many, it is a sort of null viewpoint that really does nothing. It is like being drugged, or unconscious. In that structure of view, you would never ask certain questions, like What is all this? How did this come about? Why am I here in this? Those can be mystical questions I guess, since they beg to be answered. But how can they ever be answered? The farther you go into the question, the more abstract, allegorical and mystical becomes the answer.

As I mentioned before, this indicates to me that you are entering an awakening state, in which you begin to see the dreamlike nature of our reality, and how it is, like in dreams, impossible to pin anything down. The more you focus on a thing, the more it slips from you.

I think I agree with you that the whole purpose is to go into the most serious questions, the most loaded questions, and to provoke answers, and if that is the mystical, then we have some agreement. But, at least in prophetic Judaism---which really is what Christianity is if you asked me---there is not a great deal of emphasis on the mystical aspect, maybe because it is en endless realm of speculation. So, the entire focus is placed on our waking reality, one the specific things we do. Protestantism, it seems to me, inherits that strict and sober quality from Judaism. (I know of course there are mystical branches in Judaism, it's just that they were never emphasised and when they were, it was seen as aberration, c.f. medieval Cabala).

Christianity is not about prophecy. It is about coming to know God for oneself, which is also mysticism. Mysticism is simply when a person has a direct and unmediated spiritual connection to the divine and does not depend upon outside authorities, priesthoods and dogmas. But churches can discourage that. Mysticisim does not entail endless speculation. Religion does that. If mysticisim did, I would not have said that all mystics understand one another.

You think? It is hard to refer too much to 'people' and what they want, but what they (we) want is really a very complex question. The real fact of the matter is that what 'people' want in the sense of long-for is endless diversions, sexual adventures, gluttony, violence, self-serving goals and ends, etc., etc., etc. They want to be seduced and carried along by their appetites from one indulgence to another in a succession of blissful waves, and if they could choose they'd only specify that there would never be a price to pay, that they'd never have to come down, there'd never be a hangover or a bill, that their bodies would never decay and disintegrate.

Some people are very immature, but in the long run we all want the same thing. We just look for it in all the wrong places, and get placated by substutes.

Even so-called Christian love would have no ground to function in if it were not for a severe base in ethics, self-control, willingness to avoid hedonism, to set one's goals on higher things. That love would---as it is today---degenerate into something extremely wishy-washy, sloppy, dreamy, sensual. That Christian love can only arise in a very principled circumstance. Without the principals, it really can't perform.

I don't know. I think you're making this up. Or you find fault with society as it is these days, but I see a lot of good and bad together. I'm optimistic. Better not to watch TV though.

I see your point about a warrior-god, a war-lord, and all that. But I also think a description like this misses an important point. The world we live in, in fact, is a terrible world. It can rise up at any moment and take us out. There are circumstances that arise for living things that are simply terrible and hard to come to terms with. Like it or not, we exist in a terrible world, and 'God' (even if it is just the 'effect' that the QRS talk about) is always acting, moving, creating and destroying in our world.

This is high-falutin, mumbo jumbo excuse-making. Most of the horror of our world is of our own doing. We can stop it the minute we choose. But Jehovah was in the thick of it, and look at his legacy - the middle east!

'Fools who long for the day of the Lord, what will the day of the Lord mean to you? It will be darkness, not light. It will be as when a man runs from a lion and a bear meets him, or turns into a house and leans his hand on the wall, and a snake bites him. The day of the Lord is indeed darkness, not light, a day of gloom with no dawn'.

Your interpretation is good, possible. Mine is much worse. I take it as a proof that, once again, the source of these words is a dark force, a satanic entity. In one of the New Testament epistles, for example, it is said:

GOD IS LIGHT AND IN HIM IS NO DARKNESS AT ALL.

Compare that with the above. Is the speaker a dark Lord? How can the day of the Lord be darkness? Try relooking at many of the rotten things in the Old Testament and ask yourself : Could Satan have been any worse? Much of it is a long series of angry diatribes and threats, murders of the Hebrews by the priests of Jehovah, stoning of disobeyers for minor infractions, making of war, taking of territory, absconding with virgins after killing all others, allowance of slavery, taking of booty - and little or nothing that is sublime, little or nothing of an afterlife, little uplifting or amazing ideas about the nature of God or reality or the mind like we have in the eastern religions.

The Jews, more than any other people inthe world, deserve to have their minds freed from this 4,000 year old tyranny.

I think one would have to spend a lot of time carefully examining this Biblical Yahweh but within the historical context before one could make any definite statements. It is a very, very involved issue and is not amenable to simple reductions.

Yes, this is aproblem and I readily admit it. I am not sure what to do because it seems me the OT is too big for me to tackle. There is no doubt that much of it is of evil origin, and gullible people are so desperate for fairy tales that they take the good with the bad. This is a spiritual suicide. You cannot take the good with the bad and get a clear direction. That is why the saying from Isaiah is so pivotal:

Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who don't know bitter from sweet and sweet from bitter, or light from darkness.

That is why I said Satan has had his way with the church, and with Judaism too. (and with Islam of course)

I do not myself see contradiction between the Hosean prophecy within the context of Old Testament prophecy and the teachings of Jesus, to tell the truth.

What Hosean prophecy?

The message is to wake up, get sober, avoid druggedness, don't fall into vain ceremonialism, don't worship 'false gods', be disciplined and righteous (but not at all unjoyful).

Sort of like Confucius?

Mass culture is drunk, perverse, sloppy, unconscious, dis-empowered, and (as some say) careening toward disaster. Whatever reacts to that is very unforgiving, don't you think?

Reacts to what, who is unforgiving?

Well Anna, if you asked me I would have to say that I don't think there is anything very 'ethical, coherent or merciful about our existence on this planet. What underlies the whole of existence is a subtext of death and destruction. To come up with a 'God', then, of this realm, if it were based on 'reality', would be to describe a terrible force that creates and destroys unmercifully, but that also has a 'sweet' aspect, but you only get to enjoy that sweetness for a few moments and then you are annihilated.

I am not at all in a position to debate the pros and cons of the Biblical God, to tell the truth. Can anyone definitively say what 'that' is, and if they do so, what sort of lens of interpretation are they going to use? Historical? Ethical? Fictional? Psychological? Mythological? Revisionist? New-Age? Naturalist? Atheist?

The Prophetic question is interesting, and when I say prophetic I mean the utterances of a God through 'prophets'---however you want to describe that---who tells people that if you don't behave nicely you will suffer indescribably, that 'I' will use the vehicle of other people, of nature, to make you suffer until the time that you decide to accept the necessity for certain inviolable rules of conduct, until you live up to your promise and obligation. It is an interesting question to ask: How many other religions and cosmologies are founded on a similar sort of ethical command, with both a promise and a curse that depends on how you act? From what you have written I don't think you have an interest in looking at some of this except with a prejudiced eye. You can't go back and 'revise' history to fit with a modern model, or a New-Age model (I only use that word because you did, and you seem to feel they are on the right track, whoever 'they' are). Also, I think you have to consider the Biblical conceptions in an evolutionary context and also to see how the Christian movement fits into that, arises from that, in the sense of continuation.

I get the impression when you describe this terrible Biblical Jehovah as Satan that in the next breath he might descend in some space-vehicle and show himself as a lizard-being' of modern mythological conception.

"Why the hell should the people have been loyal to Jehovah? Would you be? If your answer is yes, I daresay you need to read more of it."

These questions seem very intricate to me, not simple to work through. Well that is not true. There is a simple manoeuvre and that is, like QRS, to reject the whole thing as madness, psychosis, and begin with a clean(er) slate.

I find that I am intrigued by a God or a God-concept that demands such rigorous attention to ethics. I am intrigued by a movement that works so hard to discover what those 'commands' are and to deal with that, to spend so much human energy thinking about it. I am intrigued by the polarity between people who are raised-up with no ethical controls, or different and far more lax ones, and other people who have devised for themselves or who devise very rigorous codes, and then work to live them. I am intrigued that some people, namely the Jews, came so strictly under this ideal, and I am intrigued by the degree that adherence to this ideal has so strongly affected the whole planet, and made all this such an issue for the whole planet. I am intrigued not only in a superficial sense that some call this 'good' vs 'bad' (law vs lawlessness, etc), but also that these ideas were foisted on people (like, Europe) through a process of conquest (the Holy Roman Empire) and that, consciously and unconsciously, many people want to get out from under a 'God' (or a Satan) that makes such demands on them, such foreign demands. I am intrigued to witness what happens in a culture when they throw off that 'yoke' and when the cultural institutions---imperfect, even paganistic themselves---revert to a 'lawless' life, and when vast mercantile interests also involve themselves in this 'counter-movement'.

The list of intriguing things goes on and on, but still in the background is the essential ethical imperative.

And, as I said, I do not see the figure of Jesus Christ as having significantly modified the ethical imperative that Judaism expresses. One has to very, very carefully and very slowly go back through that period of time (the pre-Christian period, the Jewish period when, well before Jesus, there were new trends emerging, and also the Christian and the post-Christian era) and try to understand, within that, what really is this new movement. Meaning, what was it itself really trying to be, and why, before the forces of discord and opposition (between Jew and Christian) got out of hand. Someone wrote that the most terrible struggles are civil conflicts, and it is there you see the truly terrible side of man.

But what you ask is a worthy question. You seem to ask me if I think a 'God' who would destroy me, annihilate me, if I do not follow His will, is a God I can subscribe to. My answer is that we are provided with a platform in which life takes place. A planet, a sphere, a 'loka'. It is a temporary even illusory platform---a platform composed of a 'cloud of electrons' to paraphrase a local contributor. Here, we get to exist and to enter into a pre-established game. The platform is unreal and unabiding, and the 'God' who created and administers it does not care about any part of the external structures that are swept together for mere glimmers of moments from stardust. Just a breath wipes everything away, as Greenland demonstrates. Ah, then what matters? Does anything matter? If you accept the nature of the place as it is, and if you accept the theistic possibility, what 'matters' is no part of the substance, but some part of the content, or the spirit, or the soul. You can see where I am going with this. Within this terrible platform of life I don't think our illusions can serve us very well, we have to base our life on a 'bedrock' of 'truth'. Ah, but what are we going to select as 'true'? In that of course is the very core question of this religious body, and if you will permit me, the Jewish, Biblical Jehovah. I submit that seen in this way, the 'activities' of this 'God' appear different.

"Christianity is not about prophecy. It is about coming to know God for oneself, which is also mysticism."

If you were to ask me, today, what I thought Christianity was, I would say that it is the knowledge of having been chosen for a different fate. It is seeing something essential about the 'nature of the place', but finding life in the context of an internal decision, or an internal shift, that radically changes the whole nature of the game, and one's relationship to 'the world'. Well, that would be at the core, in the kernel of the issue. On 'outer' levels it is about many other and different things.

"Some people are very immature, but in the long run we all want the same thing. We just look for it in all the wrong places, and get placated by substitutes."

And their terrible God who presides over the place just plows them all in again and re-cultivates the fertile soil. (Did you ever read The Mysterious Stranger by Mark Twain?)

A smart plant, or a lucky plant, knowing of a special water to drink, drinks that water.
________________________________________________

"Fools who long for the day of the Lord, what will the day of the Lord mean to you? It will be darkness, not light. It will be as when a man runs from a lion and a bear meets him, or turns into a house and leans his hand on the wall, and a snake bites him. The day of the Lord is indeed darkness, not light, a day of gloom with no dawn".

That was specifically addressed to those who thought they were in the good graces of the Lord of the place and who vaingloriously hoped for the Day of the Lord as if it would lift them up. The message of the prophet is that it would not at all be like that, but would condemn them. 'There ain't no hiding place from the Father of creation' as Bob Marley says.

But what interests me more in that prophecy is that it indicates an internal, even psychological dislocation, so that no matter where you turn, no matter what steps you take, it turns out badly. The Africans (the Nigerians of the religion of Ocha) have a way to talk about 'afflicted head', a head (ori) that is overheated, off-track, recklessly inclined, unlucky. In that condition all choices are usually bad choices, and the being itself creates his own misfortune. The 'doctor' has to act on the head, to straighten the crossed wires, to cool the head, so that it can think and act right.

[1539 words, just for you Anna]

Yeah, man, what a load of verbiage. Seriously, Alex, you should write books. Maybe you already do..

Some songs for you Carl:

Malaika 1
Malaika 2
Zelie

Big fat books that meander all over the place, tomes that examine every nook and crevice of the human experience, each War and Peace times ten, great biblical doorstops, whole series filled with weighings of this and that, packed full with grist for the mind, yea, volumes overflowing with tales of the places a mind has been or could go, springs gushing with possibilities and veritable founts of colorful juxaposes of experience and potential. Huzzah, a library for the ages, a new Alexandria, Alex Jacobsia, huzzah!

Yeah, man, what a load of verbiage. Seriously, Alex, you should write books. Maybe you already do..

And was my post short enough?

Alex,

Well Anna, if you asked me I would have to say that I don't think there is anything very 'ethical, coherent or merciful about our existence on this planet. What underlies the whole of existence is a subtext of death and destruction. To come up with a 'God', then, of this realm, if it were based on 'reality', would be to describe a terrible force that creates and destroys unmercifully, but that also has a 'sweet' aspect, but you only get to enjoy that sweetness for a few moments and then you are annihilated.

Well, now, it is quite easy to fall into darkness. If we can wax poetical or mystical, I would say that this funny planet offers both paradise and hell. However, I think we can emphasize yet again, that most of the suffering of we humans is self imposed, that we are not worms or babies, and taking responsibility - at long last - is one of the major, essential graduation points. That is, to see that we are not being 'done to' by a god.

But despite our odd situation on this planet, we must have faith that there are logical reasons for it, that there is more out there to be had when we are ready for it. And there is no reason I can see why there shouldn't be an ethical or coherent divinity. In fact, let us not get lost in the dream!

I am not at all in a position to debate the pros and cons of the Biblical God, to tell the truth.

It so happens that it is an important topic for me, one that I embark on and will be continuing to embark on. I like getting a Jewish perspective because, quite frankly, my dislike of Jehovah could leave them in a bind or even be interpreted as antisemitism. Christians cling too tightly to the Old Testament, but at least they could more conceivably let it go without major loss. In fact, with joyful gain...

Can anyone definitively say what 'that' is, and if they do so, what sort of lens of interpretation are they going to use? Historical? Ethical? Fictional? Psychological? Mythological? Revisionist? New-Age? Naturalist? Atheist?

Of course we cannot because there is no definitive Jehovah, that is part ofthe problem. But examine the whole mess we must, and will not cop out. I will use the lens of goodness, and coherency.

The Prophetic question is interesting, and when I say prophetic I mean the utterances of a God through 'prophets'---however you want to describe that---who tells people that if you don't behave nicely you will suffer indescribably, that 'I' will use the vehicle of other people, of nature, to make you suffer until the time that you decide to accept the necessity for certain inviolable rules of conduct, until you live up to your promise and obligation.

Alex this is a myth, and I see that you are caught up in the romance of it, like a grand epic drama. "A God" you say - well it is not the creator of the universe who speaks through these remote and all but irrelevant prophets and then takes little or no interest in the rest of the planet, and who has written such a crappy book. "A God" could be any sort of entity. The God who is good and ethical does not engage in the use of force and threats and capital punishment in order to show the world the astonishing difference between himself and his guidance, versus humanity without him. What is the difference between such a God and any othe tyrant with some misguided utopian agenda, like say Stalin or what have you?

The god of this universe does not single out a particular people and tell them that they must worship by force. Let's get clear. That is the hallmark of evil, and it is time for the human mind to be freed from such utter nonsense.

It is an interesting question to ask: How many other religions and cosmologies are founded on a similar sort of ethical command, with both a promise and a curse that depends on how you act?

Jehovah seems to have been indeed the worst of the gods of old, and I believe this is the secret to his staying power - trauma! The good does not use force, anger and threats to 'teach' people to be good! The use of force is evil. This is a deep spiritual law.

From what you have written I don't think you have an interest in looking at some of this except with a prejudiced eye.

Unprejudice me then, for my prejucide comes of reading the text, and thinking, and comparing what I know inwardly of the nature of God, which does not fit with large portions of the Old Testament. I don't say all of it. The Jews themselves don't really believe in Jehovah; they have, as all humans do, an internal compass, and manage to believe, more or less, in the real God.

Also, I think you have to consider the Biblical conceptions in an evolutionary context and also to see how the Christian movement fits into that, arises from that, in the sense of continuation.

I do see an evolution. There is more of the better stuff later on, I think. But that would be a human thing. It would strengthen the case that the objectionable parts do not come from one being, that universal one, creator of billions of galaxies.
It is an interesting question, in what ways is Christiaity a continuation, and in what ways a sharp break? I think it is both. Jesus was a reformer, although Christians deny it. But you cannot reform perfection, but error. And the creator of the universe does not change his mind and his tactics from vengeance and territorialism, to something milder.

I get the impression when you describe this terrible Biblical Jehovah as Satan that in the next breath he might descend in some space-vehicle and show himself as a lizard-being' of modern mythological conception.

There is much evidence that exactly this is being described in a couple of places in the OT, as well as in literature from other cultures in the world, and this explains a lot - the sudden jump start of civilizations in certain areas, the ubiquitous descriptons of 'gods' who came out of the skies and established cities and made love and war with one another. Then, humanity got confused with the passage of time and began to think they were truly divine and creators. They were not. Jehovah, I think, was one of them. But in the case of the Bible, there seems to have been a deliberate papering over of this fact with the creation story, so as to increase the tendency toward confusion.

There is a simple manoeuvre and that is, like QRS, to reject the whole thing as madness, psychosis, and begin with a clean(er) slate.

That is what I see the new age doing, and I have no problem with it, except it would leave the clingers behind. I want to show them a way out.

I find that I am intrigued by a God or a God-concept that demands such rigorous attention to ethics.

Try karma, it gets no more rigorous than that.

I am intrigued by a movement that works so hard to discover what those 'commands' are and to deal with that, to spend so much human energy thinking about it.

It needen't be so hard, but maybe you kind of like the Jewish hair-splitting, and that's fine!

I am intrigued by the polarity between people who are raised-up with no ethical controls, or different and far more lax ones, and other people who have devised for themselves or who devise very rigorous codes, and then work to live them. I am intrigued that some people, namely the Jews, came so strictly under this ideal, and I am intrigued by the degree that adherence to this ideal has so strongly affected the whole planet, and made all this such an issue for the whole planet.

How has it become an issue for the planet?

I am intrigued not only in a superficial sense that some call this 'good' vs 'bad' (law vs lawlessness, etc), but also that these ideas were foisted on people (like, Europe) through a process of conquest (the Holy Roman Empire) and that, consciously and unconsciously, many people want to get out from under a 'God' (or a Satan) that makes such demands on them, such foreign demands. I am intrigued to witness what happens in a culture when they throw off that 'yoke' and when the cultural institutions---imperfect, even paganistic themselves---revert to a 'lawless' life, and when vast mercantile interests also involve themselves in this 'counter-movement'.

You seem to be assuming that without Torah the world descends into lawlessness. I hardly agree. We have had to improve upon Torah, such as giving up slavery. I do not think it is coherent demands by a good God which causes people to rebel. That is just neurotic guilt loading. The evil system has many, many tricks up its sleeves to convince people not to abandon the very thing which enslaves them.

The demands of the true God are total. Yet the burden is easy and the yoke is light.

I am going to do this in two parts. There may be an electric flicker, I've been told.

Part Two

many people want to get out from under a 'God' (or a Satan) that makes such demands on them, such foreign demands.

The beckonings of God are not foreign, for we all have the same inner compass.

and when vast mercantile interests also involve themselves in this 'counter-movement'.

Our world is run by greed and deception.

The list of intriguing things goes on and on, but still in the background is the essential ethical imperative.

It is lack of ethics that I object to, from start to finish. So I have no objection to an ethical discussion.

And, as I said, I do not see the figure of Jesus Christ as having significantly modified the ethical imperative that Judaism expresses. One has to very, very carefully and very slowly go back through that period of time (the pre-Christian period, the Jewish period when, well before Jesus, there were new trends emerging, and also the Christian and the post-Christian era) and try to understand, within that, what really is this new movement. Meaning, what was it itself really trying to be, and why, before the forces of discord and opposition (between Jew and Christian) got out of hand. Someone wrote that the most terrible struggles are civil conflicts, and it is there you see the truly terrible side of man.

And it was not just struggle between Jew and Christian, but several Christian factions, that were a problem. And, the victors write history. The gnostics have my sympathy. But what ethical imperative(s) do you see Judaism expressing that Jesus continued?

But what you ask is a worthy question. You seem to ask me if I think a 'God' who would destroy me, annihilate me, if I do not follow His will, is a God I can subscribe to. My answer is that we are provided with a platform in which life takes place. A planet, a sphere, a 'loka'. It is a temporary even illusory platform---a platform composed of a 'cloud of electrons' to paraphrase a local contributor. Here, we get to exist and to enter into a pre-established game. The platform is unreal and unabiding, and the 'God' who created and administers it does not care about any part of the external structures that are swept together for mere glimmers of moments from stardust. Just a breath wipes everything away, as Greenland demonstrates. Ah, then what matters? Does anything matter? If you accept the nature of the place as it is, and if you accept the theistic possibility, what 'matters' is no part of the substance, but some part of the content, or the spirit, or the soul. You can see where I am going with this. Within this terrible platform of life I don't think our illusions can serve us very well, we have to base our life on a 'bedrock' of 'truth'. Ah, but what are we going to select as 'true'? In that of course is the very core question of this religious body, and if you will permit me, the Jewish, Biblical Jehovah. I submit that seen in this way, the 'activities' of this 'God' appear different.

This bedrock is certainly needed, but instead people have been given an impossible and contradictory set of scribbles and dogmas that encouragae us to remain lost in unclarity, which makes the illusory platform a hopeless labyrinth. Yet I fail to see how, in this context, the activities of this God will appear different. It is in this very context that I have rejected it. Remember, if you are taking a position which cannot be proved false - then, if you happen to be wrong, you've got no way out. The position I am referring to, is swallowing the whole set of books in the Bible as of equal merit and all as the words and actions of the true God.

And yet one of the names of Satan is "the slanderer." And whom would he most want to slander? And if not through creating false scriptures and confusion, then how? It's a perfect system - people tenaciously cling to lies, generation after generation.

If you were to ask me, today, what I thought Christianity was, I would say that it is the knowledge of having been chosen for a different fate.

This is its most disgusting aspect. Happily not all subscribe to it. Some believe in universal salvation.

It is seeing something essential about the 'nature of the place', but finding life in the context of an internal decision, or an internal shift, that radically changes the whole nature of the game, and one's relationship to 'the world'. Well, that would be at the core, in the kernel of the issue. On 'outer' levels it is about many other and different things.

Yes.

And their terrible God who presides over the place just plows them all in again and re-cultivates the fertile soil. (Did you ever read The Mysterious Stranger by Mark Twain?)

They're barely conscious anyway. I don't think I did.

But what interests me more in that prophecy is that it indicates an internal, even psychological dislocation, so that no matter where you turn, no matter what steps you take, it turns out badly. The Africans (the Nigerians of the religion of Ocha) have a way to talk about 'afflicted head', a head (ori) that is overheated, off-track, recklessly inclined, unlucky. In that condition all choices are usually bad choices, and the being itself creates his own misfortune. The 'doctor' has to act on the head, to straighten the crossed wires, to cool the head, so that it can think and act right.

Well, Jesus said something similar, that "in that day" (after death? Judgement day?) people would call him Lord, Lord, but he would say, "I never knew you." It's true, that many who think they are followers are not, and do not know it and can't see it. So perhaps you are right that the passage is a condemnation of self-righeousness.

Ryan Rudolph wrote:I think both of you are unclear about what humility means - Humility doesn’t involve tricking yourself into believing that you’re not conscious, when you are, its about being open to the possibility of being in error, open to possibilities that are beyond your perception, open to the fact that you do not have all the answers, open to being patient with other minds, and open and accepting of your own physical/mental limitations in general.

Can Carl and I go now, Dad?

Carl, will you permit me a few quotations of Jorge Luis Borges?
_____________________________________________________

I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library.
---Poema de los Dones, from El Hacedor

A man sets out to draw the world. As the years go by, he peoples a space with images of provinces, kingdoms, mountains, bays, ships, islands, fishes, rooms, instruments, stars, horses, and individuals. A short time before he dies, he discovers that the patient labyrinth of lines traces the lineaments of his own face.
---Afterword to El hacedor, 1960

It may be that universal history is the history of the different intonations given a handful of metaphors.
---Essay: "The Fearful Sphere of Pascal"

The composition of vast books is a laborious and impoverishing extravagance. To go on for five hundred pages developing an idea whose perfect oral exposition is possible in a few minutes! A better course of procedure is to pretend that these books already exist, and then to offer a resume, a commentary . . . More reasonable, more inept, more indolent, I have preferred to write notes upon imaginary books.
---10 November 1941

Any time something is written against me, I not only share the sentiment but feel I could do the job far better myself. Perhaps I should advise would-be enemies to send me their grievances beforehand, with full assurance that they will receive my every aid and support. I have even secretly longed to write, under a pen name, a merciless tirade against myself.
---Autobiographical essay 1970

Alex Jacob wrote:Carl, will you permit me a few quotations of Jorge Luis Borges?

By all means, and I hope you will indulge me a few from Victor Borge!
_________________________________________________________


"(Referring to the piano's natural shape) Isn't it a shame when those big fat opera singers lean against the pianos and bend them?"

"I normally don't do requests. Unless, of course, I have been asked to do so."

"I'm going to play it with both hands so it will end faster."

"I'd like to thank my parents for making this night possible. And my children for making it necessary."

"One afternoon, when I was four years old, my father came home, and he found me in the living room in front of a roaring fire, which made him very angry. Because we didn't have a fireplace."

Anna,

"The beckonings of God are not foreign, for we all have the same inner compass."

When I said foreign in that context, I meant that it came from Palestine, which was certainly a foreign country to all the land West of it. Judeo-Christianity is and has been a huge imposition on the tribes of Europe, and their resistance to it, their getting out from under it, has been and I think still is a major issue.

"The gnostics have my sympathy".

There was a time I was interested in the Gnostics. I think that the so-called Gnostic teachings have been pretty politicized and those who represent them have certain angles they are working. At some point as I investigate Christianity I hope to look at their stuff again. Frankly, I am more interested right now in run-of-the-mill Christianity. Even 'conservative' Christianity. I am less interested in the more obscure, subjective understanding and more in an intelligible, sane, ethical and day-to-day Christianity.

"This bedrock is certainly needed, but instead people have been given an impossible and contradictory set of scribbles and dogmas that encourage us to remain lost in unclarity, which makes the illusory platform a hopeless labyrinth."

It sounds to me that you will or should simply abandon all of the bedrock and start all over again. The New Age is in fact doing something like that---selecting what they accept, suppressing what they don't, combining different traditions, and certainly softening all the harder edges.

AJ: If you were to ask me, today, what I thought Christianity was, I would say that it is the knowledge of having been chosen for a different fate.

Anna: This is its most disgusting aspect. Happily not all subscribe to it. Some believe in universal salvation.

I think you misunderstood. The Christian experience, the revelation, is very dramatic. It lifts one, in a way, out of the world. It separates one from the common direction. The Christian metaphysic describes a fleshy world over-rules by Satan, and the Christian path and revelation is a selection to live in accord with different values. The 'true' and 'sincere' Christians are often taking issue with the Christian herd and defining themselves as the small group following Christ.

"Don't let me change my heart
Keep me set apart
From all the plans they do pursue
And I, I don't mind the pain
Don't mind the driving rain
I know I will sustain
'Cause I believe in you." (Bob Dylan, I Believe in You)

"I think we can emphasize yet again, that most of the suffering of we humans is self imposed"

I agree. But I don't think the core vicissitudes of the 'material plane' will change. It is true that we can make life far more bearable, but there is a subtext of death and destruction, and I don't mean to be morbid, just realistic. And even though so much human suffering is 'self-imposed', we have no guarantee that humans will succeed in bringing all that to an end. Huge, disrupting circumstances may arise that will throw humankind back into more difficulty, and that may be 'par for the course' here. Also, things like running out of oil to run the machine, etc. The point I was raising is that the benevolent God who dreamed up all this (your God of goodness) chose a very harsh route to get from A to B. I merely said that the harshness of the Jewish God seemed to reflect that existential harshness.

"It so happens that it is an important topic for me, one that I embark on and will be continuing to embark on. I like getting a Jewish perspective because, quite frankly, my dislike of Jehovah could leave them in a bind or even be interpreted as antisemitism. Christians cling too tightly to the Old Testament, but at least they could more conceivably let it go without major loss. In fact, with joyful gain..."

I have a feeling you have a pretty prejudiced outlook to start with. There are different aspects to it, one is that it seems to express, in newer terms perhaps, the basic and very old prejudices against Jews, Jewish theology, Jewish concepts. To round-out your perspective I'd recommend reading some Jewish authors, and especially the Jewish perspective on the Christian ideational war against Judaism.

"Alex this is a myth".

That is true. Still, all myths reflect truths in some degree. A myth that one chooses to live by is a 'story' that molds one. Jews have stuck with a detailed and specific story, and many different results come out of that. You seem to want to look at it all very harshly and with contempt, but obviously this is not my perspective. I don't think that animus serves anyone well.

"It is an interesting question, in what ways is Christianity a continuation, and in what ways a sharp break?"

As usual, it is always a mixed bag, and it seems to me the more one looks at the issue, the more confusing it gets. The simple narrative would be to look at things in black and white. It is infinitely harder to sort through the gray areas. Obviously, Christianity represents a desire for a universal outreach, an opening up of Judaism. The first converts and the first Church organizers were strict Jews. Christianity, at the origin, was a Jewish movement. It is important not to forget that it seems to me.

"It needen't be so hard, but maybe you kind of like the Jewish hair-splitting, and that's fine!"

It is extremely hard to define ethics and to live them. You are confusing Pharisaic hair-splitting of points of law with a far more grand Universal Code of Law.

"How has it become an issue for the planet?"

The marriage between Roman law and Christian ethics has led to an international consciousness, so the whole world has been influenced, extremely so, by these traditions.

"You seem to be assuming that without Torah the world descends into lawlessness."

But what I said was different. In some senses the former Christian countries are attempting, and succeeding, in throwing off the imposition of Christian morality and ethics. When the structure that defines and maintains the law---I would not have used the word 'Torah' but rather ethical and moral constructs---is weakened or cast aside, things do indeed descend into lawlessness. When I say that I have in my mind, for example, the civil discord in Colombia, and a general impression of cultural trends in the US.

My personal opinion right now is that a tremendous amount of 'goodness', as you say, is lost as our own culture moves away from a solid, community, social Christian observance. If I say that it doesn't mean that I am suggesting Focus on the Family-type value-structures, or Christian narrow-minded right-wing conservatism, but only a longing for a focus on and involvement with the core Judeo-Christian 'spirit'. I see the Obama-movement, in fact, as being essentially Christian with many of its better features.

Alex,

**When you say Judeo-christianity has been a huge imposition on the tribes of Europe, I suspect I have a very different paradigm. Generally, I think 'civilization' has come with such detriment, that it is in fact a prime suspect for what the story of Genesis meant by the fall. You really should read Daniel Quinn's "Ishmael." One reason is that the earliest writings of the OT are from very primitive times and Quinn thinks that they are a recording of precivilized people coming into contact with the always-murderous and greedy 'civilized.' In this sense, I am sure that Judeo-Christianity is an imposition upon any tribe. On the other hand, as some American Indian chiefs are on record as noting, their way of life was already Christian and Jesus seemed quite like one of them. Unfortunately, his followers left them cold.

You contain contradictions, surprisingly conservative at times, and you are quite attracted to Christianity. But Christianity as I see it is a 180 from, at least, certain aspects of Judaism, or of Torah and prophets, or of the understanding that they gave rise to. I realize it is difficult to do, but many of your sentences contain ideas which, if you fully explained what you have in mind, would take at least one book. Yet I wonder what you really see as being Judaism, why you see it as an ethical system, and in what way you use the phrase JudeoChristianity.

Here is what I think Jesus tried to do: He tried to take people like yourself, who are constitutionally unable to re-evaluate Judaism, and he tried to use a few indirect ways of uplifting them out of the terrible spiritual morass they were in. Instead, for the most part, the Christians got stuck in it too.

**I have read two gnostics, one author now regrets what he wrote. The other is Elaine Pagels. When I read the historic words of gnostics I recognize their wisdom and I recognize them as being essentially my brothers, and that they have had the same experience I have. Nonetheless, they contain a fundamental spiritual error, which I did not know about when I read Pagels. And that error is the belief that this world is fundamentally evil and that the Supreme God has nothing to do with it. But I can certainly sympathize with those who come to this conclusion. However, Buddhism and Hinduism surpass it in wisdom.

I can't imagine why someone like you would be interested in run-of-the-mill and/or conservative Christianity.

It sounds to me that you will or should simply abandon all of the bedrock and start all over again.

But you had spoken of a bedrock of truth. Whereas Christianity's errors arise largely from embellishment beyond all recognition. Plus, it arises from most of its famous writers having no real spiritual contact themselves. People such as Aquinas and Augustine.

I think you misunderstood. The Christian experience, the revelation, is very dramatic. It lifts one, in a way, out of the world. It separates one from the common direction. The Christian metaphysic describes a fleshy world over-ruled by Satan, and the Christian path and revelation is a selection to live in accord with different values. The 'true' and 'sincere' Christians are often taking issue with the Christian herd and defining themselves as the small group following Christ.

But the problem is Christians have not lived by those values, those values which are for everyone, because Christian theology has prevented it. You can't teach love and hate, forgiveness and unforgiveness, universal compassion and hardness of heart simultaneously, to any good effect.

The point I was raising is that the benevolent God who dreamed up all this (your God of goodness) chose a very harsh route to get from A to B. I merely said that the harshness of the Jewish God seemed to reflect that existential harshness.

The harshness of Jehovah in many places in the OT is no different, I was not exaggerating, than any other famous tyrant of history. He cared for war, and the spoils of war, and was murderously angry at disloyalty.

Perhaps he does reflect the existential harshness, the worst of it. But many people in this world, perhaps nearly all people, have not found it necessary to invent so harsh a God. In fact, nearly all hunter-gather or horticultural peoples think of this world as a bountiful place, a gift of God, just as did the Hebrew people in their most ancient description of life before the 'fall' (into civilization?) as a bountiful garden.

Our view of this place as harsh is also a reflection of our low spiritual state. It comes of the fear of death. Were we spiritually more connected, we would enjoy it far more and fear it far less.

I have a feeling you have a pretty prejudiced outlook to start with. There are different aspects to it, one is that it seems to express, in newer terms perhaps, the basic and very old prejudices against Jews, Jewish theology, Jewish concepts. To round-out your perspective I'd recommend reading some Jewish authors, and especially the Jewish perspective on the Christian ideational war against Judaism.

I can only repeat, and I want you to really think about this, that you must guard against being in a position where you cannot let go of certain ideas. I have no reason at all to be prejudiced. Many Christians recoil in horror at the Old Testament, and others justify it. It would be great for the whole thing to be coherent. Christians desperately want it to be coherent, for upon it rests the legitimacy of their own religion that arose from it. Why would I want to be prejudiced against Jews when my mother is Jewish? I have read at least one such good book, and found it most excellent, This is my God by Herman Wouk. Jews themselves are not spiritual dunces. But they, like Christians, have a chain around their necks - a dead old text from unknown sources and bad times in history, masquerading as spiritual, as coming from the creator of the universe.

Hear me: This has nothing to do with "Jews." They are human beings indistinguishable from all others. All are equal.

I am interested in good Jewish theology and concepts. They probably thought of it themselves, and didn't get it from the Bible.

Jews have stuck with a detailed and specific story, and many different results come out of that.

But what if the story is untrue? If we look at life from an enlightened perspective, with the aid of eastern religion, with the aid of our shamanistic experience, we see that individual people and entire cultures believe in stories and it is largely the difference between being 'conscious' and 'unconscious.' Like I wrote you in the PM, a certain person said to me that one of the early stages of waking up, of becoming conscious, of being ready for enlightenment, is the sense that things are not as they appear. Must the Jews, just to keep up their long track record, be condemned to remain unconscious?

Frankly, it would be a pretty grand story, if only the God were better!

And you know, I don't think the Jews would need to lose their story. I think they have gone through iterations in the past, such as being henotheistic originally, and they can move on. Undeniably, the Jews have a unique and odd story, a tribe going through civilizations, (which always obliterate tribal awareness,) never quite attaching to one or founding one - and not losing their tribal awareness!

It is extremely hard to define ethics and to live them. You are confusing Pharisaic hair-splitting of points of law with a far more grand Universal Code of Law.

Well, I am interested in that, in true Christianity, but laws in the higher understanding are not rigid.

In some senses the former Christian countries are attempting, and succeeding, in throwing off the imposition of Christian morality and ethics... things do indeed descend into lawlessness. When I say that I have in my mind, for example, the civil discord in Colombia, and a general impression of cultural trends in the US.

I have little understanding of almost anything in South America. As for here, yes, it might appear that way, and yet there is as much good as bad. What is bad is not specifically traceable to a loss of Christian ethics. There are sinister efforts afoot - Big Pharma is attempting to destroy the health of the nation and is now targeting children, as just one example, and it is all about greed. Perhaps power as well in some cases. But Christians are not particularly astute about these things, nor are they particularly averse to unfettered capitalism. I will agree that unfettered capitalism is an evil, yet many Christians participate in it and praise it.

but only a longing for a focus on and involvement with the core Judeo-Christian 'spirit'. I see the Obama-movement, in fact, as being essentially Christian with many of its better features.

Well, let us define then, what those values really are.

I'm glad you like Obama. I cannot help liking him, and I had become so jaded that I was not going to vote at all. Not that there is all that much hope for him, but all the other candidates, including Hillary, are not human but ghouls.

"When you say Judeo-christianity has been a huge imposition on the tribes of Europe, I suspect I have a very different paradigm. Generally, I think 'civilization' has come with such detriment"

I understand what you are getting at, what you are describing. The process of conquest and reconquest is so much a part of experience in that part of the world that it sort of becomes moot. Surely it wasn't the Jews or the Christians who started it. When I spoke of the tribes of Europe wishing to throw off the Judeo-Christian yoke I meant predominantly the (imposed) yoke of Judeo-Christian morality and ethics that came with the civilizing process. I am aware of some 'pagan' perspectives (modern so-called 'pagans') who decry the whole civilization process and long romantically for some pre-conquest Golden Age, but I sort of dismiss them. Personally, I think there is something very high in Judeo-Christian ethics that should not be dismissed. But I know there are all sorts of contentions about this.

"Here is what I think Jesus tried to do: He tried to take people like yourself, who are constitutionally unable to re-evaluate Judaism, and he tried to use a few indirect ways of uplifting them out of the terrible spiritual morass they were in. Instead, for the most part, the Christians got stuck in it too."

The Judaism that I am familiar with, my dear, is in many ways very much more sophisticated than its Christian counterpart I'll have you know. When you say 'constitutionally incapable' are you imagining me some as some Jew, say, some Apostle tried to convert who closed his ears to his entreaties? I think you are pretty ensconced in the typicalness of the narratives as they exist (open-hearted Christian going so far out of her way to influence the cold-hearted, miserly Jew). You are unaware, it would seem, how to Jewish ears the name of 'Jesus' is associated with all the worst Gentile qualities. Christianity was a schizm within Judaism that got very much out of hand. It is a very, very complex issue why that happened and what it means...

Anyway, I am interested in the pre-Christian religions that created the matrix that Jesus came out of. I don't know a great deal but the Essenes may be that link, or people like them. The Teacher of Righteousness, etc.

"Nonetheless, they contain a fundamental spiritual error, which I did not know about when I read Pagels. And that error is the belief that this world is fundamentally evil and that the Supreme God has nothing to do with it."

It is a question of metaphor and emphasis. The Vaishnavas say something similar, yet they propose a way to move toward Godhead interiorly. I can see the 'truth' in the Gnostic idea, but one needs a holistic spiritual philosophy to function in this world.

"I can't imagine why someone like you would be interested in run-of-the-mill and/or conservative Christianity."

It's because I am interested in what can be practicable for average, honest citizens. When I go back down to South America I will likely find some Christian groups to help. You have to work with what you've got, and with how things are.

I am interested in Obama's Christianity, for example, because it is going to have a big impact on the world. I am also interested in the Christian Right not because I share their values, yet I do some of them. Or, put another way, I know what they are thinking and feeling, and the deep distrust they feel for 'modern trends'. Please remember, my general view of history is a tragic view. I don't require that everything work out perfectly. More often than not things end badly. But it is the interior effort that counts, in my way of seeing things.

"But the problem is Christians have not lived by those values, those values which are for everyone, because Christian theology has prevented it."

In what way?

I don't know. I am reading some very sophisticated (IMO) Christian theology right now which I think is very worthy. (For example William Temple, Archbishop of York, 1930s). I think that people try to do what they can but the nature of the 'field' is so difficult that they don't achieve much. But that doesn't matter. There are infinite levels within Christian thinking, from the street level to the highest levels.

"The harshness of Jehovah in many places in the OT is no different, I was not exaggerating, than any other famous tyrant of history. He cared for war, and the spoils of war, and was murderously angry at disloyalty."

You are looking at it, perhaps, incorrectly or inefficiently. Maybe the thing to focus on is that the God-Idea arises and to focus on that. There are very sophisticated aspects, for instance, to the Prophets. But, for Christians, it is 'crowned' by the advent of Jesus, and with this piece the whole begins to make sense. If you see your 'Jehovah' as a static thing, I can see why 'he' bothers you.

"Christians desperately want it to be coherent, for upon it rests the legitimacy of their own religion that arose from it."

It is pretty coherent if it is looked upon as a 'spiritual journey' by a people who 'took notes'...

Hi Alex,

I understand what you are getting at, what you are describing. The process of conquest and reconquest is so much a part of experience in that part of the world that it sort of becomes moot. Surely it wasn't the Jews or the Christians who started it.

Absolutely not. Lao Tzu bemoans the very same things that civilization brings: "When the great Tao is lost, morality and piety appear."
In fact the Cain and Abel story may be the allegorized account of a hunter-gatherer tribal people meeting up with the agricultural, civilized and more murderous people. The lost innocence.

I am aware of some 'pagan' perspectives (modern so-called 'pagans') who decry the whole civilization process and long romantically for some pre-conquest Golden Age, but I sort of dismiss them.

I don't.

When I spoke of the tribes of Europe wishing to throw off the Judeo-Christian yoke I meant predominantly the (imposed) yoke of Judeo-Christian morality and ethics that came with the civilizing process.

What, slavery? War? Denigration of women? A priesthood that lords over the people and fills them with fear?

Personally, I think there is something very high in Judeo-Christian ethics that should not be dismissed. But I know there are all sorts of contentions about this.

This is what I want you to tell me. What are these high things and why would I dismiss them? I do not dismiss high things.

The Judaism that I am familiar with, my dear, is in many ways very much more sophisticated than its Christian counterpart I'll have you know.

Some of it probably is...why not tell me a little about it.

When you say 'constitutionally incapable' are you imagining me some as some Jew, say, some Apostle tried to convert who closed his ears to his entreaties?

Oh, no, no, no. I rather think you are a modern American Jewish person who finds it difficult to really reexamine Judaism in the light of modern ideas and modern spiritual understanding, and see if perhaps some real problems might be uncovered, or solved.

I think you are pretty ensconced in the typicalness of the narratives as they exist (open-hearted Christian going so far out of her way to influence the cold-hearted, miserly Jew).

I do not and have never found Jews cold-hearted, miserly, or difficult to do business with. Nor do I consider Christians to have a decent, let alone exemplary record of open-heartedness.
I look at it like this. Person A caught the flu from an unknown source a long time ago. Person A gave the flu to person B, who gave it to me. Should I regard person A as guilty of passing the flu to B? Is A more fundamentally unhealthy than person B?

You are unaware, it would seem, how to Jewish ears the name of 'Jesus' is associated with all the worst Gentile qualities.

You think I was born yesterday?

I am interested in Obama's Christianity, for example, because it is going to have a big impact on the world. I am also interested in the Christian Right not because I share their values, yet I do some of them. Or, put another way, I know what they are thinking and feeling, and the deep distrust they feel for 'modern trends'.

Yes, no one is wrong all the time. Sometimes they are more sane than the liberals. I have high hopes for Obama...we'll see.

"But the problem is Christians have not lived by those values, those values which are for everyone, because Christian theology has prevented it."

In what way?

I did enumerate it. Jesus teaches forgiveness, but Christianity teaches that the Father never will forgive, but only accepts payment. Of course, the eastern church does not teach this and considers it an abomination, but who knows that?
Jesus teaches total compassion, but Christianity teaches the ability to have hardness of heart, and that the the Father will have hardness of heart. Maybe Jesus too. Why learn compassion, when we will only leave it behind in the afterlife? In fact, if we learn it in this life, we will break our own hearts.

You are looking at it, perhaps, incorrectly or inefficiently. Maybe the thing to focus on is that the God-Idea arises and to focus on that. There are very sophisticated aspects, for instance, to the Prophets. But, for Christians, it is 'crowned' by the advent of Jesus, and with this piece the whole begins to make sense. If you see your 'Jehovah' as a static thing, I can see why 'he' bothers you.

But the supposition that monotheism, for example, was brought to the west by the Hebrews, is false. The simplest people almost always believe in a supreme creator, and certain places, the civilized Mediterranean especially, devolved into a belief in polytheism, and even competing gods. There are no humans that I am aware of on the planet who do not have the God idea, and we are not at all dependent upon Jehovah and his antics as a warlord for that God idea. We do not have to have poison in the ointment! The medicine of spirituality is not bitter! We can safely reevaluate the negative aspects of our religions which have befuddled humanity and held us back, without any loss of God whatsoever.

This is my whole point, and I wonder that you read my previous post and seem to have misunderstood me so badly. But that's OK. I don't mind clarifying.

Nor do I deny that there are some sophisticated and wonderful things spoken by the prophets.

Now, as for Jehovah being static - if he is the creator of the universe, then of course he is static "In whom is no change nor shadow of variation."

However, he is no such thing and that is why he is not even moral or ethical or particularly nice. If by not being static, you consider him a projection of the spiritual development of a people through time, well, then what are we to do about the many millions who think the words of a misanthropist despot in an old and very obscure book are the very words of God?

I don't have the impression that this conversation is going to avail us of too much. I get the impression that I am running into certain idees fixes of yours, that differ from my own idees semi-fixes.

Whatever Lao Tzu may have meant, and even if it is true, will not do any of us any good. All human culture, by his definition, is a deviation from 'the Tao'. It only gets worse when men engage in war and social conflict. Lao Tzu's idea, it would seem, must have some other function. Most likely that function is for an individual in his-her meditations. I don't think that we can recover lost innocence, not on a grand social level. We are forced to work with ethics and morals and laws within imperfect structures. Isn't this absolutely clear? Lao Tzu, in this context, is not really relevant. Except if you want and need to pathologize the Old Testament. There are millions of people who will participate with you on this project. There are throngs of sensitive neo-hippies, New Agers, Buddhists, Pagans who have clear 'talking points' about this. Personally, I don't see the utility in it.

"What, slavery? War? Denigration of women? A priesthood that lords over the people and fills them with fear?"

You come back to the point where, it would seem, you absolutely MUST make a complete break from the Old Testament and any archaic idea of God. I am guessing that all human accomplishment in all fields will need to be seen as tainted, and you will have to reject all of it. A new society will be born when we start from a clear slate.

Judeo-Christianity, as far as I know, is part of the reason why slavery, denigration of women, and a priesthood that lords it over people, is on its way out. I read a very clear essay by an old-school evangelical Protestant (1920s) in which he clearly stated that any and all priests and priesthoods need to be continually and carefully watched and critiqued, since they are essentially untrustworthy. A 'religion of the spirit' allows this: a personal relationship with God, a personal experience.

"This is what I want you to tell me. What are these high things and why would I dismiss them? I do not dismiss high things."

All the religious traditions, including the Bhagavad Gita and I assume Buddhist scripture, arise from an imperfect and even 'oppressive' social structure. This is just a fact. But because this is so does not mean that we throw these scriptures on the bonfire. 'High' things are always mixed in with 'low' things. This is just basic, Anna. We have to go through it and select what our conscience tells us is 'high'. You do that and you come to your conclusions, the same is true for me. To me, the Old Testament is filled with supreme treasures, from the Psalms to the Prophets, from Ecclesiastes to Job to The Song of Solomon.

As to finding out what in the Rabbinical tradition, in traditional Judaism, is valuable and relevant, you'll have to do that on your own. I always liked the writings of Abraham J Heschel.

"I rather think you are a modern American Jewish person who finds it difficult to really reexamine Judaism in the light of modern ideas and modern spiritual understanding, and see if perhaps some real problems might be uncovered, or solved."

Do Jews of other nationalities have an easier time with it? ;-)

I think you don't really know enough about me or my thinking to make any definitive statements. Also, I think that you may operate within a structure of ideas---about Jews, the Bible, Judaism and the Christian-Jewish conflict---that might need to be examined and sorted out. I have done a great deal of this, according to me, and am at a point where I can approach Christianity from a 'new' perspective. I might be a little farther ahead than you, eh? ;-)

But, I am not against hearing what you think needs to be 'uncovered' and 'solved'.

"I do not and have never found Jews cold-hearted, miserly, or difficult to do business with".

Well, Jews are known as having certain avaricious tendencies, and wherever they have lived they have pretty much always been known to be focused on money, material wealth, etc. Kings and princes have always made use of Jews in running their states and they are a people one can depend on. They have also relied on Jews to build prosperous communities and to contribute wealth to the state. And they have often thrown them out for having gotten too powerful and stepped on toes.

As with so many things in life, Jewish materialism has both desirable and undesirable aspects. Personally, I think it is 'wise' to keep focused on the two poles of human life: economy and theology. One being the material base and relationship, and the other the divine base and relationship.

"Nor do I consider Christians to have a decent, let alone exemplary record of open-heartedness."

Oh God, yes. They are the WORST! Maybe its the diet of mayonnaise and white-bread? ;-)

"I did enumerate it. Jesus teaches forgiveness, but Christianity teaches that the Father never will forgive, but only accepts payment. Of course, the eastern church does not teach this and considers it an abomination, but who knows that?
Jesus teaches total compassion, but Christianity teaches the ability to have hardness of heart, and that the the Father will have hardness of heart. Maybe Jesus too. Why learn compassion, when we will only leave it behind in the afterlife? In fact, if we learn it in this life, we will break our own hearts."

There are dozens of different 'Christianities', you cannot speak that generally.

Hmmmm. In a sense the 'Father' cannot ever 'forgive'. There can be local 'forgiveness' but you cannot, I don't think, change the overarching facts upon which existence is constructed (in this moral sense). First of course you have to arrive at a definition of 'sin', but once you have it, there are things you are well-advised not to do. If you still do them, you are going to have to pay the price. 'Confession' is to unburden oneself, to untie a knot, to release. The most intricate part of spiritual life is the way that we keep sinning and repenting, and as long as we have not given up, the whole process is still meaningful, valid. But if one gives oneself over to 'sin', one burrows into regions from which it is hard to extricate oneself. No amount of 'forgiveness' is going to change that. 'Forgiveness' might say, 'Okay, you've seen the error, now you can return', but it cannot violate the core moral laws which will always operate.

I think there are intricacies to this issue that you are not admitting. If it were possible to 'wash someone's sins away', and I personally think that it is possible for a person to have a lightning flash of awareness where there is realization of 'forgiveness', still one has hard, moral work to accomplish resulting from that awareness. In that sense the 'father' is completely unforgiving. You do or you do not, there is no half-measure.

"The medicine of spirituality is not bitter! We can safely reevaluate the negative aspects of our religions which have befuddled humanity and held us back, without any loss of God whatsoever"

In my opinion, that work has been done in the persons who have done that inner work, but not necessarily having abandoned the tradition or any individual scripture. One has to look to those individuals and emulate them. I have always admired H. Hesse, or some of the Christian theologians. I admire the Russian writers, especially Vladimir Korolenko---all-time my fave---for his application of Christian values, his deep awareness of human suffering, the way his 'Christian' love is expressed. What kind of crazy nonsense are you spouting to imply that 'Christianity' has done none of this work? I could cite dozens---thousands!---of examples where values are expressed successfully.

The whole culture is dripping with these values. They always stand before us. The best that we ever do is when we make choices to apply them.

Anna wrote:"A God" could be any sort of entity. The God who is good and ethical does not engage in the use of force and threats and capital punishment

The second sentence contradicts the first.

The god of this universe does not single out a particular people and tell them that they must worship by force.

Which universe are you living in?

Anna's World, the land of loopy religionists? Seriously, you sound like someone playing with dolls. Big Teddy Bear is Biggest God, and tells all the smaller toys what to do - the bendable rubber Pinocchio, Xmen action men, Woody the cowboy, paper irigame dolls, matchbox cars, and fluffy trolls that stick on the ends of pencils. And of course, the little child tells God-Bear all the rules.

Alex,

I agree that we cannot go back to the precivilized world, but we were trying to understand something of our past and how we got here.

In the end, it seems to me on important questions I have asked, you have skipped addressing. It's not the good stuff in the Old Testament I'm worried about, but the conclusions that millions of people in many generations have come to which is based on the idea that it was dictated by an individual persona who is also the one God, when much of it is obviously unworthy of being so considered, and this pushes them to justify it. This has caused them to stop expecting God to be a shining example and instead to say that God can do whatever he wants, whether we may do likewise or not.

Judeo-Christianity, as far as I know, is part of the reason why slavery, denigration of women, and a priesthood that lords it over people, is on its way out. I read a very clear essay by an old-school evangelical Protestant (1920s) in which he clearly stated that any and all priests and priesthoods need to be continually and carefully watched and critiqued, since they are essentially untrustworthy. A 'religion of the spirit' allows this: a personal relationship with God, a personal experience.

See, where you give credit to Judeo-Christianity, I give credit to the human spirit and the upwelling of innate wisdom and freedom. The priesthood killed people, in OT times and in NT times. I think that Jesus started a movement of direct experience of God. What happened? 15 centuries later humans rebelled and said, enough! And you know what, this is the ONE thing I truly give Protestantism credit for. They just haven't taken it far enough.

I am not speaking of throwing scriptures on the bonfire, but of examining them critically. Tell me if you think it would be a good idea for Islam to critically and honestly examine the Koran to see whether it is reasonable to suppose that its exact copy, in Arabic, lies at the throne of God in heaven given the many errors, inconsistencies, grammatical problems, borrowings from other scriptures and so forth?

'High' things are always mixed in with 'low' things. This is just basic, Anna.

what has made people so afraid, paralyzed their minds, that they accept this without cleaning it up?

As to finding out what in the Rabbinical tradition, in traditional Judaism, is valuable and relevant, you'll have to do that on your own.

You are unwilling to make your case. I do appreciate its difficulty, being a large topic. But it would be nice to know the nuts and bolts of your assertions.

I have done a great deal of this, according to me, and am at a point where I can approach Christianity from a 'new' perspective. I might be a little farther ahead than you, eh? ;-)

You have come very far indeed and I greatly admire it, but I have come much further than you know. We have very different approaches.

But, I am not against hearing what you think needs to be 'uncovered' and 'solved'.

I keep telling you! The two main problems in Christianity, which I think the others may hinge upon, and which arise in part due to bad biblical books or parts of books, are the idea that people could go to hell for eternity, and that, as Billy Graham put it, "God demanded a death." (As payment) Both are fathomlessly damaging. They destroy Christianity.

Jews may or may not have been avaricious, or taken advantage of situations, and it may be that the string pullers of the world such as international bankers are largely Jewish - but I do not consider that a fair reflection of every day Jewish people. At any rate, I have not had negative experiences in this life and time.

Hmmmm. In a sense the 'Father' cannot ever 'forgive'. There can be local 'forgiveness' but you cannot, I don't think, change the overarching facts upon which existence is constructed (in this moral sense). First of course you have to arrive at a definition of 'sin', but once you have it, there are things you are well-advised not to do. If you still do them, you are going to have to pay the price. 'Confession' is to unburden oneself, to untie a knot, to release. The most intricate part of spiritual life is the way that we keep sinning and repenting, and as long as we have not given up, the whole process is still meaningful, valid. But if one gives oneself over to 'sin', one burrows into regions from which it is hard to extricate oneself. No amount of 'forgiveness' is going to change that. 'Forgiveness' might say, 'Okay, you've seen the error, now you can return', but it cannot violate the core moral laws which will always operate.

You misunderstand. The law of karma is inviolable. And no one comes to the father until they are forgiven. And no one is forgiven until they forgive. Yet there is no sin, all are innocent, and forgiven from the beginning of all time. Confession is a useful part of that process. Yes, it can be difficult to extricate oneself from situations that one has gotten oneself into. Hell is voluntary. But an angry and offended God who punishes eternally? For finite offenses? Who is wounded by people who don't believe in him? This is a horse of a very different color.

In my opinion, that work has been done in the persons who have done that inner work, but not necessarily having abandoned the tradition or any individual scripture. What kind of crazy nonsense are you spouting to imply that 'Christianity' has done none of this work? I could cite dozens---thousands!---of examples where values are expressed successfully.

Yes, many people make progress despite their religion, and partly with its help. A very motivated person can become a spiritual great despite not really leaving behind the dogma, although there is good evidence that many, many of them do indeed abandon the rigidity and understand things in their own way. It sort of goes with the territory.

And, I think the ideals of Christianity are excellent. It's the flies in the ointment I want done away with, so that the profundity of it can actually sink in. Teaching a God that any reasonable heart would hate and fear sort of precludes learning to love God with all ones mind and heart, does it not?

Anna, your entire argument rests on the premise that there even is such a thing as a God. You don't even bother proving it. Seriously, what is the point of your long discussion with Alex?

"It may be that universal history is the history of the different intonations given a handful of metaphors."

---Jorge Luis Borges. Essay: "The Fearful Sphere of Pascal"

Alex, do you think what you write here is clever, or amusing in any way?

I for one don't find it as such, and I know what humour is. You are not it.

Alex Jacob wrote:"It may be that universal history is the history of the different intonations given a handful of metaphors."

Many of them were false, and squeaky in pitch.