Miraculous consequences -Messianic return-

I've been wondering about this for a little while.

Lets say a Messianic person returns. What will happen?

If the person supports christianity, muslims and possibly jews will categorize the person as the anti-christ.
If the person supports Islam, jews and christians will categorize the person as the anti-christ.
If the person supports Judaism, muslims and christians will categorize the person as the anti-christ.

It would seem a religious war would erupt should a messianic figure appear.

Lets say it's the so called new age philosophy, where it is not a single individual that is messianic, but a group.
Should the group not support any of the above mentioned faiths, they will be deemed anti-christ-like.

Is war inevitable if any scripture is mildly correct concerning a 2nd coming or the like?

Jesus has said(or so we are led to believe) that he'll return and judge the living and dead.
Jews are still waiting for their messiah, so to are Muslims.

Anyone not living up to their(the religious interpreters of scripture) expectations can not be seen as anything else than an anti-christ, or as a minimum, a demonic entity.


Is there any scenario where war is avoidable?

reply to post by scratchmane


I have returned. Your specifics irritate me.

I am the one.

From what I've studied, all religions have the profound expectation of a person showing up who will create peace. I think this person, will be extremely skilled at bringing all these religions together, so no, wars will not happen as a result of his/her presence.

It's not just the Christian bible, almost every longstanding mythology on earth has the character of a saviour showing up, so I hope, when this person does show up/stand up, you're gonna' just recognize instantly, excellent, finally someone who speaks the truth.

And the truth, the way I believe it, is universal. It will resonate in every language and every ear.

Wait! Hold up for a second here! Jews do not believe Jesus is the Messiah. You need to understand what the Messiah concept is truly. Then listen what a few pastors tell about the Messiah. Return? Are you referring to a second coming? Jesus! This is sad.
Messiah in Judaism
Why Jews don't believe in Jesus
Jews for Judaism

Originally posted by scratchmane
Is there any scenario where war is avoidable?

These are actually four very different prospects (well, three very different prospects.) In addition, it's kind of difficult for anyone other than a Christian to view someone as an "antichrist", as this is a Christian notion, but we'll just assume "antichrist" refers to an evil leader, bent on destruction of the world.

For both the Jews and Muslims, the Messiah isn't someone who people necessarily have to "believe in", s/he is simply a future leader who will lead the respective cultures to victory over their enemies and to a long lasting peace. A military leader in Israel, for example, with the proper historical credentials, who led the Israelites to said victory / peace, might be viewed in a Messianic manner, made King of Israel, and so on. I suspect that the Muslims have a similar expectation.

So, for both of these, the "Messiah" would be unlikely to be viewed as an antichrist by outsiders, they'd be just a dynamic leader, and war is inevitable -- it's part of the story.

Christ returning would be somewhat different, as the story foretold in Revelation is of war being waged on Israel and the Church, led by the antichrist, and Jesus comes around at the end. Could someone erroneously view the antichrist as their Messiah? Probably, but not really the same thing.

So, for this, war is inevitable, but as part of Armageddon and the End of the Age, so I'm not sure you'd expect to avoid it anyway.

The last one, the non-Abrahamic "messiah" figure (as opposed to the actual religious title of Messiah,) would most likely be viewed by Christians as the antichrist, particularly if they exhibited supernatural qualities. The real question would be who would jump on the bandwagon of the messiah, what their stated intentions were, and how much their actions fit into the generally accepted pattern of the End Times in the Christian faith.

In this case, war is not inevitable -- it depends on the circumstances.

Originally posted by rajaten
reply to post by scratchmane

 

I have returned. Your specifics irritate me.

I am the one.

that's funny. Your avatar rocks, literally.

I don't see peace without war, so whomever it is that comes will bring some sort of conflict...

Originally posted by adjensen

Originally posted by scratchmane
Is there any scenario where war is avoidable?

The last one, the non-Abrahamic "messiah" figure (as opposed to the actual religious title of Messiah,) would most likely be viewed by Christians as the antichrist, particularly if they exhibited supernatural qualities. The real question would be who would jump on the bandwagon of the messiah, what their stated intentions were, and how much their actions fit into the generally accepted pattern of the End Times in the Christian faith.

In this case, war is not inevitable -- it depends on the circumstances.

My highlighting. Should anyone exhibit supernatural powers, would they by default be considered evil? This is part of my query. I want to respond to more of your post, but I am time constrained for the moment.

Originally posted by scratchmane

Originally posted by adjensen

Originally posted by scratchmane
Is there any scenario where war is avoidable?

The last one, the non-Abrahamic "messiah" figure (as opposed to the actual religious title of Messiah,) would most likely be viewed by Christians as the antichrist, particularly if they exhibited supernatural qualities. The real question would be who would jump on the bandwagon of the messiah, what their stated intentions were, and how much their actions fit into the generally accepted pattern of the End Times in the Christian faith.

In this case, war is not inevitable -- it depends on the circumstances.

My highlighting. Should anyone exhibit supernatural powers, would they by default be considered evil? This is part of my query. I want to respond to more of your post, but I am time constrained for the moment.

No, like I said, it kind of depends on the circumstances.

Consider, for example, that someone comes along who claims that he has the ability to cure all disease, convert energy to matter on a whim (thus ending the largest source of conflict for humans) and do other acts which seem supernatural. If they said "here you go, do well, and we'll see you later", there would be some who viewed this suspiciously, but most would say "thanks" and enter a Golden Age.

If, on the other hand, they said "you can have this stuff, but only if you worship me as your God", well, that wouldn't be viewed quite so favourably. You'd have people saying "sure, worship you, who cares -- I just want to be disease free and not hungry" and others saying "this is obviously the antichrist/Satan/some evil overlord who must be resisted."

War likely in the second instance, unlikely in the first.

(For clarification, I would say that "supernatural" would include technology which is so vastly superior to ours, or which violates known physical laws, so as to appear magical, divine, or otherwise supernatural. So the character above could be a spirit, an alien, a time traveller, and so on.)

Originally posted by scratchmane

Lets say a Messianic person returns. What will happen?

If the person supports christianity, muslims and possibly jews will categorize the person as the anti-christ.
If the person supports Islam, jews and christians will categorize the person as the anti-christ.
If the person supports Judaism, muslims and christians will categorize the person as the anti-christ.

None of the above will happen, because all religions on the face of the planet are false.

What will happen in our future is that religion will slowly ebb away and our future selves will look back at today and say "What barbaric stupidity"

Korg.

reply to post by Korg Trinity

None of the above will happen, because all religions on the face of the planet are false.

I agree.

Religion is Man made.

Perhaps it was originally inspired by real events we struggled to understand (and from which there has arisen some beneficial philosophy, but more often some of us saw an opportunity for control so professed contrived revelations as to the truth) but ultimately, in my opinion, who or whatever inspired these faiths did not do so knowingly.

That scenario makes far more sense to me than a God who sits back and lets terrible things happen. If there is no God as we are led to understand the concept, then the world makes sense.

It also disallows the possibility of a Messiah figure coming to save us. We are, like it or not, on our own.

However, I do not think that just because we have devised religions to explain our past and control (unsuccessfully) our behaviour, that there isn’t a possibility of some spiritually advanced other or others being able to successfully show us just what life and all its connotations is really all about.

They just better be really persuasive, that’s all. Really persuasive.

What would happen is ignorance, people would turn away and follow their leader.
He would not be understood nor being seen as the one.
Also people would not listen because what he will bring is not what many expect of him.
How can he? a story goes about Jesus bringing the kingdom of heaven and people were stunned to see there was no gold, no nothing but pure inner salvation which they did not understood.
So off they go, to find what they seek.

reply to post by scratchmane


How about this for a plot twist...

What if He comes and supports NO MAN MADE ORGANIZATION, RELIGION OR GROUP?

What if He comes and says the same thing that was said almost 2000 years ago namely,
"KEEP MY COMMANDMENTS"...

Now there's a novel idea huh?

reply to post by scratchmane


When will we learn that it's up to us, and that any solution to our collective problems must arise as an emergent phenomenon, and therefore come from everywhere and all directions as a result of a fundamental shift in our understanding of the nature of reality and our place in the creation..?

Why do we need a global political hiearchy, capped with some messianic figure, to "save the world", that just doesn't make any sense, because by its very nature, it is disempowering for the individual, who must operate him/herself as the emergent wellspring and the fountain of a new creation. In other words, we're IT, and therefore let us set to work plowing the field and tending to the garden with everything we've got.

Regarding Jesus and the Jews, Jesus was himself a Jewish Rabbi (teacher) who clearly fulfilled the law and the prophets' inspired revelations, and if that weren't enough, how could his passion and the cross and the tomb, etc. not be identified for the Great Work it represents? In other words, how could the Jews not see that the cross of Jesus Christ represents the twin pillars in the Temple of Soloman ie: Severe Justice on the one hand and Tender Mercy on the other? No other interpretation can be drawn, unless the whole thing is considered meaningless, including the whole breadth of Jewish history which culminated in that expression or manifestation. Thus any Jewish Messiah figure would be anti-Christ, or, Christ returned - yet, he himself indicated that he would come not in human form, or from any particular direction, and neither by expectation.

We need to either jettison all religion, or integrate it's teaching and revelation, fully "grok" it, and move on and into a new day and a new age, an age of reason AND faith, an age of matter AND spirit.

And if any new teacher were to happen along, he would surely be well aquainted with all the religious traditions and have a very deep understanding of modern science, and therefore, any such personage would likely be a quantum physicist who has "grokked" the metaphysical implications of the new science and who is then able to link everything together in one new grand revelation, which will empower the individual and reveal our true nature as co-creators and as active historical participants by the neccessity of free will choice.

Would such a person take the "helm" of a global pyramidal political hieararchy at the apex of a "New World Order"? I don't think so, I don't think that's where we'd find him. Such a person would have no use for temporal power, neither would they see the merit in creating what would amount to a global dictatorship under which real and authentic freedom would be nothing but an illusion. No such person would attempt to climb that pyramid or allow himself to be crowned "king of the world", because the greatest among us, will be the servant of all. The data is in on political hierarchies, but the emergent, bottom up phenomenon of the lone individual taking his place as being "at cause" and then inspiring his fellows to do the same, that, ladies and gentlemen, has yet to be seen, and still resides in a future realm of limitless possibility...

I say that the "high priests" and the "keepers of the flame" at least here on earth, have dropped the ball, we now "know them by their fruits". The data on that idea, is in now, and we don't need to see any more of that.

Unity in diversity, is the new creed, and therefore absolute religious and non-religious tolerance must be required, while retaining an open mind free from any sort of contemptuous bias, prior to investigation.

But to those of you who just say that all religion is just "mad made" and throw it all out without looking into it, without even considering it, well, that is just plain ignorant and imho, foolish. Surely the ancients have something of value to teach us, and some of the information might even have spilled over from the last golden age, as a pointer for us, as we approach the end of this particular chapter of history.

P.S. No I'm not really a time traveller. I just believe that everything must come from the future, and be drawn into the present from that creative space. It's a metaphysical truth, that's all.

P.S.S. Re: Jesus. "Our liberation is God's compulsion" (C.S. Lewis). Therefore, if we missed it, and failed to grok the significance of what was rendered there, for our grokking and benefit, then I'm pretty sure God will keep on trying to get through to us, one way or another, and for that he uses people, people like you and me, and together we will perform miraculous feats and perform the Great Work, WE, not any one >I< among us, to "prove himself". It is an ignorant and foolish generation which asks for a sign!

What the heck is wrong with us and with our thinking?

Step one I think must involve therefore, deprogramming from this BS materialist monist worldview that people who cannot begin fathom a mysterious, interdependant universal frame of reference, like to subscribe to. And of course the concept of God as a bearded man in the sky isn't workable either, and believe it or not, that is NOT what enlightened Christians believe anyway, again, that's just as ASSUMPTION, and you know what happens when people ASSUME.., and so I humbly ask all self professed atheists to refrain from that viewpoint, it's down right INSULTING to the intellect and the imagination of those of us courageous enough to try to work out a rational basis for faith in a supreme being and creator God.

Which is exactly why it won't happen that way. The religious take their scriptures far to literally. When it is really a metaphor for what is supposed to happen in the inside of the individual. For many the messiah has come in the form of enlightenment (Christ consciousness, Nirvana, or what ever you prefer to call it) about the bigger picture. I am not just talking about just a spiritual enlightenment but a also a knowledge or realization that the dead forms of religion are not the be all end all etc.

Many have entered the age of peace on the inside but it will take time before enough people enter until it manifests on the outside in our society. As for the Messiah figure what will most likely happen is a great teacher or teachers will come forth and gather many to thier teachings but not accept the old forms of worship toward them but will seem quite normal in most respects except the light they teach will stand out to those who seek and are moving ahead who confirm the truth of thier teachings within and not just blindly accept them. When enough are gathered they will form a new society or a shinning city on a hill so to speak. They will coexist with the old form of society but have power not to be destroyed. As people see the new society and it's benefits more and more will seek to join it or emulate it and the old society will gradually die out of attrition.

Many of the great teachers/philosophers of our history have been sent to prepare us for such a time and I think we are at the beginning now as more and more reject the ridged dogmas of religion. However we have a ways to go as we see. it never happens as fast as we would like but never the less there are many good signs of more and more people waking up to one degree or another.

reply to post by hawkiye

I give you a star for that. You "grok".

What's needed I think, imho, are OPEN MINDS, as a starting point, from everyone. We must stop assuming that we already know, when anything and everything that needs to be understood, exists, at least at first, in the realm of an unknown unknown, or what we don't even know yet, that we don't know. What we THINK we already know, represents just an infintessimal slice in the circular pie of what can be known, if that..

Then, with open minds, our minds can be informed by the spirit, which contains all wisdom, all intelligence and all information, and our quantum mind (as opposed to our classical mind, which is nothing but an elaborate recording device) was MADE to recieve and even transmit that kind of knowledge and information.

So to begin with most of us need to unlearn everything we thought we already new, and clear the mind and then open it up to new revelation, including the possibility that the various religious traditions might have something of value to say about the true nature of reality and our position within it, since it's possible that certain enlightened people from our distant past gained access to this realm of knowledge and awareness and intelligence, and who were completely transformed as a result. Anything is possible..

Hey Thanks for all the replies. ADjensen, you've made me positive about this scenario

Originally posted by scratchmane
Is there any scenario where war is avoidable?

edit on 9-11-2010 by scratchmane because: Extended title

A good question obviously made by a thinking and observant mind.

There is a way that war would be avoidable. But the likelihood of that happening is very small.

I'll give you an example.

In the Bible there is a tiny book called Jonah. It is referred to as one of the "minor" books or prophets, in that it is so small. You could probably read it in fifteen minutes or so.

The story is simple the people of a city called Nineveh are very bad people, so bad that God has finally decided that he will not tolerate their wickedness anymore. Now, they don't worship Jehovah, or know him. But Jehovah does send his prophet, Jonah, a witness of Jehovah, from Israel to go to Nineveh and prophecy that in 40 days God will overthrow the city because of its badness.

Now Jonah doesn't want to go, and disobeys, etc. but finally he does go and walks through the city foretelling its coming destruction stating as commanded. Guess what happened? Everyone from the king of the city down to the children all repented of their bad ways and prayed to Jehovah to stop the destruction of the city.

Guess what God did? He decided not to destroy them because he saw that they had a change of heart. Now Jonah got really mad at God for this because well, Jonah said it was going to happen and then God didn't make it happen.

So God taught Jonah a lesson. Jonah went out into the wilderness and sat waiting to watch the destruction of the city, and God made a plant grow that would give him shade (a bottlegord plant) overnight. Well he liked that shade. Well the next night God sent a worm to kill the plant and the next day Jonah was cursing the plant because the shade had vanished and he was upset it no longer protected him from the sun. Now here is what God says, and it ends the small book of Jonah:


(Jonah 4:9-11) . . .And God proceeded to say to Jo′nah: “Have you rightly become hot with anger over the bottle-gourd plant?” At that he said: “I have rightly become hot with anger, to the point of death.” 10 But Jehovah said: “You, for your part, felt sorry for the bottle-gourd plant, which you did not toil upon or make get big, which proved to be a mere growth of a night and perished as a mere growth of a night. 11 And, for my part, ought I not to feel sorry for Nin′e‧veh the great city, in which there exist more than one hundred and twenty thousand men who do not at all know the difference between their right hand and their left, besides many domestic animals?”

What is the point? If everyone on earth turned away from doing bad, God would avert the foretold coming "end" or final showdown called Armageddon. In fact scripture indicates this:

(2 Peter 3:9) Jehovah is not slow respecting his promise, as some people consider slowness, but he is patient with YOU because he does not desire any to be destroyed but desires all to attain to repentance.

Now in this our day, Jehovah has a witness he has sent to the people of the nations to warn them of this coming destruction. All that is required to avert the coming war (which will not be manmade, but rather a war between God and man) is to repent and stop working and acting wickedly.

Now some people scoff and even claim that God has never been invovled in mankind's affairs but if one studies the Bible they will learn that is very far from the truth.

We are told that there was once a world so violent and wicked that God destroyed it, and saved only one righteous family by means of an ark through a global flood.

In many of the prophets God sends out warnings to many nations, including the Egyptians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Persians, and others that he is going to overthrow them because of their violence, and he did every time.

There were people who were so terribly wicked and bad God did not only foretell their overthrow but said he would wipe them clean off the face of the earth. And there are indeed nations you read about in the Bible that no longer exist today, such as the Amalakites.

The world today is full of violence. And we are told God does not change. Now there is a tipping point at which he always intervenes. And it is dreadfully apparent that mankind is reaching it as a whole.

To avert Armageddon, ALL mankind would have to repent of all the violence going on earthwide. Now if that happened, the end could be averted. Will it happen?

You take a guess.

Originally posted by Calender All that is required to avert the coming war (which will not be manmade, but rather a war between God and man) is to repent and stop working and acting wickedly....

The world today is full of violence. To avert Armageddon, ALL mankind would have to repent of all the violence going on earthwide. Now if that happened, the end could be averted.

It is not merely a question of the violation of the Moral Law and the problem of violence.

The conflict at this point is over Doctrinal Truth, and the contradiction of that Doctrinal Truth which is at the origin of the violence.

That Doctrinal Truth is that the Doctrine of "resurrection" is based upon the Revelation of the Memory of Creation and the revelation of the memories of previous lives.

And it is the doctrine that the "resurrection" is, instead, the doctrine of the physical raising of a dead body from the grave which is at the origin of the conflict and violence between Jews, Christians and Muslims.

Mi cha el