God is Not a Person

Originally posted by wildtimes
reply to post by DISRAELI

 

Now can we please let the subject go?

Erm,
No!
You're asking that the subject of the thread be ignored?
That's not fair.
Nor "just".

No.
It was very obvious from the rest of the post that I meant the "subject of my reasons for leaving the thread".
Now you're twisting words to the point of being childishly provocative, so I will abandon this thread, as predicted, and go and talk to the grown-ups instead.

reply to post by wildtimes


Your god is a computer



I am going to create a thread about this in the near future

Originally posted by windword
reply to post by adjensen

 

We do not KNOW that the universe is not cyclical. We don't yet understand the phenomena of black holes. We don't know that black holes aren't creating new galaxies in another dimension or that this dimension isn't the outpouring of a black hole.

Additionally there is "string theory," suggesting that dimensions exist simultaneously, side by side.

You make quite a leap suggesting that singularity proves that nothing once existed. It doesn't.

If GOD always existed, then nothing never existed. If GOD existed, and was all that existed then GOD existed as a singularity. GOD was/is everything that was/is; the creator and the creation are one.

It makes no logical sense any other way.

i stumbled on this thread too late but hope to have fun and learn now. SnF wildtimes and sorry for joining late.
.
Windword, let me put my opinion and see what you have to say,
we have a beginning, say the big bang. You say God must have existed before that, true. But the thing you ignore is TIME also started at the big bang. So what was before doesnt concern us. Also SPACE came into existence after the bang.
So how can God make space and then live in it, where was He before the space was created?
And do allow me to use the personifications although i dont believe God is a person but i do believe that He has characteristics like being, All Aware, All knowing, Extremely Merciful etc.
But i do understand when you say that everything is in God but that doesnt have to be material.
If you seperate the material and spiritual then everything spiritual is connected with God all the time yet God is outside anything thats material.
There's a saying in islam, "the entire universe cant contain God but the heart of a believer can"
and a verse in Quran says "God is closer to you than your jugular vein"

reply to post by wildtimes


God is not a person and neither are you! You just 'believe' you are a person - you are wearing a mask, playing a role, acting the 'part' (pretending you are apart from the whole).
One day the mask will fall away and you will realize what you are and the game will be up.

Originally posted by logical7
Also SPACE came into existence after the bang.
So how can God make space and then live in it, where was He before the space was created?
And do allow me to use the personifications although i dont believe God is a person but i do believe that He has characteristics like being, All Aware, All knowing, Extremely Merciful etc.
But i do understand when you say that everything is in God but that doesnt have to be material.
If you seperate the material and spiritual then everything spiritual is connected with God all the time yet God is outside anything thats material.

God is the space. In the beginning there was nothing, void, emptiness.
The space, the no thing, is still present, always present - it contains all. The space is aware, it is awareness.
It is all seeing, all knowing and everpresent.

reply to post by wildtimes

isn't it time we "married" science to
religion?? They really are NOT mutually
exclusive.

totally agree!
I always feel sad by the fact that most "scientists" divorce religion when they go in the search for more.. Although it may have a good effect as a scientist refusing to think contradictory to a scripture would be a greater disaster!

reply to post by wildtimes

God "willed" the universe into
existence (I'm giving you that one);
but, at its inception, it was already
"done!"
What God would serve us a meal that
is raw, poisonous, and promotes insanity?
THE UNIVERSE is the INFORMATION we
received from the Creator; it was
perfect to begin with. Humanity on
Earth was provided everything
necessary. We have made extraordinary progress in the "course
work";
there were no mistakes made in the
Creation of the Universe. It is what it is.
Our job is to figure out how it works,
and how perfect it is.

do you think God made the universe in the past and then layed back to watch? Putting in unpersonified way, was God just an energy/force that kick started it all but not actively relavent now.
Sure it works perfectly but couldnt it be that it constantly needs the "support" from God? (Not corrections) rather think in terms of FUEL. And so its operating perfectly not just because it has a Creator but also an Operator/Refueler?
Also wouldnt it be unjust of God if humans only realised that there must be a Creator after generations of collective research?
The earlier generations just died before they could be aware,
the idea of reincarnation does answer that, yet later generations again have an advantage to realise the same in less number of reincarnations, advantage or injustice?
My point is, shouldnt each individual know this in his/her average lifetime?

reply to post by adjensen

Omnipresence -- God is (or can be) everyWHERE
Pantheism -- God is everyTHING

That's not the same thing, it's not even close. As I said, the creation cannot be the creator, because the creation is dependent on the creator to create it, and a self-created creation is logically impossible.

You are saying that "God" is in every space that isn't occupied. This would prove the Bible to be illogical, because to be everywhere is to be everything. If you are only in unoccupied space, then you are not everywhere. Everywhere has no limitations, and so to put limits on it is to change the concept entirely.

A self-created creation is logically impossible because you have never experienced it. It is not wise to declare an idea impossible simply because you cannot wrap your mind around it. When artificial intelligence is introduced, you will find your impossibilities have suddenly become very much possible. That's what we are, isn't it? Organic robots? And yet we continue to recreate ourselves in fantastic ways. The cat man, or the snake man, are works of art embodied in their very flesh. A self created creation.

You are limited by your lack of imagination. And before you say it - the imagination is very real. Everything you see around you is the result of people who dared to imagine, and dared to bring their imaginings to life. We are an imagining by which the universe can experience itself, and when our course is run, we will return to it until the time comes when we reimagine life.

We're not talking about "reinventing yourself", for pete's sakes, we're talking about the creation of the universe out of nothing.

But who says there was nothing? I have made this argument before. Nothing can mean many things to many different people. What if nothing really means "nothing of value"? What if that "nothing" can be made into "something", because it is remade to suddenly have value?

People use words far too loosely these days, without thinking about what these words have really come to mean.

reply to post by wildtimes

I think "God's" creation is perfect. "God" created it. "God" then left it to grow or die.

The universe IS "God", or Source, as I call it. "Source", because it is the embodiment of everything that will ever be needed. It is where all things, matter and energy, come from, and where all things go back to. The universe provides for all and generates all.

Originally posted by AfterInfinity

But who says there was nothing? I have made this argument before. Nothing can mean many things to many different people. What if nothing really means "nothing of value"? What if that "nothing" can be made into "something", because it is remade to suddenly have value?

People use words far too loosely these days, without thinking about what these words have really come to mean.

edit on 1-12-2012 by AfterInfinity because: (no reason given)

You cannot have something without nothing. There has to be a space first before you can have content.
Space and nothing are overlooked but the finding of nothing is the treasure.
No one can show you nothing so if you don't see it for yourself you will deny it.

reply to post by adjensen

That's the right answer -- it comes from God, but how is it God? How does God become the whole of his own creation?

Are you dense? If "God" was all that existed before, then what else was there to form a separate being from which to craft the universe. If all "God" was alone, the sole inhabitant of existence, then he was the only source of material from which to craft everything.

Hence, the creator became the creation. As Christians are so fond of saying: "He's God. He can do anything."

Originally posted by AfterInfinity

If "God" was all that existed before, then what else was there to form a separate being from which to craft the universe. If all "God" was alone, the sole inhabitant of existence, then he was the only source of material from which to craft everything.

Hence, the creator became the creation. As Christians are so fond of saying: "He's God. He can do anything."

God does not just do everything, God is everything - and nothing. The every 'thing' is the visible side of God - it is the form.
The invisible side of God is the formlessness behind the form - the no thingness (the knower of the form).
God is knowing the form he forms.

The belief in a 'you' separate to this is the suffering known as man.

There is only God.
God hides in the form.

reply to post by windword

But I disagree with your assessment that self creation is impossible. I can become many things, by my own determination.

Hi, ww (and everyone)...just woke up an am getting caught up to speed on the thread.

Now, above you said you disagree that "self-creation is impossible". You can change certain things about yourself, but you did not "self-create." And you cannot become a cat (ew, just reminded me of the movie The Fly!)

So, as Paine describes in the Age of Reason,
there was some force that created everything. A tree grows from a seed. We know that we are to simply PUT THE SEED in the ground, add water, allow sunliight. The tree grows. Did the tree create itself? Did it need US to help it grow?

(No, it could as well have been a squirrel, a bird, a pile of leaves that embedded it in the soil). But, if you just set it on a table and look at it, it will not grow. If you shout at it, or read to it, or breathe on it, it will not grow. (Though I yell often at my failing plants, and plead with the frail ones, so I'm not sure about that one!) Men did not invent the tree's growth. The tree had the components it needed within the seed.

But the seed did not manufacture itself out of thin air. It did not devise its own plan to become a tree.

That we know of.




So far.




Sorry - rambling - need more coffee....

reply to post by DISRAELI

If someone claims to have met another person, either you believe him or you don't. Scientific discoveries don't affect the matter one way or the other. That's what I mean by "no new facts".

Absolutely agree with you EXCEPT that it wasn't a "fact" in the Bible, you see, it was hearsay.

You know, the ol' familiar...pics or.........

FACTS that can be discovered are, for instance, dinosaur fossils, graves, the EVIDENCE that the person existed at all.

Claims can be believed or disbelieved, evidence is, well, EVIDENCE. Hearsay vs fact.

reply to post by EnochWasRight

As I pause here, I ask you a simple question. Have I presented a paradox to what you have stated in your thread? Further, is there a paradox created when we see that Jesus was created, yet still God? The only paradox that can be created is the one we create ourselves. What you say is true, yet to suggest that God is not a person would be wrong.

Okay, still sipping first cuppa, but I'll give this a go (you know they say that groggy in-between state of alertness unleashes the most creativity... )

God created EVERYTHING, including NON-HUMAN species, inanimate objects, atmospheric gasses, DNA, fish, tectonic plates. All man has done is learn how to connect the dots of how it all fits together. The puzzle is the CREATION.

But to answer your question here, no, you have not created a paradox: you have shown that EVERY HUMAN is part of God.

I'll get back to you, though, and thanks for participating!

reply to post by adjensen

Fine, you cease to exist, then cause yourself to exist out of nothing, and you'll have made a point.

We're not talking about "reinventing yourself", for pete's sakes, we're talking about the creation of the universe out of nothing.

Quite. I agree.

CREATION was created, and it certainly was not created by a PERSON. Just imagine!! Oh, wait, that's what humankind has always done -- imagined!! Imagined, what it must be like to have created all of creation which functions with or without MANKIND (probably better without, but that's debatable, since we are, after all, here...for better or worse)....??

It was not a PERSON. This is a cool debate here, folks.

--------------------------------------

Back to Ed (EWR), if a person is in the image of God, so is a tree, a mountain, every natural thing. That people can create out of "raw materials already created", and learn the "principles" of, say, mathematics, physics, horticulture, medicine....is all great. But no person has concocted ANYTHING out of NOTHING. Therefore, God is not a person.

That's insulting to God. As far as Jesus being "God", then are there Trees that are God (but not all trees)? Are there fish that are God (but not all fish? I have this weird giant danio in my fishtank that has a humpback - is it the fishes' messiah?) Do you see where I'm going here?

Why would God select ONLY PEOPLE to "represent" to? If anything, because we fight the laws of nature and aren't just able to go with the flow.

I don't know.

man says "God made man in his image"

But what they think is "Man made God in HIS image.
man is very arrogant and things they are some kind of god.
they are Just another animal.

why do you think the Old bible said that man could not even look at god?

saying that one thing can be god,
is like saying one ant is the earth.
and the earth is a very small bit of the universe.

reply to post by buddha

saying that one thing can be god,
is like saying one ant is the earth.
and the earth is a very small bit of the universe.

Oh, so it's okay if I just borrow one of your kidneys, 'cause it's not you, it's just part of you. Thanks!

reply to post by pacifier2012

Very weird.

If you want to know what God is why not investigate the book where he states what he is instead of what other people say he is?

Well, because the "book" was not written by GOD, it was written by people, and what it contains is WHAT OTHER PEOPLE say God is.