Do we have a spirit and, if so, what role does it play in our relationship with God?

[muhammad_isa]

Can a person get to the presence of God(heaven) through the type of person he is..

Yes .. the most important thing is a person's intention and sincerity.

 

[Aupmanyav]

Can a person get to the presence of God (heaven) through the type of person he is, or how good he modeled Jesus?

First unanswered question: Is existence of God/Gods/Goddesses or heaven/hell, a fact? Or it is just human imagination and superstition?
If you give evidence for it, we can turn to the next question: "Does God sends prophets/son/messengers/manifestations/mahdis to the world?"

 

[muhammad_isa]

First unanswered question: Is existence of God/Gods/Goddesses or heaven/hell, a fact? Or it is just human imagination and superstition?

Neither .. it is not an empirical fact, nor is it necessarily superstition.

Theology is a bonafide region of study, with historical evidence to support it.
Scientific evidence is not the only type that holds relevance to human civilisation.

 

[otherbrother]

I have experienced the same, riding my motorcycle ... Riding at night on a well-lit motorway, almost empty of other traffice, approached my turning and the desire was simply to keep going, just ride on ... I think it's along the lines of 'being in the moment'.

A zen sage was asked about the state of no-mind, and he pointed to a man, sitting on the step of his shanty dwelling, weaving a basket. His hands knew exactly what to do, 'he' did not have to interfere. He was not day-dreaming, he was engaged with his work ... The sage commented that the weaver was closer to no-mind than some of the most adept Zen practitioners.


Attachment to the world of things ... 'Monkey Mind' ...


Yes. The practice of detachment, from the world and from ourselves. The attachment to self is probably the biggest impediment to the experience of Self.


But a note of caution here, is that not attachment? The seeking of reward? The comparing of this state to that?

Eckhart said:
"The man who abides in the will of God wills nothing else than what God is, and what He wills. If he were ill he would not wish to be well. If he really abides in God's will, all pain is to him a joy, all complication, simple: yea, even the pains of hell would be a joy to him. He is free and gone out from himself, and from all that he receives, he must be free. If my eye is to discern colour, it must itself be free from all colour. The eye with which I see God is the same with which God sees me. My eye and God's eye is one eye, and one sight, and one knowledge, and one love."
(Sermon IV, True Hearing, emphasis mine)

He goes on to say:
"The man who abides in God's love must be dead to himself and all created things... Such a man must renounce himself and all the world... And supposing a man had renounced himself for twenty years, if he took himself back for a moment, that man's renunciation would be as nothing. The man who has truly renounced himself and does not once cast a glance on what he has renounced, and thus remains immovable and unalterable, that man alone has really renounced self...

This second qualifies the prior, in the sense that 'all pain to him is joy' not because he delights in pain, nor in the obsequious idea that God sends pain as a test ... I think Eckhart is using hyperbole here to make a point. All pain is joy, all joy is joy, all is joy, because it simply is what it is, and such a man makes no more of it nor any less.

Eckhart says, 'dead to himself and all created things' then he is no use to man nor God. God did not put us here to demonstrate feats of 'detachment' by sitting on tip of poles or being buried in the ground or dwelling in caves. If one experiences true solitude, as a qualitative thing, not a quantitative thing, one can experience the desert in the middle of the city. Likewise, if one has to remove oneself from the hustle and bustle to experience detachment, one has not really attained detachment.

This is not a critique of monastic orders, the priory or the hermitage ... such calling is a vocation for the sake of the world, a living witness, even if in utter seclusion.

Eckhart says, 'Such a man must renounce himself and all the world' because only then is one free to serve God, as the Shema demands.

Such a path is a perilous path. Eckhart says, "And supposing a man had renounced himself for twenty years, if he took himself back for a moment, that man's renunciation would be as nothing." (Snakes and Ladders)

This excerpt from a book I am working on might pull in the direction that Eckhart thought to be “perilous.” But it also might be a decent counter argument:

If we mistakenly see the Concrete Self as being all we really are, then that spiritual aspect of ourselves, our Connective Selves, is functionally the same as “God.” Both are perceived to be on the other side. Both are Unknowns from which we get something good.

The more spiritual we become, the less distance we sense between the sides. God is sensed to be with us in spirit, in our spirit. The advantage of psychologically “owning” (embracing) our Connected Selves is that it provides a consistent bridge between us and God. We even begin to see divinity, usually in the form of beauty, woven into this world.

Certainly, praying to God can, and often does, activate the Connective Self, with or without lucid awareness of that part of ourselves. It would be like a person moving his or her arms without being aware that he or she has arms. But awareness of the Connective “arm” of our being helps us connect with God more intentionally and, ultimately, more masterfully. Without knowing our spirit or Connected Self, we have less mastery of prayer or other spiritual/connective skills.
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I don’t think we need worry so much about ego contaminating spirit when spirit is stronger than ego. It operates from a deeper, interconnected, zone and can run circles around gross ego. It is finer than ego or monkey mind. It can go through it like a ghost passing through walls.
Of course that is if a person floats to the God-zone core of being. If he or she doesn’t go deep enough then what they identify as his/her spirit may actually be something else posing as one’s spirit. It would be similar to a false god. One’s true spirit is true to God. We can trust it because God made it and trusts it to help us connect with Him (Her, Whatever).

 

[otherbrother]

First unanswered question: Is existence of God/Gods/Goddesses or heaven/hell, a fact? Or it is just human imagination and superstition?

That statement seems to rely on either/or logic when a both/and logic could conclude that mental identification of God, etc., is both imaginary (a mere version of the truth) AND true (containing the essence of a truth, such as a God Function). In the animated movie, The Little Mermaid, the crab character called a fork a “dingle hopper.” But it could have still functione

The Independent God believers?

That God is independent of but not isolated from this physical dimension.
Not independent thinking God believers! Although I probably fit in the latter category. I’m not afraid to explore unproven concepts.