10-29-2004, 05:05 PM | #321 |
Elf Lord
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umm, is that belief with or without data or in spite of data, brownjenkins
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Inked "Aslan is not a tame lion." CSL/LWW "The new school [acts] as if it required...courage to say a blasphemy. There is only one thing that requires real courage to say, and that is a truism." GK Chesterton "And there is always the danger of allowing people to suppose that our modern times are so wholly unlike any other times that the fundamental facts about man's nature have wholly changed with changing circumstances." Dorothy L. Sayers, 1 Sept. 1941 |
10-29-2004, 05:32 PM | #322 | ||||
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Of Buddhism, one of the two main kinds is Mahayana Buddhism. The core belief, I would say, of Mahayana Buddhism is boddhiccita, if I am spelling it correctly. Boddhicitta is the desire to attain enlightenment for the sake of all sentient beings. According to Mahayana, it is not enough to seek enlightenment, one must desire to help everyone else attain this goal as well. [quote]Nolendil, does that accurately reflect your understanding or Hindu understanding of Truth?['/quote] It somewhat accurately reflects my own understanding of Truth. Quote:
It is like this--we have the Atman, the soul, and Atman is real. Atman is the manifestation of Brahman, the Absolute. Giving us the sense of seperation, and pain, are our egos, which veil the Atman. Thus, the ego must be transcended, cast away. When the Atman is realized, we become one with Brahman, become one with God. It is the opposite of void, or nothing. In terms of notions, and seperateness, and suffering, and I and mine, there is void, because those things are no more. In fact they never were, it was only the illusion. I think you might be coming from the perfectly understandable stance that it would really be horrible to lose that sense of individuality. To lose the sense of "me". I don't know how it works really, but I don't believe there is pain or suffering or nothingness in the Divine. It is not as though by merging with Brahman one becomes an "it" automatically, and retains no personal aspects. Brahman is pure consciousness. It is hard to explain, or understand. I just know that all will be well. Of course, there are different schools in Vedanta that disagree on this very point. Dvaita Vedanta, the dualism school, believes that even in Brahman, we remain individual, seperate souls, who are, yes, at one with Brahman because of the true nature shared. Then there is the Advaita Vedanta school, the non-dualism school which I agree with more, in which there is really only one Atman, and one Brahman, and Atman is at one with Brahman, and we retain no seperateness once we realize Atman. To me, this is total bliss. It does not strike me as a loss of anything, because I cannot believe that anything can be wrong with Absolute Nature. I think you will still know your mother and your father and your friends, and all the lives you ever lived, for you will be at one with your mother and your father and your friends, and all the lives you ever lived. Everything that is real is right there, in Brahman. Quote:
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Take for example, a story of Hanuman. This is a tale from the Ramayana, a Hindu epic. The characters you need to know are Hanuman, who is part monkey, part deva (divine), and is the perfect devotee, also there is Rama, an incarnation of Vishnu (God as Preserver), and Sita, his wife, an incarnation of Lakshmi (God as Grace, Beauty, and Purity). Near the end of this tale, after the antagonist has been vanquished, Rama and Sita are sending out gifts to all those who helped them. Hanuman receives a present, and opens it up. His friend is standing near him. It is a beautiful necklace, and the friend is awed by the generosity of Rama and Sita. But Hanuman takes one look at the necklace, and throws it into the river. His friend is shocked! "How could you throw away a gift from the Blessed Lord?" Hanuman replies, "It did not have his name on it." The friend retorts, "Would you throw yourself away, then?" At that Hanuman dug his own hands inside his own body, and tore his chest apart--and there, sitting in Hanuman's heart, were Rama and Sita, and upon every bone of his body was written "Ram, Ram, Ram." This story can be very disturbing. But it is actually a lesson about God being within every person. The name of God is written on our bones, even if we don't see it. A peaceful message told in seemingly not so peaceful imagery. Rian, I'm going to have to give myself more time for your questions
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10-29-2004, 05:45 PM | #323 | |
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10-30-2004, 06:44 AM | #324 | |
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Responding to Rian Part 1
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I spend time with people I do like, and not people I do not like, because of the way those people make me feel. When I am around people I don't like, I think I (would) feel bitter towards them, for some attitude or outlook I feel they have towards myself and the world, or for some past event. But I can't think of anybody I don't like who is not my friend. Sometimes I don't like my friends ... or more accurately, sometimes I really don't like things about my friends, things that bother me. I usually spend time with them anyway, and I rarely allow myself to think of the nuisance until they are not in my presence. I don't think this is a healthy thing ... I am only beginning to get good at expressing my anger, or displeasure. I call my friends my "friends" because I know something of them, and care about them. It is not difficult to be my friend. I have friends that I do not know very well. Then I have friends I do know very well, and those I tend to care about a lot, naturally. Unfortunate events occuring in their lives, even if they have nothing to do with me, depress me. This is not a good thing either--it is good to be empathetic or sympathetic or caring, but it is not healthy to take other people's feelings and put them on yourself. So I am defining my "friends" as people I know and care about ... that would imply, if taken quite literally, that I don't care about anyone else. Of course that isn't true, but just like the next person, truthfully, I care much less about people I don't know. I actually care about people I don't like more than people I don't know. I think this is because, in order for me not to like you, I would have to know something of you. There is someone in particular I am thinking of ... I think he is, honestly, a sociopath. Something is very unhealthy about him, where he doesn't seem to care for other people at all. He doesn't have what other people have, that thing which says "stop that because you are hurting others". I do not know if he mentally ill, but I met him in a special education school. He took me as his friend, I think because I was never openly mean to him, or I don't know why. I would hear stories about his father, who bore the swastika as a tatoo. I wonder: what made him the way he was? Was it just his upbringing? Was it a chemical imbalance? The choices he made? I don't know. But I know, in the back of my mind, that no one can inflict suffering upon another, unless that one is suffering already. That is something the Dalai Lama wrote about. So, because I know this person, I may detest him, but I would also care if anything happened to him. In the end I'm not much different from the next person--my friends are my friends because I know them well enough and care about them, and I spend more time with them, or would like to, because they make me feel good. You asked me to give examples. I will give you one, and just one as it's taking up so much space. I have a friend named Des. She's not likely to read this, or know what this is, so I'll use that name. She's 20, a couple years older than I am, and I first met her when I was in elementary school. She was going to junior high with my brother, and one day we all went up to the mountains, and I met her then. She was rather perturbed by me, because I kept making sarcastic, dry remarks in a completely straight face, and she didn't know how to react. I didn't care one way or the other about her then, as I wasn't very friendly in those days, but years later, about three years ago, I met up with her again when a mutual friend was getting married. Now I know her pretty well. She's very energetic, and has a rediculous sense of humor. Most of the stories she tells are utterly incomprehensible to most, because they consist largely of sound effects and funny squirrel noises. I call her Squirrely as a result, and it's caught on. She's always been very nice to me, even when she's angry, she seems incapable of taking it out on me. Whenever she's sick she calls us (my brother and I), because we are soothing to her. She comes over and cuddles, and coughs on our pillows (well because she doesn't want to cough on us). She finds us uncontroversial, which is good, because our ring of friends are at eachother's throats a lot ... "drama" and all that. Some things about Des bothers me greatly. We come from very different outlooks. Religiously, she's a very conservative Christian. She's interested in my beliefs, but to me, she doesn't seem to have any room for them. Whenever we talk about our differing beliefs, I think she comes across as very ... tyrannical is too strong a word, but she doesn't sound very accepting of anything outside her own view. I hope I don't sound the same in her own ears. This bothers me alot. It's the way she argues with me about vegetarianism. I'm a vegetarian, she's not. She speaks in way that suggests I MUST realize I'm wrong. It's the way she tries to convince me that marketing in general is an ethical thing. It's the conclusions she comes to and shares with you after a sociology class (for instance that China is an undesireable place to go too, because it's overcrowded and ignorant). I love her all the same. I feel like I've said more negative than positive, but I don't mean to. The important thing about her in relation to me is that she's the kind of person I don't ever want to lose contact with. I want to be an old man, sitting on the couch with her, watching an old dvd of 13 Going On 30, cause she thinks it's a cute movie.
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10-30-2004, 06:48 AM | #325 | ||
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Responding to Rian Part 2
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I am saying all this because I want to drive home the point of dream symbolism in Hinduism. To say that we are all a dream, and that Brahma will wake up one day and we will be gone, is not to say that we have no value, or that we are unreal. It is to say that something about us and the "gods" we believe in, is unreal. The idea is this: everything that is not Absolute Reality is NOT reality. It is like a dream, and someday it will all be gone. Brahma will wake. But our true selves, according to the philosophy of the religion from which this tale has come, are a PART of Absolute Reality. We will be preserved. The story you give is a unique tale, I must say. Brahma is not a very popular deva these days... hasn't been for thousands upon thousands of years. So, to give him credit over Vishnu or Shiva or Shakti as the one who is dreaming up the world, suggests it is an older story. It's definitely symbolic, because if you take it more or less literally, Brahma is sort of the highest authority. In Vedanta, Brahma, and Shiva and Vishnu and Ganesh and Lakshmi and all the rest are technically viewed as second to Brahman (not to be confused with Brahma). Brahman is the formless, absolute reality. Brahma is a form of that Reality, as Creator, and Knowledge, etc.. If it was more of a "take it as you read it" story, I think it would be Brahman from which the dream arises, though that would be giving the Absolute characteristics. I'm sorry if any of this is unclear, or vague, or over-long, it's 3:30 in the morning. (I can't sleep) Quote:
I don't remember what drove me to read the Silmarilion. I think I just picked it up at Barnes & Noble, and read the first sentence of the Ainulindale. I was hooked from then on. History of Middle-earth books were bought for me, and I didn't really know what they were. Once I found out I ended up getting all of them (except for one of the HotLotR books). I read them to the extent that I do, or did, because they take me somewhere else. I nourish a very specific drive of mine, a drive to be creative, and different, and real in a different way. Tolkien's works held me so captivated because they let me experience a world outside of our own. I don't know what's so captivating about that, to me. I've always wanted to get away, utterly away. I'd invent my own word as a little kid, then later I'd write about it. I'm still writing about it. Sometimes I've wanted to escape in an unhealthy way. I was delusional once, for several reasons, but one of the small factors going into that was my old desire to have something more than what I saw. Ea is a more healthy outlet, and I am thankful for it. I felt it had its own value, of itself. I felt it needed be studied. I don't really know why it needed to be, but it did. I was especially interested in the racial differences of the Elves before the Ages of the Sun, and the genealogies of the chief Elven families. Even in this other world of Arda, I had to go back in time to a world alien to the common characters of the Third Age, I had to go back to the Awakening of the Kwendi, and work forward. I'm not sure I'll ever understand the whole of it.
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10-30-2004, 11:56 AM | #326 | |||
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I'm still digging up things from page 15 to respond to, as I read the thread. Quote:
If Jesus had been striving for happiness and kindness, everyone would have liked him. Instead, he got crucified. Something doesn't seem to fit. Quote:
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." Last edited by Lief Erikson : 10-30-2004 at 12:37 PM. |
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10-30-2004, 01:09 PM | #327 | |||
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1) The early texts that exist to the Bible are far closer to the events they describe then many, many other historical documents are. The historical documents I speak of here are ones that are very broadly accepted as having been written by those that it is claimed they are written by. It is broadly accepted among scholars that the first Gospel manuscripts were written within the lifetimes of the people they describe. 2) There is an enormous number of early manuscripts available for the New Testament Biblical books. The reason this is significant is this. The more manuscripts there are, the more possibility is that error or differences will be found between the different books. However, very, very, very few differences between these manuscripts have been found. And now the really amazing point: There are more early manuscripts for the New Testament then for any other ancient history books! Modern translations refer directly back to the ancient texts. The earliest text piece, a fragment from the Gospel of John, I believe has been dated to 180 AD. Most of the modern documents are in the second and third centuries AD. However, this is far closer to the events they describe then many, many other ancient historical documents. Legend generally infiltrates history after five or seven centuries. Sure enough, false accounts of Jesus life have been found that date from that period, blatant legend. Those are some Apocryphal books, like the Book of Thomas. Anyway, the Gospels and Epistles are completely separate from that category. Quote:
First of all, you're clearly not referring to all belief. You're referring to belief that is in contradiction of evidence, and is unsupported by evidence. Often that can just be prejudice, like you say. I assume you're talking about evolution vs. creationism on this point. However, belief that is belief without evidence can still have some supporting evidence that isn't directly bonded. For example, if I have a loving wife and she tells me we're out of flour, I'll believe her instantly. No need for evidence; belief is enough. I'll go and buy flour on her word. This explains some of Christian beliefs. When we know God personally, that becomes an evidence in support of the unseen. The unseen is not simple belief then, but is belief based upon someone's word.
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
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10-30-2004, 05:12 PM | #328 | |
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
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10-30-2004, 07:08 PM | #329 | ||
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So I don't think we disagree. I DO think Jesus was striving for happiness and kindness, but the happiness and kindness he was talking about was not the popular kind. I think happiness is far from weak, and I think it is very important. We all want to be happy. What happiness can be greater than total bliss, total love, and total peace? What happiness can be greater than that which we all strive for, by whatever name? For you, it is called holiness. Quote:
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10-30-2004, 07:31 PM | #330 |
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From your post, I'm getting that holiness and the happiness Atheists experience is supposed to be essentially the same thing. Is that correct?
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
10-30-2004, 10:01 PM | #331 |
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No, I would not put it so.
Holiness and the happiness atheists may strive for, is the same thing. I am not saying "Look at that atheist over there, he is happy, and so he is holy." I am suggesting that true happiness is the same thing as holiness. Some atheists can agree with me, in that the goal of life is the attainment of happiness. Happiness, to me, may justly be called holiness. So it is more like, "Look at that saint over there, who has attained happiness." Christians want to be like Christ, Buddhists wish to be Buddhas, Hindus want to be one with Brahman, non-religious people seek happiness and peace of mind--all the same thing to me.
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10-30-2004, 11:48 PM | #332 | ||
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Differences
Happiness involves pleasing oneself, though. Holiness involves giving of oneself. A non-religious person seeking happiness seeks to fulfill their own desires, to gain the different things that the world has to offer. Religious people give up the things of the world. You're equating opposites, or at least saying that opposites lead to the same thing. Christians would say that freedom is to be found in Christ, and from the world is to be found slavery. If you accept that teaching, then you're saying that seeking slavery is the same as seeking freedom. As Jesus said, "I do not give to you as the world gives."
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So anyway, I still see massive dividing differences between the peace, love and bliss that are separate from Christ's. They are different things, as any convert to Christianity that has experienced God will be able to tell you. There are my opinions. I look forward to your response.
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
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10-31-2004, 12:42 AM | #333 |
Elf Lord
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Just for illustration, IYDM, CS Lewis observed that the difference between happiness and joy can be analogous to beer in a tankard. The frothy foam is comparable to happiness; it arises from joy and is transient and lighter. Joy is like the beer itself.
I like to think of it visualizing and (preferably) imbibing a draft Guinness Stout (which, I am sure they will serve in Heaven )!
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Inked "Aslan is not a tame lion." CSL/LWW "The new school [acts] as if it required...courage to say a blasphemy. There is only one thing that requires real courage to say, and that is a truism." GK Chesterton "And there is always the danger of allowing people to suppose that our modern times are so wholly unlike any other times that the fundamental facts about man's nature have wholly changed with changing circumstances." Dorothy L. Sayers, 1 Sept. 1941 |
10-31-2004, 01:42 AM | #334 | |||||
Elf Lord
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Response to Lief, part one
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"Happiness" is used often by Buddhist speakers, I have noted, especially the Dalai Lama and Thich Nhat Hahn. Maybe "happiness" as a word used for something that is lasting and valuable is more of an eastern idea, I don't know. I think there are things which we call happiness, that are not actually real happiness. Having sex purely for the physical pay-off, is not happiness. Eating ice-cream because it tastes good, is not happiness. Receiving a wonderful gift from a friend, is not happiness. I am speaking of total peace, total contentment, total knowledge, total fulfillment. I am speaking of oneness with divinity. That is happiness. Quote:
So I don't think I'm equating opposites, or saying that opposites lead to the same thing. I am saying that there are no opposites, in truth, and we all want the same thing. Quote:
We all want joy. Christians, Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Jews, Sikhs, Jains, Pagans, Taoists, Atheists, Agnostics, and completely unaffiliated people all want joy. No one wants to suffer, in truth. Joy is not easy to attain, but I believe every human being is equally capable of attaining it, regardless of faith, or worldview. Joy is the beginning and end of all things. Joy is what we must find. Or call it holiness. Really, it doesn't matter if you call it Coca-Cola, as long as you are still talking about joy. Quote:
So to reiterate my point, Atheists seek what we are seeking. "Joy" if you like, or any other name that seems fitting. "Joy" is a good word, because I think Atheists can agree with "joy". "Peace" is also suitable. Quote:
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Falmon -- Dylan Last edited by Ñólendil : 10-31-2004 at 01:48 AM. |
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10-31-2004, 01:43 AM | #335 | ||
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Response, part 2
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I don't know what to say to your convictions about atheists. I object to the attitude that that God only reveals Himself, in bliss, to those who say they believe in God. I will NOT say that "Atheists believe in God", because that would offend atheists and make me look rather idiotic at the same time. Might offend the theists too. What I will say is that you can accept everything that God is into your heart, without ever "believing in God". I think God is more than "God". I think God is within us all, pervading the entire universe, whilst transcending it. God is within the Atheist who denies belief in His existence. I knew an Atheist once who said didn't believe in God because he didn't buy into all the Kingly Ruler stuff. The monarch God was shoved down his throat, and he didn't like it, so he became an atheist (and later an agnostic). Did he really object to God? He certainly would have said "yes", and that's fine, and you would say "yes", I suppose, and that's fine, but that's because we're talking here on a surface level. We're talking about consciously rejecting a notion. But this man never rejected happiness (the higher kind of happiness I have been talking about), he never rejected joy, or truth, or love, or peace, or indeed bliss, or contentment. God is all of these things, to me, God is pure happiness, pure joy, pure truth, pure love, pure peace, pure bliss, pure contentment. And that Atheist can experience it all. Quote:
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Falmon -- Dylan Last edited by Ñólendil : 10-31-2004 at 01:49 AM. |
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10-31-2004, 02:29 AM | #336 |
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I'm saving your posts for a moment, Ñólendil. I'll get to them tonight, but first I want to respond on the Theology thread. This is deep, deep stuff, and will require thought and time in the response.
EDIT: Okay, coming to it now.
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." Last edited by Lief Erikson : 10-31-2004 at 02:56 AM. |
10-31-2004, 03:00 AM | #337 |
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Ñólendil, what would you say about people that convert to Christianity from other religions, and claim powerful conversion experiences? If atheism was as effective as Christianity in producing the needed results, then such powerful conversions shouldn't be needed, should they? Or was atheism simply not the proper path for those people that converted? Was their experience of atheism not proper for them, while it was for right those atheists that didn't convert?
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
10-31-2004, 03:38 AM | #338 | ||||||||
Elf Lord
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For readers aside from Ñólendil, you'll just have to bear with me as I shift out from using normal Christian jargon and word meanings. Quote:
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
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10-31-2004, 03:43 AM | #339 | ||||||
Elf Lord
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The strength of the illusion
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Ñólendil, according to you, what is evil? If all religions are ways to God, what of those who worship gods that demand the destruction of infants? Is evil a part of God's nature, or a deception in the minds of men, part of the illusion? Is all evil part of the illusion, and all misconception?
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
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10-31-2004, 04:28 AM | #340 | |||
Elf Lord
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If the world has indeed, as I have said, been built of sorrow, it has been built by the hands of love, because in no other way could the soul of man, for whom the world was made, reach the full stature of its perfection. ~Oscar Wilde, written from prison Oscar Wilde's last words: "Either the wallpaper goes, or I do." |
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