How to start and stay on the path

[Virtual_Cliff]

Gosh Taijasi! That is a pretty unique perspective!

As for Job - he wasn't a historical person. Job is a teaching about how bad things happenn to good people and good things happen to bad people. When bad things happen to us it's not because of some evil we have done is this life or any other. It just happens. I can't reconcile that with karma.

The history of the early church is certainly one of severe persecution and thousands of deaths. Yet for every death more people converted. The same thing goes on today with fanatical terrorists. You can't beat a martyr to gain support for your cause.

Remember John said to Jesus: You should be baptising me.
These symbolic actions have as much meaning as we give them but are nothing in themselves.

Healing still goes on. Many accounts on the evangelical web sites.

Yeah sorry. God loves Hitler and Stalin just as much as he loves you and me. Live with it. Remember Jesus said "Love your enemies"? Also remember the parable of the workers at the vineyard? They all got paid the same even if they only did an hour's work.

Sorry this post is a bit random - only a short lunch break.

Best wishes, VC

 

[Dondi]

This is where the evangelical pastor would probably disagree with you big time. This is the BIG selling point of evangelical Christianity--you have to do absolutely NOTHING. Not one thing you can do in your whole life will earn you even the tiniest bit of credit with God. Doing=law. Acceptance without doing=grace.

I think the issue here is that there is a concern that we ought to be giving all the glory to God, and not ourselves, for salvation, since He is the one who sent Jesus Christ to die for the sins of man. And I suppose that is a legitinate concern. If we could save ourselves, what reason would there be for Christ to die on the cross? Hence the emphasis to "accept Jesus as Savior" on that basis. We are saved by faith through grace.

But, so what? What has that really accomplished? Yeah, yeah, we can rest now that we have a home in heaven. But is that all that salvation was intended? Are we "good to go" now that we accepted Christ? I contend not. And I think that is the folly in many evangelical circles is that there is an emphasis in "bringing in the sheaves" but a lack of what to do with them once they have entered the Kingdom of God.

Salvation isn't just about getting to heaven, though that is the hope. Rather salvation ought to be about saving us from ourselves and our destructive tendancies that keep us from loving others with the right motives and attitude. As long as we harbor hate, bitterness, envy, greed, lust, pride, or whatever then it will keep us from loving others purely. Ultimately, salvation is a step toward the goal of being conformed into the image of Christ, whose sinless example is a benchmark for us.

For a tradition to embed itself into a society it has to stem from something. Jesus must have initiated Christianity for it to exist in the first place and grow. Tradition can’t just appear fresh one morning and super seed everything else and just be written down, it has to initiate from somebody or something. I can’t believe that his words and works were written at the time and somebody was running around where ever he went with a feather and papyrus jotting things down.

It is instructive to investigate the common rabbinical practice of oral traditions when speaking of the transmission of truths in Jesus' day. One must remember that written materials for the common people were scarce and also take into consideration that many didn't read at all. So people had to remember what they heard. The rabbinical method was to teach in parables and sayings that would be easier to recall. You can see this referenced by Jesus in Matthew 5, "Ye have heard that it was said by them of old time..." and when He refers to proverbs in Luke 4, "Ye will surely say unto me this proverb, Physician, heal thyself;".

Oral tradition keep the teachings alive and intactas they were passed down until they were finally written down.

A good website explaining this is found here:

http://www.ccojubilee.org/resources/biblestudy/herman/2.html

 

[Vajradhara]

Namaste Penguin,

thank you for the post and welcome to CR! enjoy your stay.

please allow me a moment to make a few comments to some of the information you've posted.

The only religion I have been interested in the past is Buddhism but although it still interests me I find it quite Nihilistic.

hmm.. this is a very serious misconception of the Dharma and one which Buddha Shakyamuni specifically warns against. Nihilism is quite far removed from the Buddha Dharma. unfortunately, many beings become ensnared in the words use to convey the ideas, especially if they are not able to read the source language and rely upon transliteraions which are somewhat inaccurate.

i would speculate that what gave rise to this view is our teaching of Sunyata, which is sometimes transliterated as "emptiness" or "void".

I have just started to try and read the Bible again and have almost completed genesis.

that seems like a sensible approach. it is always good to start at the beginning in my view.

One thing about Buddhism for example is that you try to make yourself a better person by meditation etc, you try and purify yourself

hmm.. this is problematic in several respects. we are not trying to make ourselves better persons, recall, we do not hold that persons actually exist in any sort of permenant sense. however, the development of the Paramitas could be seen as something along these lines in the sense that one is actively engaged in positive moral and ethical actions.

I have felt the benefits greatly of Buddhist meditation and it did make me a calmer person when I was doing it, how can my continued reading of the Bible and booklets from my local Evangelical church do the equivalent for me? Is it possible and how?

did you know that the Christian tradition has a long history of meditation? check out these folks:

http://www.wccm.org/splash.asp?pagestyle=default

good luck on your journey

metta,

~v

 

[RubySera_Martin]

Penguin,

I will try to repond to your questions to me. You ask what a Lutheran seminary is. It's a school operated by the Lutheran church. The topics taught at a seminary normally lead toward ordained ministry or perhaps toward professional theology. I really don't know what other seminaries teach. I just know that seminary is a school run by the church for the church. In this case, it's Lutheran. This one is on the campus of, and affiliated with, a secular university. It's just another department so far as I can see. Students can earn MA and PhD degrees here. I am working on an MA. My goal is academic, possibly professsional theology. I want to understand why people believe what they do. And how this plays out in everyday life.

Okay, we can conclude much just from looking at our world. But like the law or medicine, the more detail you understand and the more areas in which you understand these details, the deeper your insight on the topic--hopefully. What good does that do the world? I don't know. But I know when God puts you somewhere and says "get to work," it might be a good idea to get to work. So anyway, that's my background when it comes to theology--I grew up on the Bible and church every Sunday, plus a few years of formal education.

Quote rubysera martin:- ”Was this idea planted by the evangelical pastor? I ask because many Christians feel this way. But yes, not many writings of such ancient times survived.”
No, this is my own thoughts on the subject. Fragments from the bible going back to AD40 (so it is stated) is just amazing. Out of all the ancient documents that must have been painstakingly hand written it seems the bible has proven to be the most precious in the way it’s been carried down through time. Why?

I was wondering how much of this is your own thinking and how much was put into your mind by a good salesman i.e. pastor. That you come to all these ideas and conclusions on your own tells me you're a fairly sophisticated thinker and sincere seeker.

there has been numerous prophets and still is today, true. The difference is that none of these has claimed to be the Messiah or word of god and then given themselves to face execution to release us from our sins etc. This is what segregates jesus from past and present prophets, there is no comparison in my opinion.

Did Jesus claim to be the Messiah? Opinion is divided on this. The early Christians seem to have definitely thought so. The Jews, for the most part then and now, did not.

For a tradition to embed itself into a society it has to stem from something. Jesus must have initiated Christianity for it to exist in the first place and grow. Tradition can’t just appear fresh one morning and super seed everything else and just be written down, it has to initiate from somebody or something. I can’t believe that his words and works were written at the time and somebody was running around where ever he went with a feather and papyrus jotting things down.

Okay now I get a better idea of what you are asking. This is a sociological question rather than theological. I can only guess. And this guess is based on info in the NT itself and on what we know about Greco-Roman society. It is also based on how societies generally work, and how the human mind works. I don't have professional knowledge on any of these topics. Mainly just observation, plus a few courses here or there.

1. I am not convinced that Jesus was terribly original. I was raised to believe that Jesus' teachings were all original new insights that blew away everybody of his day. I felt pretty seriously betrayed when I learned that Socrates and other philosophers had been saying the same things for many centuries before Jesus was supposedly born.

I don't know when Jesus was born, but it is generally believed that he was born a few years before 1AD--anywhere from two to six. Taijasi has a very different view. You may have to ask him for the basis of it because I don't really understand. Numbers and dates befuddle my brain, so for the most part I just accept what others tell me.

2. I visualize Jesus as a teacher or preacher of some sort. He talked where people were assembled and they listened to him. He also had a group of disciples with whom he was very close. They believed he was the promised Messiah. But when the Jews got him killed (I have questions around who actually got this done but generally it is believed the Jewish rabbis were behind it), his disciples did not understand. Traditionally, the Messiah was supposed to set up the Kingdom of Israel and sit on the throne of David. Then somehow or other (on the trip to Emeaus on the evening of the first Easter?) they figured out that the Messiah was not sent to set up a temporal kingdom but a spiritual kingdom. Christianity is the outcome. You may want to read up on the history of Christianity to fill in some of the blanks.

3. One more point. He did his teachings completely within the Jewish religious tradition. He preached in the open air and in synagogues. He based his sermons on the Jewish Scriptures and folk lore. It would also seem natural that some wisdom and folklore from other traditions also filtered into the situation due to interaction with other peoples in commerce and government so that it was not exactly pure Jewish. After his alleged ascension, the disciples organized somewhat (see the book of Acts), and over the following decades and centuries, the Jesus movement took on more and more the shape of a formal church as we know it today. Texts on the history of Christianity take over approximately where the NT leaves off. There is some over-lap.

Quote rubysera martin:-”I think you are mixing Christian and Buddhist thought here” Why not? Who knows that this wouldn’t be true? We have come into existence from nothing and once we are existing we have to go back to nothing, and that is what scares people about death. The brain is at a level of development that it is ready to experience going back to nothing fully, unlike before, when the brain is just evolving and one can’t remember back before the first child hood memoies.

Why not mix Christian and Buddhist thought? Political reasons, if you plan to fit into an evangelical Christian church. It will brand you as a heretic in no time. I think you have some marvelous ideas here, but most of them see me as a heretic or simply not a Christian. I've seen it stated on this forum. Someone said it was their belief that if a person doesn't believe this and that about Jesus, that person is not a Christian. What can be posted on which site is some indication, too, of what is considered Christian and what is considered a mixture or completely other.

My personal opinion is that you can aim for truth at all costs, or Christianity, and that there are cases where the two mix. As I have stated before, this is not an unbiased position. I have had seriously bad experiences in Christianity which play into the situation. I think I am simply presenting objective facts but this can hardly be proven.

Quote rubysera martin:-”You say "and maybe I will have peace." I take it you do not feel peace at the moment”. I feel a bit lost spiritually at the moment. Like being in a big sweet shop and you know you need to eat one but can’t make your mind up which sweet to grab. Also I was really meaning peace after death.

I hear you! I've spent many years simply seeking what ideas exist out there, and then experimenting what fits best with my own spirituality.

Quote rubysera martin:- “Frankly, I found peace when I left organized religion.”Not all are this diverse, don’t judge them all but one bad experience!

I'm not sure what you're saying here but as you probably know by the time you see this, I have explored many other spiritual and religious ideas. This site, with adherents to many different religions, is one more place of exploration. I have tried about half a dozen different Christian churches, too. The "bad experiences" were not limited to one church. It sort of got to the point where I realized I can't become deeply involved with a church if I don't want to get into a fight with somebody or other. I guess I'm an either/or person when it comes to involvement; either I'm deeply involved in something or not at all. The "happy medium" is too bland for me.

Ruby

 

[Saltmeister]

This is where the evangelical pastor would probably disagree with you big time. This is the BIG selling point of evangelical Christianity--you have to do absolutely NOTHING. Not one thing you can do in your whole life will earn you even the tiniest bit of credit with God. Doing=law. Acceptance without doing=grace.

That's perhaps where I would disagree with you. It's a commonly-held view, but not quite the way I think it should be seen.

I don't believe I have to do absolutely nothing. Our spiritual journey is a process of change. We must, therefore, change. The question of whether God accepts us depends on our attitudes and direction in life. We must dedicate ourselves to God. If we don't dedicate ourselves to God, we can't be accepted by God because we aren't aligned with his purposes.

The critical factor, I think is that there are no protocols or rules to follow, no tenets or institutions to which we must align ourselves, no one-size-fits-all model to conform to. That's what you were supposed to say in place of absolutely nothing: no protocols. There is no Divine Constitution separating us from God. It is entirely personal, intimate and sentimental. I think the whole point of Jesus dying was to liberate us from this "Divine Constitution," this ideology and political system that made religion so impersonal so that we could finally connect directly with God. God sent Jesus to be condemned as an innocent man in order to discredit the ideology and political system.

No, we can't be accepted by God by doing absolutely nothing. We must, at least, change the way we think.

What you believe is influenced by your focus in life, what you see, hear and read. Sometimes our experience is insufficient for us to generate our own insights. When our experience is insufficient and we can't come up with our own ideas, we absorb what others tell us because we don't know any better. Life goes on, hours, days, weeks, even years go by. We are held back by our weekly schedule, our need to find a job and because we're so busy we never have the time to generate our own insights except to absorb what others tell us.

But I've seen enough, heard enough and read enough books, to say we can't be accepted by God (as Christians) by doing absolutely nothing. My experience tells me this isn't Christianity. No, that's not the point. The point is, there are no rules or protocols, no tenets or institutions, no ideology, political system or Divine Constitution. We can connect directly with God. That's why the curtain veiling the Holy of Holies tore open. We no longer communicate with God via protocols and institutions. It's no longer a formal, systematic or technical process. It's become sentimental and personal. The political structure has been removed and dismantled.

Some Christians have adequate experience to get beyond what others tell them. That's when you put wings on and learn to fly.

I would agree with the second thing you said, that you can't earn your way into God's Kingdom by means of your worldly achievements. But we must, however, change. Be renewed, refreshed, regenerated, reformed. We must set a direction toward a healthier heart and soul. We must rededicate ourselves to God, not just once, but every day of our lives. No turning back. Ever onward.

 

[RubySera_Martin]

I would agree with the second thing you said, that you can't earn your way into God's Kingdom by means of your worldly achievements. But we must, however, change. Be renewed, refreshed, regenerated, reformed. We must set a direction toward a healthier heart and soul. We must rededicate ourselves to God, not just once, but every day of our lives. No turning back. Ever onward.

A few people commented on this idea of grace=doing absolutely nothing. It's not a concept I was raised with. I just learned it from my Lutheran teachers and classmates. Thus, it's a relatively new concept for me and I might not have a strong handle on it yet. However, I think my teachers would disagree pretty strongly with your last paragraph here, esp. the part I bolded.

I don't know for sure what he meant, but my one teacher told me that he believes something happens to a person when baptized. Lutherans baptize little children. Thus, this thing that happens to a person happens at a very young age. Perhaps he meant that the thing that happens is exactly the things you mention, but they supposedly happen at a very young age and they are done to the person by God. It is not something the person decides to do, as you suggest.

I am not a Lutheran convert and not a traditional Christian, either. But I know a lot of things various denominations accept as biblical truth. Perhaps I should have added that this is the Lutheran understanding of grace as best I understand it. On the other hand, adding that kind of qualifications to every statement makes posts very heavy and difficult to read. Well, I'm saying it now, since clarification is needed. I would be inclined to agree more with you than with the Lutherans on this, though maybe this is because it does not fit the worldview with which I am familiar.

Sometimes I think we don't disagree so much as it appears. Certain words and terms and phrases have one meaning for one person but a very different meaning for someone else. So it would seem that perhaps the biggest differences in Christian theology are in words and terms and phrases i.e. verbal expression as opposed to actual spiritual meaning. That's just a thought I'm playing with.

Ruby