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Author Topic:   Created in the image of God
LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 25 of 101 (2810)
01-26-2002 6:37 AM
Reply to: Message 23 by TrueCreation
01-19-2002 2:43 AM


quote:
Originally posted by TrueCreation:
"I think that's the only feasible interpretation. How can an omnipresent entity have a form? Except when it is deliberately acting in human form for some particular purpose. Yet unlike the biomechanics, which can vary across species adapted to various environments and are always highly specialized, it would seem that the capacity to reason, and to feel, and to have moral values, would be universally similar, whether one is a biological form or something else."
--Ofcourse God has a form, though how will you perceive that form in 5 dimentions? Length, width, height, time, unknown (supernatural). Consider my Mr. Flat and Mrs. Flat analogy as I posted in my 'who created the creator' thread.
--------------
[This message has been edited by TrueCreation, 01-19-2002]

I'm curious....why woulkd God need a form exactly? and why would you assume that God exists in 5 dimentions?....and while we're at it,why would you assume that there are 5 dimentions...why not 6 or 13 or 138284874738?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 23 by TrueCreation, posted 01-19-2002 2:43 AM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 26 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 1:25 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 27 of 101 (2827)
01-26-2002 1:29 PM
Reply to: Message 26 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 1:25 PM


but why would God need a form? are you not placing a human limitation on a supernatural being? And why would that be a set form? why would we assume that this form is that of a male...or even a female? Why would you assume that God could not exist in whatever dimention it choses?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 26 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 1:25 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 28 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 2:02 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 29 of 101 (2840)
01-26-2002 2:08 PM
Reply to: Message 28 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 2:02 PM


Actually,your argument is based on the assumption that the "super-natural" does exist in the first place and that there are more than 4 dimention to existance. Care to present evidence to support those assumptions? Also Is not God said to be omni-potent? Does that not imply that there exists nothing that God cannot accomplish,including making itself understandable to us while still remaining a God worthy of worship.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 28 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 2:02 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 30 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 2:16 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 31 of 101 (2848)
01-26-2002 2:25 PM
Reply to: Message 30 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 2:16 PM


that does not answer my question at all....why would you assume that an infinite being needs a form? why would that form be male? (you keep refering to God as HE or HIM)...its that not placing a mortal limitation of God? to confine IT to a specific gender?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 30 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 2:16 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 32 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 2:31 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 33 of 101 (2884)
01-26-2002 3:52 PM
Reply to: Message 32 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 2:31 PM


But in the realm of science,why do you assume that there even is a God?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 32 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 2:31 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 34 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 3:56 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 35 of 101 (2894)
01-26-2002 4:13 PM
Reply to: Message 34 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 3:56 PM


I'm afraid that my own examination of the Bible forces me to concluded that its unlikely an all-knowing God inspired its writing.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 34 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 3:56 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 36 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 4:20 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 37 of 101 (2903)
01-26-2002 4:37 PM
Reply to: Message 36 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 4:20 PM


First of all,i'm not an Atheist. I fully believe in God. But i think my own beliefs would be characterised as Dheistic...meaning i believe that God works completely through natural processes and Created the universe by setting the stage,determining the rules,lighting the spark of life and then sat back and let nature takes its course. I believe that God is not a biological entity of some kind but rather a very ancient and very powerfull spirit and that all lives are the children of God. I believe that when it is said that God created us in ITS image,i believe that this means our consiousness,spirit or souls,which is the essense of who we are. And i believe that God created the universe so that ITS children could have a learning ground,where they could manifest as corporeal shells so they could interact with their environement and with each other to learn from those interaction in order to first develope and then refine consious thoughts. I believe that the corporeal shell we inhabit at a given time is in direct relation with our level of developement...simpler forms of life for newly born souls and more complex biological constructs for older,more advanced souls. So you see,i view the universe as a learning ground where i will dwell in one corporeal form or another until such time as there is nothing left for me to learn here,at which point i will move on to whatever lays beyond this reality. So i dont really think that i qualify as an athiest

This message is a reply to:
 Message 36 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 4:20 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 38 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 4:44 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 39 of 101 (2922)
01-26-2002 5:32 PM
Reply to: Message 38 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 4:44 PM


I'm afraid not...The God of the Bible is infinite and always existed. I firmly believe that God is finite,although the sheer scope of its being is so makes IT appear as infinite from our point of view AT THIS TIME. I also believe that God began at some point in a very distant past. As for the fall of man,i dont believe a word of it. Most of the book of genesis is actually ancient sumerian and babylonian myths that have been recycled by the hebrews. In the original story of Adam,he was created by GODS(plural) along with a woman called Lilith. But Lilith spurned him and so the GODS created Eve. And the story of Noah to the Babylonians is actually the story of a legendary hero called Gilgamesh,who wa warned by the Gods that a flood was comming and he should build a boat to save the animals,who could not save themselves. In that story,the flood is not a punishement but a natural disaster of which the Gods warn mankind because they care for them. Notice how dramaticaly that story was changed by the Hebrew

This message is a reply to:
 Message 38 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 4:44 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 40 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 6:19 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 41 of 101 (2950)
01-27-2002 4:34 AM
Reply to: Message 40 by TrueCreation
01-26-2002 6:19 PM


My belief in God stems from observation of the world around us...every life has a begining at some point and an end at some point. I see no reason to believe that the LIVING God would be any different...only in the case of God,the sheer scale of IT's being,as i said,is probably so vast that to us,IT appears as infinite and all encompassing. Take for exemple the relation between a blue whale and a microbe. Viewed from the microbe's point of view and considering its very short life span,the whale on which it dwells would appear to be infinite and its unlikely that it would ever gain a perspective that could allow it to actually see the whale as a whole and understand that its actually merely a much larger,much more complex life form than the microbe is. Multiply this by about 15-20 billions,and you can approximate the relationship between man and God. To me,that does not reduce the awe inspiring majesty of God,btw. I believe that God did create the universe,albeit through a long,natural process. But i dont believe that God created LIFE per say...i believe that God GAVE birth to life,much like a parent gives birth to children and we,as humans,are but one of many manifestations of this life. And i believe that this is what God is telling us through ITS word...but to me the word of God is not the Bible...the word of God is the whole of creation itself and the Bible,like the Koran,the Torah,the Talmut,the eastern phisolophies,the native american belief,the hindou religion,the Norse mythologies and so on and so forth all the way up to and including today's scientific knowledge are all mankind's attempts to decipher this Word of God.
As for the book of Genesis,yes it is concievable that it was the original source of all creation legends across the world but judging from the facts at hand,thats rather unlikely. There is clear historical and archeological evidence to demonstrate that the Babylonian and Sumerian empires predate the Hebrew civilision by at least 1000 years and so obviously,their creation story came BEFORE the book of Genesis as writen by the hebrew. Fruthermore,it is a well known fact that the hebrew were at one point slaves of the Babylonians and it stands to reason that this is where they aquired those ancients sumerian/babylonian myths and legends about Adam,Lilith(which they dropped completely in their version),Eve and Gilgamesh(which became Noah in their legends). Also,there is a historical precedent in Babylonian lore for the hebrew belief about the longevity of the Patriarch. The Babylonians believed that many of their greatest kings in their past had reigned for thousands and thousands of years at the time....i believe that in their folklore,one babylonian king had reigned for nearly 35 thousands years. So the hebrew also included this in their story,both to illustrate the relative wisdom of the Patriarch in their story and to account for the fact that 2 people living 50-60 years at most,which was the longevity prevalent in hebrew time,could not have given birth to the whole human race...on the other hand,if they and their children all lived to be 900 years old,well,that gives them plenty of time to have hundreds of children each and that settles the problem. And since there was no one who lived to be 900 in the days when the bible was originaly writen,well,they had to begin decreasing the longevity of people in the chronological order of their story until they reached longevity that was observable at the time.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 40 by TrueCreation, posted 01-26-2002 6:19 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 42 by TrueCreation, posted 01-27-2002 1:47 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 43 of 101 (2967)
01-27-2002 5:52 PM
Reply to: Message 42 by TrueCreation
01-27-2002 1:47 PM


Study your history...the Babylonian empire began around 2000 BC and it was inherited from the Sumerian empire,who's exact origin are unclear since much records have been lost over time but what is clear is that they had at least 12 century of history before the Babylonians took them over,which would place their origin AT LEAST 3200 BC...700 BEFORE the biblical flood...and none of their historical records,which were inherited by the Babylonians make mention of a world wide flood with the possible exception of the legend of Gilgamesh...and even in that story,the flood is local. And the Hebreu themselves admit to having been slaves of the Babylonians in a distant past...the Babylonians reigned over all of what is know as the Middle East today for nearly 1600 years. Their culture thus predates the Hebrew civilisation,which back then consisted of scatered tribes here and there. So it stands to reason that their myth are older in origin because the Babylonians themselves inherited them from a previous culture...the Sumerian. As for the 35000 years old king,thats just a Babylonian legend...no serious historians believe it to be factual. But it does illustrate some interesting parallels between Hebrew legends and the Babylonian legends who reigned over them for 15 centuries...As i mentionned earlier in another thread,the Adam legend was either Babylonian or Sumerian in origin and is somewhat different for the hebrew version of that tale,as in the earlier babylonian version,Adam was created along side Lilith from the earth itself and when Lilith spurned Adam,the Gods cursed her and then took a rib from Adam to fashion an obediant wife named eve. The hebrew,who believed in ONE God as opposed to many Gods like the Babylonians took that story and modified it somewhat,saying that ONE God created Adam and then Eve and dropped Lilith all together from the story.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 42 by TrueCreation, posted 01-27-2002 1:47 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 44 by TrueCreation, posted 01-27-2002 6:25 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 45 of 101 (2981)
01-27-2002 9:23 PM
Reply to: Message 44 by TrueCreation
01-27-2002 6:25 PM


I do not believe that my comment was in any way insulting or demeaning to you. How do we know if those dates are accurate? the fact of the matter is that we dont. But historians work by comparing historical records from different times periods in a given culture and draw a conculsion from there. It is concievable that the dates given in those ancient records are flawed or attempts at deception for some reason we can only guess at but then,couldn't the same thing be said about ALL historical and pseudo-historical accounts...including the Bible? However it is,i believe,reasonable to assume that people who bothered to keep historical accounts back then were as thoughrough as we are today. So what we have are conflicting informations from different source. I have a natural tendency to believe more information that come from what i would call non-coercive sources myself(i.e. with no "either you believe this and that or you burn in hell forever,you heathen" type of threats) so i tend to believe non-dogmatic historical records over dogmatic ones. I also have great difficulty with the flood story because to me,such an act of unbridled malovelance and destruction is diametricaly opposed to the nature of a nurturing Creator.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 44 by TrueCreation, posted 01-27-2002 6:25 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 46 by TrueCreation, posted 01-27-2002 10:04 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 47 of 101 (2992)
01-27-2002 11:00 PM
Reply to: Message 46 by TrueCreation
01-27-2002 10:04 PM


The Bible does have a genealogy but there is absolutely no physical evidence to substanciate it either(i.e. no tombs from Adam and company). One could say that they were destroyed during the flood but i'd say thats rather conveniant. Also,the Hebrew,who are the first writers of the Bible did not begin to write it down until 1700 BC so everything before that was oral history and as such,subject to the same possible corruption over time. And as i said,i believe that the biblical legends are inheritance of the babylonian and sumerian myths anyway.
As i explained yesterday,i do not think of God as a God of autority and perfection,making every effort to tolerate our sinfull nature out of love. I do NOT believe that God holds us to a strict standard of perfection you describe. And i certainly do not believe that God would punish us with eternal damnation should we fail to meet that standard. I believe that God's love for us is completely and utterly unconditional,like the love of any good parent for their children. I believe that Jesus Christ was a part of God,sent here on earth to set the record strait and make certain we understood this basic fact. And i firmly believe that every culture received such a mesage from God,in one form or another. I also believe that God dislike the concept of organized religion...Jesus certainly was not a partisan for it. I believe that the relationship between us and God is completely personal and involves no specific rules. I do believe that God gave us some basic rules of conduct to illustrate how we should be good to one another. I believe in the ten commandements and try to abide by them as much as humanly possible because to me,they are completely logical and necessary to sustain any form of long term community but i dont believe for one second that God made ANY rules beyond those (i.e. rules against eating pork,working on the sabbath,homosexuality,ect). And i dont believe that God would ever destroy the world to make a point and on that particular point,my position will remain as such unless God in person tells me otherwise.
[This message has been edited by LudvanB, 01-27-2002]

This message is a reply to:
 Message 46 by TrueCreation, posted 01-27-2002 10:04 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 49 by TrueCreation, posted 01-28-2002 6:18 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 50 of 101 (3026)
01-28-2002 6:42 PM
Reply to: Message 49 by TrueCreation
01-28-2002 6:18 PM


I know that Homosexuality is expressly condemned in the Bible but i'm convinced that God had nothing to do with that condemnation winding up in there...This is clearly a cultural bias of the ancient Hebrew that has stuck with us like a bad stain and i hope that we will get rid of it eventually (the idea that homosexuality is somehow wrong). Homosexuals are who they are because thats how God wants them,for some reason we can only guess at(diversity,testing man's tolerance of the difference,population control,ect) Interestingly,Jesus makes absolutely no mention about homosexuality.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 49 by TrueCreation, posted 01-28-2002 6:18 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 51 by TrueCreation, posted 01-28-2002 11:04 PM LudvanB has replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 52 of 101 (3044)
01-28-2002 11:15 PM
Reply to: Message 51 by TrueCreation
01-28-2002 11:04 PM


TC,you can quote all the Biblical condemnation of homosexuality till the cows comes home,you are still quoting the OPINIONS of MAN writen by the hand of MAN. You may believe your Bible to be God inspired...I,however,do not.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 51 by TrueCreation, posted 01-28-2002 11:04 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 56 by TrueCreation, posted 01-30-2002 10:56 PM LudvanB has not replied

LudvanB
Inactive Member


Message 55 of 101 (3153)
01-30-2002 10:40 PM
Reply to: Message 51 by TrueCreation
01-28-2002 11:04 PM


And BTW TC,Aids is next to non-existant among homosexual women (lesbians) so your contention that AIDS is somehow a punishement for homosexuality is absurd. Aids is a plague that is ravaging Africa even as we speak. Are you gonna pretend that they are being punished for being black? This sort of idiotic "natural catastrophies are actually divine punishements" mentality belongs in the dark ages,mr Torquenada...

This message is a reply to:
 Message 51 by TrueCreation, posted 01-28-2002 11:04 PM TrueCreation has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 58 by TrueCreation, posted 01-30-2002 11:02 PM LudvanB has replied

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