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Experiencing God

godnotgod

Thou art That
You are welcome to believe that, just as others who "experience" a different god do. Faith does not exactly mean belief. Faith is a subset of belief, perhaps. You can have belief and not need faith if you actually have enough evidence for your belief. If you do not, then faith fills the gap. .


Belief clings;
faith lets go


 
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Muffled

Jesus in me
Perhaps if you put your beliefs aside you might actually know something. Is it not obvious to you that beliefs stand in the way of such knowledge?

If, as you claim, you truly 'don't know anything', then why on Earth would you proceed to think that you know something?

"Do not seek the Truth; only cease to cherish opinion"

Chien-chih Seng-ts'an
Third Zen Patriarch [606AD]


http://www.mountainman.com.au/hsinhsin.html

I believe the people who think they know something only believe they do. I find that my beliefs bring me knowledge but of course other people are going to view that knowledge as a belief.

I believe I did not say that I don't know anything but simply those who make the rules say I don't know anything. I believe I know everything that I need to know when I need to know it through God who knows everything.

I believe this seems out of context. Why would any wise man tell people not to seek the truth? I do believe cherishing opinions that may or may not be true is detrimental to seeking the truth.

PS: You can provide me with zen teaching anytime you like but be warned that I see things through a Christian bias.


 

psychoslice

Veteran Member
I believe Jesus is the proof so your assessment is incorrect.
Just saying that Jesus is proof doesn't mean anything, you then have to prove that he actually lived and did all that which said he did, you are better of just saying, I have faith in him, and leave it at that.
 

godnotgod

Thou art That

I believe this seems out of context. Why would any wise man tell people not to seek the truth? I do believe cherishing opinions that may or may not be true is detrimental to seeking the truth.

PS: You can provide me with zen teaching anytime you like but be warned that I see things through a Christian bias.

Christian bias? Then Christian doctrine may not be true, as it is slanted, as you so admit. What is true is universal, and not compartmentalized into any one teaching, thereby excluding others. If you say that 1+1=2 is true in Denmark, then it is true all over the world. But if you say that the utterances of Yeshua are true, then they must also be true all over the world. In the first case, 1+1=2 can be demonstrated to be true, but what are ascribed to Yeshua as true may be (as some have been) words put into his mouth by others. The only way of testing Christian doctrine as being universally true is to see if they coincide with other doctrines, rendering both non-sectarian and universal in nature.

The quote from the Zen Patriarch must be understood perse, and not in any 'Zen' terms. There is no Zen doctrine; Zen is just a "finger pointing to the moon, but is not the moon itself." In the West, we generally think of 'truth' as the accumulation of information leading to knowledge. But in the East, ideas, concepts, opinions, beliefs, etc, are subtracted until all that is left is Reality itself.

When people embark upon the seeking of Truth, they do so with preconceived notions of what 'Truth' is already in place, creating various biased views about Reality. The Zen teacher here is saying to empty oneself of those notions so that Reality can be seen and experienced directly.


Be aware that we have a body of information that points to Yeshua as having been heavily influenced by Buddhistic and Essene teachings, while much of his original teachings have been destroyed and the remaining overwritten by Paul and Rome to create what is now modern Christianity.

What is detrimental to seeking the Truth is Truth itself, as all seeking comes to an end. By constantly stoking the fires of belief, you are perpetuating seeking and not Truth.
 
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Muffled

Jesus in me
Just saying that Jesus is proof doesn't mean anything, you then have to prove that he actually lived and did all that which said he did, you are better of just saying, I have faith in him, and leave it at that.

I am proof that Jesus lived and lives.
 

Muffled

Jesus in me
Christian bias? Then Christian doctrine may not be true, as it is slanted, as you so admit. What is true is universal, and not compartmentalized into any one teaching, thereby excluding others. If you say that 1+1=2 is true in Denmark, then it is true all over the world. But if you say that the utterances of Yeshua are true, then they must also be true all over the world. In the first case, 1+1=2 can be demonstrated to be true, but what are ascribed to Yeshua as true may be (as some have been) words put into his mouth by others. The only way of testing Christian doctrine as being universally true is to see if they coincide with other doctrines, rendering both non-sectarian and universal in nature.

The quote from the Zen Patriarch must be understood perse, and not in any 'Zen' terms. There is no Zen doctrine; Zen is just a "finger pointing to the moon, but is not the moon itself." In the West, we generally think of 'truth' as the accumulation of information leading to knowledge. But in the East, ideas, concepts, opinions, beliefs, etc,
are subtracted until all that is left is Reality itself.

When people embark upon the seeking of Truth, they do so with preconceived notions of what 'Truth' is already in place, creating various biased views about Reality. The Zen teacher here is saying to empty oneself of those notions so that Reality can be seen and experienced directly.


Be aware that we have a body of information that points to Yeshua as having been heavily influenced by Buddhistic and Essene teachings, while much of his original teachings have been destroyed and the remaining overwritten by Paul and Rome to create what is now modern Christianity.

What is detrimental to seeking the Truth is Truth itself, as all seeking comes to an end. By constantly stoking the fires of belief, you are perpetuating seeking and not Truth.

I don't believe this helps. Boiling 1+1=2 down to one does not reveal the truth of 1+1=2.

I believe this body of information is not true. Of course this is my Christian bias kicking in but I happen to believe that people viewing other information simply have a bias towards falsehood. So I say prove it if you think it is true and require me to do the same.
 

Milton Platt

Well-Known Member
Christian bias? Then Christian doctrine may not be true, as it is slanted, as you so admit. What is true is universal, and not compartmentalized into any one teaching, thereby excluding others. If you say that 1+1=2 is true in Denmark, then it is true all over the world. But if you say that the utterances of Yeshua are true, then they must also be true all over the world. In the first case, 1+1=2 can be demonstrated to be true, but what are ascribed to Yeshua as true may be (as some have been) words put into his mouth by others. The only way of testing Christian doctrine as being universally true is to see if they coincide with other doctrines, rendering both non-sectarian and universal in nature.

The quote from the Zen Patriarch must be understood perse, and not in any 'Zen' terms. There is no Zen doctrine; Zen is just a "finger pointing to the moon, but is not the moon itself." In the West, we generally think of 'truth' as the accumulation of information leading to knowledge. But in the East, ideas, concepts, opinions, beliefs, etc, are subtracted until all that is left is Reality itself.

When people embark upon the seeking of Truth, they do so with preconceived notions of what 'Truth' is already in place, creating various biased views about Reality. The Zen teacher here is saying to empty oneself of those notions so that Reality can be seen and experienced directly.


Be aware that we have a body of information that points to Yeshua as having been heavily influenced by Buddhistic and Essene teachings, while much of his original teachings have been destroyed and the remaining overwritten by Paul and Rome to create what is now modern Christianity.

What is detrimental to seeking the Truth is Truth itself, as all seeking comes to an end. By constantly stoking the fires of belief, you are perpetuating seeking and not Truth.

What we percieve as true changes all the time. Not that there isn't anything that is absolutely true, but actually knowing that a truth is absolute is the problem.

As to religious dogma and doctrine, they can't all be right, but they can all be wrong
 

BenTheBeliever

Active Member
I am proof that Jesus lived and lives.


I just want to say I agree with you here. Each of us are proof enough for ourselves. Sadly you can show real big proof to people but as long as they chose to have blind eyes you'll never get them to understand or agree or come to know God like us Christians do. I felt you need to hear that. God bless
 

godnotgod

Thou art That
I don't believe this helps. Boiling 1+1=2 down to one does not reveal the truth of 1+1=2.

Your logic here is erroneous: 1+1=2 is already boiled down as irrefutable fact. But because Christian doctrine cannot be so demonstrated, belief arises. Belief is not truth. It is merely an idea about truth.

I believe this body of information is not true. Of course this is my Christian bias kicking in but I happen to believe that people viewing other information simply have a bias towards falsehood. So I say prove it if you think it is true and require me to do the same.

There is no smoking gun. However, the body of information that exists which points not only to his association with the Nazorean Essene temple at Mt. Carmel, but to travels to the east, is far more convincing than the non-information coming from the Christian view, which is simply that God in the flesh lived out a quiet life in the village of Nazareth for some 18 years without notice. We know that the Buddhist king Asoka sent Theravadist monks to Egypt and Greece to establish monasteries there, which, as I understand, became Essene monasteries known as the Thereapeutae. This Essene sect was a healing sect, and who was Jesus? A healer, of course. The Nazorean temple at Mt. Carmel, a mystical Jewish cult, had connections to the Therapeutae. As of this date, we have no archeaological or any other evidence of a 1st century Nazareth, so this town did not exist where any such 'Jesus' lived. However, Mt. Carmel, a family monastery, was only 10 miles outside of present day Nazareth, and in the 1st century, a tent city existed at the foot of Mt. Carmel, which most likely was what was referred to in the NT as 'Nazareth'. We find no mention of any such 'Nazareth' in the OT, in the Talmud, from any historian, nor from any maps of the period. In fact, Josephus lived in the town of Japha for over a year, just one mile away from present day Nazareth, and in his account of 63 Galilean towns and villages, there is no mention of any 'Nazareth'.


We do have evidence placing Jesus (ie; 'Yeshu') at Mt. Carmel in a letter addressed to the Nazorean Essene temple at Mt. Carmel naming Jesus, James, and Simon, announcing the death of John the Baptist, from the Book of John.

The Buddhist monks in the Hemis monastery at Leh in the Himalayas referred to their 'beloved St. Issa', (meaning 'Lord') whose recorded utterances closely resemble those of Jesus in character and meaning. And on and on through India and China, Persia and Tibet, we have stories of of this man who left his trace behind. All told, as a total body of information, it is far more compelling than 18 years of mysterious silence from the Christian accounts, indicating that something is terribly wrong with the orthodox account.
 
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godnotgod

Thou art That
What we percieve as true changes all the time. Not that there isn't anything that is absolutely true, but actually knowing that a truth is absolute is the problem.

We know that The Universe is not only an absolute, but The Absolute, since it is Everything there is, for which nothing relatively exists to which it can be compared.
 
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Muffled

Jesus in me
I just want to say I agree with you here. Each of us are proof enough for ourselves. Sadly you can show real big proof to people but as long as they chose to have blind eyes you'll never get them to understand or agree or come to know God like us Christians do. I felt you need to hear that. God bless

I believe sometimes it is like a charismatic Christian describing his experience to someone who hasn't had one. All he does is express his opinion of what he thinks is happening.
 
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