Origins and the Theist

[Dondi]

Originally Posted by path_of_one

This is where that one cryptic statement I wrote comes in. I believe that God just is. God exists in a state of all things and all time- an eternal moment. But in another sense, through His creation, God experiences and embodies evolution. God is evolution, just as God is every other natural process. He's just more than all this, too.

So, God doesn't evolve along with us (to me). But God does evolve as us. Yet, God is always the same.

Another way to think about this is to look at the Mandelbrot images. God is the equation that manifests the images, and so God is also the ever-changing images. God is both unchangeable and eternal (the equation) and ever-changing, evolving, and dynamic (the manifestation of the equation).

One gets dizzy just looking at those.

While I'd like to think God is in all of us, (well, His Spirit is everywhere, I agree, but that's different from manifesting in us), there has to be a line of demarkation. I can't see Him in the child rapist and child killer, I can't see Him in the Enron extortioner, I can't see Him in the abusive alcoholic, I can't see Him in the drug smugglers and dealers, I can't see Him in the stalkers and serial killers.

Not that any of these can't be repentent or can't be forgiven, God knows I needed forgiveness in more ways that I can count. But what is going on in the mind of God as these things are happening? The Bible says the Holy Spirit grieves, but if He is in these people, or anyway involved in the evil men commit, well, what does that make Him? Does He experience any of this, as victim or perpetrator? He is a Holy God, the scriptures teach us. Surely He must withdraw from anything unholy. But how can He if He is part of everything?

Yeah, that part confuses me and I tend to think that people misinterpreted what was going on. I don't think God is experimenting and I don't think God gets convinced by people to do anything. But I can see how from a human perspective, this would seem to be how things are. That is, that would be a valid human experience of God, though I would say that doesn't make it accurate about God's actual nature.

Surely, though, my original question must pan out, that God is learning from us (learning just how decrepit we can be, mostly). Much like an inventor who has to work the kinks out of his inventioin and improve on the work. After all, isn't that how evolution is working?

[lunamoth]

Originally Posted by Dondi

Luna,

One final question on this, then I'm done. In regards to the Doc. Hypo., would you say that an "oral tradition" based on the Penetatuch stayed intact though the centuries as passed down from generation to generation until it was written down at a later date by these different writers (J, E, P, D). Or at least piecemeal source documents that were compiled or referenced (much like the supposed Q document (or Mark for Matthew and Luke )for the NT)?

From my reading on this, J and E are the oldest sources and based upon oral tradition and written down probably some time after King David. J demonstrates concern for showing that the reign of David was the fulfillment of God's promise to Abraham. J may be have been written first and E a hundred years later, and then after that the two were put together by an editor.

The Book of the Law (probably Deut 12-26) was 'found' in the temple during the restorations in 621 BCE, during the reign (and reform period) of Josiah. This marked an important transition point in Hebrew history: the introduction of the written "word of the LORD." It was probably written around 650 BCE. After the fall of the southern kingdom the Deuteronomist editor wove the D material into the JE account. D's work is in all of the Pentateuch except Genesis.

P, the Priestly code, was introduced to the written work after the return from exile (around 538-450 BCE)and probably never existed as an independent source. And there are probably other sources as well.

Although written down much later, J tradition probably dates to about 950 BCE and E to 850 BCE or a little later.

There was a continuance of oral tradition along with the developing written forms. The documentary hypothesis is a description of a general process and not a rigid scheme.

[Dondi]

But all this is based on conjecture, all on the internal examination of the texts, right. There isn't any external evidence to confirm this, is there?

[lunamoth]

Originally Posted by Dondi

But all this is based on conjecture, all on the internal examination of the texts, right. There isn't any external evidence to confirm this, is there?

Well, I'd say it's based on scholarship. There's not a lot of archeological evidence to support the history as described in the OT, and I'm not well versed in the subject. There are no documents of that age as far as I know.

I'm not equipped to argue for the Documentary Hypothesis Dondi. You asked, and I've explained that I find it an interesting and satisfying approach to understanding how the Bible was written. And, I don't find it a threat to my faith in any way.

[Dondi]

Very well. I hope I wasn't seemingly argumentative about it. I'm just probing for your take, luna, that's all. And I appreciate your answer, really. I will pursue this particular matter on my own.

We'll continue with the OP now.

[path_of_one]

I'm not answering for Luna (really curious about her input, actually) but figured I'd throw out that from my understanding, parts of Genesis (such as chapters 1 and 2) are quite ancient in oral tradition and this is actually why you get inconsistencies in the text.

I'll further throw out a few ideas on the validity of the Bible from my own perspective (hope no one minds). I believe the Bible was written by many authors, over time, and is not infallible in the sense that everything is literally accurate. BUT, and it's a big "but," I do believe the Bible is infallible in the truths, the meanings, that it carries through the generations. If read with the Spirit, the Bible contains a tradition and a mythology (a sacred story) that is an infallible pathway to God.

It is a different way to interact with sacred text. On the one hand, we can base our faith on the text as literally infallible, and ignore any studies to the contrary, both in data (such as evolution and age of the earth) and in textual history (such as authorship). On the other hand, we can say that the text is in response to truth, to the human experience of God itself, and as such contains the pathway to that experience for us whether or not every detail was perfectly preserved. In the latter way of reading sacred text, the text is alive. It is not a document that was simply penned a long time ago by someone important and we have to read it, memorize it, and believe in what it says. It is an invitation to us, a way to experience God for ourselves, a way to initiate a conversation between a Living God and us. The Bible is a precious gift that tells of people's experience of God. Whether they accurately recorded every detail is, to me, just not that important. They had a relationship with God and revelation from God, and their attempts to express this, if approached with the Holy Spirit at my side, allow me to see how I can build a relationship with God and how I can receive revelation for my own life. And as a bonus, I get a beautiful ethical system that (in Christianity) has its pinnacle in a movement by Jesus that is so filled with love, compassion, and social justice that it provides not only guidance for living a good life, but also inspiration and transformation.

I don't know if this helps or not, but I think it's a matter of focus rather than simply interpretation and study methodology, when it comes to different ways of studying the Bible. I don't spend time trying to prove the Bible is "true." I don't really care if Jonah could have literally lived in a whale for three days, or if Jesus literally raised Lazarus from the dead, or if there was a literal garden of Eden with some sort of literal fruit that brought knowledge of good and evil. I wouldn't tell anyone that it's a bad thing to think those things, but for me, I choose to accept the premise as part of the story, and what I care about is the meaning of it all. What is the meaning of Jonah in the whale? What is the meaning of Lazarus' resurrection? Of Eden? I want to be connected with the Living God, the Living Bible... I want these stories to come alive in my life, to transform me. For me, that won't happen with me picking them apart and trying to figure out what is scientifically upheld versus what isn't, and agonizing over it all. It happens by reading the story as a sacred story, and allowing it to pull me into feeling, thought, experience of God on my own... like poetry or art or music.

There is a contemporary praise song that goes...

O Lord, you're beautiful
Your face is all I seek
And when Your eyes
Are on this child
Your grace abounds to me

Instead of pondering on if God has a face and eyes... I just let the music and the poetry pull me into a connection with God. God is alive with me, and in me... I am filled with grace, I am alive with God's beauty.

This is how I read the Bible. Maybe it's because I'm just a very experientially based person. But I just accept the "impossible" stuff as part of the story, and let the story pull me in. When I read the story of Jesus healing the woman who touched His robe, I don't wonder how that is possible or if it really happened. I just weep, knowing how glorious it is that Jesus can heal us like that, just based on our faith. That our pain and suffering can be laid at God's feet. That Jesus notices those who quietly, humbly reach out to Him.

In some ways, I think my study of Christianity is very complex. I read about these various historical hypotheses. I read the scientific evidence. I don't accept literal infallibility. I don't accept tradition wholesale. On the other hand, I think the core of my faith- my actual spirituality- is very, very simple. I walk with the Spirit. I experience God and all the beings around me. I work toward being loving. I try to follow Jesus. The rest, I kind of... just let go. I trust that God will lead me to the truths I need, if I seek in earnestness and constancy. And the rest, I must not need. Maybe others do, and for whatever reason, I just don't.

I tend to think if we (as Christians- as the Body of Christ) focused more on our common experience of a relationship with Christ, and on doing the things Christ did (being Christ for others- alleviating poverty, ministering to criminals, healing, etc.), that we wouldn't have so many splits and divisions. If we could just trust that in time, God would take care of our differences, but our role is to lift each other up each day to God... That isn't a statement about you, me, or even the topic (sorry )- but my ponderings just led me to this...

[lunamoth]

Originally Posted by Dondi

Very well. I hope I wasn't seemingly argumentative about it. I'm just probing for your take, luna, that's all. And I appreciate your answer, really. I will pursue this particular matter on my own.

We'll continue with the OP now.

I didn't think you were argumentative...but just as I said I don't know enough to argue the DH one way or another.

One thing that may not have come out in my posts is that I do trust (have faith in) that the Law was given by God, that God saved Israel and that "Something Happened." It's not like I think the Bible was just invented out of whole cloth or that that there were nefarious forces at work in the compliation of the Bible.

[lunamoth]

Just want to link to this thread: http://www.comparative-religion.com/...tml#post153401

An interesting discussion about redaction theory.

[path_of_one]

While I'd like to think God is in all of us, (well, His Spirit is everywhere, I agree, but that's different from manifesting in us), there has to be a line of demarkation.

I'm not arguing, just curious. Why? Why must there be a demarkation? Why would the Spirit be everywhere, but not in us? What, then, is it in us that causes us to reach out to God in the first place, to surrender to Christ... if it is not the Spirit Itself?

I can't see Him in the child rapist and child killer, I can't see Him in the Enron extortioner, I can't see Him in the abusive alcoholic, I can't see Him in the drug smugglers and dealers, I can't see Him in the stalkers and serial killers.

I don't mean this as prodding or poking, Dondi. I mean it very gently, but the internet is a difficult media for communication...

Isn't your not being able to see him in a murderer a consequence of your own limitation? What I mean, is that Jesus saw every person as worthy of salvation. We are all sinners. So... if God cannot be in anything unholy, then how is God in any of us?

I can't speak for you or anyone else. I've been face to face with someone that did drugs, dealt drugs, and killed before. And in their eyes I saw a tormented child of God, someone whose essence (of God) was hidden so far from themselves that they were in hell. I saw someone very sick, desperately in need of a physician (Christ), whose pain and suffering were unleashed onto the world in the form of anger and control and hate. I saw someone who was lost.

At that person's core was someone no different from me. At their core, they were physically stardust, dust from the earth and the sun... alive and sustained by God's breath. They were once an infant who smiled and cooed and laughed. And here, now, they were but a twisted shadow of what their essence was.

In the eyes of God, is that person the little baby that was first created? Or the murderer that was the result of years of suffering? Or the person they would one day become (I pray) through the redemptive power of Christ?

If God is in this person, the free will that He created the person with has hidden their essence (God) from them. They forgot what they had in their core- the divine light of God, to light and warm their own way and the way of others. And in each of those people, I believe that the divine light (the Spirit) in them, does weep as they do these things to cause more suffering. Certainly, when people repent and see and follow the light once more, they often speak of knowing they were on the wrong path and squelching this knowing in themselves. So who is the person inside them that is telling them they are doing wrong, if not God? What is it in a person that causes them to tire of evil, to finally collapse at the feet of Christ, to reach out to God, if not God?

You see, I feel it is possible that the Holy Spirit is in us, and yet still grieves when we do not worship God and honor the Spirit. Free will allows us to hide from even ourselves. We even do this with lesser things- our feelings, for example. We create layers upon layers in our minds to avoid what is difficult, uncomfortable.

Because it is very scary for our minds to give up our notion of "me"- our notion of self, of control, of power and continuity... giving ourselves up to God is very threatening. So we hide from the fact that we have no other choice, really. We will be given to God whether we choose to or not. We will die whether we like it or not. It is an illusion that we are separate. But it is an illusion that keeps us in hell (separation from God)- in torment.

The Bible says the Holy Spirit grieves, but if He is in these people, or anyway involved in the evil men commit, well, what does that make Him? Does He experience any of this, as victim or perpetrator?

I believe in all cases, the Spirit is the ultimate victim. Or I should say, God is. All sins are sins that are ultimately against God, because nothing is mine. There is no "mine." My body is God's. My mind is God's. My soul is God's. So all the suffering and evil that we produce, is directly affronting God.

The perpetrator is a temporary result of free will, which allows us to think we are separated from God and have a choice to ultimately do something against the will of God.

But in eternity, this is not so. The perpetrator cannot last. Everyone will bow to Christ one day. And so it is, like all sin, a temporary and fleeting thing that will be healed by Christ. That is not to say it is not important, because it is. Just because God is in us does not mean God causes us to sin.

He is a Holy God, the scriptures teach us. Surely He must withdraw from anything unholy. But how can He if He is part of everything?

I am not sure that God must withdraw from the unholy because He is holy. Isn't that what Christ is for? That Christ, embodied by Jesus, was perfectly holy and yet could minister to the unholy. That He could, on the cross, ask for forgiveness for the sinners around Him.

Again, I think it is an issue with the nature of time. We think of time as literal, so for us, there are times in which people are very unholy. But if God is outside this, then all people already are and always were reconciled to Him through the redemptive power of Christ. They just haven't realized it yet, from our perspective.

This is tough to explain... not sure if I'm doing a halfway decent job or not.

Surely, though, my original question must pan out, that God is learning from us (learning just how decrepit we can be, mostly). Much like an inventor who has to work the kinks out of his inventioin and improve on the work. After all, isn't that how evolution is working?

But if God is learning from us, then how is God omniscient and all-powerful? And why would He only learn the bad stuff? People do tons of beautiful and loving things- is He learning something about goodness?

I have no answers on this... but I find it confusing how God can only be the good stuff, and be learning about the bad stuff through us, yet He is omniscient and created everything. Then, wouldn't He know about evil from the beginning and have created it, even if only the conditions that would cause it to flourish? If it didn't come from something God created, then where did it come from and how did it get there originally? It all gets very confusing to me and gets me thinking in circles, which is why I typically leave these types of origins of evil questions alone.

[China Cat Sunflower]

What is the crux of the biscuit on this? What, in terms of narrative literality, do we have to have from Genesis to set up the Jesus=Salvation thing? I recognize that it's a huge pain in the ass to redraw the lines of dogma, particularly in the Protestant tradition, but how much of that is really about core theology? How much of it is really just a question of custom and style?

Chris

[path_of_one]

Way to cut to the chase, Chris. LOL I must confess I don't know, maybe Dondi will have some ideas. I tend to think none of it is necessary as a setup, but that's my usual simplicity. I tend to think Christ=grace of God=salvation. Why do we need salvation/deliverance? Because we sin.

Genesis isn't really necessary for me to look around and notice that I and (seemingly) everyone else sins. And to think, then, to unite with a holy Divine Being, I need something to get from point A to point B- the forgiveness of that Divine Being for my screw-ups. So enters Christ in the form of Jesus.

I dunno. Guess I'm bad at complex doctrine.

[China Cat Sunflower]

Well, Dondi was saying that you need to have an edenic state for man to fall from in order to set up Salvation. But what if that state is psychological? What if the story is an allegory about how human consciousness developed? Does that goof anything up theologically? I don't think that it does. The origin and function of sin, even Original Sin, in the story doesn't really change. It's still about consciousness and the nature of choice. There still needs to be an Adversary to Christ, but that adversary can be an internal, inherent weakness which is a by-product of having learned the difference between good and evil, rather than an evil demi-god like the literal Satan. And with the creation cosmology freed up to be strictly metaphysical we don't have to defend a scientifically untenable theory of ultimate origins.

Chris

[lunamoth]

Originally Posted by China Cat Sunflower

What if the story is an allegory about how human consciousness developed? Does that goof anything up theologically? I don't think that it does. The origin and function of sin, even Original Sin, in the story doesn't really change. It's still about consciousness and the nature of choice. There still needs to be an Adversary to Christ, but that adversary can be an internal, inherent weakness which is a by-product of having learned the difference between good and evil, rather than an evil demi-god like the literal Satan. And with the creation cosmology freed up to be strictly metaphysical we don't have to defend a scientifically untenable theory of ultimate origins.

Chris

I can agree with that Chris, but I just don't think it's the only way to see it. I think there can be multiple layers of meaning. The 'payment for original sin' layer speaks to some people, but to me it never made sense.

I've mentioned the layer that speaks to me...the fall is alienation and yes, that alienation comes from the nature of choice and, as I see it, free will.

So, the Fall is separation and alienation. Reconciliation comes through love, the ultimate love being Christ on the cross. In a way that is God saying He will bear the cost of our sins...even as we go on sinning.

I find a lot of meaning in 'the way of the cross,' dying to self and rising with Christ. I accept that a metaphysical transformation is involved.

[lunamoth]

Originally Posted by China Cat Sunflower

Well, Dondi was saying that you need to have an edenic state for man to fall from in order to set up Salvation.

Chris

About this. Elsewhere I had an interesting discussion about the relationship between the Garden and the Kingdom. One seems like the origin, the other the goal, but are they they same 'place.'

[China Cat Sunflower]

Originally Posted by lunamoth

About this. Elsewhere I had an interesting discussion about the relationship between the Garden and the Kingdom. One seems like the origin, the other the goal, but are they they same 'place.'

I think, actually, that the Fall is the tipping point between the Garden and the Kingdom in the evolution of our consciousness. From there we either struggle toward the light or tread water in various ways. So in that sense I'd say that I see the canoe as the Garden, you're old man tossing your butt out for a swimmin' lesson as God, and the island in the distance as the Kingdom.

Chris