by megs 15 Replies latest watchtower beliefs
Okayyy... Even when I believed in God, I never believed that "satan" was going around influencing us lowly humans... I mean, what's the point? Humans are well able to mess up on our own, without the hand of satan. Conversely, we are able to do good things on our own, without the hand of God.
Who here believes that satan has a hand in things? Please give evidence to support your assertion.
Thank you
megs, you really don't believe that Satan walks around like a roaring lion seeking to devour someone?
Seriously, I am more and more leaning toward the belief that Satan is the push to God's pull and vice versa. There can be no action without duality.
Actually, I don't believe in Satan at all... Or God... I took off the blinders of cognitive-dissonance...
Religions that stem from the talking snake story in Genesis, promotethe equally strange story that we humans are constantly being "tempted" by unseen evil supernatural forces. Talk about recipe for paranoia and blurring the line between personal responsibility and blaming other factors ("But your Honor, the Devil made me do it!")
As you nicely say, We humans are quite capable of messing things up by ourselves without seeking explanations from "unseen" supernatural forces. Besides, blaming a third party becomes a cop out for taking personal responsibility for our behaviour. It is sad that many people go through life blaming the Devil for the bad experiences and praising God for the good, when the universe just grinds on in its own perpetual obliviousness to unseen influential forces, good or bad.
When you are pulled to do something you intuitively know is immoral or unethical, and you give in to that temptation, that is Satan. Does that mean he is an entity. No. Does that mean a force of wills between what you know is right and what you know is wrong is taking place? Yes. Is there an Intelligence behind this "dance", I think so. How can evolution take place if there is no choice between what is good for you and what is not?
The evolution of humanity is the result of history... trial and error over thousands of years. It has nothing to do with good or evil. One could argue that we have hardly evolved at all...
I'm not using "good" and "evil" as religion would explain it. Evolution of humanity has taken place on many levels...physically, mentally, spiritually (body, mind, spirit). Each individual makes choices daily and it is these collective choices that move us along the evolutionary path.
When you are pulled to do something you intuitively know is immoral or unethical, and you give in to that temptation, that is Satan.
If you're speaking metaphorically, cool. Even so, from where comes our human preoccupation with explaining our behaviour by means of external factors?
Again, why not just say, "I'm feeling an urge to do something that I intuitively know is immoral or unethical so I'd better exercise some self-control and remind myself of my values".
Now, that's fair and square taking responsibility for one's behaviour, instead of poetically clouding the issue by invoking a third party.
:Who here believes that satan has a hand in things?
:Please give evidence to support your assertion.
The Watchtower Printing Corporation.
Farkel
JW Pet peeve of mine of mine: How much Satan really influences us.
My take was that the GB for whatever reason was never quite comfortable giving to much "credit" on bad things happening to Satan, because it seems it would be easier to get out of not going in FS or to the meetings. Hell, an angel of Satan stopped a(good) angel in the book of Daniel, surely he can stop us....
Satan is the straw man. What Satan represents is to me far more fascinating. Satan represents the freedom to think on our own, make up our own mind, and reject the priesthood that invented "god." To scare people from thinking for themselves, you have to personify independant thought. Enter Satan, stage right.
