Should God show himself?

[TransmutingSoul]

I stopped reading halfway through because for a god who can't be seen, communicated with. The writer knows a lot about it.

The Messengers give the Message, that after their passing, remains as all we can know of God.

God is seen in all things and we talk to God in heart, good deeds and living a moral and virtue filled life.

God is bigger than our material reality and is only seen in the attributes, which is the Messengers.

Regards Tony

 

[Brickjectivity]

All that would make every bible a lie.

People throughout history have claimed to see it, communicates with it, and always telling us what it wants.

Its not a textbook. Most of it is written in controversial fashion (including the stories) to contradict principles, themes and stories extant and common in surrounding culture -- like the way Noah directly contradicts themes in the Gilgamesh Epic. Its written against other cultural morals and ideas, not written in a vacuum. It takes their ideas about God or gods and opposes them and is not a treatise upon what God actually is to Jews.

Its also not meant to deceive you into believing its a textbook. This writing was not done in the dark or in a deceitful way but is a direct punch in the nose to somebody (somebody now forgotten in History), complete with political risk. In other words somebody got into trouble for each bit that is in the Bible. Everything in there has been written in the face of threats, imprisonment and hate. If you're going to claim its a textbook on doctrine and God, then you're signalling to me that you don't know anything about how it comes to be. Its a record of protest, and there is much evidence in support of this.

 

[Kenny]

By not showing itself it only confuses the issue and leaves open the possibility that it's just a manmade creation.

He did, under the name of Jesus. Not only did he come, show us God but even resurrected... it didn't stop people from believing what they want to believe anyway.

As Jesus said, 31 “Abraham said to him, ‘If they won’t listen to Moses and the prophets, neither would they believe even if someone was raised from the dead!’”

 

[TransmutingSoul]

If you're going to claim its a textbook on doctrine and God, then you're signalling to me that you don't know anything about how it comes to be.

I can offer an observation to expand thoughts on this comment. I see in the Bible what was also offered in the Quran and Baha'i Writings.

We now have the Quran, where Muhammad was persecuted over many years and the writings of Baha'u'llah, who for over 50 years was subject to injustice.

In the writings it can be seen that even though the injustice is mentioned frequently, it was not a protest, it was an appeal for justice, an appeal to those who are in charge of justice, to consider what is true justice.

Regards Tony

 

[SigurdReginson]

That would be aliens with technology far in advance of ours using Clarke's Third Law to get us to submit to their will, of course.

Good point! Even then, such evidence wouldn't necessarily mean that an actual supernatural being created everything.

That kind of technology is godlike, though.

 

[Windwalker]

I've never understood this thing about finding a god to fit the individual other than it being proof god is manmade.

What it is about is the individual seeking Liberation, or Enlightenment. How someone needs to see or frame the Divine for themselves, whatever forms or paths that needs to take for them, is a sort of dance between themselves, and the Divine they seek.

Yes, ideas we have about the Divine, what can be called by many names, like God, are man-made, in the sense that they are images from our minds. But they are images inspired by the heart, whose purpose is to open us to connection with the Absolute. The quest is to see beyond the symbols into an Awakening, or Realization of the nature of existence itself, or God.

Because we all have different histories and personalities and experiences, there never truly can be a one-size fits all solution. Like climbing a mountain, you have to be adaptive. The tools we come up with to help us do that, can be said to be "man-made", but the desire to climb that mountain itself, is not. That, in my view, is the Divine within us, urging us to figure out how to get up there. That's not man-made. That's Ground. That's Source.

 

[paarsurrey]

With the 1,000s of different versions of religions and the different versions of those religions, an appearance by God is long overdue. There also billions on Earth who would welcome the knowledge of its existence just to confirm which version of its being, religion, messenger, prophets are right.

By not showing itself it only confuses the issue and leaves open the possibility that it's just a manmade creation. No theist really wants that, even if their religion might not be exactly right at least they would know how close they are to the truth.

Isn't it a manmade idea that G-d needs to show up and it is overdue, please? Is it useful and reasonable? G-d has always been Evident. Right, please?

Regards
____________
[57:4]
ہُوَ الۡاَوَّلُ وَ الۡاٰخِرُ وَ الظَّاہِرُ وَ الۡبَاطِنُ ۚ وَ ہُوَ بِکُلِّ شَیۡءٍ عَلِیۡمٌ ﴿۴﴾
He is the First and the Last, and the Manifest and the Hidden, and He knows all things full well.
The Holy Quran - Chapter: 57: Al-Hadid

 

[MNoBody]

With the 1,000s of different versions of religions and the different versions of those religions, an appearance by God is long overdue. There also billions on Earth who would welcome the knowledge of its existence just to confirm which version of its being, religion, messenger, prophets are right.

By not showing itself it only confuses the issue and leaves open the possibility that it's just a manmade creation. No theist really wants that, even if their religion might not be exactly right at least they would know how close they are to the truth.

typically a farmer appears to the crop at harvest......hmmm

 

[DagonVarunaMitraApolloZan]

See, hear, whatever if it exists it can communicate. Otherwise we wouldn't have a clue what it was. It would be like describing a Venusian.

A manmade being.

If the Universe isn't manmade, and your experience moment to moment isn't really man-made, and you notice that things are seeming to change and move, and you are experiencing change and apparent motion and animation, and it seems to be just a chaotic bunch of things going on, but somehow also consistent seeming with your memory and this moment to that moment, then what is responsible for all that, like what you ate for breakfast or whatever is being called "God" by some people, and by other people called other things, but it all amounts to the same really. All this "crap" you see and even are, can be said to be "God's trashy communication" to you, do with it what you can, as there is nothing else for you.

 

[PAUL MARKHAM]

I think the way we have been given to find God is already perfect, it is through the Messengers and all creation.

We can choose to find God, the way God has chosen to be known to us, or choose not to.

Regards Tony

So you would rather get it from messengers than god. Why?

 

[PAUL MARKHAM]

The Messengers give the Message, that after their passing, remains as all we can know of God.

God is seen in all things and we talk to God in heart, good deeds and living a moral and virtue filled life.

God is bigger than our material reality and is only seen in the attributes, which is the Messengers.

Regards Tony

So you would rather hear the messenger than god itself.

 

[PAUL MARKHAM]

Its not a textbook. Most of it is written in controversial fashion (including the stories) to contradict principles, themes and stories extant and common in surrounding culture -- like the way Noah directly contradicts themes in the Gilgamesh Epic. Its written against other cultural morals and ideas, not written in a vacuum. It takes their ideas about God or gods and opposes them and is not a treatise upon what God actually is to Jews.

Its also not meant to deceive you into believing its a textbook. This writing was not done in the dark or in a deceitful way but is a direct punch in the nose to somebody (somebody now forgotten in History), complete with political risk. In other words somebody got into trouble for each bit that is in the Bible. Everything in there has been written in the face of threats, imprisonment and hate. If you're going to claim its a textbook on doctrine and God, then you're signalling to me that you don't know anything about how it comes to be. Its a record of protest, and there is much evidence in support of this.

It's presented as the word of god, are you saying it's not?

 

[PAUL MARKHAM]

He did, under the name of Jesus. Not only did he come, show us God but even resurrected... it didn't stop people from believing what they want to believe anyway.

As Jesus said, 31 “Abraham said to him, ‘If they won’t listen to Moses and the prophets, neither would they believe even if someone was raised from the dead!’”

So he can appear. So what's stopping him now?

We have far better communications now than in the First Century.

 

[PAUL MARKHAM]

Why?

Because like Tony says you would rather read your book than listen to god itself.

 

[PAUL MARKHAM]

Just out of curiosity, what would you imagine you would see if this thing were to show itself, and what would you believe, were an image of a thing to be shown to you? Can you describe what would satisfy you?

No idea at all. So many different versions it's obvious no one has.

 

[Spirit of Light]

Because like Tony says you would rather read your book than listen to god itself.

I am sure if the voice of Allah or Allah in person next to me would teach me a lot more, not only about the teaching, but about my self too.
That is not something i waiting to happen right now, so the written word in the Quran is what guides me in my spiritual life.
As you seen in many of my latest threads, i am in a tranformation in my life, do i ask for guidance? Yes. But no i dont hear a voice in my head telling me what to do.the answers is given through the teaching, or sometimes in my own personal search within my own being.

 

[PAUL MARKHAM]

I am sure if the voice of Allah or Allah in person next to me would teach me a lot more, not only about the teaching, but about my self too.
That is not something i waiting to happen right now, so the written word in the Quran is what guides me in my spiritual life.
As you seen in many of my latest threads, i am in a tranformation in my life, do i ask for guidance? Yes. But no i dont hear a voice in my head telling me what to do.the answers is given through the teaching, or sometimes in my own personal search within my own being.

We all know a god isn't going to show up anytime soon or ever. This was a thread to ask the question. Some of the answers are amazing.

Like god is a personal thing.
Some would rather read than listen to god.
The endless opinions on what a god can or can't do.

 

[Spirit of Light]

We all know a god isn't going to show up anytime soon or ever. This was a thread to ask the question. Some of the answers are amazing.

Like god is a personal thing.
Some would rather read than listen to god.
The endless opinions on what a god can or can't do.

You are free to have your understanding @PAUL MARKHAM, even all of us are human beings we see and understand religion/spiritual practices differently.
Some people understand God one way wheras others will understand God differently.

Personally i know my own understanding of God is limited, but i am ok with that. It means there is more to learn, more to get a better grip on.
I dont need to pull other peoples belief down just because they understand life, religion, God, prophets differently from my self.

To me, life is not about telling other people what they should or should not believe to be correct. To me, life is about what I have to do to realize what I, as a person have to do to make life better.

If i can not answer to my own life, how can i say others are wrong to do or believe what they do.

Life is not about me. Life just is.

 

[TransmutingSoul]

So you would rather get it from messengers than god. Why?

They are all we can and will ever know about God.

They are the Self of God' amongst us, which to me is the Spirit we can know God by.

The Bible talks of this as being born again, born into the Spirit that was Jesus and all God's Messengers.

Regards Tony

 

[Evangelicalhumanist]

I'll tell you this -- anybody (or any thing/entity/etc.) that wants me to pay attention to it really ought to, at very least, make themself known to me. Otherwise, why on earth would I pay any attention at all?

@Audie may want me to worship her, but if she doesn't engage me and tell me why, I'm afraid I'm going to leave her a bit disappointed.