15 Sep '07 15:15>
Originally posted by whodeyYou forgot Baha'ism.
Off the top of my head major religions that come to mind in the world today are Christianity, Islam, Judism, Hinduism, and Buddism.
Originally posted by whodey1. A religion in question must show where we came from and where we have been and where we are going in relation to God.
I think for a religion to be credible, it must have certain elements.
1. A religion in question must show where we came from and where we have been and where we are going in relation to God. For example, it must show how we were created/evolved, how God has interacted with mankind throughout time, and where God has brought us today, and where we are go od of the Bible seems to dominate the stage of the major world religions of today. Go figure?
Originally posted by Hand of HecateWhat use would it be for anyone to attempt validating the bible to you, seeing how you are more than willing to validate a bowl of pudding? Even so, here is an offering:
What makes Christianity's version of Spiritual Truth any more accurate than the other dubious invetions of humanities creative psyche? Why is Christianity any more valid than Hinduism for example?
Originally posted by Hand of HecateIs that with or without vanilla waffers?
So if I decide that I've had a spectacular spiritual connection with a bowl of pudding I can't call my spiritual revelation a religion unless I fulfill your criteria?
OK, let's see:
1. Obviously we all came from pudding... cosmic pudding, but pudding nonetheless. God has taken the pudding and shaped it into all we see around us. Ultimately, as ...[text shortened]... he world. All hail the Great Spiritual Cosmic Pudding.
Pudding unto you my Brother.
Originally posted by vistesdAll I am saying is if one is pursuing a specific religion in which they feel they have found the "path" to God one must conclude that answers are possible and God wishes to relate to them in some way. Otherwise they are wasting their time. If, in fact, God does exist but has no interest in relating to us or there is no way to come to revelations in terms of our purpose/goals that he has set before us then we are simply wasting our time in pursuing such a God. That is why I say it is a waste of time trying to pursue any type of God that is not percieved as offering a relational aspect to humanity at large. Why pursue something or someone that has no interest in being revealed or in being discovered?
[b]1. A religion in question must show where we came from and where we have been and where we are going in relation to God.
This statement implies—
(a) that these questions are answerable;
(b) that such answers can be “shown,” without our subjective interpretive involvement in deciphering the facts of the world presented to us in such a way as ...[text shortened]... answers thus provided may be simply fantasy answers. Surely, a simple “don’t know” would be better.
Originally posted by vistesdTo say that there are no pre-religious set of truths upon which a religion is based would be to imply that religions at large are formed in a vacuum. Or you could say that such religions are based upon purely made up facts. However, how would one then relate to such a religion? What would be its purpose? Religions are formed via percieved truths about the world at large and how one interacts with it.
2. A religion that is credible must ground itself in truth.
This implies that there is a pre-religious set of truths upon which the religious viewpoint can be grounded. To assume as part of this that the Bible, for example, contains such truth begs the question, since the Bible is itself a collection of religious texts. What you need to show is tha ...[text shortened]... ed in some non-Biblical truth that can be “shown”. (The same for other religious texts, of course.)
Originally posted by vistesdVery interesting. Ok, scrap the Far Eastern religions as being religions. I guess all the major religions of the world are then left with are religions based upon the God of the Bible. Is that what you are implying?
According to your expressed understanding here—as I read it—Buddhism and Taoism are (with small exception perhaps) not religions at all. Neither is a large segment of Hinduism (viz., Advaita Vedanta and Kashmiri Shaivism; despite use of some theistic symbolism, neither of these expressions affirm a supernatural God of theism).
Originally posted by vistesdYes, I thought about this as I was writing it. However, there are many evidences that at its roots the Jewish religion had evangelical intentions in terms of reaching out to the entire world rather than just a tribe of people who were the Hebrews. An example is the Torah stating that through Abraham all the nations of the world will be blessed. The focus here is not simply the Jewish people even though they may have been the first. My theological view is that God began a work. He began with a man who then gave birth to a nation who then gave birth to the Messiah who then reached out to all of mankind. One must start somewhere and work out from there, no?
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EDIT: Your 4. might be challenged within a historical context. For example, the revelation of YHVH was initially to a small tribal group and did not reach outside that group in any big way for millennia—and then only as, really, a new religious viewpoint that enabled that. Today’s tribal religion may be discovered to be the next millennium’s major religion...[/b]
Originally posted by DoctorScribblespwnd
That's precisely why orangutan's solution is crap. You are a human being, in virtue of which you must navigate the world as it is represented in your set of beliefs. To the extent that you wish to survive, you cannot simply shed all of your beliefs as if they were burdens instead of essential assets. You should have known better.
Originally posted by epiphinehasThis is useful and I plan on reading Daniel closely at my earliest opportunity. However, it is my understanding that it is widely held that the book of Daniel was written in the 2nd century BC and not the 6th century as you attest.
What use would it be for anyone to attempt validating the bible to you, seeing how you are more than willing to validate a bowl of pudding? Even so, here is an offering:
The bible can be trusted as truth because its prophecies have been validated by history.
The prophetic book of Daniel, written in 600 B.C., accurately predicts the successive empi ames translation is actually the Meshiach Nagid,...