OK here we go ! There seems to be tongue in cheek "tolerance" of the views of James Thomas by some posting on this thread. If I'm wrong I apologize but I'm not bringing this up in a judgemental way. If its so, I'm curious has the idea that God is dead effected your tolerance of testimony based on transendental experience ?
Siddhashunyata
JoinedPosts by Siddhashunyata
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50
Personal "God" and self-representation
by Narkissos init is commonly assumed that monotheism, in its jewish, christian and moslem forms, resulted in (or was related to) a specific development of human self-representation.
before a unique creator and judge the individual had to stand as an indivisible unit (e.g.
the "soul" in the middle ages) which was either justified or condemned, either saved or lost.
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Personal "God" and self-representation
by Narkissos init is commonly assumed that monotheism, in its jewish, christian and moslem forms, resulted in (or was related to) a specific development of human self-representation.
before a unique creator and judge the individual had to stand as an indivisible unit (e.g.
the "soul" in the middle ages) which was either justified or condemned, either saved or lost.
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Siddhashunyata
On the one hand,culturaly the death of God seems to have liberated a self contained individual (perhaps the legacy of monotheism) from guilt. Getting beyond disillusionment the guiltless, while existing , seek and find a more authentic spiritual experience with what is and they feel compassion . They do not imitate , they simply are transformed.
In this way the Death of God is an assault on man's ego and the idea, traveling through culture to the individual ( the mind set of monotheism), is a step toward liberation. An enlightened culture is at last possible and we see "Spiritual " movements on the rise.
On the other hand, the idea, traveling through culture has assisted the growth of "Consumerism" and the "self-contained individual" who once looked to God now looks to Consumer Culture for absolution. In that sense there is a new "self-contained individual", less sensitive and very materialistic. He has been liberated into the arms of Corporations.
I don't know how else to answer the questions . You have equated the issue of "Gods cultural death" to one's awakening to that issue through the JW experience. While that may have some validity, the cultural effect of God's death operates within all organized religions (including JW) regardless of dogma. Coming out of JW merely allowed more expression of some of those effects.
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What is a clear, concise definiton of SPIRITUALITY?????
by jazbug intoday's buzzwords are "i'm not religious, i'm spiritual.
anyone have an understandable meaning to spirituality that's not riddled with doublespeak.
thanks, jazbug
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Siddhashunyata
Spirituality is not a quality it is a state of being. By definition it includes everything that goes with a state of being such as perception and action. Thus spiritual people do not imitate they simply are.
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1975 Believers 101
by JAVA ina believer of a conviction is a hard person to change.
tell a believer you disagree with them and he?ll run away.
show him the facts and figures, and he?ll question the source.
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Siddhashunyata
Disillusionment is a positive step toward knowing what Jesus Christ knew, that the self must be left behind. The experience of believing with your whole heart and mind and finding out that you believed wrongly is tantamount to losing trust in your own mind and heart. This is what Zen masters try to provoke in their students by asking murky, obscure and odd questions. Losing trust in the conceptualizing of the prefrontal cortex opens up the possibility of knowing truth directly. That's what happens when the ego dies. Thus one kind of life dies but another kind begins. It is this latter life that is the mystery. It manifests itself in all beings and is undifferentiated, it is One Life. That is what Jesus Christ knew.
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Signs of the end, are they so clear that we don't see them anymore?
by JH in7 ?for nation will rise against nation and kingdom against kingdom, and there will be food shortages and earthquakes in one place after another.
8 all these things are a beginning of pangs of distress.
9 ?then people will deliver you up to tribulation and will kill you, and you will be objects of hatred by all the nations on account of my name.
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Siddhashunyata
Doesn't it seem odd that the Bible has two diametrially opposed ideas about "TIME". On the one hand we are not to be concerned about time ( "who can add a cubit to his life span?", "don't be anxious over anything" ) on the other hand ( "be on the watch", "work out your own salvation with fear and trembling" and all the time related prophecies). Could it be that this inconsistency shows the deep contrast between the Jewish Messianic hope of a time related deliverence and the Spiritual message of Jesus as a Buddhist for which there is some evidence in that during his youth ,in Egypt , there was a Buddhist monastc community at Alexandria.
In Jehovah's Witnesses I was never able to reconcile the tension that I felt between the spiritual pursuit of peace and the obsessive anxiety over time . In my opinion , if the Bible is your guide, you have a choice to pursue its spiritual teachings , which lead to peace, or its time and reward related teachings , which lead ,among other things, to anxiety. Taking all of it together produces the madness of "Fundamentalism" which we see today.
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Is our society changing ........... becoming more religiously polarized?
by tyydyy ini realize that it's entirely possible that i'm seeing things from my own perspective only but i've noticed a increasingly powerful voice speaking for religious thoughts in world politics.
are we seeing a return to a victorian age?
am i just paranoid?
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Siddhashunyata
Good topic. In my opinion we are witnessing the final convulsions of belief itself. Science and technology have stripped belief bare as has the reality of dilemmas blasted across the airways and the media. Massive injustice , unbelievable suffering are common points of discussion amidst the pining of religious zealots. The difference from other periods of history are the facts of science found out by the instruments of science: telescopes and microscopes. We know the heavens are in a turmoil of change and not static and perfect. We know DNA means a criminal mind , a penchant for cancer, or addiction. Child abuse creates child abusers . These things fly in the face of a naive belief that the individual is responsible before God. It is impossible to justify the horror of two headed babies or wholesale bombing of innocents. These things simply exist because their causes and conditions exist. They have nothing to do with good /bad, right/ wrong . Qualifications are imposed on the facts by the believing hypocrits crafting their needs into a world view and then attempting , through wealth and political power, to project it on rthe world. The problem is not morality the problem is ignorance and power. In my opinion we are witnessing the end of religious power, the final light before the sunset, the last gasp of power based on belief. In the end there will be only "heart and science" (Emerson)
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"Lunch with Ted and Melita Jaracz" {photo enclosed}
by sf in.
wonder just when this was taken.
i thought he was a bit younger looking then this: .
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Siddhashunyata
"now what about these colored shirts, brothers?"
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Blood Issue. Meaning of letters HLC
by Siddhashunyata inrecently there was a thread on the blood issue wherby it was no longer a disfellowshipping offense but , a deceitful change in policy whereby anyone who took one would be assumed to be disassociated.
very clever.
in the post, reference was made to an hlc letter.
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Siddhashunyata
Thanks Scully for the truth and thanks blondie for the meaning behind the truth.
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Blood Issue. Meaning of letters HLC
by Siddhashunyata inrecently there was a thread on the blood issue wherby it was no longer a disfellowshipping offense but , a deceitful change in policy whereby anyone who took one would be assumed to be disassociated.
very clever.
in the post, reference was made to an hlc letter.
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Siddhashunyata
Recently there was a thread on the blood issue wherby it was no longer a disfellowshipping offense but , a deceitful change in policy whereby anyone who took one would be assumed to be disassociated. Very clever. In the post, reference was made to an HLC letter. What do the letters HLC stand for?
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What Profound ironies do you know about?
by Siddhashunyata inin another thread big tex related a story about the memorial wine that was so ironic that i thought maybe others saw profound irony in some of their experiences.
for example i recall a brother who gave up a military pension 2 years before retirement in order to pioneer for jehovah.. he would deride another brother for working long hours at his business ( auto repair business) and who spent virtually no time in field service.
years passed, the pioneer brother became needy and had to stop pioneering in order to work while the other brother had saved enough to retire and pioneer.
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Siddhashunyata
delema = dilemma