So you don't believe that God would make some tribe of indigenous peoples suffer in the afterlife because they don't know about christianity in any shape or form?

That's what i am saying.But if you have read the bible and mock the scriptures then the world becomes a dark place. Though as we both know everyone on earth at the end of times will see the glory of the lord and will not be able to deny it . And if they do then well it's freedom of choice they never wanted to believe whether it was true or not.Peoples of the earth before the coming of the lord are already rejoicing.The dead in christ will rise first then the believers of the earth. Then for a short time the evil one will walk the earth and then the army of the lord will return (us) and all the martyrs that have turned to christ will rise and then we do battle with all on the face of the earth and the devil and his dominium will be thrown into the lake of burning sulphur forever amen.And we christians will have a new earth that will need no sun for god will be it's light in the supernatural world.We will live with him just like adam and eve in the beginning without the forbidden fruit lol.It's a new beginning the evolving of the human race second stage of our development, eternal life live forever good ya!

How do you know that anything you just wrote is true and/or will take place? Or, if one accepts there's no actual proof per se, what is it that convinces you it must be true?

Do you eccept there is good and evil in this world.Right well thats one hurdle crossed.Now then this will be difficult for you to comprehend, when i was a teenager i had a close call with death and while i was in a coma i travelled and was shown around the spirit world where i saw the gate of hell in the clouds and the stairway to heaven and the new earth and the kingdom of god which i have to add is a huge city in a bubble it was minature as i remember it. Why i was shown it all became clear to me but of course i selfishly denied my calling and ran away. When i awoke from my coma about 6 months later i saw the two witnesses on a train to bristol it was a warning. I have no idea why but since then i have become born again and i get visits either from jesus himself or angels every so often.So i believe what is written in revelations that is probably the only book i have read it's all about the present and future i can relate. I still am not sure about anything my feet are firmly on the ground and god knows it. I no longer go to church i find it irritating and boring and every church i go to everyone is to ambitious and they often hurt the simple faith we should all have. There are to many denominations to simplify it we are distant from one another we are divided by ignorance and selfish just as i was when i was a teenager and they call themselves christians and they all seem to know so much but have very little faith when trusting in the lord when it comes to money and authority forget it i'm better off. I have a simple faith and pray every day i am a sinner i won't deny it lol but for me i have seen what you all long to see and without seeing it you find it difficult to believe i understand. But for me i would put my head on the block than turn away for i know that we are not alone.

Hmm, okay .. That is interesting.

You write that the gate to hell is in the clouds? Do you know why this is or was it a misspelling? And I have a hard time understanding everything, but you wrote that the kingdom of God is a miniature city inside a bubble? Where's the bubble, is that too in the sky somewhere?

Somebody get a straitjacket.

I don't think it's a matter of being convinced so much as "even if I don't buy it it's better to be on the safe side". Pascal's wager and everything. That's why the most nutty religions are so successful, it's a fundamental key to their conversion process that while not explictly stated by the people trying to convert, very rarely does it not cross a person's mind.

That's really interesting. I had an experience of being blessed by the Holy Spirit when I was 16 it was the most incredible moment of my life. I could never turn away from God because I know that he is the one that is guiding me through life, aiding me in my suffering and sadness.

Ahh, Tore! :) Your clear, concise questions are always so soothingly thoughtful. I admire that you take the time to think of good questions about what you read.

I agree that people are too often divided by ignorance and selfishness, chard, yet this is one main criticism I have about some religions: they inspire people to believe that humanity is divided into believers who will have salvation and non-believers who will go to hell. To me it seems you are perpetuating the very divisions among humanity that you say you dislike.

Vanilla, when you considered that your experience was a hallucination, what made you decide it was not? Certain psychiatric conditions, for example, cause people to believe they talk to or see angels:

Thanks Vegangelica :) I am curious in finding out more without sounding too judgmental because I do think the subject and these experiences are interesting.

About hallucinations, just after my 12 years birthday, I was in the hospital with a pretty bad concussion from falling off a swing down a little mountain slope and banging my head pretty bad. I couldn't sleep that night in the hospital because the nurses were doing something painful to this other man in the same room as me and he couldn't keep quiet because of his pains. Sometime in the early morning when I was pretty scared and worried, I suddenly saw flames for just a split second. Not like the room was on fire, just fire filling my vision. It scared me pretty bad so I got out of bed and stumbled out in the corridor where I could see other people .. that calmed me down enough for me to go back to bed.

Possibly it was a hallucination or just a really vivid start of a dream just as I dozed off. I'm sure one could interpret it in a religious way, but considering it's only happened that one time after a pretty bad head injury leads me to think it had something to do with the injury and the bad experience rather than God sending me a message. If God sends visions, it would be strange if he only does it when people are sick and injured.

This is something I've always wondered about. I'm not religious in anyway but I like hearing about why people are. I hate being preached at, I'm just interested in why people choose to believe what they do (If having faith in something makes people feel better about themselves and their lives then who am I to judge?). But, whenever anybody says about 'visions' it's always based around some kind of injury or near death experience. Which I guess makes sense in a way, but I never hear stories about how somebody is at their lowest ebb and ready to chuck it all in when, all of a sudden, God pops down to say hello. Or when people truely need guidance in their life...

By all means, if someone can enlighten me then that would be awesome :)

Personally, I don't believe in religious visions. The way I see it, everything can be chalked up to a basic electrical fault. The human brain is really just an extremely intricate electrical circuit, anything that the brain perceives which isn't actually there in reality is simply the result of some part of the circuit not functioning properly.

Having said that, I accept that some people believe this to be God communicating with them, and like Tea Supremacist said, if that gives them comfort then I'm in no position to judge that, it's simply a difference of opinion.

I had a friend who was getting ready to kill himself but then felt he saw Jesus standing in a white robe before him, saying nothing. He became a very strong believer in the Christian religion.

For me, knowing the truth as much as possible is more important than feeling comfort. I'd rather feel awful, abandoned, doomed and lost, if that is the reality, rather than live imagining some wonderful future that is pretend.

I have relatives who, whenever someone dies, say, "He's with his maker now and is at peace!" This always makes me think of the movie "Logan's Run." There's a scene where people happily let themselves be exploded, since they've been taught to believe that they are going to a wonderful afterlife. In reality, they are just being vaporized.

To be honest, the whole vision subject is something I take with a pinch of salt, even when one of my best friends told me that God spoke to her, I remain extremely skeptical. Part of this might be because I've been in the situation where I'm at my lowest and ended up in hospital over it and God and Co. were no where to be seen (obviously the rest of it was just cos I don't believe anyway!).

As Jibber said, the brain is a complex thing and to hear the story about your friend (just as when I heard my friend speak about it) would lead me to put it down to miswiring. Perhaps, subconsciously your friend wanted to be 'saved' and this was his brain's way of getting hm out of the situation he was in? he is obviously happier now and good for him. I sometimes feel a little sad that I am so skeptical about it, because it does bring comfort to some and it must be nice for those people to have that comfort blanket. On the other hand, I see believing in a deity to make yourself feel better is general disillusionment. If I wanted something to make the pain go away or to feel better about life, I'd go back to smoking weed and living off rum :)

I agree with everything you've said...except the part about smoking weed and living off rum, which I think would just make me feel sick! ;)

The hard part when a friend says something about seeing ghosts/angels, etc., is that I have to weigh my concern for that person's overall mental stability with my desire to appreciate that for her or him it was a meaningful experience, even if it wasn't real. I also appreciate that they tell me about it, since doing so isn't easy when you realize people think it sounds crazy.

I'd start to worry, though, if they *didn't* think it sounded crazy. I start to worry about the person having schizophrenia or some psychosis that will harm her or his life if untreated.

hello again right i forgot to add i was in my hospital bed and a bird tapped on the window of course i was dreaming he told me to hold on tight and i flew into the heavens on his back. The hell is in fact a prison its in the clouds heaven is much higher up i saw two plains, There was a lot going on though most of it didn't interest me. I was then taken back down to earth and the bird flew away. I looked into the heavens for some kind of sign and thats when i saw the kingdom of god a huge city surrounded by glass a bubble it landed like half a mile from where i was standing it looked golden.You must realise that i must be really special to see it well i am lol.Right lets tackle another people in this time have no imagination and they are expected to believe in something or some one in the spiritual well they won't unless they gain something from it. It's sad but like i said before i pray they live to see the coming of our lord jesus so they will be blessed to. Pick a side that's all it comes down to i'm sorry it's not an ideal world or is it in the heavens not yet anyway. It's bloody and cold and you will all have to pick a side in which you pay with your lives. There's no sense in trying to escape there is none i tried it's real iv'e picked my side now i had no choice live or die.All you want it perfect, well your hoping sorry it's not death and more death that's the reality, it's war and we are all in it.If i am good i don't have to believe in jesus for i will go to paradise how can i not burst your bubble all i saw was two plains good and evil there is a plan for both and there is jesus paradise or hell sorry folks. A little tip from me if you know your seconds from death eccept jesus in your life then hope it works out for you lol. Of course this is all in my head i was almost brain dead but then when i awoke up until now my brain is working fine i think lol i see lot's though there's no way i can write about it. For all those who are left behind you will all have to die for your faith in jesus for it is written in revelation that you will all be decapitated from your shoulders to have any chance of eternal life so it's easier to believe now and you will enter heaven without dying if your around when jesus returns. I know this to be true myself hope you understand it's entirely up to you i have eccepted that most of my family will die for they don't need faith and don't ever whether it's true or not they don't care, i do my problem but i eccept and i speak about it no-more.Life is cruel but the crueler it is for me the more i realise god loves me work that one out if you can. I expect nothing no riches no glory nothing i do it because deep down i am a rebel lol. Everything i get turns to dust i have nothing in this life eccept love and that is all i will ever need and desire i suppose that's why i am blessed because i know i am here to serve.

edit: apparently I can't post youtube videos:

YouTube - Clone High - Ghandi's Raisin Adventure

The code only:

And yet that's usually when people claim it happened.

I mean heck, during traumatic experiences and trauma to the head, you're gonna see sh*t, possibly religious stuff because you have it in the back of your mind.

Also people need to look up a little thing called DMT. It's a chemical in the brain that acts much like a psychedelic drug, it's believed (though not proven) to be the origin of dreams, and is also the most probable cause of near death experiences, basically in the state of dying or near death your brain releases this chemical and you start tripping balls basically.

And yeah, the whole thing about seeing the two witnesses on a train, sorry if I don't buy that. OMG there's two people on a train, SIGN OF THE APOCOLYPSE!!!

Anyway, I occassionally suffer from a thing called sleep paralysis, a sensation that is felt during Hypnagogia primarly when you are still concious of things around you. It usually happens when you wake up from a nightmare. You are in a paralized state, semi awake and aware of your surroundings but you also see and hear things that aren't there because the REM part of your brain hasn't shut off completely yet.

It's happened to me several times and I've experienced all kinds a things. Creatures standing on top of me, spirits floating around the room, a dog knawing on my head, the sound of loud bluegrass music, red lights and intense humming sounds, loud explosions. And sometimes right when I wake up from a nightmare and return to conciousness some of the images from the dream are still imprinted to my vision and slowly disappear like condensation on glass after blowing cold air on it.

My grandma believes that these are things I experience because my soul is trying to leave my body. Yeah she got that from some Sylvia Browne book.

Wow, boo boo, your sleep paralysis sounds like a wild and fascinating experience...probably scary, too, though maybe you get used to it?

Sometimes when I'm drifting off to sleep, but very rarely, I'll suddenly think I hear something...it's as if a dream has started when I'm not yet quite asleep. It might just be the sound of a person's voice saying a word. But it *sounds* like a real sound and startles me, so I become fully awake.

It is similar to when you are dreaming and in the dream you hear sounds as if they were real. Dreams do show the brain's/mind's capacity for concocting very odd and sometimes disturbing "experiences." I'm glad I've never dreamed/thought a dog was gnawing on my head!

Yeah, that's it! That's what we need. More Campbell's. Joseph Campbell. Or any other good expert on comparative religion. It's always interesting, and for sure we'll find some answers. For instance, let's see those f***ing apples....

Keep in mind that Christian iconography is often inspired by that from other religions, even if the subject in question has nothing to do with it. Look, four years ago I took this photo of a Roman mosaic from the 3rd century:


Hercules stealing the golden apples from the Garden of the Hesperides. And that reptile is Ladon.

According to Greek mythology, that blissful garden (you can see the resemblance to the Christian Paradise) was in the western corner of the World. That is, the known world to the Greek civilization at that age. Thus, some ancient Greek authors such as Strabo and Stesichorus said that paradise was located in the Iberian peninsula (and that show us, one more time, the well-known intelligence, wisdom, shrewdness and ability to get right of the ancient Greeks).

Now, notice the underlying concept: in both cases the order, the stability, gets broken. To keep the good state of balance, the apples of the Hesperides must stay at the garden, and Adam and Eve must not eat the forbidden fruit from the tree of knowledge.

REALLY interesting subject if you look into it in any depth. A lot of my art history courses dealt with how early christian rulers took "pagan" iconography and transformed it into Christian subject matter to make the transition between religions go more smoothly. Early depictions of halos around the virgin mary and jesus were depicted as solid yellow discs, exactly the same as how many earlier Sun Deities were depicted.

Also, think of the common image of God in human form. Old man, long white beard...sound familiar? There's a reason why early Christian art (especially around Constantine's reign in the Roman Empire) actually visually portrayed God as a human form very similar to Zeus. Over time, once Christianity was established, portraying God as a human was phased out in art.

I agree that it is a very interesting topic. By the same token I've always found it interesting to read about some of the older mythology Christianity adapted for different Bible stories and of course the pagan holidays that evolved into Christmas and Easter.

One time, I awoke (I think) and I just stayed in position trying to get back to sleep. And then I heard this LOUD explosion that startled the f*ck out of me, I start yelling and run into the hallway, my grandma is in the bathroom and I say "did you hear that?" and she said "you screaming? yeah", I turn back to my room, look out the window, nothing.

Very weird.

And yeah, I was having a dream that I was being chased by a dog, then I wake up and I can't move and there's this thing with it's jaw around my head making these awful sounds, I shake myself and it's gone.

Ah, the sleep paralysis thing. I have that sometimes. The thing that shows up in your room is typically the scariest thing your mind can come up with at that particular moment. My most recent one had me waking up with my ex gf laying on top of me. That should tell you something about my current feelings towards her.

Whenever this happens to me, I am more fascinated than scared. Sure, my subconscious mind is screaming just like it should but my conscious mind is more like "hm wtf"

Back on topic, and in response to chard.

So god is going to be more harsh to those who HAVE read the bible and reject Christianity? And that's because they know the truth and choose to deny it?

First of all, how would reading the bible PROVE anything? How would having reading it mean that you KNOW the truth? So does that mean everyone who has read the bible and rejects Christianity KNOWS the truth but they reject it making it a much more severe sin?

How about this alternative scenario. Maybe people read the bible, and they reject Christianity not because they're denying some irrefutable truth but because they think it's a load of BS that can't be proven?

Oh, damn...I thought this was the dream thread.

I'm so tired of arguing about Christianity. I think the philosophy of Christianity can be just as real as any other. The literal interpretation that is so popular amongst Christians is as close to being real as Vanilla Ice's talent as a musician. What I mean when I say philosophy is that the bible should NEVER have been taken literally. Jesus said he is the son of god because we are ALL sons of god. God is personified to make understanding him easier just as many Hindu gods are. He is not actually a bearded guy in the sky.

I don't know if anyone said all this before, but I really didn't feel like reading through the whole thread.

Exactly. I've always been curious about influences between religions. Sometimes it's a complex matter and you have to read a lot of things about History, culture, social and psychological archetypes, etc. And sometimes it is simpler and easy to understand.

Some issues are almost like a child game. For example, to many ancient peoples the following beliefs are very simple: humans live on Earth; deities are in the sky; so intermediaries between the two are... are... errr... winged beings, perhaps? Yes! :laughing: Obvious. In fact, the word angel means "messenger" in ancient Greek. And once more, Jews and Christians weren't "original":

http://img837.imageshack.us/img837/4...gartmerkur.jpg


The Classical winged messenger: Hermes for the Greeks or Mercury for the Romans. And to be honest, it is disappointing to see how those ancient Middle-East shepherds changed an efficient, elegant and ergonomic design for a crude, flamboyant, kitsch and sexless chicken-frankenstein-like creature.

Culturally speaking, in my opinion (as an agnostic) Hermes/Mercury is more interesting than the Christian angels.

The so-called fallen angels are also a Christian "copy" (iconographic and symbolic) of Classical myths, but that's another story...

This **** is real, and it scares the living **** out of me.

The kids speaking in tongues thing. I went to my brother's youth church a few times when I was a teen and all the kids were doing it, it was strange.

Not surprising, considering what their god did to his own son:

- Jeeesssss!! Jeeesss, come here!!
- I have a job for you. You've got to go down to the Earth for a suicide mission. C'mon, don't be long, some goatherds are already waiting for you.

the bible is a collection of myths with some historic facts stirred in to increase the efficacy of its stories. it is largely metaphorical, and should not be taken literally.

while the jesus of the bible may have connections to a real historic figure, the story of his resurrection is just another retelling of the classic tale of shamanic death and rebirth. this, like many common metaphors found in world religions, is ultimately sourced in experiences of altered states of consciousness.

I have a Bachelor's in Philosophy. Studying philosophy taught me to classify ideas, prioritize concepts based on whatever you are focusing on, compare and contrast things, qualify what it means to "know" something (epistemology), and be comfortable with the position: I don't know.

I have been a stout athiest, a stout christian. I have studied people that believed only what you use your senses to perceive can be believed, and I have studied people that believed you can't trusted your senses (mirage anyone?) and only things that pass the logic test should be upheld.

*Hindu's believe there are many paths to the top of the mountain
*Buddhists believe there is no such thing as a self, that there are only seeds of human traits in a wherehouse, and that when a person is born they get some collection of these trait (seed for music, seed for wood-working)
*Taoists never mention god, only that there is a path to walk, and that there is a thread that runs through everything and ties it all together
*Christians believe Jesus came from God to educate the world, and that there is "no way to the father but by" him.
*The bible was written by imperfect people, no matter how inspired they were
*What you really believe is what you do when everything falls apart
*People gravitate to the ethics that suit their preferences
*One day when I was an atheist, I was running around a track at Fresno State University, and something hit me in the chest hard enough to stop me in my tracks, and I heard "I am here"

I wrote this song:

The parts of me and you (chorus)
and this and that
Light and dark
Thin and fat

Eternal teeter totter (chorus)
but a thread runs through it
A thread runs through it
What is the thread that runs through it?

Get busy crackin seeds
but a thread runs though it
a thread runs through it
what is the thread that runs through it?


Or dirty minded
when I asked you if you knew it
or could no one make you do it
see a thread run through it?

(chorus)

Words are just sounds
that we use
but whatever words you choose
a thread runs through it

The fawcett is on or off,
why don't you leave it on?
A thread runs through it
what is the thread that runs though it?

(Chorus)


(A Thread Runs Through It copywrite 2004)

Didn't God tell the writers of the Bible what he wanted them to say? Were they not under the influence of God?

No.

Christian biblical canon was determined by the Council of Trent, Synod of Jerusalem, etc... I don't think that God spoke to the people of the council to determine the final canon.

Is this proveable?

I don't know.

I think the bible may be inspired by what I call God, but how well can the intsrument (humans) get it right?

If God "says" "The path is very narrow on the ridge"
And some Prophet writes "I want you to shoot an arrow at a bridge"

what can we do?

I think it is up to each person to listen. What is God telling you?

The Arabic word for God is "Allah"

The Hebrew word is "Eloh" since it takes a germanic mail ending, it is used as Elohim. Elohim is all through the bible.

Allah- pronounced "uh LUH"
Eloh- pronounced "ay LOH"

say it fast and who can tell the difference. Is that what all the fighting is about?

Yes. Decades of bloody warfare is simply a heated debate over which language has named "god" correctly.

??? And what's the point? :confused: A simply linguistic resemblance or difference doesn't entail a conclusion like that.

Everybody can play that kind of "games", mixing linguistics and religion. Look: Zeus (Ζεύς;, Greek) --> Deus (Latin). And here comes the "trap": to the polytheistic Romans deus meant god (with lower case); to the early Christians (monotheistic) the same word meant God (with upper case), that is, the only god.

But, obviously, there is an enormous difference between Zeus and God, despite those ancient Palestinian second-rate pseudo-writers tried to remedy their pathetic lack of literary imagination by imitating deeds from Classical mythology. For instance, the famous fantasy "a god impregnates a human virgin with not even being close to her" is not a Christian creation. As always, Greeks were previous and were better.

In short: Zeus was horny for Danae and invented the golden rain. Read the whole story yourselves.

So you agree, the names aren't important, and getting the stories right isn't important either. If God is a real thing, and I think it is, people should run into it as they go around, like they do with wind, trees, and other people.

Distraction is the enemy. Now why would that be?