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Icelander
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Can you?
#5587708 - 05/03/06 08:44 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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I don't know what enlightenment is exactly. But I have a question for you all. Do you think you can achieve enlightenment without believing in any concept of God. Reasons please.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Deviate
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yes, absolutely. no beliefs are required to realize you're nature.
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leery11
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Re: Can you? [Re: Deviate]
#5587895 - 05/03/06 09:24 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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Yes.
Beliefs are for people who don't want to become enlightened..... they are tools for pointing you in the right direction, but the more you BELIEVE the less you KNOW.....
I would wager enlightenment involves shredding away that which is believed and replacing it with that which is known and experienced directly.
If your goal is enlightenment and you put that goal into action I do not see why what you believe matters... you may use yoga, matrial arts, meditation, selfless service to the community, fasting, chanting, prayer, Christianity, Buddhism, Islam..... but in the end once you're enlightened belief doesn't matter......
The Buddha said his teachings were a raft which were to be abandoned once you got to the other shore.
plus Buddhists don't believe in God.
-------------------- I am the MacDaddy of Heimlich County, I play it Straight Up Yo! ....I embrace my desire to feel the rhythm, to feel connected enough to step aside and weep like a widow, to feel inspired, to fathom the power, to witness the beauty, to bathe in the fountain, to swing on the spiral of our divinity and still be a human...... Om Namah Shivaya, I tell you What!
Edited by leery11 (05/03/06 09:25 PM)
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Basilides
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No. God is philosophically the Absolute Reality, the Absolute Truth. Enlightenment (to me, at least) is to awaken to the metaphysical infrastructure of all Reality, to experience the connectedness of All, the Divine commonground. Believing (Faith) is the prerequisite to Inner Knowing. I know there's alot of absolutism around here about subjectivity and objectivity, but at the end of the day outside the radiating Light of God, there is only ignorance (not knowledge), the Wheel of Life, the Re-Cycling of unliberated essence.
Of course, this is just what I think.
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    "Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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leery11
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ah well if you define things that way then you are right.

God is enlightenment...... then? If so, then yes. But God is just three letters on a screen. Unless it means something to you....... to some people it's just simply Tao or it its entirely irrelevant "" but enligthenment.... is enlightenment..... and I don't see a conflict really.
so perhaps the only criteria is that they believe there IS an enlightenment and a more interesting question would be "Can you be enlightened if you don't believe in enlightenment?"
-------------------- I am the MacDaddy of Heimlich County, I play it Straight Up Yo! ....I embrace my desire to feel the rhythm, to feel connected enough to step aside and weep like a widow, to feel inspired, to fathom the power, to witness the beauty, to bathe in the fountain, to swing on the spiral of our divinity and still be a human...... Om Namah Shivaya, I tell you What!
Edited by leery11 (05/03/06 09:33 PM)
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Deviate
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Quote:
Basilides said: No. God is philosophically the Absolute Reality, the Absolute Truth. Enlightenment (to me, at least) is to awaken to the metaphysical infrastructure of all Reality, to experience the connectedness of All, the Divine commonground. I know there's alot of absolutism around here about subjectivity and objectivity, but at the end of the day outside the radiating Light of God, there is only ignorance (not knowledge), the Wheel of Life, the Re-Cycling of unliberated essence.
Of course, this is just what I think.
yes but you needn't have beliefs prior to realizing that, correct?
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recalcitrant
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Is what we believe part of enlightenment? IF God is supposed to be the sum of reality, and outside that ultimate enlightenment there is nothing, then what we believe is a small part of enlightenment, right?
Why do you think that beliefs are less enlightened than knowing experience? Our beliefs in science have given us a huge advantage against the other animals that know much, but believe nothing.
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We have to answer our own prayers
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SkorpivoMusterion
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I'm a proud Atheist, both soft and hard, depending on how I want to look at it. I can call myself a hard Athiest through the use of the fundamental axioms, or simply a soft Atheist by virtue of illuminating the arbitrariness of such pertinent concepts. If enlightenment is to be described as a state of being whereby more mature developments of rational cognition [thinking] has been sustained, and therefore more mature, rational ethics have followed, then the fact that I'm an Atheist has not conflicted with such intrapersonal growth.
Blindly believing in such fundamental, metaphysical contradictions would only hinder my cognitive maturity and self-efficacy. Atheism has not been inimical to such developments - quite the contrary, in fact. But then again, acceptance of reality and acting in accordance with it, has always been a cornerstone of enlightened behavior.
However, the absence of any belief in a "god" of any sort, has not been the engine of my 'enlightenment' - more like an oil, if anything. In other words, can one attain greater maturity in their cognition and ethics without such frivolous beliefs? Absolutely. But one cannot if they have no coherent, well-defined and non-contradictory philosophy, that is consistent with reality and their interests.
-------------------- Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.
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Icelander
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Quote:
Basilides said: No. God is philosophically the Absolute Reality, the Absolute Truth. Enlightenment (to me, at least) is to awaken to the metaphysical infrastructure of all Reality, to experience the connectedness of All, the Divine commonground. Believing (Faith) is the prerequisite to Inner Knowing. I know there's alot of absolutism around here about subjectivity and objectivity, but at the end of the day outside the radiating Light of God, there is only ignorance (not knowledge), the Wheel of Life, the Re-Cycling of unliberated essence.
Of course, this is just what I think.
How do you compare your concept of God and lets say, the concept of Tao which doesn't recognize Deity.
Or lets say, do you have to believe in a supreme being that is a conscious entity?
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Basilides
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Re: Can you? [Re: Deviate]
#5587938 - 05/03/06 09:37 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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I slightly edited my post before you quoted me 
Belief in God, literally blind faith, believing without seeing, in my opinion is the first step to actually knowing God. Faith eventually matures into Inner Knowledge.
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    "Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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Deviate
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Re: Can you? [Re: Deviate]
#5587939 - 05/03/06 09:38 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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The Buddha said his teachings were a raft which were to be abandoned once you got to the other shore.
plus Buddhists don't believe in God.
thats not true, many buddhists DO believe in GOD. the buddha did not incorporate God into his teachings because he did not want people to become tangled in philosophical questions reguarding God such as "why does God allow this" or ''can God microwave a burrito so hot that even he cannot eat it". instead he simply pointed people back to their nature as pure spirit. when giving teachings to people who believed in God he taught from the standpoint of God existing and when asked by his deciples if God existed, he was silent. however, his teachings is clearly theistic in nature, sharing all the same basic components as the other theistic religions only using different terms.
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Basilides
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I actually know very little about Taoism so I cant really comment
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    "Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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leery11
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Re: Can you? [Re: Deviate]
#5587953 - 05/03/06 09:41 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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interesting.
I read a suttra where he explained that the concept of a creator God is false.... that people find themselves in the Brahma world and in being alone wish that they had company. At some point this wishing comes true which leads them to feel that they are in fact a creator God.....
and the other beings fall out of the Brahma realm into lesser realms thinking that the initial one there created them.
It was a bit confusing.... but he pretty much said belief in a creator is a false view.
-------------------- I am the MacDaddy of Heimlich County, I play it Straight Up Yo! ....I embrace my desire to feel the rhythm, to feel connected enough to step aside and weep like a widow, to feel inspired, to fathom the power, to witness the beauty, to bathe in the fountain, to swing on the spiral of our divinity and still be a human...... Om Namah Shivaya, I tell you What!
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Deviate
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Re: Can you? [Re: leery11]
#5587966 - 05/03/06 09:45 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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Quote:
leery11 said: interesting.
I read a suttra where he explained that the concept of a creator God is false.... that people find themselves in the Brahma world and in being alone wish that they had company. At some point this wishing comes true which leads them to feel that they are in fact a creator God.....
and the other beings fall out of the Brahma realm into lesser realms thinking that the initial one there created them.
It was a bit confusing.... but he pretty much said belief in a creator is a false view.
could you link to me this? id be curious to read it. is it possible he meant a creator God who created the world as apart from himself was a false view? i believe some buddhists not even believe the world was ''created'', its simply an apperance in the single non dual reality.
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Icelander
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Quote:
Basilides said: I actually know very little about Taoism so I cant really comment
You might like to take the time to aquaint yourself with it. My personal philosophy is much in alignment with it. It is very simple and ultimately profound IMO.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Basilides
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Re: Can you? [Re: leery11]
#5587991 - 05/03/06 09:53 PM (17 years, 8 months ago) |
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What I call "God" is merely an expression applied to a personal experience. The Logos is called many things in many languages.. and God (which has philosophical entailments and absolutes) expresses this experience quite well I think.
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    "Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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Icelander
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Maybe to you but to many the concept of God is a very human one. Many christians were brought up with a picture of an old white bearded human (much like a king) on a golden $$$$ throne. And when you say the word God that is exactly what pops up in their mind because they are programmed to it. It's very much like the ruler king in the political realm when you think about it.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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SkorpivoMusterion
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Quote:
Icelander said: You might like to take the time to aquaint yourself with it. My personal philosophy is much in alignment with it. It is very simple and ultimately profound IMO.
"Those who follow Tao declare that there is no evidence that a god created our world. They have not found any empirical proof, and they cannot accept the idea philosophically." -excerpt from "365 Tao"
Coincidentally, the premises I hold in regards to such metaphysics, is also in alignment with Taoist philosophy - which is the Objectivist position as elucidated by Branden here: http://evans-experientialism.freewebspace.com/branden.htm
-------------------- Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death, and sweet as love.
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Basilides
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The bearded ruler in the clouds in Christian thought is an exterior, exoteric idealization of God as I see it, and it remains on the outer edges of the Christian faith, far away from its Living Pearl.
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    "Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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Icelander
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Thanks. I will read this when I'm more awake.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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