What GOD says about US.

by Blueblades 14 Replies latest jw friends

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  Eyebrow2

  I had to settle for the Tao of Pooh
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  Francois

  One more note on The Tao Te Ching for you, Blue. Since Chinese thought is represented by pictograph and the language itself is tonal, it is particularly hard to translate into English. The result is that each person who translates from Chinese to English can put a different connotation on any given word or phrase and still be considered "correct."

  For instance, one of the original translations of a particular phrase was kept to its pictoral simplicity and came out: "Tao not Tao." Fuller translations of the subject phrase is one of my favorites: "The Tao you can name is not the eternal Tao." (BTW, that word is pronounced "dow")

  I point this out because, for me at least, it has been necessary to read several translations of the Tao Te Ching, comparing the translations, to come up with my own intuitive feelings about what it is saying. I suppose I've read 6 or 7 of the hundred or more translations available. And each time I read a different translation, I feel I understand a little bit more of what is being said.

  Hope that info is helpful to you.

  francois
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  Introspection

  Francois, why don't you just learn the Chinese language and get it over with? Seriously though, it is cool to read it in the original language - the feeling tone it conveys is similar to the sudden sound produced when the zen master strikes with the stick, or in some cases like back in the day - a slipper. (even if you don't get struck the sound is always striking) Of course, that's no guarantee of understanding - lots of Chinese people can make no sense of the TTC. But what I've found with people who have to really put in the effort to learn something - not just a foreign language but generally speaking just a way of thinking - is that when they get it they really get it. As you know, though, it is not about a way of thinking per se, but having those simple ideas encapsulated (they themselves summing up what might be less accurately described with many more words) in a few rhyming syllables just kind of propels you to that silent space where there's nothing, or where the thoughts come from.
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  SYN

  Two thousand years? I don't personally believe that God has ever uttered a single word to anyone on this planet at any time since the beginning of man (although I think it's possible he might have conversed with Jesus late in his life here).

  Well now, this is the same belief as mine, except I was reframing my thoughts into the standard Christian mindset especially for owner of this thread

  Think about it. Any time any thing happened on this planet which primitive man didn't understand, which was frequent, primitive man attributed whatever it was to God, when in fact it was man's own imagination, or it was an angel or some other phenomena. Again, I don't believe that God has ever had a conversation with any mortal man...ever. Including Abram, Moses, David or anyone else.

  Yep. Apparently a rather large chunk of rock impacted in what is now Iraq (i.e. near "Ur") about 4000 years ago. Interesting, eh? That would certainly have raised comment amongst the people there. It's not the sort of thing you forget easily, no matter how primitive you are.

  I do believe the Divine Will was somehow abrogated on this planet, and not by man, but by some sort of cosmic planetary authority gone bad of his own freewill choosing. This abrogation has caused untold problems on this planet not the least of which is our lack of a supreme and final spiritual authority on earth, resulting in a plethora of different "only true" Gods, and "one true" religions. Additionally, I believe it has caused us to be spiritually and even physically quarantined from all other life in the universe ever since. However, NONE OF THIS is our fault, it is chargable to whoever the planetary authority was that allowed the Divine Will to be abrogated in the first place.

  Hmm, I don't really have any comment on this. Well, not at this time of the morning anyway.

  I think, I believe, that the Universe of Universes TEEMS with life, that it is just lousy with planets, and all those dodecahillions of planets are absolutely crawling with life; life of every conceivable type and style, life as we have never conceived of it; life in each and all stages of animal and spiritual evolution; life everywhere struggling with the same invitation/command, "Be you perfect as your Father in Heaven in perfect." And the spiritual and cosmic economy of each of these planets is directed by its own assemblage of spirit and spiritual helpers whose job is it to assist in guiding us in the proper direction. It's the only thing that makes sense.

  What about parallel evolution? Even if the Universe was teeming with life, would we recognize it as such? Maybe we'd encounter intelligent gas clouds on Jupiter (ala Arthurt C. Clarke), and we'd fly right through them, killing scores, and not even realize it. Continuing this line of thought, we may in fact share Earth with other intelligent creatures, possibly even more intelligent than we are, but we just don't realize that they exist. So in all likelihood, if we ever encountered intelligent life, we wouldn't understand it anyway. I mean, do we understand the minds of our very close cousins, the cetaceans? Nope. And look how many chromosomes they share with us! This also brings us to the Berserker analogy, in which a form of intelligent life becomes so powerful that it rapidly wipes out every form of non-Berserker life in the Universe. This is pretty close to what we're poised to become, provided Singularity and/or budget deficits don't interrupt our space exploration programs (which is becoming increasingly likely with every minute that passes, unfortunately).

  However, as stated, someone of and in authority on our world screwed the Moose as they say in Upper British Columbia, and all our spirit connections that we could be directly aware of were broken. And just as soon as whatever it was that was broken is repaired, we will again be welcome in the cosmic streams of communication with other planets. Right now, however, and for ages, we have been that proverbial "bad apple."

  Perhaps. But would we understand what "they" are talking about? Would they even recognize us as intelligent at all? Would the term "they" even apply to "them"? These are all human terms, and by neccessity most intelligent life forms (if they exist) would be so inutterably ALIEN to us that there'd be no hope, really. What do you think about that?

  I also believe (since you asked, hehehe) that the role of the Master was not to win us back the affection of an offended Lord, or to die a grisly death to make up for our screw ups that we inherited from "Adam & Eve" (which is nothing but a pleasing fable designed for primitive, illiterate, savage ears). Jesus was here for a number of other reasons which included a) showing God to Man; showing Man to God; and showing Man to Himself, b) to illuminate The Way of spirit progression to man, and c) to begin putting aright whatever it was that got screwed up at the beginning of the evolution of sentient life here so that we can and will be spiritually and socially fragrant to the rest of creation once again...and not dangerous to them, either.

  Humanity cannot be made "undangerous" or "safe", cosmically speaking, without removing the essentially human bits of humanity. This is a sad truth. However, it all makes sense if you look at humanity as a sort of a womb for whatever comes next, if you will. Imagine us as being the progenitors of a new form of intelligence, machine intelligence, then everything fits into place. Earth has finally grown Herself a nervous system, and now she is in her final birth pangs, to borrow phrases from Olde English. It's actually pretty scary. And remember, mothers go through great "tribulation" in order to give birth, and it looks like Earth pretty much is going through the same thing right now. Perhaps the funniest part is that we couldn't possibly stop it if we tried! We have all been removed to the vantage point of complacent observers. Enjoy the show!

  And what about my conceptualization is impossible, improbable, or not as good as any other concept about life as it is lived on this planet? It certainly paints a better, more compassionate picture of God as a loving Father than any other, and it does admit completely of evolution, such that there should be NO argument between religion and science. I like my idea. It's so reasonable. So rational. So peaceful. So possible. So pregnant. So start shooting it down if you like. I'm a big boy; I can take it.

  Perhaps there is a fundamental driving force behind all of what is currently happening to us, behind Singularity (whenever it gets here). Sort of a physical property of matter to try and become intelligent, if you will. But then again, these are just my musings and they are probably wrong, but you can't argue with hard numbers!

  At the end of the day, the future is going to be more unbelievable and weird than any of us little people can possibly imagine. Good post, BTW, Francois.
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  SYN

  BTW, Francois, I think you'll like the book I'm currently busy writing. It's written in the last year and a half before we hit the brick wall of Singularity (i.e. when the exponential graph begins curving upwards, or the "Spike" as it's called by those "in the know"), and it deals with exactly the same topics as we're discussing here.