Do you believe in god? the gods discussion thread

doublelongdaddy;424857 said:

I have thought it out and I still stand by it; Better to believe in God than not, if it turns out he does not exist you lose nothing, if he is real you gain everything...I will play it safe and praise my God.

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K, then you didn't read my response as it invalidates the logic of this argument-the argument only works if there are 2 choices... that's more like economics lol, the reality is there are 1000s which means the argument won't hold water.

Crazy Doc;424861 said:

K, then you didn't read my response as it invalidates the logic of this argument-the argument only works if there are 2 choices... that's more like economics lol, the reality is there are 1000s which means the argument won't hold water.

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Dude, Just because you think this was does not make it correct, it makes it a personal choice. I still stand by my logic 100%

doublelongdaddy;424862 said:

Dude, Just because you think this was does not make it correct, it makes it a personal choice. I still stand by my logic 100%

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I'm not arguing with anyone's personal faith-as I've said everyone has a monopoly on their own faith. But the argument is flawed if we are speaking of logic without faith. Because there are 1000s of gods, the odds are - you don't have the right one, and will incur his punisHydromaxent, just like the atheist. With that in mind-the atheist makes more sense because both guys are fucked, but the atheist never wasted his time.

Regarding the burning monk - Shocking but in a respectful way. These people are renown for the abilities they have. The fact his heart remained intact afterwards says something to me! That did NOT happen by coincidence! A sign, message to those around and they knew(know) it. Peace to him.

What I will say regarding the 1000's of gods is its all swings & roundabouts. Depends on what religion you are because the Islamic faith isnt going to entertain the gods in the Sikh faith and vice versa with the other religions. They keep to their own teachings and belief systems. These 1000's of gods are again mans interpretation of gods, not saying they are not gods but who's to say they are not all working onm behalf of a more superior force anyway? these 1000's of gods could be all the same god but the different cultures and regions have a spin to how 'it' would look and act.

So in truth 1000's of gods could be brought down to 100's of gods and even less. If it were to be 1000's of gods anyhow it doesn't matter because they still have power even if it doesn't exist because of the energy building over the years from the prayers and worshipping has literally created deities that may have never existed. When I practised the occult years ago and my teacher at the time would tell me about how mans constant beliefs in gods would create an entity even if it wasn't in the first place ... believe so much and it will happen sort of thing and so over the millennia the constant minds have potentially done that ... this is hard to grasp for the average layman but in 'magic' its done all the time with what are called in Chaos Magic as Servitors.

Anyway according to the faith the god/s is different and for the most part perhaps lets say or suggest even that regions (Cultures) interpretation of the higher powers around them, that something has to be greater than them to worship. The Mayans and Aztec's sacrificed people to satisfy their gods and again they had 100's and 100's.

I find it difficult to put my full feelings into words because its complex but all the gods in all religions and other arts are essentially interlinked and related i.e. sun gods, moon gods etc The higher self to me is also strongly related to ones own Guardian Angel or Spirit Guide, but that's like religion and god if you believe in it albeit I have communicated directly with mine and anyone can with practice.

In the bible it does say about not taking up the names of other gods on ones lips, so its not encouraged in some faiths whereas in others they have multiple. Again back to the thread name do you believe in god? YES and I believe in many other spirits and deities around us. Allot of this I think with gods is very reletaed to the heavens and the universe in general. The planets have their own powers and can be used by special sigils and numbers used for 1000's and 1000's of years. They are like the moon and have influence on things here. I mention this because gods, universe, space, planets, time all are together for me and only now are we becommming more receptive to it ... quantum physics is explaining more and we start to scratch the surface ... Science will never accept god/s because it will never fully accept what cannot be seen but remember this ... what is seen is never eternal but what cannot be seen remains eternal forever! If you cannot see it does not mean it is not there ... again as humans we are simple in essence, we do not know allot really about the universe and think we know everything That we could even perhaps be the only life around ahhahahaahah what wank!!! who believes that needs to be shot, sorry but who is that niave? As humans on earth we have a purpose ... what? who knows YET ... the Dinosaurs were here before us what was their purpose? can it be deciphered? they were massive and roamed the earth but in the end they were destroyed by what many call an act of god! t

REDZULU2003;424873 said:

Regarding the burning monk - Shocking but in a respectful way. These people are renown for the abilities they have. The fact his heart remained intact afterwards says something to me! That did NOT happen by coincidence! A sign, message to those around and they knew(know) it. Peace to him.

What I will say regarding the 1000's of gods is its all swings & roundabouts. Depends on what religion you are because the Islamic faith isnt going to entertain the gods in the Sikh faith and vice versa with the other religions. They keep to their own teachings and belief systems. These 1000's of gods are again mans interpretation of gods, not saying they are not gods but who's to say they are not all working onm behalf of a more superior force anyway? these 1000's of gods could be all the same god but the different cultures and regions have a spin to how 'it' would look and act.

So in truth 1000's of gods could be brought down to 100's of gods and even less. If it were to be 1000's of gods anyhow it doesn't matter because they still have power even if it doesn't exist because of the energy building over the years from the prayers and worshipping has literally created deities that may have never existed. When I practised the occult years ago and my teacher at the time would tell me about how mans constant beliefs in gods would create an entity even if it wasn't in the first place ... believe so much and it will happen sort of thing and so over the millennia the constant minds have potentially done that ... this is hard to grasp for the average layman but in 'magic' its done all the time with what are called in Chaos Magic as Servitors.

Anyway according to the faith the god/s is different and for the most part perhaps lets say or suggest even that regions (Cultures) interpretation of the higher powers around them, that something has to be greater than them to worship. The Mayans and Aztec's sacrificed people to satisfy their gods and again they had 100's and 100's.

I find it difficult to put my full feelings into words because its complex but all the gods in all religions and other arts are essentially interlinked and related i.e. sun gods, moon gods etc The higher self to me is also strongly related to ones own Guardian Angel or Spirit Guide, but that's like religion and god if you believe in it albeit I have communicated directly with mine and anyone can with practice.

In the bible it does say about not taking up the names of other gods on ones lips, so its not encouraged in some faiths whereas in others they have multiple. Again back to the thread name do you believe in god? YES and I believe in many other spirits and deities around us. Allot of this I think with gods is very reletaed to the heavens and the universe in general. The planets have their own powers and can be used by special sigils and numbers used for 1000's and 1000's of years. They are like the moon and have influence on things here. I mention this because gods, universe, space, planets, time all are together for me and only now are we becommming more receptive to it ... quantum physics is explaining more and we start to scratch the surface ... Science will never accept god/s because it will never fully accept what cannot be seen but remember this ... what is seen is never eternal but what cannot be seen remains eternal forever! If you cannot see it does not mean it is not there ... again as humans we are simple in essence, we do not know allot really about the universe and think we know everything That we could even perhaps be the only life around ahhahahaahah what wank!!! who believes that needs to be shot, sorry but who is that niave? As humans on earth we have a purpose ... what? who knows YET ... the Dinosaurs were here before us what was their purpose? can it be deciphered? they were massive and roamed the earth but in the end they were destroyed by what many call an act of god! t

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Good stuff zulu, just one comment: Worship is not inherently to something greater than yourself. For example, in my faith-the "object of worship' is described as a mirror. And that is precisely what it is-a mirror to see one's life clearly. But it is still something I worship, even though it is me. If it's me, it cannot be higher than me.

Mine is not the only faith that would take exception to the "worship requires a higher power" claim. Just wanted to mention that. I would agree it is USUALLY the case, but not always.

Crazy Doc;424878 said:

Good stuff zulu, just one comment: Worship is not inherently to something greater than yourself. For example, in my faith-the "object of worship' is described as a mirror. And that is precisely what it is-a mirror to see one's life clearly. But it is still something I worship, even though it is me. If it's me, it cannot be higher than me.

Mine is not the only faith that would take exception to the "worship requires a higher power" claim. Just wanted to mention that. I would agree it is USUALLY the case, but not always.

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But worshiping yourself is still worship, which means your higher power is yourself.

doublelongdaddy;424879 said:

But worshiping yourself is still worship, which means your higher power is yourself.

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lol good one. Sorry, no higher powers here. If you speak Japanese to a British that doesn't know Japanese-not a word will make sense. That's where were at here. Unless you know something about a faith that lacks a higher power-you likely just won't get it.

Or, perhaps, the future self that you desire to become.
Or recognize that you need to become.
Advancement is always necessary.

doublelongdaddy;424879 said:

But worshiping yourself is still worship, which means your higher power is yourself.

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MAXAMEYES;424885 said:

Or, perhaps, the future self that you desire to become.
Or recognize that you need to become.
Advancement is always necessary.

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Wow.. we AGREE for once-on the last part, I don't think we're ever finished, there is no final goal. But I don't agree with the future part. It's a "here and now" thing and I've experienced it-a fundamental change in the self in a single instant. I would describe it more like "polishing my life", day after day.

As physical beings we have "time" to deal with, no getting around that. Spiritually, conceptually even, maybe not so much. But "the future" need only be a thought ahead.

Crazy Doc;424887 said:

Wow.. we AGREE for once-on the last part, I don't think we're ever finished, there is no final goal. But I don't agree with the future part. It's a "here and now" thing and I've experienced it-a fundamental change in the self in a single instant. I would describe it more like "polishing my life", day after day.

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MAXAMEYES;424890 said:

As physical beings we have "time" to deal with, no getting around that. Spiritually, conceptually even, maybe not so much. But "the future" need only be a thought ahead.

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I disagree-if time is infinite, then infinity is in the moment. Time is an illusion. Sure, you can start measuring something infinite-but you cannot finish and if it is infinite, all those measurements are meaningless. And if you live in the moment-you don't "deal with time" at all. Not saying I can live that statement, but it is how I would wish to live every moment, I can only count a few so far.

Time may be infinite, but we sure ain't.
And now there's a growing body of evidence, and argument, that "time" as we have known and defined it for ...well...just about ever, actualy just does not exist. Even Einstein observed that 2 hours with a pretty girl could seem like 10 minutes where 10 minutes on a hot stove could seem like 2 hours.

I like Steven Wright's take on it: Time is Gods way of keeping everything from happening all at once.

Like most things, for each individual it's a matter of perspective and definition.

Crazy Doc;424891 said:

I disagree-if time is infinite, then infinity is in the moment. Time is an illusion. Sure, you can start measuring something infinite-but you cannot finish and if it is infinite, all those measurements are meaningless. And if you live in the moment-you don't "deal with time" at all. Not saying I can live that statement, but it is how I would wish to live every moment, I can only count a few so far.

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MAXAMEYES;424942 said:

Time may be infinite, but we sure ain't.
And now there's a growing body of evidence, and argument, that "time" as we have known and defined it for ...well...just about ever, actualy just does not exist. Even Einstein observed that 2 hours with a pretty girl could seem like 10 minutes where 10 minutes on a hot stove could seem like 2 hours.

I like Steven Wright's take on it: Time is Gods way of keeping everything from happening all at once.

Like most things, for each individual it's a matter of perspective and definition.

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Agreed, also I'd point out that a lot of what I'm saying is Idealism, but Idealism that I fully believe. I'm not saying it's easy to live it, it's damn near impossible-but the correct path SHOULD be difficult, not easy. I care about THIS world, not the next. And that is not because of lack of faith in the next world-that is irrelevant, I simply believe that THIS is the "pure land", for purity is in the mind, not some distant environment.

Turnover;424894 said:

View attachment 23617

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Yup

MAXAMEYES;417322 said:

I just read back a little...Krispin; thought that little clown-fish was fins up in the tank by now.

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lol that is funny, what is wrong with some people ? I want to ban him.

doublelongdaddy;424843 said:

In my opinion it is smart to believe in God because if you don't and he is real it would really suck when you pass I would rather have faith and play it safe.

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It's like the lotto. You can't get saved if ya don't play.

The thought manifests as the word. The word manifests as the deed. The deed develops into habit. And the habit hardens into character. So watch the thought and its ways with care. And let it spring from love, born out of concern for all beings.

Buddha.

Do Buddhists Believe in God? -- by Kusala Bhikshu

Why is it... The Buddha never talked about the One God of the desert, the Judeo-Christian God? Does this mean that all Buddhists are atheists and don’t believe in God? Did the Buddha believe in God?

These are some of the questions I would like to try and answer today.

The Buddha was born 500 years before Christ, in what is now Nepal. His dad was a king, his mom was a queen, and his dad wanted him to take over the family business (the kingdom) when he got older.

The kind of world the Buddha was born into was magical. Everything seemed to be alive. The trees, mountains, lakes, and sky were living and breathing with a variety of gods in charge. If you needed rain you asked one god, if you needed it to stop raining you asked another. The priests of India did all the religious work, and got paid for it.

In India at the time of the Buddha you became a priest if you were born into the right family, and not because of the school you went to, or the grades you got.

There were other kinds of religious people as well.

Mendicants were men who left their family, friends, and jobs to find the answers to life. They did not live in homes or apartments, but lived under trees and in caves, and would practice meditation all day long. They wanted to really be uncomfortable, so they could understand what suffering was all about.

Many kinds of meditation were practiced by these mendicants. In Tranquility Meditation for instance, you think about just one thing, like looking at a candle or saying a word over and over. When the mind becomes focused in oneness, you experience a great peacefulness.

Even if the mendicants were sitting in the rain on a cold day, they were still content. They found in their meditation practice the essence of happiness.

Renunciation is when you give up all the things that make your life pleasant. Sometimes the people with money and power in India would buy a lot of stuff to make themselves happy and their lives more comfortable, thinking that happiness and comfort depended on what they owned.

When the mendicants could see their own suffering clearly, after many years of renunciation, they understood that happiness was not dependent on the things they owned, but the kind of life they lived.

Even all the gods in India could not end the suffering of one human being.

At the age of 29, the Buddha stopped praying to the gods to end his suffering and the suffering of others. He left his family and friends, went to the edge of the forest, took off all his clothes and jewelry, covered his naked body with rags of cloth, cut off his hair and started to meditate.

He became a mendicant, and It took him six years of hard work and much suffering, but in the end he was able to stop his suffering forever (Nirvana) and help others stop their suffering as well.

Did the Buddha believe in God, the One God of the desert, the God of the Christians, Jews and Muslims?

Well... No... He didn't... Monotheism (only one God) was a foreign concept to the Buddha, his world was filled with many gods. The creator god BraHydromaxa being the most important one.

At the time of the Buddha, the only people practicing the religion of the One God of the desert, were the Jews. Remember, it was still 500 years before Christ came into the world.

The Buddha never left India. The Buddha walked from village to village... In his entire lifetime he never went any further than 200 miles from his birthplace.

The Buddha never met a Jew... And because of this, he never said anything about the One God of the desert.

There is also nothing in the teachings of the Buddha that suggest how to find God or worship the god's of India, although the Buddha himself was a theist (believed in gods), his teachings are non-theistic.

The Buddha was more concerned with the human condition: Birth, Sickness, Old age, and Death. The Buddhist path is about coming to a place of acceptance with these painful aspects of life, and not suffering through them.

Please be clear on this point... The Buddha is not thought of as a god in Buddhism and is not prayed to. He is looked up to and respected as a great teacher, in the same way we respect Abraham Lincoln as a great president.

He was a human being who found his perfection in Nirvana. Because of his Nirvana, the Buddha was perfectly moral, perfectly ethical, and ended his suffering forever.

Does that mean that every Buddhist in the world is an atheist?

No!!! I have met a lot of Buddhists who believe in God. I have met a lot of Buddhists who don’t believe in God... And a lot of Buddhists just don’t know.

All three points of view are OK if you’re Buddhist because suffering is more important than God in Buddhism.

Sometimes a student will ask me how everything in this world got started... "If you don’t have God in Buddhism then who or what caused the universe?"

When the Buddha was asked how the world started, he kept silent. In the religion of Buddhism we don’t have a first cause, instead we have a never ending circle of birth and death. In this world and in all worlds, there are many beginnings and ends. The model of life used in Buddhism has no starting place... It just keeps going and going.

Now having said that... If you’re a Buddhist it’s OK to believe God was the first cause... It really doesn't go against the teachings of the Buddha, his focus was on suffering... It's also OK to believe science has the answer… Like the big bang theory, etc... Some Buddhist’s don’t even care how it all started, and that’s fine too. Knowing how the world started is not going to end your suffering, it’s just going to give you more stuff to think about.

I hope you can see that God is not what Buddhism is about... Suffering is... And if you want to believe in God, as some Buddhists do, I suppose it's OK. But, Buddhist's don't believe God can end suffering. Only the teaching's of the Buddha can help us end suffering through wisdom and the activity of compassion.

In his whole life and in all his teachings the Buddha never said anything about the One God of the desert.

Here is what the late Dr. Suzuki, one of the greatest teachers of Zen Buddhism, says about his concept of God: "If God after making the world puts Himself outside it, He is no longer God. If He separates Himself from the world or wants to separate Himself, He is not God. The world is not the world when it is separated from God. God must be in the world and the world in God."(