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Then who made God? If a God does not have a creator then why not the world? I believe evidence suggests the Big Bang as the start of the world. Well at least before that bang physics is not understood and would time exist? Would time exist as created by God or did time come before God? What would awareness be like without time ie what is God's mind?
And then there is the Mahayana and 'wisdom of emptiness'. @Yoshua are you familiar with the Mahayana sutras or popular teachings?
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federicaSeeker of the clear blue sky...Its better to remain silent and be thought a fool, than to speak out and remove all doubtModerator
I think there's plenty of reliable, proven literature on how the world and all that's in it came about and I personally very much doubt that some unseen, unheard supernatural being had any great part in doing it.
Read up on Evolution, and other worthy scientific tomes. This guy's pretty well got it nailed
Isn't the belief that the universe had to be built self-defeating?
If the universe had to be built, say like a house, then who built the lumber yard? If the universe was built, what was it built from? And who built whatever that was? Believing that there was a beginning requires ever more absurd antecedents.
The conclusion that there was no beginning seems inescapable. We can see how to rearrange that which is here, but there is no foundational substance from which to have fabricated it. It's all just rearranging.
Further, there is no place to send it to at the end.
It's unfashionably infinite. And pat belief in a celestial conjurer, in our own form no less, prevents us from contemplating the wider infinity.
@Yoshua said:
I believed "knosis" means spiritual knowledge.
Yes indeed kenosis means an emptying of self, which is recognized in Buddhism. We sometimes fill the emptying with peace and love. Buddhists gain from their practice, a natural state of love and compassion for all beings.
The eternal condition of awakening is known in Buddhism as Nirvana. In the other dharmic religions this has connotations of union with God. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana
As Buddhism does not require belief in Brahman, God or the Flying Speghetti Monster but merely deals with our delusions and unsatisfactory nature (known as Sin in Christianity) our Gnosis or knowing is based on what we learn through meditation and practice.
@Steve_B said: It's unfashionably infinite. And pat belief in a celestial conjurer, in our own form no less, prevents us from contemplating the wider infinity.
Yes, particularly because "God" looks like a product of a limited human imagination which finds it difficult to grasp the sheer scale and strangeness of the cosmos.
@Yoshua said:
If no belief in God, then how do you have peace and love? assurance of eternity?
I find peace and love in the everyday experience. Meditation practice helps me connect with those more easily.
Eternity? Overrated. Mark Twain said it best: “I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.”
Comments
Then who made God? If a God does not have a creator then why not the world? I believe evidence suggests the Big Bang as the start of the world. Well at least before that bang physics is not understood and would time exist? Would time exist as created by God or did time come before God? What would awareness be like without time ie what is God's mind?
And then there is the Mahayana and 'wisdom of emptiness'. @Yoshua are you familiar with the Mahayana sutras or popular teachings?
I think there's plenty of reliable, proven literature on how the world and all that's in it came about and I personally very much doubt that some unseen, unheard supernatural being had any great part in doing it.
Read up on Evolution, and other worthy scientific tomes.
This guy's pretty well got it nailed
Indeed. The universe is incredibly strange, and the "God did it" explanation probably just isn't weird enough to be true.
Isn't the belief that the universe had to be built self-defeating?
If the universe had to be built, say like a house, then who built the lumber yard? If the universe was built, what was it built from? And who built whatever that was? Believing that there was a beginning requires ever more absurd antecedents.
The conclusion that there was no beginning seems inescapable. We can see how to rearrange that which is here, but there is no foundational substance from which to have fabricated it. It's all just rearranging.
Further, there is no place to send it to at the end.
It's unfashionably infinite. And pat belief in a celestial conjurer, in our own form no less, prevents us from contemplating the wider infinity.
Yes indeed kenosis means an emptying of self, which is recognized in Buddhism. We sometimes fill the emptying with peace and love. Buddhists gain from their practice, a natural state of love and compassion for all beings.
The eternal condition of awakening is known in Buddhism as Nirvana. In the other dharmic religions this has connotations of union with God.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nirvana
As Buddhism does not require belief in Brahman, God or the Flying Speghetti Monster but merely deals with our delusions and unsatisfactory nature (known as Sin in Christianity) our Gnosis or knowing is based on what we learn through meditation and practice.
Hope that is helpful
Yes, particularly because "God" looks like a product of a limited human imagination which finds it difficult to grasp the sheer scale and strangeness of the cosmos.
I find peace and love in the everyday experience. Meditation practice helps me connect with those more easily.
Eternity? Overrated. Mark Twain said it best: “I do not fear death. I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and had not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.”