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Theory of God/Christianity?
My family raised me in church and the whole time I had so many questions and no I haven't studied but my questions are
1.) if there is a God, where did He come from?
2.) is there any evidence proving there is God?
My family says yes bc it is miracles (He) performs like I was born blind but I have had multiple surgeries so I can see with corrections. But isn't that a good well educated, steady handed surgeon? Not a miracle of God?
3.) I'm really confused on how humans get here?
I am just really confused and I guess looking for reassurance of not believing in God or Christianity.
1.) if there is a God, where did He come from?
2.) is there any evidence proving there is God?
My family says yes bc it is miracles (He) performs like I was born blind but I have had multiple surgeries so I can see with corrections. But isn't that a good well educated, steady handed surgeon? Not a miracle of God?
3.) I'm really confused on how humans get here?
I am just really confused and I guess looking for reassurance of not believing in God or Christianity.
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Comments
However, I think those are only questions you can answer for yourself. But if you want reassurance, I can tell you that not believing in God or Christianity is highly unlikely to result in you being struck by lightning!
If you want to know how humans got here, read a science book. Buddhism won't give you those answers because the question Buddhism attempts to answer is "Why is there suffering in the world?"
These are conclusions you must come to for yourself.
We can give you our opinions, and all sorts of arguments as to why we think the way we do, but your family feels the same way about their side of the coin, and it's something they have a right to do.
If there is a God, only God can tell you where he came from. we don't know.
My own personal opinion is that I don't believe in God to begin with, so it's not a question that has ever warranted an answer...
There is much evidence that there is a god, and it's irrefutable - to a Christian. There is No evidence that there is a God, which is irrefutable to a non-Christian.
Do we know if the surgeon is a God-loving Christian? Whether he is or not, what is therefore his opinion?
Humans get here because two people make whoopee and a sperm fertilises an egg.
What other answer is there?
It's a biological fact.
I personally cannot add any Christian angle to this....
You must permit your own research, logic and investigation to take you to wherever you go.
I was a Christian, now I'm not. But my journey is not yours, and many on here have different experiences and views to put forward.
I really wish you well.
2) There's a lot of evidence if you count personal spiritual experiences. But to convince a rational man you're going to need some emipirical or logical evidence of God, and the as far as the physical component of God, there is no evidence.
Yes. Modern medicine cured you of your ailment. As far as science is concerned, a supernatural deity is not needed for explaining the laws of physical reality.
3) Evolution tells us that we are descendants of a single common ancestor. All living things share a common ancestor.
Whatever we come up with has no supernatural or divine validity.
Well..., maybe .0000001% of what we experience has that sort of s & d value and insight but it can't be communicated to others.
It's all a creation of a little bit of mind stuck in these human bodies with these senses. Doesn't mean it's worthless, it just means it's limited.
Why are some people so stuck on thinking they have knowledge that's absolute truth? Like any form of denial its so they can feel better about themselves; the anxiety of uncertainty is a tough problem for some people.
The bonus comes when they can influence others to think the same way; getting people around themselves who believe the same things "force multiplies" everybody's conviction.
It's a normal human tendency (getting people around you who think the same way), but this time it's focussed on a wholly false assumption about absolutes.
they don't know.
2.) is there any evidence proving there is God?
My family says yes bc it is miracles (He) performs like I was born blind but I have had multiple surgeries so I can see with corrections. But isn't that a good well educated, steady handed surgeon? Not a miracle of God?
miracles aren't proof of god. the fact that we need "miracles" are proof that god doesn't exist. if he controlled everything then why do you need miracles in the first place? he apparently controls literally everything, and people are hurt all the time. he has the full power to stop them, so if he exists he's kinda a jerk.
(to people who say he let's us do it to ourselves to teach us, if he's all powerful he could has just have created us with the knowledge. basically an all powerful being allowing pain to occur means he's malevolent or at best ambivalent.)
3.) I'm really confused on how humans get here?
I am just really confused and I guess looking for reassurance of not believing in God or Christianity.
the universe got here possibly by quantum fluctuations or a separate 3 dimensional brane
the earth got here through dust basically swirling and forming a planet after the big bang
humans got here through evolution. starting with some naturally occuring bilayers which came through random elemental combination.
the universe can be fully explained without a god, so believing in one, when we have no evidence for his existence is irrational.
There is evidence (all around us and in our meditations) proving that there is ***something*** (so to speak) HUGE involved. This world is an extremely marvelous mystery. Can we know what that something is? No.
A tiny bit of Mind grabs hold of a physical form (fertilized egg) and runs with it as a human being for a while. No biggie.
Thanks for the chance to think about it BC. That's the best I can do these days.
I am so glad for you that doctors were able to give you sight. As evidence of a God's hand, I'd wonder if that means God doesn't much like all those people who have to live blind all their life. That's the problem with pointing to miracles.
As for how humans got here, we know about evolution. As for how life first arrived on Earth, science gives us several possibilities that don't require a God.
But all this is not useful, because you've got to explore your own spriitual life and beliefs and come to your own decisions. The only reassurance I can give is that many of us were also raised in Chrisian households, had the same questions and doubts, and found meaningful lives walking a different spiritual path.
Hope this helps.
Gotta clarify: Buddha said [I'm paraphrasing] "Do not waste your time trying to ____characterize____ god."
Think of what that means.
To me it means we'll get nowhere trying to do it. That's all it means.
It does not mean there is no god; it just means we can't understand god in any true valid valuable way.
I go further and guess Buddha knows all our characterization attempts will be totally anthropocentric and appallingly limited.
IMO, of course. Just an amateur.
Buddhism is the same as science. It tells us life is formed from elements (dhatu). Elements are physical elements, mental elements and the spiritual element (Nirvana).
Your example of blindness is excellent. When an element is missing from life then life is not whole. When that element is restored to life then life becomes whole.
For example, if the heart stops or breathing stops then life ends. The heart is restarted or breathing rescusitated then life is restored.
Our simple examination of life shows life is not created by God.
Instead, as the Buddha taught, life is the elements or dhatu.
Life is dhamma or nature. Life is dhamma dhatu or elements of nature.
All the best
In metta,
Raven
Gotta clarify: Buddha said [I'm paraphrasing] "Do not waste your time trying to ____characterize____ god."
Please give the reference for this as I am sure it is not in the Digha Nikaya, Majjhima Nikaya, Samyatta Nikaya or Anguttara Nikaya.
In the first sutta of the Digha Nikaya (DN1), the Brahmajala Sutta, the Buddha expounds 62 views which are part of the net of views that keep one bound to samsara - ie wrong views. One of those wrong views is the concept of an ever-lasting creator-god being.
MY (ROGER'S) REPLY STARTS BELOW:
May I try to clarify? When I said " 'I do not believe in god.' is NOT a buddhist position" I mean a person who says that is equating Buddhism with atheism which I KNOW it is not. Buddha never said, "I do not believe in gods (or God)." BTW, if Buddhism IS atheistic I will renounce it.
When I paraphrased what Buddha said "Do not waste your time trying to ____characterize____ god." I mean he avoided answering the question, said attempts to answer the question CAUSE STRIFE and SUFFERING and can't be answered anyway. Or I misinterpreted that to mean trying to characterize god WILL NOT END SUFFERING.
Since apparently there is no mention of a first cause in Buddhism _I_ read into it that it is useless to speculate on it. Therefore trying to understand God or gods as a first cause is futile as a means to end suffering.
I'm sorry I don't have the original references from which I got my interpretation. I will look when I get home.
Found this in my files, it's just one of many references to god and Buddha.:
LINK:
http://www.urbandharma.org/udharma3/budgod.html
Some points from above the garden-variety Buddhism-and-God essay which is referenced in link:
******
Sometimes a student will ask me how everything in this world got started... "If you don’t have God in Buddhism then who or what caused the universe?"
When the Buddha was asked how the world started, HE KEPT SILENT (my - ROGER-emphasis). In the religion of Buddhism we don’t have a first cause, instead we have a never ending circle of birth and death. In this world and in all worlds, there are many beginnings and ends. The model of life used in Buddhism has no starting place... It just keeps going and going.
Now having said that... If you’re a Buddhist it’s OK to believe God was the first cause... It really doesn't go against the teachings of the Buddha, his focus was on suffering...
Knowing how the world started is not going to end your suffering, it’s just going to give you more stuff to think about.
The Buddha never met a Jew... And because of this, he never said anything about the One God of the desert. In his whole life and in all his teachings the Buddha never said anything about the One God of the desert.
There is also nothing in the teachings of the Buddha that suggest how to find God or worship the god's of India, although the Buddha himself was a theist (believed in gods), his teachings are non-theistic.
Did the Buddha believe in God, the One God of the desert, the God of the Christians, Jews and Muslims?
Well... No... He didn't... Monotheism (only one God) was a foreign concept to the Buddha, his world was filled with many gods. The creator god Brahma being the most important one.
******
post-edit
is that better??
IOW, no comment on a first cause means there are no teachings on how to find god(s) or how to worship god(s).
In the context of a student of Buddhism wanting to understand the nature of god (the original point of this thread) I extrapolate that to mean what I said in paraphrase:
Buddha said "Do not waste your time trying to ____characterize____ god."
Works for me.
Thank you Vangelis for the challenge. I'll keep working on it.
My motivation? I would love it if Buddha said "Questions of the nature, personality, intentions, and character of God are a complete waste of time because they will not end suffering and will never result in knowledge of the absolute."
Reaching Buddhahood does not infer that the Buddha is always right (or am I wrong?)
My nickname here is spock because I think a certain reliance on logic is good, but we also need to be human! (I'm not a trekkie BTW). That's why Buddhism is the path I choose to follow.
It seems very illogical to believe in any type of god, but one cannot dismiss with full confidence that god(s) do or do not exist.
I went nuts with trying to get HTML to work on my own. I had to give up since my brain can't handle long periods of working on a car engine while trying to drive the car.
It's just that we can't know them. If we can know them whatever we know can NOT be communicated (our language is the problem: it sucks because it's inaccurate crude)
We can only make up things about what we think we know about them, him, her, or it. Assuming "them," "they" "it" even applies.
IOW, our views are merely speculations and will be based on the experience of being human. They won't have much validity beyond that.
IOW (again) not worth killing others over or arguing too vociferously about.
Besides the fact that apparently from my amateur POV it has nothing to do with Buddhism.
I detest evangelism. Buddhist evangelism. Christian. And yes atheist too.
2.) Other than the bible, I haven't heard of any.
3.) Well, humans from their prehistoric age, learned that survival depended on their use of intelligence, dexterity and wisdom which were transmitted as knowledge. So,centuries pass, their knowledge range widened ,and nowadays knowledge is so ... huge, that things developed by humans look like God-made miracles.
If you feel love you can prove it exists, to yourself at least, but the question of solipsism is much more interesting as you are right, you can not prove that it is false. You also can't prove that your memories are real, at any moment your entire past could just be false, you could be a brain in a jar that has only existed for five seconds with a huge set of false memories and stimuli.
However we have no evidence for that. We have huge amounts of evidence that corroborates any sensory input. Our senses constantly corroborate each other, you can look at something and feel it and see that the stimuli match up. You also have the evidence of the testimony of other apparently similar beings. All of this taken as evidence is making the assumption that our senses are displaying a reflection of the real universe. This is opening up a huge doorway into epistemic philosophy but basically it all comes down to accepting certain useful assumptions for which you have huge amounts of evidence.
I was not really mad at you but I have participated in a christian chatroom which was a meeting ground for christians and atheists to bash eachother. So you just represent generic atheist X a mental conglomeration in my mind. But I would think you would take my thoughts of interest perhaps. And don't take my tone or words personally please.
That being said I am critical of the idea "you SHOULDN'T believe in god because there is no proof".
A person who is a christian relies on their belief system and might experience huge suffering if they lost their faith. Not that they would because someone is arguing with them. But I think it is a bad idea to try to dislodge a person from their spiritual beliefs.
Another topic is that some christians have an experience of the holy spirit of God. This is something they have evidence of just as you have evidence of sense imput. I am schizophrenic. I have evidence of things that do not exist all the time.
Having a strong fixed belief. A rigid view. Is a problem whatever religion you are. And rigidly believing supported by evidence is still rigidity. Its a matter of touch. I'll take a light touch and compassion, being big about things - generous, any day.
I personally believe whatever I can prove or whatever is supported by evidence, if I had proof of God I'd believe he exists. It is in no way rigid. If i had reason to believe that evidence was unreliable as a means of finding truth, I'd no longer accept evidence, and if i found that believing in something other than truth would make me happier I'd believe that.
I do hold one and only one "rigidity." The one that I want myself and others to be happy. For me being happy includes living with a truthful idea of the universe and a logical philosophy. Evidence is conducive to truth, from this comes my rigid stance on evidence. It all comes from my single rigid stance that I want myself and others to be happy.
Imperfect world I know haha.
Language is seductive. IOW, I know the word "god" ostensibly by our language and it's dictionary definition BUT I really have no direct or even indirect experience of ___what it refers to___ so there's no way to conclude anything about it and be certain (rationally and logically speaking).
There's another form of logic called "poetic logic" it's based on metaphor it has it's own structure principles and validity. Language is full of it, so is visual art and music.
No big deal. Just talking.
Roger, your playing a little game of semantics here. When you say you don't know what is meant by the word God you are implying his existence. You do have some notion of God, that he created the universe, that he might manipulate things.. or something. And you can try to prove or disprove that concept. Granted if god does exist he is likely beyond this conceptual stuff.
So either you know a few things about him and you work from that or you admit that you literally know nothing about him, but then what is the point of proving/disproving or even talking about him.
@!@!#K@JKF@!LJDDSDFS!!!!! so i can't make the conclusion that it is illogical to believe it exists.
basically you do have some idea of what is meant by god. you use those concepts to try to understand him. So you can say something like, does an intelligent omnipotent creator of the universe exist? if you can't prove its existence then belief in it is irrational. If you don't even want to define it that broadly, then what are we even talking about?
It doesn't make any sense really.
If one can't make a statement which makes sense, no process of induction or deduction applies.
Just a guess.
If you can't prove god exists then it is illogical to believe in him, same goes for if you can't even define what he is.
Obviously we have some kind of experience. But that is not 'truth of existence'.. I think therefore I am was incorrect.
Define 'I think' Define 'Am'. You need axioms. Nonetheless Grok and Gunga learned to hunt buffalo with spears they crafted.
BTW, That sounds like an innocent question my cat would ask when we have the animation of guests in our house.
Ok, carry on.
Now, even though that sort of god does not exist, the Pali texts are replete with references to celestial (or heavenly) beings referred to as Devas. Devas is commonly translated as gods - a translation that I believe is as a result of the xtian accretions of many of the early translators. I think the word should be left as is - Deva (or if it must be translated "celestial being" or "heavenly being" would be far better). These beings are not everlasting and they did not create all of existence.
So, depending on which type of god you are referring to, you might have to consider renouncing Buddhism. The Buddha recalled so many of his past lifetimes, that they went on for many, many eons (in fact, this was one of the things he did on the night he became enlightened). He stated about this experience that "there is no discernible beginning" and consequently, he would not speculate on how it all started. He certainly denied that it started with a creator-god being. As for the article you quote, I think there are a number of mistakes in it and I can see how it would be confusing to read. For example, stating that monotheism was a foreign concept to the Buddha is not strictly correct. The predominant religion of the time was Brahmanism. This consisted of the god Brahma which the Brahmins wanted to eventually re-unite with. When a Brahmin would ask the Buddha how he could be reborn in the Brahma realm, he would tell them if he knew that they were not capable of escaping samsara.
If we can use axioms
Very interesting Vangelis. I'm grateful for the details and clarifications you provided.
Two points. (sorry this is so cumbersome, I'm sure I could learn a lot more if we were all chatting in a room at a retreat).
"Everlasting creator-god." Yup I'm sure that does not exist. It's too easily framed in with language. Like we know what Buddha is referring to by just a few translated words.
I get the general sense though: such a thing does not exist. I have to say it's more HUGE than that. See? No problem, AFAIK. Seriously, not trying to be glib.
IOW, Buddha IMO, is saying our concept of god, as far as our brains can experience and COMMUNICATE is ridiculous; therefore one should not attempt to characterize it: it doesn't exist for us. If we can't communicate it it doesn't exist BETWEEN us. It can only be experienced directly and privately.
Like a language, there is no such thing as a private langauge so language is limited. BUT there IS a such thing as a private experience of "god" which would be a private experience of how "HUGE" things are which sometimes occurs thru meditation. Again, it's impossible to describe or discuss or teach or learn: one must get to "huge-ness" oneself and one must also STFU about it. (sorry for the swearing but I like the emphatic power it has in this context).
I'll renounce any religion which tells me I'm wrong about how I conceive god. Because I don't know what they are talking about!!!! It's really just a word with a shabby, indiscrete, dim referent! Why is that? Because I believe we are a pinprick of universal mind riding along in these human bodies and brains with their sense organs and silly language and therefore can't possibly communicate how HUUUGE things are.
What's worse, any specific knowledge or experience allegedly coming from HUUUUGE things are can't possibly be _COMMUNICATED_ and so anybody who tries to do that I run away from really quickly! That's why I said: "I'll renounce any religion which tells me I'm wrong about how I conceive god." Kind of a "Catch 22," which it should be.
Language is seductive. We really don't know what we are talking about when we diverge from the concrete.
My conception of what Buddha meant was things are huge (beyond _shared_ human experience) so don't waste your time trying to express aspects of that "Huge-osity" just be content with the Dharma and Practice it. Certainly aim to experience "Huge-osity" via meditation, but totally forget about trying to say anything or "teach" anything specific about it.
I dunno. Just something I came up with. I'll change my POV if I get compelling insights from my teacher once I decide to take refuge.
Again, I wish we could all be i a room and discuss. This typing is like breathing thru a straw!
Thank you for inspiring me to mental-ize and try to express on this.
So, I have to ask : why do we need to prove that God exist or not ? What's the benefit of finding God ?
IMO the only thing which needs and has proof is that something ineffable marvelous and huge exists. I think that's true.
Benefit of finding god? No ultimate benefit because there's no suitable referent connected to the word "god." You can't find a ___"D#h*W+|"___ because you don't know and can't possibly know what it refers to! It certainly can't be communicated even if it could be found which it can't. lol :nyah:
Benefit of convincing people god (whatever THAT is) has been found? You can prey on people's irrational fears to your own advantage.
The other one cent comes from this: meditate and you will probably find the ineffable marvelous and huge that exists