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Aquila King

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I wanna try something a bit different than usual here. (this may turn out to be completely futile, but we'll try it at least)

Rather than asking people to debate/discuss the existence of a God or afterlife, etc. I want this thread to be where each of you basically go all-out in one post. In other words, in asking the question: "Does a God / spirtual aspect of reality (such as spirits and an afterlife) exist or not, and if so in what way?" I want you to make your case in full as to what position you hold on this topic, and why. Try to go into as much detail as possible, feel free to add as many links to cite sources as you want, and again, try to make your case in full as to why you believe your position to be correct. 

My point here isn't as much to create a debate thread, it's more to create a single place where all the best most in-depth arguments reside. The more cross discussion and debates between posters in this thread, the messier it'll become, and so I kind of want to just have all the best arguments on all sides be more prominent and singled out here for once.

Make sense? Cool. Let's give it a go.

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I have no proof one way or another. My position is spirituality is opinion which is a argument that can't be won. 

Of course I live in a household that's Buddhist, the Quaker form of Christianity and me. :lol:

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I began to believe in the God of the Bible as a child.  As I grew into adulthood, I strayed in that I questioned the basis for my faith and I realized a couple of things.  First, faith cannot ever be proven to another who does not experience faith.  Second, I have no need to convince anyone that what I believe is true.  They have to decide for themselves what they believe about the nature of existence.  As I watch the events unfold in the M.E. today, I see evidence of Jesus' statement to His disciples:  "I have told you now before it happens, so that when it does happen you will believe."  

or this:  I have told you this, so that when their time comes you will remember that I warned you about them. I did not tell you this from the beginning because I was with you, New Living Translation Yes, I'm telling you these things now, so that when they happen, you willremember my warning.  

As these events unfold in our day, we will need faith less and less because we will be seeing the fulfillment of His words.  For those who do not accept that as proof, there is nothing else they will accept either, until He actually returns and begins to rule and reign as a Sovereign over the nations of the earth.  

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1 hour ago, Aquila King said:

"Does a God / spirtual aspect of reality (such as spirits and an afterlife) exist or not, and if so in what way?

Hi Aquilla King

I do no see god as an entity for me god is our intelligence. We give meaning to everything around us and are able to understand how things interact and use that understanding to realize potential. I don't have documentation, doctrine, fellowship or a system of rites just live life in a positive manner. To me the time I have on this earth is all there is which makes it valuable to me so no I don't believe in spirits, ghost, angels or demons just men with good or bad intent.

jmccr8

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God is spiritual and personal between someone and their beliefs. You can't cause it or get between it. I don't have a big issue with it really.

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Nothing going one way or the other either believing ornot, things do kinda skews rationality a bit when things creeps towards hearing, seeing and doing things with,for and 'commanded' by god. Things seldom, if ever ends well... 

~

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When I was a child I believed in magic, believed that a magician used genuine magic to make coins disappear, as I could believe a man might use magic to walk on water etc etc.  As a grown up I know magic is simple trickery, usually used for profit in one way or another.  I now know enough, understand too much to believe such tales, so I quote Corinthians.

Quote

When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things

And thus God disappears in a puff of logic!

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Just a quick answer for now to your question "Does a God / spirtual aspect of reality (such as spirits and an afterlife) exist or not, and if so in what way?" : I am old enough to know that, over a lifetime, a person's beliefs will change ..... sometimes radically, sometimes just modified a little. It puzzles me when people claim to have had a static belief for many years, because to me that suggests an unenquiring mind.

This is an excellent topic, Aquila! :tsu: Thank you for posting it. I will add more later.

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The existence or nonexistence of god is entirely subjective (since there is no way to prove either). The believe/nonbelief can shape a person's personal reality. They may find meaning and stability through their faith. 

If I go back to my days of occultism, the life is magical. The "gods and spirits" were friends, due to the model I used. Life as a whole was meaningful and synchronicity/coincides were a normal occurrence. Life, to be honest, was a lot more enjoyable in those days. I had faith in myself most of all. Now days though, it's pretty much a mechanical existence.

Hope this answers something and perhaps explains why I'm dabbling in a bit of "magical thinking". 

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8 hours ago, Aquila King said:

I wanna try something a bit different than usual here. (this may turn out to be completely futile, but we'll try it at least)

Rather than asking people to debate/discuss the existence of a God or afterlife, etc. I want this thread to be where each of you basically go all-out in one post. In other words, in asking the question: "Does a God / spirtual aspect of reality (such as spirits and an afterlife) exist or not, and if so in what way?" I want you to make your case in full as to what position you hold on this topic, and why. Try to go into as much detail as possible, feel free to add as many links to cite sources as you want, and again, try to make your case in full as to why you believe your position to be correct. 

My point here isn't as much to create a debate thread, it's more to create a single place where all the best most in-depth arguments reside. The more cross discussion and debates between posters in this thread, the messier it'll become, and so I kind of want to just have all the best arguments on all sides be more prominent and singled out here for once.

Make sense? Cool. Let's give it a go.

I'd love to, but it would take several pages, and more time than I currently have  :)

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8 hours ago, Aquila King said:

: "Does a God / spirtual aspect of reality (such as spirits and an afterlife) exist or not, and if so in what way?"

Mine is a "not" .

As i make no claim to any existance then i do not really have to go any further.

If people want to believe, thats fine by me. If they want me to believe, they are going to have to bring something to the table, the table has been empty for quite a long time. 

 

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Sound like walls of words are necessary here, and welcomed by the OP.

Is it not rather an ambitious goal to solicit such a grand scheme from us?

No walls from me, though. And I'm just placing down a couple of bricks. I wonder who was the first human to ever think about god or gods, if it was a matter of one getting the idea, and then spreading it, like a contagious disease. But it seems that it's not a matter of record as to just one human being the first to ever get the idea and then spreading from that source. There is evidence that in various parts of the world, common ideas of god(s) sparked independently and from more than one source. Therefore It seems more probable that the thought of God(s) and the supernatural/afterlife may be embedded in our DNA.

And if evolution has any validity and also correlation to DNA, it seems that the skeptics are greatly outnumbered by those that believe in some kind of supernatural god. Therefore, on that alone, I put forth as indirect proof that  there is a God. Perhaps not a God in any way resembling anything like put forth by any of the major religions, but more probable a God completely different than anyone of us can ever imagine. Without my own imagination, I tend to favor Socrate's/Plato's idea of God. As far as spirits go, and also the afterlife, there too I favor Socrates'/Plato's views on them. But again, the afterlife is probably something none of us remember just how it is. I say this because it seems that the afterlife is also our before-life, according to Socrates/Plato.

One day, It will be proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that God and the afterlife exist. When this day will be, only God knows. Beyond the shadows of the cave is where we will find our proof. And for most of us that is when we Break On Through (To The Other Side) of the Doors. Or on Judgement Day.

 

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On 4/25/2019 at 2:44 PM, Pettytalk said:

One day, It will be proven, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that God and the afterlife exist.

Slap it on the table. And can you fill up the dogs bowl while you are at it

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jacopo_Bassano_Last_Supper_1542.jpeg

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3 hours ago, Pettytalk said:

Beyond the shadows of the cave is where we will find our proof.

 Do you have any thoughts on what kind of proof  will be found in the shadow of the cave?

Any idea on what cave? That is quite important for those who do not want to miss it would like to be there.

 

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To be honest. None of the explanations will amount to much of anything. Well except learning a bit more about people and why they view things a certain way. But, it all comes down to beliefs.

People will believe, what they want to believe, because they want to believe in it.

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@Aquila King   I'll start just by describing what I believe as my Advaita (Non-dualism) religion/philosophy. I won't get into the 'why' just yet:

Advaita means not-two in Sanskrit meaning God and creation are actually not two things but one thing. In the western world the term Non-dualism is commonly used.

There is only God that exists and is real and is permanent. God is completely non-physical and pure consciousness . Our thinking minds can not get behind exactly what consciousness and awareness are. Try thinking about it and you’ll be stumped. God is in a constant state of pure infinite being-awareness-bliss.

What does God do? What does one in a constant state of pure infinite consciousness do? In his creative aspect (another mystery)  he thinks a play/drama called the universe. In this play/drama in his thoughts a spark of his consciousness incarnates a myriad of finite beings inside  a universe of things. He experiences finiteness through animating each thing with a spark of his infinite consciousness. These finite entities begin with no idea of their infinite source and experience then as individuals. This is Act I of the play/drama.

In Act II, these finite entities begin through finding attraction/love a greater sense of self. Through the process of love they eventually advance to God-Realize that they and All are One Consciousness. It Is All God.

Why does God do this? To experience the joy of advancement from finite ignorance to total being-awareness-bliss.

 

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On 4/25/2019 at 2:21 AM, Aquila King said:

"Does a God / spirtual aspect of reality (such as spirits and an afterlife) exist or not, and if so in what way?" I want you to make your case in full as to what position you hold on this topic, and why. Try to go into as much detail as possible, feel free to add as many links to cite sources as you want, and again, try to make your case in full as to why you believe your position to be correct. 

I suppose the first thing to say is ... no one has, as yet, proved to the satisfaction of the wider community, the existence of a God or a spiritual aspect of reality, therefore anything that people post in this thread can only be what they feel to be true at the moment of posting .... what makes sense to them here, now. Unless, of course, they have had a specific experience which has proved to them, personally that God/a spiritual aspect exists. This is fraught with difficulty because who's to say the person isn't fooling themselves or has misinterpreted an experience? To say nothing of the fact that they were most likely on their own at the time of the revelation. 

I had a Protestant Christian upbringing ... the existence of God and the truth of the Bible were presented as fact and no one I knew argued against that. The church I went to was centuries old and therefore a magical place to me as a child. As soon as one stepped through the doorway the atmosphere changed to one of reverence. One didn't speak unless it was a prayer or a hymn(to this day I still occasionally sing those hymns to myself because I find them comforting; plus the music is lovely!). I loved the quietness and stillness and reverence that accompanied anything to do with 'my' religion ..... BUT .... when I was still quite young, perhaps 6 or 7, I began to feel that God was not quite as He was being presented to me. I began to question in my mind just what it was that He did that was so amazing that it justified all the praise He was given and awe that was directed at Him. I couldn't see anything then and I haven't seen anything since! Over a lifetime I have never seen anything that suggests there is a God, in the Biblical sense of the word. As soon as my parents felt I was old enough to make the choice I stopped going to church and I have never been confirmed.

Next stop Spiritualism! After experiences with a ouija board(and other events that happened around that time), I became convinced of the existence of forces/beings that were not part of this physical world. And there's the rub: from then onward my story becomes a personal one wherein it is impossible to prove anything that occurred. Only a handful of people have shared my experiences with me. I have had many experiences that have convinced me beyond a shadow of doubt that there is more, much more, than just a physical world with physical beings in it. This is why, when UMers post their stories, no matter how fantastic, I never rubbish them. I know that what I have experienced is hard to believe if you haven't experienced it yourself ..... that doesn't mean it isn't true!

To go back to God: do I believe there exists something which, in the broadest possible terms could be called 'God'(most definitely not the God of the Bible)? Called 'God' because that gives others a rough idea of what I'm talking about. Yes, I probably do, but it's something that I believe my tiny human brain doesn't have the capability of understanding. Reason tells me that something caused the physical world to materialise and that something many people call 'God'. The problem for me is when people anthropomorphise  that cause, that force. I have never seen any evidence of a dear old man who lives in the sky, listens carefully to prayers and has the best interests of individuals or communities at heart. And don't bother giving me that 'He wants us to have free will' cr*p! It's possible(and advisable), to allow people to have free will most of the time but to intervene when things get out of hand and start adversely affecting others(when people get out of their depth). That is the mature thing to do.

So I definitely believe in something beyond the physical, and that would include terms like soul and spirit. I definitely believe in mind-to-mind connections as I have experienced those many times over the years, both person-to-person and group-to-person. On occasion, these connections were over hundreds of miles. I think of these connections as soul-to-soul/spirit-to-spirit and therefore I would have to say that I think mind = spirit. As I currently understand it, individual minds/spirits merge and become one, the further away they move from the physical realm. So I think it's possible to see a ghost, because that would be a connection between two souls/spirits/impulses that are, at source, one and the same being. I believe that connections often arise from stressful situations and this is often a death or deaths. Signals are sent out from those in distress and are picked up by others who are sensitive to such things. Perhaps 'sensitives' are those who never fully incarnated and therefore still have 'one foot in the spirit world', so to speak.

As for an 'afterlife', I don't think of it as a place but rather a merging of souls and eventually the disintegration of individual souls.

 

 

   

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  • 2 weeks later...

Each of our lives is connected to some ancient myth and it's archetypes.

As above, so below said Hermes Trismegistus speaking through Apollonius of Tyana.

Maybe it's Odysseus, or maybe it's Medea. Maybe it's Isis or maybe it's Gilgamesh.

That's for you to find, even if there is nothing new under the sun. But if you can find those myths that are cosmic and correspond to you, you can understand them, deconstruct them and break the bonds of faith. Remove the code of the counterfeit spirit.

 

 

 

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On 4/24/2019 at 6:21 PM, Aquila King said:

 

Make sense? Cool. Let's give it a go.

Tall order AK, making a case for such a thing in a single post.  

I remember a certain verse from the Bible, from the Apostle Paul where he speaks about once thinking, speaking, and acting like a child, then contrasting that with thinking and being as one who is mature and has put away childish things.  The point being that we change, evolve if you will over time from one thing, to another.  We develop from an infant, and toddler, child, adolescent and many of us reach adulthood....we are different from what we once were, yet our past has shaped us and is a part of us.  

For many of us, myself included, we were raised with a religion (mine was Catholic - confirmed altar boy here) and as we grow older we no longer accept those things we once believed as truth the way we understand it as adults.  That’s where I am.  I have abandoned all religion (except for the one I am inventing - another topic) and I choose to approach the world with the mindset of truth being the supreme thing for me.  Also, an admittedly difficult thing to understand.

Anyway, I cast my lot with those who believe there is something besides material existence, and that thing many of us refer to as God.  I believe this way because of my experiences over time.  I have experienced the spiritual, even the supernatural as I understand it and I have seen faith work for me.  I have also seen religion fail for me...for what that’s worth.

i would not be able to explain God, define his/her nature....or even be able to understand it the way that I understand other things.  But, it is my belief that “God” does in fact exist, and that this being is ultimately good on the highest level, and perhaps even what we call love....all this in spite of what seems like evidence to the contrary.  

And of course, even that statement fails because there is no evidence to the contrary.  But, it does seem like we live in a world where evil does exist, even if that word is defined by the actions of people, suffering, disappointment and ultimately death.

There nice thing about believing the way that I do now after so many decades of searching, studying and practicing religion, is that I feel greatly relieved from fear.  Since I believe that if God exists, he is good....I don’t have fear.  Since I believe all religions false in a sense, I fear no religion.  Now, I just fear things that can harm, maim, or kill me while I exist in this place.

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On 25/04/2019 at 2:29 PM, third_eye said:

Nothing going one way or the other either believing ornot, things do kinda skews rationality a bit when things creeps towards hearing, seeing and doing things with,for and 'commanded' by god. Things seldom, if ever ends well... 

~

That depends on the god you are conversing with and what its expectations are ;)  It has worked exceptionally well for me and for many other people whom i know closely and well . 

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On 27/04/2019 at 2:00 PM, ouija ouija said:

I suppose the first thing to say is ... no one has, as yet, proved to the satisfaction of the wider community, the existence of a God or a spiritual aspect of reality, therefore anything that people post in this thread can only be what they feel to be true at the moment of posting .... what makes sense to them here, now. Unless, of course, they have had a specific experience which has proved to them, personally that God/a spiritual aspect exists. This is fraught with difficulty because who's to say the person isn't fooling themselves or has misinterpreted an experience? To say nothing of the fact that they were most likely on their own at the time of the revelation. 

I had a Protestant Christian upbringing ... the existence of God and the truth of the Bible were presented as fact and no one I knew argued against that. The church I went to was centuries old and therefore a magical place to me as a child. As soon as one stepped through the doorway the atmosphere changed to one of reverence. One didn't speak unless it was a prayer or a hymn(to this day I still occasionally sing those hymns to myself because I find them comforting; plus the music is lovely!). I loved the quietness and stillness and reverence that accompanied anything to do with 'my' religion ..... BUT .... when I was still quite young, perhaps 6 or 7, I began to feel that God was not quite as He was being presented to me. I began to question in my mind just what it was that He did that was so amazing that it justified all the praise He was given and awe that was directed at Him. I couldn't see anything then and I haven't seen anything since! Over a lifetime I have never seen anything that suggests there is a God, in the Biblical sense of the word. As soon as my parents felt I was old enough to make the choice I stopped going to church and I have never been confirmed.

:tu:

Agreed.

On 27/04/2019 at 2:00 PM, ouija ouija said:

As for an 'afterlife', I don't think of it as a place but rather a merging of souls and eventually disintegration the of individual souls.

^^^ Yeah see, our thoughts will always differ on that,  but it will not stop me loving you. :D

Just out of curiousity, why would souls merge after death?

Who are they merging with?

If they disintegrate, does this not mean they all have to die at the same time to be able to merge together before any  disintegrates?

Don't shout at me, lol, i am just curious to the thinking behind it. :wub:

Edited by freetoroam
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5 minutes ago, freetoroam said:

 

^^^ Yeah see, our thoughts will always differ on that,  but it will not stop me loving you. :D

Just out of curiousity, why would souls merge after death?

Who are they merging with?

If they disintegrate, does this not mean they all have to die at the same time to be able to merge together before any  disintegrates?

Don't shout at me, lol, i am just curious to the thinking behind it. :wub:

:lol: This is not the thread to be shouting at people in! Anywho, I'm just stating how I see things at the moment .... this may well change as the years go by. To explain the 'merging' thing as I see it: if you imagine a very deep part of the ocean which has waves coming up in peaks and the tip of each wave looks across the surface of the ocean and sees other wave tips, apparently separate to itself and believes them to be separate entities. This individual wave is unaware that all the wave tips are one and the same being .... the ocean. When the individual wave becomes flat, it merges once again with the ocean. Sorry, that's a rather crude way to express it but it works for me. :)

Why would souls merge after death? Because the deepest part of the ocean is their source/original home and there is a natural pull back to that place. I imagine the merging(and re-emerging), and disintegration to be a never ending process. The 'ocean mass' is mainly there all the time with just bits of it manifesting in the physical world at any given time.

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I agree with Guyver in this instance in that it's a tall order. No matter what circle this subject can be discussed in, that's all this can ever be. A discussion. There are not two legitimate arguments, there is only one. 

In any academic institution there is no argument. It's not debated or discussed. There are no lectures on creation by creators, there are no texts on the possibility of God existing. It's not actually a debate. It's a discussion. Every poster here has an opinion, but if one takes the path of the sciences, religion is not even worthy of consideration regarding questions of existence. Human egos like to think we can know more than we do. There seems to be a great deal of resistance to the facts, as most are much better versed in superstition. We like to think we know. But science isn't 'what we think'. It's observation, repeatability and predictability. The sciences have proven themselves time and again. From putting men on the moon to worldwide communication and the devices everyone reading this is relying on. 

At the end of the day, the sciences tell us what is going on. They follow a path to a natural universe. Nothing in that universe points at the existance of a God. The only place God is found and referenced is in our species. And not just the popular gods of today but thousands of times for thousands of different reasons. Not once because something that actually exists suggests so. 

Whilst many find such an approach arrogant and closed minded, I can't think of anything more closed minded and arrogant than insisting an idea that only exists in our writings and cultures is valid and worthy of challenging the vast natural order our best minds are devoting entire lifetimes to understanding. Rather than has God being disproven, the real question that is the elephant in the room is, why would such an entity as God actually exist? Because 'we reckon so'? 

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the original cause. That would be the source of a belief in god I imagine. Then perhaps all causes after could be no less than the original cause-equal of merit or importance.

the constant cause. I suspect it all leads to infinite possibilities.. ever expanding and moving forward.. perhaps even infinite lesser gods...

maybe curiosity is the constant driver that unfolds the universe, curiosity from our perspective as we seem to be the most inclined. Maybe even a universal curiosity? 

Why cant there be a satan and jealous god? Why couldn’t Zeus have reigned supreme in his day? I kind of like that one movie where the basic idea is without belief the gods perish. 

Maybe rejecting the demiurge is as high as we can get spiritually and not trying to find another god to take its place. Or at least realizing doing so expands the demiurge. Maybe philosophy and religion are over excercised.

maybe a man should think as he does, and spend time thinking about the world we live in. Become a student of what we can actually interact with and seek a spiritual presence on ones on. Call it whatever ya want, build your interaction with it on your own experiences. 

Maybe we spend too much time theorizing and debating ideas that were handed down to us and never stop to have an original thought about the whole matter. 

When christians turn away from Christianity they follow typically a stereotypical path of experimentation and find something that satisfies their logic and roll with it-until it needs tweaking. Others cling to their faith out of fear of eternal damnation. Some just actually believe an omnipotent god needed to sacrifice his son for all the bad things we’ve done... others seek the reward of heavens of golden streets or “virgins” of all things. All on a predictable path, break the cycle.

how important are these things to the humble? When I look around me with eyes that see I cannot help but to be humbled. Material things are nice but I see better rewards internally. 

I like what Carlos Castaneda wrote in one of those books- Don Juan says “God? What am I to know about God?”

 

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^ ^  What a wonderfully insightful post! Thank you for that. :)

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