Zionist Christianity - a cautionary tale

reply to post by Perplexedandconfused

The term panentheism is new to me.

It was new to me too about a year ago. I didn't read those books though, just ruthlessly seized the word they coined.

Of greater importance I think is how either pantheism or panentheism differs radically from "Creator", which I would describe like this:

Creator:
The Great Big Man (GBM) stood in nothingness and out of nothing he caused all to be which has come to be. The GBM is not the creation, neither is he part of creation, neither is creation any part of him. Therefore, there is no relation with the GBM except that which he arbitrarily establishes.

The creatures have no idea what the GBM is or may want unless he gives them a book, or takes special people aside to instruct them as priests to teach the people. This becomes Theism. A hierarchical authoritarian system which leaves no individual freedom or relationship to the GBM apart from the book or priesthood.
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No Creator
The GBM who was an individual gave up being and became not. From what was, started to become what is. In the fullness of time (about 6 billion years) there came to be those who could appreciate participation in him who was and gave up being in order that all that lives could become and have life. And the life was the life shared with all living things.

The one who was, speaks not from himself, but rather speaks from one to another between those who became. The thoughts and ideas, they share, just as also their lives they share. For all comes from him who was, and yet is not. No particular book is required, neither a priesthood. To fellowship with those who are is also to fellowship with he who was.

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Like I said: the distinction between Creator - No Creator is of vastly more importance for world-views, and the kinds of societies that grow based on one or the other.

Originally posted by pthena
reply to post by Perplexedandconfused

The term panentheism is new to me.

It was new to me too about a year ago. I didn't read those books though, just ruthlessly seized the word they coined.

Of greater importance I think is how either pantheism or panentheism differs radically from "Creator", which I would describe like this:

Creator:
The Great Big Man (GBM) stood in nothingness and out of nothing he caused all to be which has come to be. The GBM is not the creation, neither is he part of creation, neither is creation any part of him. Therefore, there is no relation with the GBM except that which he arbitrarily establishes.

The creatures have no idea what the GBM is or may want unless he gives them a book, or takes special people aside to instruct them as priests to teach the people. This becomes Theism. A hierarchical authoritarian system which leaves no individual freedom or relationship to the GBM apart from the book or priesthood.
--------------------------------------------------
No Creator
The GBM who was an individual gave up being and became not. From what was, started to become what is. In the fullness of time (about 6 billion years) there came to be those who could appreciate participation in him who was and gave up being in order that all that lives could become and have life. And the life was the life shared with all living things.

The one who was, speaks not from himself, but rather speaks from one to another between those who became. The thoughts and ideas, they share, just as also their lives they share. For all comes from him who was, and yet is not. No particular book is required, neither a priesthood. To fellowship with those who are is also to fellowship with he who was.

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Like I said: the distinction between Creator - No Creator is of vastly more importance for world-views, and the kinds of societies that grow based on one or the other.

Thought provoking....No Creator ...is similar to non-duality or monism?

reply to post by Perplexedandconfused

Thought provoking....No Creator ...is similar to non-duality or monism?

The above cosmogonies were presented to demonstrate the difference between Creator and Not-creator. The difference between Monism and Duality, is slightly different. The below list shows a quest for the "primal element" Is it water or unknowable or air or fire or being.

Monism - Ancient Western philosophers
The following pre-Socratic philosophers described reality as being monistic:

Thales: Water.
Anaximander: Apeiron (meaning 'the undefined infinite'). Reality is some, one thing, but we cannot know what.
Anaximenes: Air.
Heraclitus: Change, symbolized by fire. (in that everything is in constant flux).
Parmenides: Being. Reality is an unmoving perfect sphere, unchanging, undivided. We say there are things that exist and things that don't exist; Parmenides wrote that there nothing doesn't exist, only existence does.

The above list seems so primitive to us now, us in the post modern age. It is obvious to us that duality is a major factor; As in: matter-energy, matter-dark matter, energy-dark energy, space-dark space(don't know if we know about the last). So introduce gender, femaleness and maleness to account for the origin.

Let the above told story of No Creator-GBM stand for Monism. Now here is Dualism: (note that physical attribute disappears, replaced with amorphous gender).

The PF(Primal Female) and the PM(Primal Male) came together to know one another. At climax they ceased to be (big bang?). And the rest pretty much goes on as the GBM (not creator) story above. Because the newly introduced duality is more difficult to put into a mythological story format, I wrote out the GBM, for the sake of simplicity. Lazy me!!

I still do think of Sky as Male and Earth as Female. Rain and evapo-transportation are pretty sexy. But then, I'm rather primitive minded.

Is this off-topic or what? When I look at it, it seems a curative to fights over stone temples, and animal sacrifices, and messiahs and fake messiahs and pretty much any theistic notions of future as predetermined in some prophecy or other.

Edit to add:

But then, on the other hand, if the Earth has reached a critical point, maybe, just maybe, it is time to flip it over.

Thus: Instead of Sky(male) supplying semen to Earth(female) the time has come for Sky(female) to provide the milk of the breast to Earth(male), for further development? Thus would be fulfilled the prophecy of the universe overturned! Yes, definitely something to be considered.

And the male now, is not the original Father, but rather the First Born Son, and the Father has retired. And the First Born Son is the Christ!

reply to post by pthena


more titillating thoughts....that take me in to unfamiliar but seemingly inherent places...where no man has taken me for a while...intriguing....I thank-you.

reply to post by pthena

Thus would be fulfilled the prophecy of the universe overturned!

Sorry to be playing catchup but what prophocey?
By the way thanks for breaking the definition down. Those terms are so knew.

LOTZA LUV
& Thxs for when ever you get time.

reply to post by Mividau

Sorry to be playing catchup but what prophocey?
By the way thanks for breaking the definition down. Those terms are so knew.

I was messing with the notion of things being predetermined in theistic systems of prophecy. So it was a joke.

It wasn't a prophecy, it was a tarot reading actually. It happened like this:

Many years ago, (1996), I lived and worked in a small retirement community. Evidently, on a hill nearby, atmospheric phenomena was known to occur, such as lights in the sky and such. This caught the attention of a UFOlogist, who promptly moved to my community, along with his wife.

He quickly set up night time excursions to the hill, as paid tour guide of course, while she did palmreadings and computer generated astrological natal charts. While they were getting their operation under way, he took part time work in the facility I worked at. That's where I made his acquaintance.

One night, he invited me over to his home for a potluck dinner, which was to be the people he was rounding up for a paid excursion to the hill. So I went to the potluck, brought a can of beans or something that bachelors are in the habit of showing up with at such gala occasions. That's when I met his wife, who proceeded to do a palmreading on me. Not much from that, so she invited me to return the next day for something more exciting.

The next day she brought out a brand new deck of tarot cards, with the book that came with it for interpretation. She shuffled the cards. I cut the deck. She asked me what layout I preferred. I told her a layout that I had heard of before. Then she laid out the cards. Her first reaction was shock. "Every one of these cards is a card of power! Do you know what the odds are on that?" And she started flipping through the book looking for the odds or something.

"I'll take it for granted that that doesn't happen often if ever", I replied. And then she started flipping through the book again to interpret the cards. "Don't bother." I said, "It's obvious to me. The only thing standing between me, and my heart's desire, is an up-side-down universe."

After 20 minutes of flipping through the book, she confirmed what I had said. Then her jaw dropped, and her eyes got very large, and she quietly asked, "Who are you?"

So you see. Calling it a prophecy was a bit of a joke.

As for the terms being new to you, I think it's a matter of would be paid gurus not being able to turn a profit from simple definitions.

reply to post by Perplexedandconfused
I should continue the story though.

It has been said, and written about, that a bride is being prepared for the Christ. It would be easy to assume some future age in which the Mother has retired, and matters resume as they were in the beginning, Christ above, Bride below.

But presently, the Christ and the Bride are indistinguishable, no clear demarcation between the one and the other, as both mature together under the Mother's nurture.

And when at last, they have reached the stage for marriage, will it matter even then? For as it is written, "The two become one flesh." And really, it will not matter which one is on top.

reply to post by pthena


Laughing....great story!

No Creator
The GBM who was an individual gave up being and became not. From what was, started to become what is. In the fullness of time (about 6 billion years) there came to be those who could appreciate participation in him who was and gave up being in order that all that lives could become and have life. And the life was the life shared with all living things.

The one who was, speaks not from himself, but rather speaks from one to another between those who became. The thoughts and ideas, they share, just as also their lives they share. For all comes from him who was, and yet is not. No particular book is required, neither a priesthood. To fellowship with those who are is also to fellowship with he who was.

John 4:24 God is spirit, and the people who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.

God made man in his image which is Spirit. Spirit has the ability to divide itself among all and in all. Jesus understood that all were "one" in Spirit and prayed that all would be one as he and Spirit were one that we may all be in unity. Will man ever awaken to realize that we are all one?

hmmm...if we are all one...are we all having incestuous relationships?

reply to post by Perplexedandconfused

hmmm...if we are all one...are we all having incestuous relationships?

A step up from bestiality,

But seriously: As far as the Spirit goes, would you share with perfect strangers what you deny your own family?

But the problem in the days of Jesus and extending still to this day is the unwillingness to share with the other. Therefore all the more significance that Jesus revealed all to the Samaritan woman, "Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks." This was after he had said, "You Samaritans worship what you do not know."

So two peoples with the same book, containing the same book-god, were unable to see themselves as one people. But the God who is spirit, and not bound in leather, can do what the "leather-bound" could never do. Bring all together in spirit and truth.

Originally posted by pthena
reply to post by Perplexedandconfused

hmmm...if we are all one...are we all having incestuous relationships?

A step up from bestiality,

Yikes!


But seriously: As far as the Spirit goes, would you share with perfect strangers what you deny your own family?

As far as the Spirit goes, I would deny no-one. The Spirit is not mine to with hold from anyone.

But the problem in the days of Jesus and extending still to this day is the unwillingness to share with the other. Therefore all the more significance that Jesus revealed all to the Samaritan woman, "Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks." This was after he had said, "You Samaritans worship what you do not know."

So two peoples with the same book, containing the same book-god, were unable to see themselves as one people. But the God who is spirit, and not bound in leather, can do what the "leather-bound" could never do. Bring all together in spirit and truth.

Indeed

reply to post by Perplexedandconfused
I dropped a bomb over at
Jesus said, "Away from me Satan...", therefore he is not Messiah
You might want to check it out.

reply to post by pthena


LOL, Jokes on me

I like the way you put our image of god and the true one in perspective.
The true one is not bound by our rules. Which I am slowly learning more and more about.
What is you're take on the Emerald Tablets. Sorry I asked, but I want the opinion of someone
who questions everything and allows their heart to guide them.

Thanks and when ever you're free.

P.s. Is that you're granddaughter? She is so adorable. My daughter asks everytime we see you're pic.

reply to post by Mividau

Emerald Tablets

I've heard of them once.

Yes, that is my granddaughter, for whom I am nanny. I don't spend all my time on line after all.