Religion II

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by Actor

You do! Great!

Sorry. You're going to have to work at it.

All in due time. First things first.

That's what I was afraid of.

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

I propose that we change the title of this thread to something more appropriate...like "The Science of Religion".

Better yet...just join the cult of Scientology. And you'll be good to go. Heck...they might even have their own forum.

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

Alan Wilson Watts (1915–1973) was a British-American philosopher who interpreted and popularized Eastern philosophy for a Western audience.

Words.......

https://youtu.be/cgNpU9mvzLM

Funny how words only become YUGE problems when used in God talk. For all other purposes, words are great. In fact, could we humans actually live without communicating in words?

And I bet words would also be a great way to communicate to others that when it comes to God talk, words are useless. No one would have any problem whatsoever with this kind of God talk.

Words are great...except when I say they're not.

Liberals love to shoot down free speech of conservatives because they don't want to hear what conservatives have to say. Likewise, the natural born enemies of God love to shut down God speech because they don't want to hear what He has to say. This is why the Jews killed so many of the OT prophets and ultimately The Prophet.

You're another insufferable bore, Hcap. Don't bore me with any more of your useless words.

[hcap]

Originally Posted by boxcar

Funny how words only become YUGE problems when used in God talk. For all other purposes, words are great. In fact, could we humans actually live without communicating in words?

"God talk" is your primary weakness. You think god is definable.
We may only be able to point.

To understand many subjects one must learn the proper language. Your understanding of other religions and science, math, engineering and history lack the nouns and verbs to define basic concepts of those topics.

Buddhism warns against winding up getting lost in a jumble of misapplied words instead of dealing correctly with what those subjects are about. You divide large concepts artificially into repetitious and tiny, irrelevant word games.

Your inability to understand cause and effect and before preceding after comes intermediately to mind.

Words are very useful but in Zen, replacing the experience with limited descriptors is the old confusing the map for the territory
Yes we need maps but living in a 2- or 3 dimensional map is a poor substitute for what the map represents

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by hcap

"God talk" is your primary weakness. You think god is definable.

"Definable"?? Boxcar even knows what God can or cannot DO! Boxcar has an intimate relationship with God...a la Moses.

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

"God talk" is your primary weakness. You think god is definable.
We may only be able to point.

To understand many subjects one must learn the proper language. Your understanding of other religions and science, math, engineering and history lack the nouns and verbs to define basic concepts of those topics.

Buddhism warns against winding up getting lost in a jumble of misapplied words instead of dealing correctly with what those subjects are about. You divide large concepts artificially into repetitious and tiny, irrelevant word games.

Your inability to understand cause and effect and before preceding after comes intermediately to mind.

Words are very useful but in Zen, replacing the experience with limited descriptors is the old confusing the map for the territory
Yes we need maps but living in a 2- or 3 dimensional map is a poor substitute for what the map represents

But you're doing God talk right now. Again, your kind of God talk is fine, just not mine or any Evangelical Christian's for that matter.

So, tell us, please: What do you know about God that you can tell us with such great certitude that He is not definable?

[hcap]

Zen is like looking for the spectacles that are sitting on your nose.
ZEN SAYING
.................................................. ............................
Too many words in Zen also

Tokusan Sengan (782-865 lived in northern China, where he studied the sutras and became a respected Buddhist scholar. When he heard that a sect in southern China advocated a "transmission outside the scriptures," he got angry and vowed to "exterminate the Zen devils." He set out for the south with a copy of the Diamond Sutra in a large box. On his way he stopped at a tea house, where he ordered a snack from the old woman there. Now, "snack" in Chinese literally means "to light up the mind."

The old woman asked Tokusan what he had in the box, and he told her it was the Diamond Stura. "Is that so?" said the woman, "Then answer this question: If you want a snack to light up your mind, which mind are you going to light up?" The Diamond Sutra contains a famous passage that says, "Past mind is unattainable, present mind is unattainable, future mind is unattainable."

Tokusan knew the passage well and could discourse about it with great erudition, but when the woman challenged him to apply its wisdom to a practical matter, he was at a loss. Thus realizing the limits of scholarship, Tokusan decided to study Zen instead of trying to destroy it.

Remember bozx, the devil is in the details. One way of double checking your understanding is

"to apply its wisdom to a practical matter"

[hcap]

Originally Posted by boxcar

But you're doing God talk right now. Again, your kind of God talk is fine, just not mine or any Evangelical Christian's for that matter.

So, tell us, please: What do you know about God that you can tell us with such great certitude that He is not definable?

No, I am not trying to define "god". Only a way of knowing things. Words sometimes are barriers to these large concepts. Once again I am willing to accept the ineffable.

Tathata, which means "suchness" or "thusness," is a word sometimes used primarily in Mahayana Buddhism to mean "reality," or the way things really are. It's understood that the true nature of reality is ineffable, beyond description and conceptualization.

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

No, I am not trying to define "god". Only a way of knowing things. Words sometimes are barriers to these large concepts. Once again I am willing to accept the ineffable.

Tathata, which means "suchness" or "thusness," is a word sometimes used primarily in Mahayana Buddhism to mean "reality," or the way things really are. It's understood that the true nature of reality is ineffable, beyond description and conceptualization.

Yes you are. You most definitely are trying to define God! You're telling us something about God. You're telling us that he can't be defined. Therefore, the question is begging to be asked: How do YOU know he can't be defined? You must know something about him to make any rational statement about him. Either that or you're blowing smoke up everyone's butt; and you're speaking out of your ignorance, making an irrational statement about him.

So which is it?

[Actor]

Originally Posted by boxcar

That's what I was afraid of.

So want a royal road! Sorry, there isn't one.

But let's get started. You accept the big bang theory, right?

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by Actor

So want a royal road! Sorry, there isn't one.

But let's get started. You accept the big bang theory, right?

Yeah, right.

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by Actor

But let's get started. You accept the big bang theory, right?

I, personally, will accept the "big bang theory" when science tells me what existed before the big bang.

[hcap]

Originally Posted by boxcar

Yes you are. You most definitely are trying to define God! You're telling us something about God. You're telling us that he can't be defined. Therefore, the question is begging to be asked: How do YOU know he can't be defined? You must know something about him to make any rational statement about him. Either that or you're blowing smoke up everyone's butt; and you're speaking out of your ignorance, making an irrational statement about him.

So which is it?

More word games. You never stoop and do not see what you do just to keep this nonsense going full blast.

I only said god may be unknowable. Not knowing something is very distinct from your volumes and contradictory tomes ad infinitum about your particular jealous and spiteful god.

If one does not understand something and realizes one's own ignorance, yes you may play your silly word games and say I am defining an aspect of an unknown, but that bunky, IS VERY DIFFERENT THAN TELLING US that how and why your bonkers deity murders infants and farm animals as some sort of "divine justice"

[hcap]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

I, personally, will accept the "big bang theory" when science tells me what existed before the big bang.

What existed before god? God's father and grandfather?

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

More word games. You never stoop and do not see what you do just to keep this nonsense going full blast.

I only said god may be unknowable. Not knowing something is very distinct from your volumes and contradictory tomes ad infinitum about your particular jealous and spiteful god.

If one does not understand something and realizes one's own ignorance, yes you may play your silly word games and say I am defining an aspect of an unknown, but that bunky, IS VERY DIFFERENT THAN TELLING US that how and why your bonkers deity murders infants and farm animals as some sort of "divine justice"

Why do you have to be so duplicitous? Why can't you be honest for once in your life? You said God is undefinable. Period. No maybes. No perhaps. No possibly. Just..."God cannot be defined".

So, again, I ask you: How do you know this?