Religion III

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

So let's see.....justification is God who is just and the one who justifies sinners.

Now you claim justification may be defined by the words "just" and " justified"

Just brilliant

Rom 3:23-26
23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24 being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; 25 whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; 26 for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, that He might be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.
NASB

Really? How much in fact do you know what all other religions of the world...... are about?

I know enough to know that no other religion in the world teaches that God justifies sinners by imputing His own righteousness to them.

And I'm so sure of this, this should make you glad instead of mad; for now you have a golden opportunity to prove me wrong, Oh Worldly Wise One. You have a great opportunity to show us just how much some other world religion has in common with Christianity in terms of salvation.

As another wise man once asked, "Feelin' lucky, punk?"

[hcap]

Originally Posted by boxcar

I know enough to know that no other religion in the world teaches that God justifies sinners by imputing His own righteousness to them.

Of course not. No other religion understands what "justification" is, and it looks like no Christian here can explain it without using undefined Christian jargon and circular terminology. Now you are claiming "imputing His own righteousness to them". More jargon. Why not simply say if you believe in your god enough, you get saved? Why hide behind top heavy verbal vagaries?

How come you seem to aim to bamboozle non Christians with pretentious jargon?

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

Of course not. No other religion understands what "justification" is, and it looks like no Christian here can explain it without using undefined Christian jargon and circular terminology. Now you are claiming "imputing His own righteousness to them". More jargon. Why not simply say if you believe in your god enough, you get saved? Why hide behind top heavy verbal vagaries?

How come you seem to aim to bamboozle non Christians with pretentious jargon?

Arrr...poor Hcap's little head hurts? Could it have anything to do with all your butt hurts?

What part of 1482 didn't you get about Justification? All of it?

[hcap]

I think I will avoid your mental gymnastics attempting to always prove you are never wrong and an expert on everything. Instead I searched back almolst 50 years to when I did a short retreat at "New Camaldoli Hermitage", near Big Sur, in California.

Much time was spent in contemplation not arguing theology

YouTube (Short URL)

[hcap]

The Abbott was fond of Thomas Merton. As am I


“In the end the contemplative suffers the anguish of realizing that he no longer knows what God is. He may or may not mercifully realize that, after all, this is a great gain, because “God is not a what,” not a “thing.” That is precisely one of the essential characteristics of contemplative experience. It sees that there is no “what” that can be called God. There is “no such thing” as God because God is neither a “what” nor a “thing” but a pure “Who.”* He is the “Thou” before whom our inmost “I” springs into awareness. He is the I Am before whom with our own most personal and inalienable voice we echo “I am.”
― Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation


“Everyone of us is shadowed by an illusory person: a false self..We are not very good at recognizing illusions, least of all the ones we cherish about ourselves. (34) Contemplation is not and cannot be a function of this external self. There is an irreducible opposition between the deep transcendent self that awakens only in contemplation, and the superficial, external self which we commonly identify with the first person singular.(7) Our reality, our true self, is hidden in what appears to us to be nothingness....We can rise above this unreality and recover our hidden reality....(281) God Himself begins to live in me not only as my Creator but as my other and true self. (41)”
― Thomas Merton, New Seeds of Contemplation

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

I think I will avoid your mental gymnastics attempting to always prove you are never wrong and an expert on everything. Instead I searched back almolst 50 years to when I did a short retreat at "New Camaldoli Hermitage", near Big Sur, in California.

Much time was spent in contemplation not arguing theology

First you call me a biblical scholar, then after I define the biblical doctrine of justification you mock me by calling me an "expert on everything". Conflicted much?

[dnlgfnk]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

Christianity may indeed trace back to 3,500 years ago...but I am talking about the more modern exegesis of it that I see debated throughout some of the conversations here. If Jesus spoke as a simple man, to simple people...then, why has the exegesis of what he said gotten so complicated to understand in modern times? For example: Hard though I might try...I can only understand about 10% of what dnlgfnk writes in this thread.

I wouldn't call this simple...

https://colinblundell.files.wordpres...5/scan0030.jpg

Perhaps others do. But ok, I extract "self-remembering" from among the various branches, since...

http://www.gurdjiefffourthway.org/pd...EMEMBERING.pdf

Great. I have that in place. Simple.
But now I have to fend off Brian Farrell (professor/biology, Harvard), Feyerabend, Rorty, and one of the Four Horsemen of atheism, Dennett, who deny the reality of consciousness and threaten one of the pillars of my system. And also David Chalmers, who perhaps commits heresy by entertaining the idea that irrational objects in the universe also possess consciousness. So now a new term is entered into the discussion--"panpsychism". And now neuroscience scoffs at your system due to their philosophical belief that since particles have no free will ("biological reductionism"--great. More terms to know and hand on) , man does not have free will. So there is the threat to scrap the whole system entirely. Further, Ouspensky detailed how difficult it was to "self-remember", apparently to the point that former members print t-shirts which read, "Recovering Self-Memorizer"...

https://forum.culteducation.com/read.php?6,27083

...So that the system must be defended as truth from all sides. If one brick falls, the whole thing comes down. It must be internally cohesive.

Now that is just one branch of many tiers in place to explain the state of the world and one's place in it. Now multiply that by 20 centuries, and for the Christian, simple fisherman dealing with "Love one another as I have loved you", were soon dealing with "Should the Jewish converts be circumcised"?, etc., etc., etc.

[PaceAdvantage]

Originally Posted by hcap

I think I will avoid your mental gymnastics attempting to always prove you are never wrong and an expert on everything. Instead I searched back almolst 50 years to when I did a short retreat at "New Camaldoli Hermitage", near Big Sur, in California.

Much time was spent in contemplation not arguing theology

https://youtu.be/Sr3LrgGz664

Why are there crosses all over the place if they emphasize religious, non-religious, of any faith, no faith, etc. etc.?

[thaskalos]

Originally Posted by dnlgfnk

I wouldn't call this simple...

https://colinblundell.files.wordpres...5/scan0030.jpg

Perhaps others do. But ok, I extract "self-remembering" from among the various branches, since...

http://www.gurdjiefffourthway.org/pd...EMEMBERING.pdf

Great. I have that in place. Simple.
But now I have to fend off Brian Farrell (professor/biology, Harvard), Feyerabend, Rorty, and one of the Four Horsemen of atheism, Dennett, who deny the reality of consciousness and threaten one of the pillars of my system. And also David Chalmers, who perhaps commits heresy by entertaining the idea that irrational objects in the universe also possess consciousness. So now a new term is entered into the discussion--"panpsychism". And now neuroscience scoffs at your system due to their philosophical belief that since particles have no free will ("biological reductionism"--great. More terms to know and hand on) , man does not have free will. So there is the threat to scrap the whole system entirely. Further, Ouspensky detailed how difficult it was to "self-remember", apparently to the point that former members print t-shirts which read, "Recovering Self-Memorizer"...

https://forum.culteducation.com/read.php?6,27083

...So that the system must be defended as truth from all sides. If one brick falls, the whole thing comes down. It must be internally cohesive.

Now that is just one branch of many tiers in place to explain the state of the world and one's place in it. Now multiply that by 20 centuries, and for the Christian, simple fisherman dealing with "Love one another as I have loved you", were soon dealing with "Should the Jewish converts be circumcised"?, etc., etc., etc.

IMO...no "philosopher" or religious teacher worth his salt has avoided scathing criticism, often hurled from all sides of the spectrum. It's a mistake to judge a man like Gurdjieff from what others say about him...whether those outside opinions idolize the man...or vilify him. I've read Gurdjieff on my own, and have put some of his teaching to actual practice in my own life. That's how I decide if Gurdjieff was a fraud, or not. And I suspect the same can be said about those who are attracted to religious teachings of a different type. How can I properly categorize a Jesus, a Buddha, a Gurdjieff, or a Rudolf Steiner...if I rely only on hearsay in order to form my opinion of them?

Yes...the passing of time isn't kind to the spiritual master, and his teaching. That's why I question the prospect of placing absolute "faith" in a religious teaching that I encounter second and third-hand. I like to take the religious teaching out for a spin myself...to see if it resonates with me. And if it doesn't, then I leave it alone...without ridiculing it. All the teachings aren't for us...nor are we for them.

[dnlgfnk]

Originally Posted by thaskalos

IMO...no "philosopher" or religious teacher worth his salt has avoided scathing criticism, often hurled from all sides of the spectrum. It's a mistake to judge a man like Gurdjieff from what others say about him...whether those outside opinions idolize the man...or vilify him. I've read Gurdjieff on my own, and have put some of his teaching to actual practice in my own life. That's how I decide if Gurdjieff was a fraud, or not. And I suspect the same can be said about those who are attracted to religious teachings of a different type. How can I properly categorize a Jesus, a Buddha, a Gurdjieff, or a Rudolf Steiner...if I rely only on hearsay in order to form my opinion of them?

Yes...the passing of time isn't kind to the spiritual master, and his teaching. That's why I question the prospect of placing absolute "faith" in a religious teaching that I encounter second and third-hand. I like to take the religious teaching out for a spin myself...to see if it resonates with me. And if it doesn't, then I leave it alone...without ridiculing it. All the teachings aren't for us...nor are we for them.

I wasn't calling out the 4th Way specifically. I chose it to speak some of your language. If you take the individuals I mentioned (Dennett, et.al.) as personifications of movements against my Christianity or specifically my Catholicism through the centuries, I was citing the fact that new issues arise seemingly by decade, rather than century, and a system/philosophy/religion must respond with linguistic and conceptual accuracy to be what it claims to be. Thus language and ideas get more complicated when serious challenges must be met with serious responses. John Henry Newman detailed this in his later 19th century An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine.
I think you prefer to describe the writings and events of early Christianity with a "hermeneutic of suspicion", but many if not most "high church" Christians accept the First 7 Councils...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_...nical_councils

... and the central issues at hand are stated. They were often hashed out with technical language and deep conceptual thought. E.g., "hypostatic union", borrowed from Greek philosophers...

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/07610b.htm

I'm not appealing for it's truth, but relevant to the discussion, trying to illustrate how complex, necessary accuracy (for the Christian at least) can develop from 1st century implicit theology in fisherman to 4th century statements aimed at depth and accuracy of terms.

[hcap]

Originally Posted by PaceAdvantage

Why are there crosses all over the place if they emphasize religious, non-religious, of any faith, no faith, etc. etc.?

You must be joking.

The retreat was open to all religions and non religions, but they were a Catholic monastery.

Contemplation or a practical path to understanding was the point you missed. You sound as simple minded as boxcar

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

You must be joking.

The retreat was open to all religions and non religions, but they were a Catholic monastery.

Contemplation or a practical path to understanding was the point you missed. You sound as simple minded as boxcar

Well, then, this "simple-minded" guy would like to know "understanding" what, specifically?

[hcap]

Originally Posted by boxcar

Well, then, this "simple-minded" guy would like to know "understanding" what, specifically?

Watch the video of the monastery I posted

I know you "do" videos, no matter your denials

[boxcar]

Originally Posted by hcap

Watch the video of the monastery I posted

I know you "do" videos, no matter your denials

Very selectively do I do videos.

But nonetheless, if the "understanding" is spiritual in nature, then that understanding is [b]beyond the natural grasp[b] of spiritually dead human beings, which is everyone's natural born state, by the way.

Rom 3:11
11 There is none who understands,
There is none who seeks for God;
NASB

One must be born again to see (understand) the kingdom of God. Spiritual understanding is a grace from God that flows from the new birth from above.

[hcap]

Originally Posted by boxcar

Very selectively do I do videos.

Fine nothing else for me to say to a so-called religious scholar as yourself. Contemplation, prayer and meditation should be right up your alley.