Quote:
Originally Posted by boxcar
Okay...so there's a "moon" to be seen in the Amalekite account but no moon to be seen in the different Judas accounts? In the former case, the "moon" speaks to you (?) and sez, "Okay, time to allegorize up". But in the latter, there's no moon, therefore, those accounts must be taken literally which is why you don't jump through allegorical hoops to perform mental gymnastics to reconcile their differences?
Am I warm here?
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Ok I kinda figured out your question.
However you are jumping around trying to analyse too much
without the underlying "body of knowledge" In my metaphorical understanding of god eradicating the Amalekite infants and farm animals, I drew upon an ancient tradition spoken about in many "paths" . That is the warning against the devious illusion that we are already of one mind, one identity.
We are not.
Lower Self: The Ten Thousand I`s
http://dangxia.org/englishfile/lower...nthousand.html
The lower self is a collection of attitudes, dreams, and mechanical habits that dwell within a man. There is not an unchangeable ‘I’ that is always the same. Rather, a man's many thoughts, emotions and sensations are his ‘many I`s’, which are traditionally numbered as ten thousand. As the ten thousand I's randomly assert themselves, each one mistakenly takes itself to be 'real I', and moreover, constantly interferes with the effort to simply Be Present. Jesus Christ said, "Thine enemies shall be they of your own household."
So the "principle" behind using the allegory/metaphor of using external events, and many characters to point to those "fragments" within our psyche is one of the most basic ways to understand scripture metaphorically.
Christian tradition--The Bible, Mark 5 - 9: And Jesus asked him, What is thy name? And he answered, saying, My name is Legion: for we are many.
So the Amalekite "children" are inner fragments retaining leftover harmful characteristics of their "parents". The danger is we do not recognize they have the potential to grow and as I said "re-infect" us.
In the simplest case if we try and stop a bad habit like smoking, or overheating, when we manage a small success and cut down on that habit, we forget how devious that habit may be. Walk into a room with a lot of smoking and after quitting, the smell alone opens a door for that "memory" just a tiny bit and for one instance for that sneaky "infant" to sneak back in.
"Oh maybe I can take a drag on a friends cigarette? Just one, just one drag" .
Or let med try a bite of that doughnut I just gave up. "Just one teny, tiny bite.Then I'll be good again"
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Zen Buddhist tradition-- Bodhidharma (First Partriarch of Chinese Zen Buddhism. 6th c.): Near and yet you cannot see them. This is the nature of the ten thousand things.
Quote:
Sufi tradition -- Hafiz (14th c. Persian Sufi poet): It is always a danger to the aspirant on the path when one begins to believe and act as if the ten thousand idiots who so long ruled and lived inside have all packed their bags and skipped town or died.
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