by Singing Man 59 Replies latest jw friends
Your bills and debts become someone else's problems! You would not have to shave anymore, or brush you teeth. Never have to wash the car again either! I can go on, but you get the idea. Maverick
I see our resident sadducees has graced us with his divine wisdom
Anyway does anyone have some good resonable ideas as to what happens to us after we die?
The answer has been staring you in the face for years, but you have been blind to it. Here's a few quotes from your own JW Bible.
I suppose it starts with the fact, that your soul has never really died?
*** Rbi8 Proverbs 8:22 *** 22 ?Jehovah himself produced me as the beginning of his way, the earliest of his achievements of long ago.
Translation: You were mostly likely there too... right at the beginning when God created the heavens and the Earth. The above scripture is usually attributed to Jesus, but the text does not imply this.
*** Rbi8 Matthew 10:28 *** 28 And do not become fearful of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; but rather be in fear of him that can destroy both soul and body in Ge·hen'na.
Translation: Your body dies - your soul does not (unless God decides to take it back.... I think you'd have to be a real hard-core bad-dude for this to happen, since God also makes the Sun shine on sinners, just as he does nice people.)
*** Rbi8 John 9:1-2 *** 9 Now as he was passing along he saw a man blind from birth. 2 And his disciples asked him: ?Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, so that he was born blind?
Translation: Jesus's disciples were fully aware of the cycle of rebirth of a soul when they asked Jesus the question above. They assumed (correctly) that the man had lived before, and this was yet another one of his lives. Jesus never once rebuked them for this thought, but did caution them against drawing incorrect conclusions about the laws of cause and effect, karma and grace.
*** Rbi8 Matthew 17:10-13 *** 10 However, the disciples put the question to him: ?Why, then, do the scribes say that E·li'jah must come first?? 11 In reply he said: ?E·li'jah, indeed, is coming and will restore all things. 12 However, I say to YOU that E·li'jah has already come and they did not recognize him but did with him the things they wanted. In this way also the Son of man is destined to suffer at their hands.? 13 Then the disciples perceived that he spoke to them about John the Baptist.
Question for reader: What thought process caused the disciples to induce that John the Baptist was once the soul known as Elijah? Note, that Jesus did not teach the disciples this concept in the above statement, the disciples were already able to draw the correct conclusion to Jesus' statement!!!
*** Rbi8 John 3:5 *** Jesus answered: ?Most truly I say to you, Unless anyone is born from water and spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
Translation: Your body will die (your soul will not), and you will be reborn again (and again, and again)... but it is far more important to concentrate of why you are reborn. Also note: Nicode'mus understood Jesus, but did not believe him, Jesus rebuked him for this.
The answer to your question lies in the Bible, not the WatchTower or Awake magazines. Throw them out, or start a fire!
I believe that we are returned to life through a new born baby. Our past knowledge is used in the new life and that explains how iron , copper, industrial, and space ages evolved. Just think of how education, higher learning, higher math, has progressed. How inventions in the last hundred twenty years have changed the earth. The buggy, train, car, airplane computers,robotics. On and on . I'll do a hell of a lot more the next time around than this stand in the woods.
I'm fairly sure - given my experience in this life - that there is a God, and he is aware of each individual, and cares about their growth. He helps them grow throughout life, so it doesn't make sense that He would put all that effort into developing my personality and then just kaput?
So there is something. It may be reincarnation with the idea of continuing the personal growth, maybe in another form.
What I think that is important is to take full advantage of this life to become the best person you can possibly be. There are so many basic lessons that need to be learned - like the balance between greed and charity, between hedonism and asceticism, between love and hate.
I'm pretty sure that we get wiser in a fundamental sense each time we go around the cycle, and maybe eventually we build up enough karma to reach the next plane, and then we keep growing.
The plain fact is that MOST human beings that have ever lived have believed in a Creator of some sort, and life after death, of some sort. That does not prove it, per se, but it does indicate that humans have an instinct towards those beliefs. Which is interesting.
I find no benefit in fighting that instinct, and a great deal of comfort in my belief. It may be a narcotic of the masses, as Marx said, but if so, it's a necessary one for me.
As for the body, there is an old proverb:
The worms crawl in
The worms crawl out
The worms play pinochle on your snout.
CZAR
My perspective on beliefs about the afterlife is this: if there is anything we should have learned from the Witness experience it is that the more conviction we have in a belief (no matter what it may be) the more difficult it is for us to learn, grow, and experience consenual reality. I think there is a lot positive to be said about an individual who is open to examining new ideas and information without being judgemental of someone else's progress in their understanding of how things fit together. I know this is hard to do if we really believe something, but we would be smart to be skeptical and open about our own beliefs.
I can say this about my own beliefs is that they evolve and change. I tend to be a pretty hard core skeptical and scientifically oriented person. I want to see evidence for any theory or hypothesis, and the more radical the new idea is, the more supportive information I need to feel comfortable with accepting the new concept.
How all this relates to the afterlife goes like this...right now the scientific community, in several fields, (like physics, cosmology, astronomy) are going through a remarkable period where a lot of established beliefs are crumbling. While there is no wholesale exodus to New Age thinking, I would feel safe in saying that our understanding of reality in the past has been fundamentally flawed and many new discoveries are being made that suggests that maybe it isn't so crazy to believe that our material universe is all there is. Many cosmologists now subscribe to the multiverse theory which says that our universe, everything produced by the Big Bang, is only a small grain of sand in a seashore of other universes. Physics is showing us that mathematical models are showing that even our familiar 5 dimensions are an illusion and that what we experience and see is only part of reality. Astronomy is showing us things we just cannot explain in our current worldviews of how things work. Other scientists are showing things once considered impossible (like the positions of the planets effecting our lives) are in fact happening and scientists brave enough to investigate several well known mediums who supposedly contact the dead, have found out that they cannot explain away the incredible odds that something very strange is happening, and that information from the "other side" is coming through that defies the laws of chance.
All this is disturbing to rationalists who want a nice and predicatable model of reality. Most people don't enjoy uncertainty and the end result is that a lot of people just dismiss anything "messy" like this. While we should be skeptical, we should also be open enough to investigate things that just don't fit in our current beliefs instead of making a blanket dismisal of anything that doesn't fit. Besides that, you would be missing out on all the fun. My suggestion therefore is to keep looking, develop your truth telling tools and skills, and see where your investigation leads you.
Kind Regards,
Skipper
I believe in an afterlife too. It's just lived vicariously, through bugs.AlanF
Alan that really cracked me up. I just spit my morning diet pepsi all over the monitor.
Don't forget worms, we live on vicariously through worms too.
LOL
I definitely believe our souls move on. I truly believe we will be reunited with our loved ones who have gone before us.
I wish I knew what I believed. I am so confused now about this since I took away the only foundation of faith I have ever known. I'm almost afraid to believe there is something to hope for incase I find out that is lies too.
Sns while I personally think this life is it for us I would think a person such as yourself should continue on living a good life. After all should there be an enity that will hand out rewards after you die wouldn't living a good life be enough for him? Do you really think he would require you to worship him in the manner some church has laid out?
I think it's the ultimate form of hubris to declare a steadfast position about something that no one can know with any certainty.
I'm secure enough in my ignorance of what comes after death (seeing as I've never died, and all) to admit that I don't know what happens after we die. I have some ideas, a few wishes about what happens when our lives end, but I just don't know. And, since death is inevitable, I suppose that I'll find out someday. Or not, as the case may be.
