I think it is self evident. Creation, as described in Genesis, could be true but created in such a way that could lead people to believe it is wrong.
This results in a situation where people believe what the Bible literally says is foolishness, even though it is actually true.
Besides the verses in Genesis are there other verses in the Bible on creation which impress you?
What would they be if there are?
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Since we are foolish and made in the Image of God, then maybe God is also foolish, and dotes on us because we are foolish like Him.
Maybe vis-à-vis Earth humans (not dolphins, whales, cats, or some breeds of dogs, mind) God was foolish in dropping ambiguous and confusing hints, with which certain people in the Hellenistic Roman Empire and subsequent commentators ran wild, blessing us all.
Maybe God wishes He had said something more like, "Oh, hai! Welcome to the party! Yes, I did make all this, but don't be afraid."
But no. See above re: certain pipsqueaks of Earth pushing themselves and their notions and psychological issues forward and ruining it for everybody.
@kevin-eleven saidGreat example of a post many people around here call a good discussion.
Since we are foolish and made in the Image of God, then maybe God is also foolish, and dotes on us because we are foolish like Him.
Maybe vis-à-vis Earth humans (not dolphins, whales, cats, or some breeds of dogs, mind) God was foolish in dropping ambiguous and confusing hints, with which certain people in the Hellenistic Roman Empire and subsequent commentators ran w ...[text shortened]... pushing themselves and their notions and psychological issues forward and ruining it for everybody.
@kevin-eleven saidKevin,
Since we are foolish and made in the Image of God, then maybe God is also foolish, and dotes on us because we are foolish like Him.
Maybe vis-à-vis Earth humans (not dolphins, whales, cats, or some breeds of dogs, mind) God was foolish in dropping ambiguous and confusing hints, with which certain people in the Hellenistic Roman Empire and subsequent commentators ran w ...[text shortened]... pushing themselves and their notions and psychological issues forward and ruining it for everybody.
You seem eager above to find fault with God.
Why is this?
I mean like a tone of - "How can we get this whole thing turned to such an angle that God comes out looking like evil, incompetent, blameworthy?"
Is this a need you have?
And if so what do you hope this kind of view will do for you?
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@sonship saidMonsignor, I'm not sure if you are kidding or perhaps presenting some kind of koan. 😉
Kevin,
You seem eager above to find fault with God.
Why is this?
I mean like a tone of - "How can we get this whole thing turned to such an angle that God comes out looking like evil, incompetent, blameworthy?"
Is this a need you have?
And if so what do you hope this kind of view will do for you?
If we are foolish just as God is foolish because we share His traits, who are we to say that foolishness could not be part of God's Perfection?
If we are foolish just as God is foolish because we share His traits, who are we to say that foolishness could not be part of God's Perfection?
I think I see.
The thrust of your thinking is like this - Whatever ails human beings, being foolishness or any other ignoble or negative characteristic, this has to be because it is a trait God bestowed upon us out His own nature.
I mean if I am told we were made in the image of God and according to the likeness of God THEN it follows our negative traits only reflect the negative traits of the Creator.
Is that kind of the concept you're putting forward?
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@sonship saidI don't believe I seek to find fault with God Itself or Himself or Herself or Themselves (singular).
Kevin,
You seem eager above to find fault with God.
Why is this?
I mean like a tone of - "How can we get this whole thing turned to such an angle that God comes out looking like evil, incompetent, blameworthy?"
Is this a need you have?
And if so what do you hope this kind of view will do for you?
However, there are many of the core doctrines of some religions of Earth that I do not believe, although I understand and must accept that millions and billions of others do believe those.
Sometimes I do present more expansive perspectives not centered on Earth or its silly but distressing monkey people.
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To turn one of your questions around: Some people seem eager to believe that God is Perfect, so here's a question:
If it turned out that God did have flaws, would you be able to forgive Him? And would you love Him less or more?
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re: "Is this a need you have?" -- I think I answered that above.
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This view of mine, which tbh is pretty vague, is probably just part of my natural development given my genetic tendencies and humours as well as influences encountered during my path during the particular societal matrices that I transited and inhabited.
I don't expect this view to give me hope, and that's fine.
It might be better to say that various degrees and flavors of appreciation have also developed alongside this developing and provisional view.
Whether there's an afterlife or not: Time will tell. I have adopted a "wait and see" attitude about that.
Conversely to Pascal's Wager, if we do occur and then expire with no afterlife, why not just center ourselves in the now and be very appreciative of our occurrence and of all existence, rather than gluttonously seeking for "more" in some imaginary eternity to the extent that we don't appreciate what we have already been given?
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@sonship saidYes, and thank you for trying to understand the conceptual framework I was trying to present (which of course is just conceptual and not necessarily an accurate map of Reality).
@Kevin-Eleven
If we are foolish just as God is foolish because we share His traits, who are we to say that foolishness could not be part of God's Perfection?
I think I see.
The thrust of your thinking is like this - Whatever ails human beings, being foolishness or any other ignoble or negative characteristic, this has to be because it is a trai ...[text shortened]... ct the negative traits of the Creator.
Is that kind of the concept you're putting forward?
RE: negative (?) traits -- Within this framework I would of course acknowledge that we probably do have additional traits not shared with God, necessary for the struggle to survive as spatially and temporally localized and perishable beings.
Poor, pitiful us! Oh, well. What can one do? 😉
@Kevin-Eleven
You pose some interesting comments to which I will reply.
But I listened to some of your album.
I'd like to tell you of some of the groups I went to see live in my younger days.
Why? Oh, I never did here before. Just for fun I guess.
Groups sonship saw play live in highschool and college days:
This is the honest truth now.
Grateful Dead, Stevie Wonder, Canned Heat, Iron Butterfly, Pink Floyd,
BB King, Eric Clapton, Country Joe and the Fish, Jimi Hendrix, The Capitals,
The Flamingoes, Soft Machine, Bonnie and Delaney, The Mind Garage,
Sha-na-na,
Those are just some of the groups I remember, mostly seeing them at Filmore East in the 60s (when dinosaurs walked the earth).
Just showing off a little cause I perceive you like rock music from the YouTube's you link me to. Out of the stack of concerts I remember going to probably the most memorable ones were Hendrix and Iron Butterfly.
I'll give more attention to your questions hopefully before too long.
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@sonship saidWonderful wonderful wonderful!
@Kevin-Eleven
You pose some interesting comments to which I will reply.
But I listened to some of your album.
I'd like to tell you of some of the groups I went to see live in my younger days.
Why? Oh, I never did here before. Just for fun I guess.
Groups sonship saw play live in highschool and college days:
This is the honest truth now. ...[text shortened]... drix and Iron Butterfly.
I'll give more attention to your questions hopefully before too long.
I am glad you got to see those groups in that setting and at that age and in those times (I gather you are about a decade or so older than me -- born in late 1959).
As for me -- and not to toss a bomb into The Happening -- I wonder what kind of rebuttals the Angry Christians and the Anti Christians might offer. 😲
But I would also accept that my posts might have been more of a derailment than on-topic for this course of discussion, and would accept that.
Peace to you, and to all people of our world, and to all beings throughout the Cosmos.
That Grateful Dead concert is meaningful to me because of the way it ended.
They were dead tired and the audience had no mercy. They kept wanting the band to play on and on. And even the manager of the Filmore East came out with a check to give to the lead guitarist Jerry Garcia for him to play another hour.
But they tried to tell the people "We're TIRED !".
Anyway, they closed with a Christian folk hymn acapella -
singing "Jesus Loves You Best, So I bid you Goodnight, Goodnight, Goodnight."
Boy, that was prophetic for me at the time.
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@sonship saidYes, and I can also see how that ties into the Christian theme of dying to oneself.
@Kevin-Eleven
Can you imagine that? Grateful for being Dead?
Or to the "ego death" that some shroomers have mentioned (haven't done those -- they used to be on my bucket list but now I think that might be a bad idea).
Or maybe just getting outside the story of oneself, much of which is arbitrary happenstance.