doppelganger
Through the Looking Glass
I say it isn't the "ineffable" as soon as we take upon ourselves the conceit that we can "eff" it. Whenever we do so, the result is that the ineffable gets all effed-up.
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Can we eff the ineffable?
- Thread starter doppelganger
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doppelganger
Through the Looking Glass
Interesting. My experience is directly contrary. When I eff-up, the door to uneff my identity is effing closed.
Popeyesays
Well-Known Member
I don't think you can entirely remove the urge to eff the ineffable. I think it is part of human nature.
I also think that ineffability is kind of like pregnancy, there are no "degrees" of ineffability--whatever you are attempting to eff will never notice you are trying at all.
So may be that is more like the flea climbing the elephants with rape on its mind. If you will pardon the mixing of metaphors.
I would suppose attempting to eff the ineffable can lead to nothing but a confusion of metaphors anyway.
One of my favorite Baha`i quotations deals with the issue:
"Ten thousand Prophets, each a Moses, are thunderstruck upon the Sinai of their search at His forbidding voice, "Thou shalt never behold Me!"; whilst a myriad Messengers, each as great as Jesus, stand dismayed upon their heavenly thrones by the interdiction, "Mine Essence thou shalt never apprehend!" 63 From time immemorial He hath been veiled in the ineffable sanctity of His exalted Self, and will everlastingly continue to be wrapt in the impenetrable mystery of His unknowable Essence. Every attempt to attain to an understanding of His inaccessible Reality hath ended in complete bewilderment, and every effort to approach His exalted Self and envisage His Essence hath resulted in hopelessness and failure.
(Baha'u'llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha'u'llah, p. 62)
Regards,
Scott
I also think that ineffability is kind of like pregnancy, there are no "degrees" of ineffability--whatever you are attempting to eff will never notice you are trying at all.
So may be that is more like the flea climbing the elephants with rape on its mind. If you will pardon the mixing of metaphors.
I would suppose attempting to eff the ineffable can lead to nothing but a confusion of metaphors anyway.
One of my favorite Baha`i quotations deals with the issue:
"Ten thousand Prophets, each a Moses, are thunderstruck upon the Sinai of their search at His forbidding voice, "Thou shalt never behold Me!"; whilst a myriad Messengers, each as great as Jesus, stand dismayed upon their heavenly thrones by the interdiction, "Mine Essence thou shalt never apprehend!" 63 From time immemorial He hath been veiled in the ineffable sanctity of His exalted Self, and will everlastingly continue to be wrapt in the impenetrable mystery of His unknowable Essence. Every attempt to attain to an understanding of His inaccessible Reality hath ended in complete bewilderment, and every effort to approach His exalted Self and envisage His Essence hath resulted in hopelessness and failure.
(Baha'u'llah, Gleanings from the Writings of Baha'u'llah, p. 62)
Regards,
Scott
A
angellous_evangellous
Guest
doppelgänger;1051618 said:
Therefore there is nothing ineffable? (Because we have to know something of the "eff" in order for us to identify it as ineffable - just enough to "eff" it up)
doppelganger
Through the Looking Glass
Everything is ineffable. But everything is effed nonetheless.
A
angellous_evangellous
Guest
doppelgänger;1051892 said:
So nothing is ineffable, everything is just effed up.
Popeyesays
Well-Known Member
doppelgänger;1051892 said:
And it's OUR "eff up".
Next we can discuss "scruing" the inscrutable~
Regards,
Scott
A
angellous_evangellous
Guest
doppelganger
Through the Looking Glass
A
angellous_evangellous
Guest
doppelgänger;1051916 said:
Let's "eff" it and ruin the illusion of its ineffability.
doppelgänger;1051618 said:
A
angellous_evangellous
Guest
I read this in Justin Martyr this week and I thought of this thread.
First Apology 61
And for this [rite of baptism] we have learned from the apostles this reason. Since at our birth we were born without our own knowledge or choice, by our parents coming together, and were brought up in bad habits and wicked training; in order that we may not remain the children of necessity and of ignorance, but may become the children of choice and knowledge, and may obtain in the water the remission of sins formerly committed, there is pronounced over him who chooses to be born again, and has repented of his sins, the name of God the Father and Lord of the universe; he who leads to the laver the person that is to be washed calling him by this name alone. For no one can utter the name of the ineffable God; and if any one dare to say that there is a name, he raves with a hopeless madness. And this washing is called illumination, because they who learn these things are illuminated in their understandings. And in the name of Jesus Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and in the name of the Holy Ghost, who through the prophets foretold all things about Jesus, he who is illuminated is washed.
First Apology 61
And for this [rite of baptism] we have learned from the apostles this reason. Since at our birth we were born without our own knowledge or choice, by our parents coming together, and were brought up in bad habits and wicked training; in order that we may not remain the children of necessity and of ignorance, but may become the children of choice and knowledge, and may obtain in the water the remission of sins formerly committed, there is pronounced over him who chooses to be born again, and has repented of his sins, the name of God the Father and Lord of the universe; he who leads to the laver the person that is to be washed calling him by this name alone. For no one can utter the name of the ineffable God; and if any one dare to say that there is a name, he raves with a hopeless madness. And this washing is called illumination, because they who learn these things are illuminated in their understandings. And in the name of Jesus Christ, who was crucified under Pontius Pilate, and in the name of the Holy Ghost, who through the prophets foretold all things about Jesus, he who is illuminated is washed.