@moonbus
Moonbus, which one of your posts or threads would you recommend as the more positive contributions to the subject of Spirituality ?
Could you go back over the last ten years and recommend a thread you participated in in which one could derive some positive help on human Spirituality from your writing?
I mean we can see you're talented at devising injurious wisecracks. Where did you get some serious thoughts in on Spirituality ?
@sonship saidI am genuinely spoilt for choice in identifying great posts from Moonbus that are insightful and thought-provoking (across numerous forums). In the Spirituality forum, for example, I would highlight:
@moonbus
Moonbus, which one of your posts or threads would you recommend as the more positive contributions to the subject of Spirituality ?
Could you go back over the last ten years and recommend a thread you participated in in which one could derive some positive help on human Spirituality from your writing?
I mean we can see you're talented at devising injurious wisecracks. Where did you get some serious thoughts in on Spirituality ?
'It is a peculiarly Judeo/Christian idea that moral laws require or imply a law giver, and that only a supernatural law giver guarantees that the laws so given are objectively right. There are ethical traditions which posit objectively valid moral principles without any supernaturalism or law giver at all. Kant, for example.'
@ghost-of-a-duke saidI like his posts too but do not agree with the quote. Without someone who holds us all accountable all that man can offer up is an opinion. No matter how noble we think it is another may laugh it to scorn.
I am genuinely spoilt for choice in identifying great posts from Moonbus that are insightful and thought-provoking (across numerous forums). In the Spirituality forum, for example, I would highlight:
'It is a peculiarly Judeo/Christian idea that moral laws require or imply a law giver, and that only a supernatural law giver guarantees that the laws so given are ob ...[text shortened]... ectively valid moral principles without any supernaturalism or law giver at all. Kant, for example.'
@kellyjay saidIt's okay for us not to agree old chap with each other's posts. I would willingly concede many of your own posts are thought-provoking, even if I will invariably (as an atheist) disagree with your point of view.
I like his posts too but do not agree with the quote. Without someone who holds us all accountable all that man can offer up is an opinion. No matter how noble we think it is another may laugh it to scorn.
'It is a peculiarly Judeo/Christian idea that moral laws require or imply a law giver, and that only a supernatural law giver guarantees that the laws so given are objectively right. There are ethical traditions which posit objectively valid moral principles without any supernaturalism or law giver at all. Kant, for example.'
I have not much considered supernaturalism as the necessary ingredient to the giving of the laws of God. But rather with them came the offerings of propitiation - the consecration offering, the sin offering, the peace offering, the meal offering in anticipation that men would be unable to fully live up to these laws.
He would need forgiveness for their transgression.
The offerings point to the Son of God Who single handedly became the whole human race's propitiatory sacrifice to bear the collective guilt of all mankind in one all-inclusive offering on behalf of all.
That is supernatural - that He had to be a Man in order to be able to die. And He had to be God in order to make the significance of His death have eternal efficacy and impact.
That's enough for this post.
@sonship saidThat post came from Moonbus. By responding to it I'm going to presume you found it worthy of a response.
@Ghost-of-a-Duke'It is a peculiarly Judeo/Christian idea that moral laws require or imply a law giver, and that only a supernatural law giver guarantees that the laws so given are objectively right. There are ethical traditions which posit objectively valid moral principles without any supernaturalism or law giver at all. Kant, for example.'
I have not ...[text shortened]... e the significance of His death have eternal efficacy and impact.
That's enough for this post.
@sonship saidI was more active in the SF in years past than recently. Some years ago there was quite a protracted series of threads about the various kinds and degrees of atheism, to which I contributed (it has since dropped off the thread-archive list). KellyJay and I have discussed serious matters at length over quite some period of time. RJHinds, Eladar, GoogleFudge, Tom Wolsey, and the redoubtable TWhitehead (who has not posted in a long while), and I engaged frequently on SF issues in years past. I have also corresponded with Suzianne, Grampy Bobby, and others by PM. I continue to contribute to the ... thread started by Rookie54.
@moonbus
Moonbus, which one of your posts or threads would you recommend as the more positive contributions to the subject of Spirituality ?
Could you go back over the last ten years and recommend a thread you participated in in which one could derive some positive help on human Spirituality from your writing?
I mean we can see you're talented at devising injurious wisecracks. Where did you get some serious thoughts in on Spirituality ?
Seek and ye shall find.
Whether anyone derived any benefit or insight from any of my remarks depends on the soil where the seeds fell. Nothing grows on barren ground.
@sonship saidThis is one of your go-to off-the-shelf gimmicks.
@moonbus
Moonbus, which one of your posts or threads would you recommend as the more positive contributions to the subject of Spirituality ?
Could you go back over the last ten years and recommend a thread you participated in in which one could derive some positive help on human Spirituality from your writing?
I mean we can see you're talented at devising injurious wisecracks. Where did you get some serious thoughts in on Spirituality ?
You've tried it out on me, too.
I went off and found a sample of 25 threads I had started in the previous year and posted a link for each one. They were diverse and, in many cases, well subscribed.
You did not acknowledge the effort I'd made to respond to your challenge.
You then fell silent for a week.
@ghost-of-a-duke saidHear hear!
I am genuinely spoilt for choice in identifying great posts from Moonbus that are insightful and thought-provoking (across numerous forums).
1 edit
@fmf saidThanks for that, FMF and Ghost.
Hear hear!
Now, to quote a recent example:
@suzianne said
My point in saying that the ministry of Jesus changed everything, is that it made a previously inaccessible God (except through the high priests) accessible to everyone. This made Christianity the first 'personal' religion. Or, as you say, a "consciousness of [personal] responsibility".
To which I replied:
There is a pre-parallel in the East, in the Bodhisattva figure, an enlightened one who has reached the state of being able to not return (i.e., nirvana), but, upon seeing all the creatures which had not reached the blessed state, Bodhisattva 'sacrifices' his own berth in nirvana and vows to stay in the embodied state until the very last living creature has made it to nirvana—-Bodhisattva will enter last of all. A rather interesting twist on the "last shall be first and first shall be last" idea.
That post got 2 thumbs up, so somebody must have derived some encouragement from it. How's that, sonship? Spiritual enough for you? Or do you require a more in-your-face style?
@moonbus saidIt seems sometimes as if "Spiritual", for sonship, simply means listening to him preach. His perspective on anything which is NOT the same as what he believes is apparently covered [and dismissed] by Philippians 3:8
How's that, sonship? Spiritual enough for you? Or do you require a more in-your-face style?
@fmf saidHe extrapolated the words "animal excrement" from Philippians 3:8 and has brandished them repeatedly in reference to non-Christian ideas.
It seems sometimes as if "Spiritual", for sonship, simply means listening to him preach. His perspective on anything which is NOT the same as what he believes is apparently covered [and dismissed] by Philippians 3:8
@ghost-of-a-duke saidThere have been many, invariably characterized by lean and cogent language.
That post came from Moonbus. By responding to it I'm going to presume you found it worthy of a response.
I liked this one:
"That a transcendent unmoved mover is needed to get existence going does not, by a long shot, establish that God exists, or that that God has anything to say to man, or that that transcendent unmoved mover is equivalent to the God of the OT or the NT, or that that God is the same as the man who died on the cross at Calvary. In some religions, the maker of the material universe is not the highest God, but a meagre demi-urge. A transcendent unmoved mover to get the universe going might have been like a match which kindles a fire, moves on to the next candle, and is eventually extinguished. Simply another mindless force external to this present universe, with no ethical message for man, would suffice as an explanatory principle, how existence got going. No design or intelligence needed."
@moonbus saidYou can suggest some body reached enlightenment to do things, that in no way is equivalent to God becoming a man to take on our guilt for our salvation, then rising from the dead. That was done for us in spite of guilt and inability to overcome our plight.
Thanks for that, FMF and Ghost.
Now, to quote a recent example:
@suzianne said
My point in saying that the ministry of Jesus changed everything, is that it made a previously inaccessible God (except through the high priests) accessible to everyone. This made Christianity the first 'personal' religion. Or, as you say, a "consciousness of [personal] responsibility".
...[text shortened]... that, sonship? Spiritual enough for you? Or do you require a more in-your-face style?
@fmf saidTwo of the reasons I stopped contributing much to the SF are:
It seems sometimes as if "Spiritual", for sonship, simply means listening to him preach. His perspective on anything which is NOT the same as what he believes is apparently covered [and dismissed] by Philippians 3:8
a) that the SF has come to be dominated by specifically Christian issues, whereas we used to discuss much broader issues which often included pagan, Buddhist and other non-theistic perspectives.
and b) that the Christian issues have come to be dominated by interpretations of specific passages of the Bible (e.g., sonships' Revelation 20:14,15 thread, or whether Paul's is the primary Gospel). I find this tedious, and irrelevant even within a Christian context. This fixation on Biblical passages is peculiarly Protestant/Fundamentalist. Whereas, within the mainstream Christian tradition, which means the (Western) Catholic and (Eastern) Orthodox churches, the primary channels whereby the Holy Spirit makes the will of God continuously known to man are Apostolic Succession and Ecumenical Councils. The Bible is tertiary, a snapshot frozen in time by the Council of Nicea in the 4th c.; Christianity has moved on since then.