The Soul does not exist (note to Mods at beginning)

The subconcious is handling so many things, and like you talk about the concious taking in what we see. I didn't think so, the subconcious is handling all of that. The millions of nerve endings and translating that data into something the concious can understand, that is what the subconcious does. Or atleast I thought.

I cannot imagine the meager 2000 in the concious handling all those millions of nerve endings, taking acoustic vibrations how ever many happen per second, and understanding the data, turning it into sound and all that. How long does it take me to conciously do a simple math problem? The subconcious must be handling all of that.

Originally posted by NJE777
Thank you for your wisdom and intellect.

I read earlier on in this thread that some people are looking forward to 'nothing', the end. Well, for those who dont know my spiritual journey, I experienced death recently, and last night I experienced nothingness. Believe me... re evaluate what you think because nothingness is frightening.

Nothingness is a void where no light, energy exists. There is nothing to see, nothing to feel except your mind that is searching for comprehension of what and where you are at. My sister is blind and I ask her 'what do you see?'. She says 'nothing...nothing...' What is nothing? All I know is that in that 'nothing', you, your mind doesnt end

I asked the Holy Spirit why I experienced it, no answer as yet....but when I read the desire for nothing on here, it did concern me. Perhaps the only reason is to share this with you because I know that I am not going to experience it again.

love & light

My friend, I have experienced amazingly scary things myself,
and what you had recieved is not 'nothing' ..
what you experienced is not what you think it is.. that is your 'normal' view-points version of what happened..... deep down in another view-point hidden deep within you, you experienced a very profound thing that should puzzle you depending on your understanding for atleast a year or more ... but I will try to help you learn to understand it faster.
Your deep view-point made you aware of one thing though in your normal view-point.. that YOU were still there, observing.
What were you observing? You were observing a QUESTION, an Enigma..
What is that question or enigma? ... I am sure that you are still hidden from knowing, because it opens up many more doors of questions after it...
Think of this.. you were still AWARE right? .. observing... but you KNEW you weren't observing 'normal' things.. because there was a seeming lack of 'things' ... right?
as you said you perceived that there was no light or energy..
The reason why you felt like it was death, was because you as a binary ONE folded in on itself.. there was no longer an 'out-side' .. and your beginning was looking at your end.. (I don't mean birth and death as in alive and dead or a visual scene) I mean the beginning of thought and the end of thought.
The only thing in your experience is you were not sure of what you were looking at... or what you were questioning.. its in my opinion that it just didn't make sense to you so your normal view-point didn't deem it worthy of revision..

Your thought is your spirit...
Your LORD is your thought made flesh.
GOD is the total output of thought from every human-body collapsed onto what we call a second.
Your soul is the neuro-net / 'file-folder' of experiences / total memory...

Humans are unique because they can be aware that they are aware of being aware (sorry for the riddle like sentence)

See, .. hrm.. this is going to be hard to illustrate.. I'll give it a try...
I'll use each line to dictate a year, or a progression in time.. and give you an example of something one may remember for that year to make a memory / neuro-net

-Birth
-1st year, learned to walk
-2nd year, learned to talk
-3rd year, learned what colors are etc.
-4th year, learned to read

Okay .. so for this example.. we are trying to show how thought creates future from the past.

Birth was the beginning of this persons cycle
the following years are spent learning how to express the energy felt by oneself.
We react to the energy force that is already present, we perceive it against the filters that we are taught, color is an energy filter, shape is an energy filter, sound is an energy filter, language is an energy filter.... right and wrong are an energy filter, GOD is an energy filter created by man to explain total human conciousness
Okay so there are filters created to explain energy sensations... like a 'net' to grab certain energies and 'hold' their vibration... hold it where? .. in memory, in the net that it has created.. the net itself is a vibration field, the net IS us, its the shape or vibration we choose to HOLD, we HOLD what we WILL, drop what we WILL, and acquire what we WILL..
We for some reason are inherently drawn towards Happy, loving, light things... depending on your focus.

Okay so we have a net, (the neuro-net) that captures and holds vibrations(experiences [an experience is a variety of energy collapsed onto one second]) so it holds consecutive seconds/experiences/vibrations...
So if we have a full net (or are 'done' learning) we than begin to measure every NEW vibration against the old vibrations stored in the net. and THUS the net we have constitutes who we are, (our vibration form, energy signature) we begin to 'feel' full or as if we've had enough.. many people do this while holding a very badly created net so, if we emptied our entire net, (or trained ourselves to be indifferent towards it) allowing us to percieve energy 'differently' and than filled our net with a good self-serving/neighbour-serving net, and than claimed full, with this 'new' net.. that percieves for example everything against a filter based on LOVE, our experiences will always be colored with love.

So to put this practically..
Imagine you have immediate amnesia, as soon as you experience something you forget it... so to stop this GOD has given you a magical net that captures everything on paper and stores it in the net.
now
Imagine carrying this limitless tight knit net infront of you because its heavy... everything you see and experience is drawn onto a piece of paper and dropped into this limitless tight knit net ... so even if you closed your eyes, your audio sensations would even be drawn, etc.. tactile sensations and all.. (so these pieces of paper have to be quite big to caputre everything you sense) .. so as you walk around in the world, you have to keep taking those sheets out to cross reference them against your new experiences or else you would never know a tree isn't a dangerous bear, or a cliff for that matter... (What a horrible existance)
Even the act of cross referencing would create references of cross referencing..
in other words you would have sheets of paper to explain your experiences of experiecing sheets of paper. a vicious circle it can be.. the bag just keeps getting bigger and bigger because you don't want to miss anything that might help explain the new phenomenon, CONTINUED.

I think Matter creates the soul. ANd, the soul is like RAM on a computer. Once you pull the plug, the system that created the ram dissolves and so does the ram. When we die it's no different than when a computer is shut down. The os shuts down too.

PuRe Energy
THANK YOU!
Now my mind is going back to that 'nothing', an enigma and trying to see if there is something there. You really explained that well. Very complicated, I am impressed, so impressed, here is a WATS

Originally posted by BASSPLYR
I think Matter creates the soul. ANd, the soul is like RAM on a computer. Once you pull the plug, the system that created the ram dissolves and so does the ram. When we die it's no different than when a computer is shut down. The os shuts down too.

The opposite of this Quantum physics and maybe like Quantum computers information is infinite and we as a conciousness are able to hold the quantum particles in some way that is stored in Eternity. Don't use human technology to explain an Infinity being such as God down to our own methods. Try not to rule it out maybe all information is stored some how maybe even God's help.

Once again, amazing post have been made since my last post in this thread.
(I would like to quickly thank the mods/admin for moving the post to its original forum.)

In responce to JSquared,
Funny you mention the dialouge from yoda to Luke concerning the nature of who we truly are.
I just watched the scene twice the other day with the kids.
Movies really are excellent tools for contemplating such issues as the soul.
It does sound ironic saying that at first, but when you think about it...people everwhere, for the most part, are searching for the same thing...and what better place to merge various concepts to try to solve such puzzles...movies. (Not saying in them lie the answer, but there is a lot to be gained in developing ones various perspectives on such issues.)

You mention that the memory lives on in those that love us.
Its interesting, cause that is what my father-in-law believed before passing away. He never was religous. This idea was something I could not do anything with, so just let it be, and thought I was on a better track with my opinion at the time.
However, if it is possible for particles to go between people. (i.e. parts of the neuro-net, etc.) as there is the quantum theory of entanglement, then there could be some truth to this...although, as mentioned earlier, not quite how we would think of it.
This theory of entanglement also is hinted at with Yoda (bringing up StarWars again), when he tells Luke that everything, even space is connected to each other...or rather, there is no space.

So when the body dies off...what we call a "soul", could be particles (im guessing from the neuro-net, I dont konw) which remain with another person, perhaps. Now in this sense, it seems like a memory to the other person, and not like a "soul" or "living being" as we have grown to know.
But it may just be due to the amount of consciousness, or rather the "strength" of the other neuro-networks identity, that it pushes down another possible "identity" from popping up. (not sure if you are following along with this at this point), but in a sense, this could be where multiple personality disorder comes in. Its when the neuro net has equal balance between a various number of souls, and gets confused. Bring up religion quickly and this could explain possesion also.

And Esoteric Teacher,
Thank you for your politeness before you deconstructed one of my post.
You have some points there. And part of it is due to how I explained myself. (or rather would need further clarification...)
What did grab my attention is what you said about the conscious and sub-conscious.
If I understood correctly, you are saying that basically all thought, sense perceptions, etc. occur in the sub-conscious and this is 400billion bits per second that then go to the conscious, in which only 2000 pieces "Reveal" themselves to us through what we concsioulsy are aware of.
(meaning we have no clue what is going on period...there could be fairies and we wouldnt know it.) But in saying this, it is interesting how this ties into vibrational frequencies...we cant see infrared, etc. (Im starting to spit out various pieces of info from my mind at random as I ponder this, my apologies if its becoming incoherent...but maybe someone can see where Im starting to go with it. )

This post is getting long, so I will continue my responces in the next post...

Peace

Dalen

NJE777, interesting story regarding nothingness.
Your basically saying that your mind was active but you could not see, hear, feel, smell, etc.?
Now you mentioned you had a near-death experience, but this didnt appear to be it...was this something that happened when you went to sleep? Can you expound on this, and also your near-death.

I had a near-death (was hit by a car while on a bike, no helmet on, and blood eveywhere...mentioned this somewhere earlier in the thread I believe.) What happened after that I will have to share when I can do the story more justice.

But suffice it to say, with my near-death, and my "natural '___'" experience , I have begun wondering if this cant be explained by the simple fact that my mind...still alive, is "projecting" these images.

As Esoteric Teacher & Novice pointed out, we have 400billion (?) bits of info per second in the subconscious, which only provides 2k bits in the conscious realm per second. So who knows what this "beautiful" mind is capable of.

If I could wrap my hands around the workings of the mind, then I feel I would be closer to my answer. (or if I could figure out the cause of all causes...I have a better chance with the former I think. Its worth a try.)

Novice & Esoteric, do you have any links from scientific journals concerning this bit of info concerning the subconscious and its relation to the conscious in regards to the bits being processed, etc.? It seems that I have heard something like this, but havent looked into that aspect recently.

Pure_Energy, the last paragraph summarizing the neuro-net was quite interesting.
The idea of going minute by minute not remembering...whoa, thats to much, doubt we would get anywhere.
The stages of life you wrote about brought something to mind.
Its along these same lines in which I started this forum "the soul does not exist."
When I got to thinking about the mind & soul, and any connections they may or may not have, here is what I came up with.

Is there a "me"? When I say "me" Im referring to the bit that most everyone calls a soul...and by popular definition, its that spiritual aspect, that is like vodoo or majic, it slips between your fingers. It cannot be thought of or grasped as no one has discovered it yet, but everyone is sure it exist, as they cannot imagine going on without it.

So in diggin deeper, I thought about the mind...the thought processes.
Do I have an original thought outside of that which was produced by stimuli?
What do I mean? (Im not sure Im going to put this where it can be understood, but I will try)
Every action and reaction happens based upon some kind of sensory input we have had sense a kid. All of our opinions, knowledge is built up from external sources.
Even back to the first thought, it was a reaction to what was "outside of us" or the brains interpretation of the electrical signals outside of it.

You even can go back to the moment of conception and say that the "data" was transferred, so again there is not a real point from which something "arose" from the inside that was not learnt, acted upon, etc. from without having first been influenced by something else.
(now if you argue that we are all one, and part of the force, then that kind of lessens this debate, but when you argue the point of an "individual" who has always existed, but forgets at birth, then dies and goes to heaven or hell, or wherever, then the argument I have seems to stand. That is if I could only explain it clearly, as it seems as clear as mud as I write, but Im sure some of you will wade through and get to the point on the other side. )

Skipping down to Bassplyr, the whole computer idea is an interesting one as I have mentioned elsewhere...because I think where computer and humans differ is a fine line.
I will quickly say again this. Imagine in 5k years (give you guys time to believe it will be possible ) We will have created robots with a.i. that basically would think they have as much right to live as we do. The way they process information would make them think that they are indivudals, so much so that they might think they to have a soul. And we might act, at first, as their "gods" putting in wiring to "short-circuit" them in order to keep them from taking over the planet.
(i.e. in religion the "gods" short-circuited" man by cutting their life span, messing with communication at babel, etc.)
So in short, as this approaches the topic from a whole different view point, (though a view point that must be explored thoroughly in order to help us better address the topic at hand), at some point, there becomes the need in an organism to exist beyond death. One could argue, that as one evolves, that this is a reality for all, but just becomes more apparent as one gains more knowledge.

As "The time Lord" hinted at in his post, this subject is great indeed...and as of now we cannot fathom it, so all we can do is compare to that which we know...which, in the end, may not even be close. But everything is a step, and we will take each step, one at a time.

Again, thank you all for the wonderful post. I will wrap up for now as its getting late and Im tired, and I dont want the meaning of my post to be totally lost due to lack of coherency.

Peace to all

Dalen

Sit in a dark room.
Suspend all thoughts.
Become only aware, without thinking.
Feel the awareness.
Become the awareness.
Become aware of the awareness you just became.
Observe the observer.
Observe the observer observing the observer.
Welcome to Infinity.

Think about everything you are unable to think about.
Think about thinking.
Observe your thinking while thinking about thinking.
Concentrate on concentrating.
Think about concentrating.
Concentrate on thinking about concentrating.
Become aware of your thinking about concentrating on concentrating.
Observe the awareness of your thinking about concentrating on cencentrating.

Now stop all thoughts.
You are Nothing and Everything.
All things are thoughts. All thoughts become things.
The soul is a complex thought form.
Therefore the soul is merely an illusion created by thoughts of the infinite mind.
We all are sharing the Infinite Mind where from all things are thought.

Think about Nothing.
Become aware of your thinking about Nothing.
Nothing could not be thought of without an awareness to observe it.

When the infinite mind becomes silent all that remains is Awareness.
Awareness of Nothing.
Awareness of Nothing is boring.
That's why Everything exists.
The Infinite Mind, that we All are, wants to think of Everything.

We are all One Awareness separated only by thought.

Originally posted by dAlen
Pure_Energy, the last paragraph summarizing the neuro-net was quite interesting.
The idea of going minute by minute not remembering...whoa, thats to much, doubt we would get anywhere.
The stages of life you wrote about brought something to mind.
Its along these same lines in which I started this forum "the soul does not exist."
When I got to thinking about the mind & soul, and any connections they may or may not have, here is what I came up with.

Is there a "me"? When I say "me" Im referring to the bit that most everyone calls a soul...and by popular definition, its that spiritual aspect, that is like vodoo or majic, it slips between your fingers. It cannot be thought of or grasped as no one has discovered it yet, but everyone is sure it exist, as they cannot imagine going on without it.

So in diggin deeper, I thought about the mind...the thought processes.
Do I have an original thought outside of that which was produced by stimuli?
What do I mean? (Im not sure Im going to put this where it can be understood, but I will try)
Every action and reaction happens based upon some kind of sensory input we have had sense a kid. All of our opinions, knowledge is built up from external sources.
Even back to the first thought, it was a reaction to what was "outside of us" or the brains interpretation of the electrical signals outside of it.

Dalen

I would really like to tackle this post..
I first want to comment on something that so many of you dear lights have ignored.

Especially you dAlen, because you started this thread...
You don't even realize it.. because you call it THINKING...
but you are in such a deep meditative state you may not be aware, because its some-what 'new' that so many people are like this.. (without knowing)
You are effectively imagining things... (but because the basis has been made) you are able to summarize and rationalize actualities.. what I mean is..
No one, not even scientists know exactly what happens when ANYTHING happens... its all just guesses really.. VERY Educated guesses..

Everything you just detailed thinking about would be considered Witch-Craft talk at one point in the past..

I amaze myself when I come up with this stuff.. but that IS the way you walk around the world.. the only thing the sack is in your noggin... the sack of grey-matter... a very magical toy-sack (santa ring any bells?)
your brain, as a magical sack, takes the THOUGHTs OUT-THERE that have already become MANIFEST and rummage through the sack for your interpretations to cross reference 'present' for 'present' ... (lol hahahaha) .. to see which 'present' is better lol (according to your filters/perceptions)

now in reference to your


Is there a "me"? When I say "me"

YES! .... obviously you wouldn't have that idea, if it didn't exist to some degree..

According to your flesh, because your TANGIBLE FLESH determines your ENTANGIBLE thoughts according to your perceptions of the Tangible manifestations of thought that exist OUTSIDE of you..
Please take your time to understand that.^^^

Without your body, the YOU no longer exists........... now.... if you'd never met anyone or been seen by anyone your whole life.. you would definately cease to exist.. (but thats impossible because you come out of another human! lol)
sooooooooo you exist down the line conciously or subconciously in another living beings memory... and if we were to continue down the line, manifesting thought, we could successfully resurrect each and every human ever born...

Now, considering the original thought idea....

Do you not think that loving some cave dude that just killed your whole family was an original thought at one time?
Its considered a NOT DOING..... NOT DOING what you seen... instead you're doing something unseen.

LOVE is/was the first Original THOUGHT... acceptance / accepting what has JUST happened, and UNDERSTANDING WHY you should NOT CONTINUE The Cycle.

The Ignorant FLESH is called SATAN etc etc..
The Understanding FLESH is called Angel.
The LORD is OUR self idea of our self (our residual self-image). (like the matrix)
CHRIST is a LORD who has all acceptance and understanding there is.. to CHRIST all THINGS are LOVE, just hidden by the IMAGE of THEIR FATHER... the foreign GOD(The FLESH) the OUTSIDE... when it is the INSIDE that RUNS the OUTSIDE...
Spirit means THOUGHT, Holy Spirit means Holy THOUGHT...
YOU ARE SPIRIT, .. that is saying.. YOU ARE THOUGHT... THOUGHT exists for a millenia extending outside of us.. because the further we keep looking outside of us the MORE thoughts we have INSIDE of us... WE ARE THOUGHT... IF you look INSIDE (which Quantum Science has begun to do) you will see there is just as much INSIDE of us to research as there WAS/IS outside of US.. and the more we RESEARCH OUTSIDE of us the more we have to research what is INSIDE of us.. it is just logic.

We have made the tangible definitions entangible.. we made THOUGHTs of THOUGHTs..
We are such powerful machines that we can manifest THOUGHTs of THOUGHT..
We are even so attracted to thought we make up thoughts, (like boobs and curves) to give ourselves reasons to interact with that thought.
All we are IS thought.. it might sound pretty boring but its quite amazing to think we are a THOUGHT in a thinking BODY..

Originally posted by dAlen
NJE777, interesting story regarding nothingness.
Your basically saying that your mind was active but you could not see, hear, feel, smell, etc.?

At first I wasnt aware, it took a little bit for me to go from sensing to connecting a thought. And the first thought was 'where am I'..? Then I looked around and tried to hear anything. The only sound was my mind, and it was like an echo. I then tried to become aware of what I could see (that much I am aware of) but when I looked, trying to see, there was nothing. I do remember really 'trying to see' and my eyes saw 'nothing'. My mind was very active and for about 3 or 4 seconds (not sure if timing can be applied here) I was just trying to sort where I was and what was happening. Very very strange experience. I have gone back, thanks to PureEnergy's imput and tried to see if I can remember anything else. What I have sensed is that I was in 'space' but there were no stars. So this nothing space.

This experience had nothing to do with the DE ( I dont know why they call it 'near death'...lol) It was 'death' but not permanent...I woke up startled from this.
I woke up and looked around, I was awake, it wasnt a dream. The strangest thing was that my room was completely black, no light, which is not how my room is. My bedroom has night light from marine tank and that wasnt there. So if this is an enigma then I dont understand what and why. I at first kept it simple, but I am starting to feel that it isnt as simple as I would like to believe.


Nat

NJE777, I was going over your posts again and a thought struck me. No, it didn't hurt, no permanent impressions at least....

There is a region in the numenal world called the Abyss. The objective is to cross over. For some it is a challenge, others still it is small play. There is a demon that guards it, I think his name is Chronozon, the Dweller in the Abyss after Aliester Crowley. Chronozon is more of an idea or tool than a demon, forever changing form and mirroring the practicioner's own struggle with ego. Most likely a form of deep genesis within the collective unconscious.

Meeting with him is like a headlong rush into an oncoming locomotive. You havn't yet become acquainted, so that may be why you are still here. I see a stronger reality, but for the time being the analogy escapes me.

Originally posted by Matyas
There is a region in the numenal world called the Abyss. The objective is to cross over. For some it is a challenge, others still it is small play. There is a demon that guards it, I think his name is Chronozon, the Dweller in the Abyss after Aliester Crowley. Chronozon is more of an idea or tool than a demon, forever changing form and mirroring the practicioner's own struggle with ego. Most likely a form of deep genesis within the collective unconscious.

thanks for the info, will look into this...

Meeting with him is like a headlong rush into an oncoming locomotive. You havn't yet become acquainted, so that may be why you are still here. I see a stronger reality, but for the time being the analogy escapes me.

Very interesting analogy you have used. I have a recurring nightmare of a locomotive. The build up is it misses me by a millimetre, then the last one it was going to fall on me and I was watching it, and started counting, got to nine and then woke up, just as it fell. Woke up before it fell on me/killed me, I thought maybe that was the fear of death...?? When I had my DE, I just naturally applied it to that. I dont know but you mentioning that, coinciding with my dreams, definitely checking it out now.

thanks


just went and did a quick search and it has freaked me out... when I died, the biggest thing I could see was this tree, it was huge. I was looking at it for ages trying to interpret what is was, then I read this:

Choronzon is deemed to be held in check by the power of the Goddess Babalon, inhabitant of Binah, the third Sephirah of the Tree of Life. Both Choronzon and the Abyss are discussed in Crowley's Confessions (ch. 66):

"The name of the Dweller in the Abyss is Choronzon, but he is not really an individual. The Abyss is empty of being; it is filled with all possible forms, each equally inane, each therefore evil in the only true sense of the word—that is, meaningless but malignant, in so far as it craves to become real. These forms swirl senselessly into haphazard heaps like dust devils, and each such chance aggregation asserts itself to be an individual and shrieks, "I am I!" though aware all the time that its elements have no true bond; so that the slightest disturbance dissipates the delusion just as a horseman, meeting a dust devil, brings it in showers of sand to the earth."[2]

en.wikipedia.org...

Maybe its just a coincidence?
Dont know..but little unsettling.
cheers





[edit on 25-11-2006 by NJE777]

I did a search too and came across this unlikely site that explains it thusly:

The Abyss and the Veil

Two obstacles hinder your ascending the Tree of Life; the Veil and the Abyss. The Veil shields your ordinary consciousness from your soul, the middle trinity formed by Chesed, Geburah and Tiphereth.

The Abyss prevents access to Kether, Chochmah and Binah, the upper trinity, the Long Face. You cannot cross this Abyss if you are bonded by your intellect. By riding a mercabah (vehicle) of experience, you can cross the Abyss to access this upper trinity.

"When you look into the abyss, the abyss also looks into you" Nietzsche

source

I don't completely agree with this. It is right, but only partially. The tree in Jungian psychology symbolizes the soul, where the upper part represents the conscious and the lower part the unconscious. In my understanding of the Qabala, being strictly the English interpretation, the highest attribute of the Sephiroth is humor. Therefore the magician who does not take himself too seriously will cross the Abyss with the most ease.

There is most definately an objective connection here with the collective, so sacrifice of the self for the greater good is also a key. In my numenal experience when the Winds of Chaos threatened to rip my soul asunder I held fast to the middle of the tree, thus preserving my sanity. The teaching of balance in the community helps to preserve the mental health of the individuals. There is an equal give and take between the community and the individual. This is essence of humanity.

Here is a quick link to an article in Wired called "The Seoul of a new machine".

This is about a software robot that can go between computers "possessing" it and then dissappear into the "ethers".

The implications of this is staggering in light of everything said in this thread.
For those just looking at the thread, it is quite long to go through, but this ties into some of the discussion of the potential "true" nature of a "soul" from a scientific point of view...again looking for tangibles beyond that of religion. (or perhaps explaining religion through science.)

Peace

Dalen

Excellent story from the BBC on Robots having rights like humans.
This link is interesting , as it shows that people, governments are seriously considering this.

What does this have to do with this thread.
It fits perfectly into some of the topics discussed earlier...one day the robots will say, "I must have a soul" and not realize there "soul" is just the awareness they have of "and identity"...their "network", like our "neuro-network" is the soul.

So they will have rights to have equal rights...
We say oh no...our creation being equal? Thats just what the "gods" [elohom] thought after they made us, and said out of fear: "they may be like one of us"

Enjoy

peace

dalen

I rose from the dead. God doesn't lie.

Originally posted by TheRealJesus
I rose from the dead. God doesn't lie.

Ah, I see. Your speaking for Jesus. - true, He does have a problem speaking for himself after his death.

And who ever said anything about God lieing? The better question is do you know God...or what God is?

Is there more you could contribute - I mean, thanks for resurrecting this old post of mine - , but I have a feeling we are approaching this subject from two totally different perspectives. Just so you know I was a 'classical' christian, pretty much my whole life, so little comments made, such as the one you made, doesnt pack much meat to it.

(I was a missionary, worked with/for one of the most well known pastors in the states...yes I know that doesnt 'make' one a Christian, but my point is I have a pretty clear clue as to where Im going when Im talking on these matters...true, I may not communicate it effectively, but a lot of that has to do with how open one is on their perspective of what is being said.)

If your comment was genuine, and not just fly by comment...again, this post has been 'buried' for some time...and its resurrected by basically a one line sentence that has nothing to do with the soul existing or not existing. (what is a soul, where is it at, what do yo mean by soul...) There are a lot of concepts, symbols, that 'classical' Christians take literal - they never got the point that most things are in parable format, but if they studied Judaism they would realize this.

I would encourage you, to view this thread where you see can see all my post without the distraction of the other ones...just so that you can at least get an idea what this thread is about. As it looks like your truly not interested in understanding what is being said, but dropping a line that supports your predisposition to a dogmatic line of view. (this is typical when one is fundamentalist, in any religion, as they are 'right' and the other one is already wrong.)

I will also say, that you have a little to gain by communicating with people by dropping the little cliche type sayings. Do you truly believe that this would be enough for anyone to stop and drop and repent. After all, I mentioned that you really did not tie this into the thread at all. Just because the topic is that the soul doesnt exist, doesnt mean 'God lied.' I highly doubt you are aware (as most 'classical' christians arent) of what it is God purportedly said, let alone truly deliver a nice line of apologetics.

Those that do think they are good at apologetics at this site, are really good at closing their ears to what others say, and at repeating they same old cliches (albeit longer winded arguments...but the same tired ones) as to why they are right.

In short, these are not reasoning based on 'reason', or thought from within. If it were, it would be different, it would have substance, no matter how wrong they might be.

No, they are dogma...and therefore dead, and only have enough 'fuel' to keep that person energized as they go running in circles trying to convince everyone of their 'rightness'.

Ill tell you what, if your interested, check out my blog at the link below.
I have and probably will, continue to right more articles that address this type of attitude of the classical christian. Not because its wrong. And not to relieve everyone else of the headache of being targeted for 'conversion'. But to try to help those who have a zeal, but truly want the truth, and yet know its not exactly coming together as their own sermons to people say it should.

But then again, with the one line response to the topic I started here, that has had a lot written about it in depth already...I highly doubt you read past the title line, and the pre-formulated opinion just popped out.

Again, I welcome people to read my threads and to contribute. They dont even have to agree.

But, personally, I have very little patience in hearing the ramblings of classical christians (not impatience for them particularly), but for their lack of listening to what is being said, and then discussing the subject at hand without keeping up defenses so that what is said never gets through...thus it becomes a cyclical argument with them.

Those type of post...well, I 'ignore'. So all such comments are lost and go by the way-side.

Again, thanks for posting, and I wish that you had at least brought some more thought into why it is you said what you did and discussed the topic itself more.

Peace

dAlen

"those who know, do not speak. those who speak, do not know." -lao tse

Originally posted by sollie
"those who know, do not speak. those who speak, do not know." -lao tse

ah, so we see which group you and I are in.

Again, not sure how the one liners are contributing to the topic of the forum...oh, there not.

Peace

dAlen

- I do want to ad, that the quote itself is a good one to ponder, as there are different points that can be taken from it.

[edit on 15-11-2007 by dAlen]

Im from the conspiracy and I honestly feel we exist in more than one

dimension, and our dream state is definitly the closest one to this third

dimension. What we are beyond these dimensions were familar with, i

dont know. But if you look at the bigger picture, this body wasnt designed

to live forever and the same goes for our ego. This is but one experience

in the vast ocean of infinity. So you see we shed this body for a new

experience to be born into, a new adventure with a fresh set of eyes, we

dont die, were reborn. So I would say the soul exists inside but also

outside this dimension and is probaly more complex then we can imagine.

At least I hope so lol