No-MiddleMan Movement: Religion without middlemen

[gnostic]

I've learned way more about any religion from outsiders of the faith. All the insiders are way too biased.

Everyone are biased when it concerns their religions, insiders and outsiders.

The only differences between the two is that there is less politics involved with outsiders...but less it may be, the politics still exist - they just don’t know it is there.

 

[safdar.dushantappeh]

Denial is not the best way to pitch a theme. If one is going to point out or help others to understand so-called "perversions" created by middlemen then what is it that you are actually doing? You are doing what every person before you has done. Who is to say that innovations you come up with are not perverse to the sensitivities of others? Who is right? The thing is you and your group are simply inserting your own understanding, which is the definition of a middleman, into the mix. Denial of this is, at best, disingenuous and highly misleading. You are middlemen too. Own it and move on.

Let me first quote the response that is given by NMMM (which I also agree with):
Q1: Is not NMMM itself yet another middleman?
A1: No. At no point one needs to trust NMMM or anyone else. If you find yourself agreed with the beliefs mentioned above, then you can participate in the movement by presenting rational arguments and help your fellow believers in search for the truth. You would read the rational arguments, discuss it, challenge it, and then decide for yourself.

Then let me clarify the difference between our minds. Your main concern seems to be "who is right?", trying to come up with an absolute truth. My main concern is show the idiocy of claiming of "I am right" and elaborate that that has nothing to do with religion. Let me reference my own article here "Islam without Extremists", that shows the root of lots of extremism is mistaking "trusting" the religious doctrines with "believing" in the Creator. The key point for me personally is that no authority, which I understand them as middlemen, can tell you "what is right". We instead should present supporting arguments for our positions, which could be right or wrong, and each individual would judge the arguments separately and might could to different conclusions.

 

[safdar.dushantappeh]

If there is a sovereign God who reveals truth to mankind through revelations to both the individual and to his chosen prophets, then you are mistaken in your approach. It only makes sense for mankind to make up the doctrine if there is no God already doing so. Personally, I believe the first, although I respect your right to believe as you do.

Let me give you my personal answer to this. I am Muslim and I believe (no proof) that the truth that God has revealed is summarized in this sentence:
(Know well, none has an exclusive claim to the Truth.) For all those who believe in the God and in the Last Day and do good deeds - be they either believers, Jews, Sabaeans or Christians - neither fear shall fall upon them, nor shall they have any reason to grieve. (69)
The rest is commentary, at its best, or the perversions introduced by middlemen and presented as religion or the God's commands. And I found NMMM aligned with my understanding of religion, and I am going to help their voice to be heard.

 

[YmirGF]

Let me first quote the response that is given by NMMM (which I also agree with):
Q1: Is not NMMM itself yet another middleman?
A1: No. At no point one needs to trust NMMM or anyone else. If you find yourself agreed with the beliefs mentioned above, then you can participate in the movement by presenting rational arguments and help your fellow believers in search for the truth. You would read the rational arguments, discuss it, challenge it, and then decide for yourself.

Then let me clarify the difference between our minds. Your main concern seems to be "who is right?", trying to come up with an absolute truth. My main concern is show the idiocy of claiming of "I am right" and elaborate that that has nothing to do with religion. Let me reference my own article here "Islam without Extremists", that shows the root of lots of extremism is mistaking "trusting" the religious doctrines with "believing" in the Creator. The key point for me personally is that no authority, which I understand them as middlemen, can tell you "what is right". We instead should present supporting arguments for our positions, which could be right or wrong, and each individual would judge the arguments separately and might could to different conclusions.

Not a particularly persuasive argument, but hey, whatever floats your boat, I suppose.

Out of curiosity, do you consider Muhammad himself to be a middleman? One would think the point inarguable. Likewise, how do you get around Muhammad's exhortations to avoid innovation?

 

[Jumi]

Yes, I realize people worship all sorts of objects and natural events as a god or as evidence of a god's actions. So is the conversation restricted to non-supernatural things, then?
I see no need to rename natural objects as "god" when we already have names for them. Maybe the "god" moniker needs to be dropped.

Ancient peoples had no problem calling natural things gods. The way human mind works is that it's easy to see natural events as having "character" in a way animals and humans do. The workings of the sun, giving life to plants and by extension to animals and humans while punishing them with heat at times when was practical. Supernatural is something that comes from Christian theology.

If it is not supernatural, then it is natural, right? It has to be one or the other. "flesh and blood" was a euphemism. It could be a pile of rocks.

I'm not holding any philosophical ideas at this point what it could be. The reason I don't think that it's supernatural is that I don't believe in "supernatural" things, but I'm open to proof on that.

Didn't get the humor....you have to warn me sometimes....I'm slow that way. Not your fault.
You are claiming that the cause of a particular experience is caused by a god. I want evidence of the god. If it is not a god, then evidence of whatever it is.

If I would try to prove it to you, it would be circular logic. Whether God is "caused by us" or the experience caused by God I hold no preference.

Okay, just so the goalpost doesn't get moved....clearly define what you mean when you use the word "god". What are his attributes, limitations, and makeup.

Sorry, perhaps I have misunderstood. I thought we were discussing "religious" experiences.

The God experience is a mystical one and not easy to explain. What we can get out of it is what God is not, as much of it is against traditional, cultural ideas... It's clearly not something that has desires for people to follow rigid guidelines set in stone. There are no words coming out of it, if there are, they come from whoever had the experience. There are no goals set with the experience. There is something of a purification of ideals and emotions that happens there. If we could reproduce the experience by artificial means, it would be of great value to us as mankind.

As to limitations of God I don't know except that it exists anywhere there exist humans or perhaps similar minds, but it's clear that it's up to us to experience, we don't know if God is trying to cause the experience or if it's us by fortune or skillful effort being able to reach that Gnosis.

There is a variety of religious experiences. Not all of them hold claims such as information about morality or the world. I call the religious experiences people commonly have "spiritual experiences". I don't see anything "special" about them though they are in reach of everyone and beneficial to us as long as we don't use them as excuses for something bad. As I can produce them or their equivalents pretty much by going out into the forest, by meditating, by mathematics, by music...

I apologize for the odd way of interlacing my comments. After all this time, I'm still wrestling with the quote system on this board.

I can read it just fine.

 

[safdar.dushantappeh]

Out of curiosity, do you consider Muhammad himself to be a middleman? One would think the point inarguable. Likewise, how do you get around Muhammad's exhortations to avoid innovation?

To me middleman is a living entity. A figure from the past cannot obscure my vision or improve it. Such figures are however abused by the middlemen when they say "This is what that figure wanted you to do". This like a christian saying "I follow no one but Jesus" but they in fact follow a particular doctrine that describes Jesus, not Jesus himself. Since I had received similar questions about Muhammad(pbuh) before I already wrote an article in answer: Muhammad محمد (The target audience in the article are Muslims but I hope you get the point)

 

[Milton Platt]

Ancient peoples had no problem calling natural things gods. The way human mind works is that it's easy to see natural events as having "character" in a way animals and humans do. The workings of the sun, giving life to plants and by extension to animals and humans while punishing them with heat at times when was practical. Supernatural is something that comes from Christian theology.


I'm not holding any philosophical ideas at this point what it could be. The reason I don't think that it's supernatural is that I don't believe in "supernatural" things, but I'm open to proof on that.


If I would try to prove it to you, it would be circular logic. Whether God is "caused by us" or the experience caused by God I hold no preference.


The God experience is a mystical one and not easy to explain. What we can get out of it is what God is not, as much of it is against traditional, cultural ideas... It's clearly not something that has desires for people to follow rigid guidelines set in stone. There are no words coming out of it, if there are, they come from whoever had the experience. There are no goals set with the experience. There is something of a purification of ideals and emotions that happens there. If we could reproduce the experience by artificial means, it would be of great value to us as mankind.

As to limitations of God I don't know except that it exists anywhere there exist humans or perhaps similar minds, but it's clear that it's up to us to experience, we don't know if God is trying to cause the experience or if it's us by fortune or skillful effort being able to reach that Gnosis.

There is a variety of religious experiences. Not all of them hold claims such as information about morality or the world. I call the religious experiences people commonly have "spiritual experiences". I don't see anything "special" about them though they are in reach of everyone and beneficial to us as long as we don't use them as excuses for something bad. As I can produce them or their equivalents pretty much by going out into the forest, by meditating, by mathematics, by music...

I can read it just fine.

Okay, I don't think we have much else to discuss. Your god is ill defined, unless you want to call the universe a god. But I see no reason to rename it.

As to religious "experiences", they only have value to those who have them, at best. They serve as evidence of nothing, really. If you cannot concretely connect the experience to a specific cause, then the answer to what the cause was would be, "I don't know", not "it was connected to or caused by a god". Whatever experience happens can be assumed to originate in and be manifested by one's own brain, since that is the most likely scenario. You can still call it what you wish, but it can be assumed to originate internally, barring evidence to the contrary.

Thanks for the non-contentious conversation........

 

[Jumi]

Okay, I don't think we have much else to discuss. Your god is ill defined, unless you want to call the universe a god. But I see no reason to rename it.

Why it's ill defined is that there's not much to define out of something that comes from such an experience. It's like discovering a new atom that doesn't follow the periodic table at all before we have investigated it's properties. With Gnosis, there are no instruments we can use. There's not much we can put in a box and label, except that this one stands out.

I don't call the universe God. Pantheists take to that. Though I understand the appeal of it and I flirted with the idea when I was atheist.

As to religious "experiences", they only have value to those who have them, at best. They serve as evidence of nothing, really. If you cannot concretely connect the experience to a specific cause, then the answer to what the cause was would be, "I don't know", not "it was connected to or caused by a god".

I would remind that mystical ones are different from "generic" religious experiences. Even those have value only to those who have experienced them, as I've said the experience itself "tells" you that this is what has been called God. I wouldn't offer it as "proof" to you or sell it to you.

 

[Milton Platt]

Why it's ill defined is that there's not much to define out of something that comes from such an experience. It's like discovering a new atom that doesn't follow the periodic table at all before we have investigated it's properties. With Gnosis, there are no instruments we can use. There's not much we can put in a box and label, except that this one stands out.

I don't call the universe God. Pantheists take to that. Though I understand the appeal of it and I flirted with the idea when I was atheist.


I would remind that mystical ones are different from "generic" religious experiences. Even those have value only to those who have experienced them, as I've said the experience itself "tells" you that this is what has been called God. I wouldn't offer it as "proof" to you or sell it to you.

Honestly, I can’t tell them apart since there is no clear definition or any way at all to objectively analyze them.

When you are telling someone else about them, it is just a story about something that happened, or you think happened. There is no difference to the other person between an experience you are utterly unable to demonstrate occured and one you made up.
Not saying you made yours, up....just saying from the outside looking in, that is how it is. I don’t doubt people have experiences of all sorts. I just am probing for evidence of causation and questioning their god assertions.

You’ve been more patient with your attempts at explanation.

 

[Jumi]

Honestly, I can’t tell them apart since there is no clear definition or any way at all to objectively analyze them.

Those who've had mystical experiences can tell them apart, pretty much everyone else can only read about them and probably be confused. That's ok, since most people who've had mystical experiences have trouble putting them to words anyway. Those with what I call just "religious" experiences can get quite wordy with detailed descriptions. From my perspective the only thing that's the same about them is that they're associated with religions... though mystics can be found among non-religious and even atheist folks.

When you are telling someone else about them, it is just a story about something that happened, or you think happened. There is no difference to the other person between an experience you are utterly unable to demonstrate occured and one you made up.

Well, that's usually one of those that I'd call "religious experiences". They're often something like out of a dream and many think their dreams are religious experiences... By contrast, the story is usually either completely missing or not important in mystical experiences. Often there's not much to talk about, or we talk about them in analogies instead.

Not saying you made yours, up....just saying from the outside looking in, that is how it is. I don’t doubt people have experiences of all sorts. I just am probing for evidence if causation and questioning their god assertions.

I know how it is. I don't see any harm in doubting it either. It's quite clear from the experience that whatever it is, it doesn't differentiate between believer or non-believer. In fact, I'm guessing belief is a barrier of sorts to getting there, which you might know is in much of popular religions quite the opposite.

You’ve been more patient with your attempts at explanation.

Of course, I see this as a forum for exchange of ideas. If I'm questioned about mine that also helps me think about things I might have missed.

 

[safdar.dushantappeh]

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