Spiderman
Veteran Member
those Hindus are actually atheists
a·the·ist
ˈāTHēəst/
noun
- a person who disbelieves or lacks belief in the existence of God or gods.
-
Welcome to Religious Forums, a friendly forum to discuss all religions in a friendly surrounding.
Your voice is missing! You will need to register to get access to the following site features:- Reply to discussions and create your own threads.
- Our modern chat room. No add-ons or extensions required, just login and start chatting!
- Access to private conversations with other members.
We hope to see you as a part of our community soon!
Atheism produces little hope
- Thread starter Spiderman
- Start date
a·the·ist
ˈāTHēəst/
noun
Considering the fallible nature of humans, 93% of all humans could most likely be wrong. I agree with @Sunstone that your rant against atheism has absolutely nothing to do with whether people have hope or not.
Both Shinto and Christianity are grounded to a certain extent in ancient mythology and superstition which makes them questionable in terms of real hope.
Jumi
Well-Known Member
Then your choice of pictures was unfortunate.
Spiderman
Veteran Member
I've already agreed that they are both questionable, and I could be wrong
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
Why would an atheist not have any hope? We're here aren't we? Tells me things work out already without having notions and ideas of gods exasperating the fundamental inquiry into our existence right from the start.View attachment 21700 View attachment 21701 So I was studying Shintoism, what used to be the state religion of Japan, and an atheist mocked it.
Shinto's probably don't have the whole truth, and they probably have some legends that are nothing more than someone with a wild imagination.
However, they might have some truth. They build great tombs for their emperors, where they go to pray and burn incense and make wishes.
They believe their Spirits live on as Kami, exalted glorified spirits, and continue looking out for their Nation.
When a family member dies, the family member becomes a "family kami", looking out for the family with the ancestors.
They have many shrines that are dedicated to the soldiers who died in various Wars, where hundreds of thousands of names are written in a book of souls.
They venerate their ancestors and dead relatives, and keep shrines to them.
There are priests and clergy who pray to the kami and care for the shrine, which they believe is a house for the spirits, whom they honor in many ways, accepting any visitors.
The Shinto's believe that everything from rocks, trees, water, the sun, nature, and all creatures, contains something divine, and is evidence for the existence of the Divine.
I was mocked by an Atheist for sharing my recent attempt to practice Shintoism (and connect with the kami and souls of the Emperors of the rising sun), and mentioning a coincidence that came afterwards, that spoke to me.
Perhaps it was just a stupid coincidence with no Supernatural origin... I do actually treat everything with skepticism, despite being very spiritual.
But I honestly felt pity for the atheist who was mocking me.
So back to the title of the thread. I'm not saying that atheists have no hope. If you're happy as an atheist, I don't want you to be a theist..., I want you to be happy.
However, the philosophy of atheism is hopeless, if you look at it in this sense,
What do you have to look forward to 200 years from now? There's really not much hope in that context.
Shinto's, as well as roughly 93% of the world has hope that the spirit goes on living. They also have hope that there are spirits, whether those Spirits be gods, goddesses, kami, Saints, Angels, or ancestors, that look out for and help the world.
Hoping in such things, and prayers to those supernatural entities can produce joy, ecstasy, euphoria, bliss, and peace... I've experienced it many times.
Also, people of many faiths believe that the euphoria, beauty, and joy that we experience on this Earth, is just a foretaste of a much greater euphoria, beauty, and joy after our spirit leaves its body, and travels to perfection, eventually reaching some form of paradise.
That can produce a lot of Hope.
So, these people, who make up the vast majority of the world, can actually hope that 200 years from now, they will be experiencing joy, pleasure, euphoria, and bliss, that the joy and euphoria we experience on Earth, cannot even come close to equaling.
An atheist on the other hand, is stubbornly clinging to the belief that they will just become food for the maggots and worms, rot in a hole, or become a pile of ash.
We evolved from a single cell organism in the ocean or pond scum, there are no Supernatural entities looking out for us, and we will get sick, fall apart, die any day, and there's no hope for anything afterwards.
Now an atheist is not without hope in this context. They can enjoy sensual pleasures, friendships, marriage, hobbies, nature, food, fun, games, adventure, romance, beauty, etc.
But the beauty is fleeting. I'm sure many beautiful people lost their beauty overnight in a firey car crash ,or became paralyzed from the neck down overnight in something similar.
Just an example that everything is fleeting, and all you've worked for can be taken from you today or tomorrow.
The theist has hope that this is not our home. That we have a destiny to find an eternal home that is better than this.
So, in view of what's going to matter 100 years from now, atheism doesn't really produce much, if any hope.
Many theists have almost unshakable hope, and are experiencing peace, joy, and Euphoria in their spiritual practices.
Now what if the 7% of atheists are correct, and the 93% of people who believe in Supernatural entities are mistaken...
Well 200 years from now, the atheists will not be celebrating that they were right, and the theists will not regret that they were wrong.
So, no one really wins...
I've read multiple books by survivors of concentration camps. They said, many of the people that went and grabbed the electric fence to commit suicide, or completely gave up hope and died, were people that had no faith.
People that had strong faith, had more hope, and it made their experience in the concentration camp more bearable.
I could die tomorrow, so I'm going to choose the path that gives me more joy.
I could be wrong, but at least it makes me happy even in some of the worst of circumstances sometimes...that is, studying the various spiritualities of different religions and trying to practice it.
If I die, I'm not going to regret being wrong... and perhaps, that tiny 7% of people who rejected this hope, were so smart they knew better than over 90% of people out there.
Good for them! 100 years from now, none of us will care.
Thoughts?
I'm going to continue my studies of Shintoism for now... and pray to the samurai and emperors of the sun!
View attachment 21703 View attachment 21704
HonestJoe
Well-Known Member
Those types of beliefs. There is a vast range of very different and often contradictory belief and assertions in that field. Most of them must be wrong at least in part because of all of those contradictions. On that basis, I don’t think the generic commonalities between all their beliefs are relevant to their validity.
So then you have to ask yourself whether false hope would be better than accurate realism?
Spiderman
Veteran Member
I'm glad you are content and have found the happiness you are looking for! Do what makes you happy!
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
I wouldn't say happy necessarily, more like complacent under the circumstances.I'm glad you are content and have found the happiness you are looking for! Do what makes you happy!
Spiderman
Veteran Member
If hope is giving them joy, empowerment, and strength, at least they have found something that makes them happy, speaks to their heart, and inspires them.Those types of beliefs. There is a vast range of very different and often contradictory belief and assertions in that field. Most of them must be wrong at least in part because of all of those contradictions. On that basis, I don’t think the generic commonalities between all their beliefs are relevant to their validity.
So then you have to ask yourself whether false hope would be better than accurate realism?
In the end, they're just going to rot in a hole, and it's not going to make a difference to them whether they were right or wrong, if you indeed are right
Yes, I'm well aware that religions contradict each other... but I believe each of them have pieces of the truth... and likely each of them have some falsehoods... that's why I don't get into the mythology very much...
But some of them have many similarities... like, necromancers, shamans, shintoists, spiritualists, and others, are all united with Catholicism, and each other, in the faith that there is life after death, and that the dead can be invoked and contacted, and that they assist the living with their intercession.
Their methods and traditions for honoring and contacting the Dead can be very similar as well.
No hope is better than false hope. Certainly more realistic.
Father Heathen
Veteran Member
Hope is something we make with our hands. Sitting on them and wishing upon a star actually produces less of it.
Faith isn't the sole source of hope.
We just hope for different things.
Sitting on God's knee in Heaven just isn't one of ours.
Shinto is very interesting.
Atheist isn't. In fact, atheism barely is. At its best it gets out of the way, cleans the stage so that there is room for the good stuff. It was never meant to "produce hope".
But how or why atheism would be the enemy of Shinto, I can't figure.
Atheist isn't. In fact, atheism barely is. At its best it gets out of the way, cleans the stage so that there is room for the good stuff. It was never meant to "produce hope".
But how or why atheism would be the enemy of Shinto, I can't figure.
Never understood that, myself. Why long for immortality?
Audie
Veteran Member
View attachment 21700 View attachment 21701 So I was studying Shintoism, what used to be the state religion of Japan, and an atheist mocked it.
Shinto's probably don't have the whole truth, and they probably have some legends that are nothing more than someone with a wild imagination.
However, they might have some truth. They build great tombs for their emperors, where they go to pray and burn incense and make wishes.
They believe their Spirits live on as Kami, exalted glorified spirits, and continue looking out for their Nation.
When a family member dies, the family member becomes a "family kami", looking out for the family with the ancestors.
They have many shrines that are dedicated to the soldiers who died in various Wars, where hundreds of thousands of names are written in a book of souls.
They venerate their ancestors and dead relatives, and keep shrines to them.
There are priests and clergy who pray to the kami and care for the shrine, which they believe is a house for the spirits, whom they honor in many ways, accepting any visitors.
The Shinto's believe that everything from rocks, trees, water, the sun, nature, and all creatures, contains something divine, and is evidence for the existence of the Divine.
I was mocked by an Atheist for sharing my recent attempt to practice Shintoism (and connect with the kami and souls of the Emperors of the rising sun), and mentioning a coincidence that came afterwards, that spoke to me.
Perhaps it was just a stupid coincidence with no Supernatural origin... I do actually treat everything with skepticism, despite being very spiritual.
But I honestly felt pity for the atheist who was mocking me.
So back to the title of the thread. I'm not saying that atheists have no hope. If you're happy as an atheist, I don't want you to be a theist..., I want you to be happy.
However, the philosophy of atheism is hopeless, if you look at it in this sense,
What do you have to look forward to 200 years from now? There's really not much hope in that context.
Shinto's, as well as roughly 93% of the world has hope that the spirit goes on living. They also have hope that there are spirits, whether those Spirits be gods, goddesses, kami, Saints, Angels, or ancestors, that look out for and help the world.
Hoping in such things, and prayers to those supernatural entities can produce joy, ecstasy, euphoria, bliss, and peace... I've experienced it many times.
Also, people of many faiths believe that the euphoria, beauty, and joy that we experience on this Earth, is just a foretaste of a much greater euphoria, beauty, and joy after our spirit leaves its body, and travels to perfection, eventually reaching some form of paradise.
That can produce a lot of Hope.
So, these people, who make up the vast majority of the world, can actually hope that 200 years from now, they will be experiencing joy, pleasure, euphoria, and bliss, that the joy and euphoria we experience on Earth, cannot even come close to equaling.
An atheist on the other hand, is stubbornly clinging to the belief that they will just become food for the maggots and worms, rot in a hole, or become a pile of ash.
We evolved from a single cell organism in the ocean or pond scum, there are no Supernatural entities looking out for us, and we will get sick, fall apart, die any day, and there's no hope for anything afterwards.
Now an atheist is not without hope in this context. They can enjoy sensual pleasures, friendships, marriage, hobbies, nature, food, fun, games, adventure, romance, beauty, etc.
But the beauty is fleeting. I'm sure many beautiful people lost their beauty overnight in a firey car crash ,or became paralyzed from the neck down overnight in something similar.
Just an example that everything is fleeting, and all you've worked for can be taken from you today or tomorrow.
The theist has hope that this is not our home. That we have a destiny to find an eternal home that is better than this.
So, in view of what's going to matter 100 years from now, atheism doesn't really produce much, if any hope.
Many theists have almost unshakable hope, and are experiencing peace, joy, and Euphoria in their spiritual practices.
Now what if the 7% of atheists are correct, and the 93% of people who believe in Supernatural entities are mistaken...
Well 200 years from now, the atheists will not be celebrating that they were right, and the theists will not regret that they were wrong.
So, no one really wins...
I've read multiple books by survivors of concentration camps. They said, many of the people that went and grabbed the electric fence to commit suicide, or completely gave up hope and died, were people that had no faith.
People that had strong faith, had more hope, and it made their experience in the concentration camp more bearable.
I could die tomorrow, so I'm going to choose the path that gives me more joy.
I could be wrong, but at least it makes me happy even in some of the worst of circumstances sometimes...that is, studying the various spiritualities of different religions and trying to practice it.
If I die, I'm not going to regret being wrong... and perhaps, that tiny 7% of people who rejected this hope, were so smart they knew better than over 90% of people out there.
Good for them! 100 years from now, none of us will care.
Thoughts?
I'm going to continue my studies of Shintoism for now... and pray to the samurai and emperors of the sun!
View attachment 21703 View attachment 21704
Thoughts? I think you must have some reason for constantly attacking people and science that you do not remotely understand.
Do you know?
HonestJoe
Well-Known Member
If it’s just hope alone maybe but we both know this hope can come with all sorts of baggage too. It’s more often hope as long “as you do this” and “unless you do that” or even “unless you’re that type of person”. It can easily become something unobtainable or that requires potentially harmful (to themselves or others) behaviour in life to meet the criteria. Promoting the concept as unconditionally positive is disingenuous and possible dangerous.
Audie
Veteran Member
Seems a lot like filling out a publishers clearinghouse prize application,
and then hoping for a yacht.
The conflict in @PopeADope reasoning concerning Shinto is that Shinto religion s not based on a God, and 37-39% of Japanese are Atheists, and a large percentage are indifferent (agnostic) to the existence of God not only because of Shinto, but also Zen Buddhism is dominantly atheist/agnostic concerning the existence of God. Japanese are a culture that tends to mix religions eclecticely.
From: The six countries in the world that believe in God the least
Between 30 and 39 per cent of the people on the Japanese islands say they are "convinced atheists"."
Religion in Japan has historically been centered around Shintoism, which is based on ritual and a mythology surrounding the ancient past of Japan, rather than an all-seeing god.
I admire Shinto and Zen because of their disciplines concerning the Martial Arts since I studied Akido, Iado, and Kendo for many years, but do not buy into the mythology and rigid traditions,
I wonder if most Shintoists do.
Audie
Veteran Member
One thing about "signs" is, they are never overt as to what they
are supposed to mean.
For all the "supernatural" powers supposedly out there, they sure
have a hard time expressing themselves.
"Oh, we must warn him!" Send three ravens to fly over at dawn!"