Does Satan Exist?

[OctoberGirl]

[quote]buffalokilla wrote:
Zap Branigan wrote:
Of course he exists. He plays hockey.

Funny note on that - I think it was in 2001 that he was on the most penalized team in hockey, but he himself had the fewest penalty minutes in the league.

Apparently Satan really is behind all the bad things in the world.

Like slashing.

To those who actually are, STOP BLAMING GOD AND SOME DEVIL! It’s people like you who are holding back moral progress.
[/quote]

How is his name pronounced? I have never met or heard or anyone with that last name! Although I did meet a husband and wife who actually changed their names to Nick and Nikki Danger. so sad.

[vroom]

Of course Santa exists… idiots.

[haney1]

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
haney1 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
haney1 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
haney,

You may say you are not getting pissy, but it is how you are coming across.

How many times do I have to state my intentions?

I wasn’t trying to interpret your intentions.
[/quote]
I never said you were. The fact that I stated them should have cleared up your misconceptions about my tone. sadly you keep talking about how it is coming across.

You said
“Are you seriously trying to quantify your intelligence against jsbrooks on an internet forum?”

I said your intelligence.

And I adressed the other part of your reference. If it was about me only than you should have just stated

“Are you seriously trying to quantify your intelligence on an internet forum?”

I addressed all of your context. not part of it.

again, you misunderstand what is typed.

Look I am not interested in ignoring parts of your post because that isn’t what you meant to say. Say what you mean, and leave out the unimportant parts. If JSbrook was unimportant to your point than don’t include him in it.

you referenced the Dead Sea Scrolls as a resource. It is an incomplete and homogenized resource. The public only knows what the project wants them to know. The Dead Sea Scrolls been tooled. My point being, it is a manufactured truth.

That is pure speculation, and would not stand up.

I don’t need a book to know what is right for me.

what does that have to do with anything I have said? I didn’t know I was telling anyone to believe the Bible. In fact I have not claimed inerrency. I am merely arguing for the integrity of the transmitted text.

So I am calling red harring on this statement.

I actually am not certain what you mean by smoking gun.

I.E. there is a big cover up of all of Christiandom since we don’t know what the vatican is hiding.

you asked me to prove the Vatican had secret texts.

Actually no I didn’t.

You said
“There are many secret texts that will never be available to the public.”

I said
“such as?”
My question was specifically what documents are hidden that we should be concerned with? If you couldn’t name any than you are arguing from silence.

My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.

Then you are arguing from silence. Which is a weak argument for Christians and non believers a like.

That was me commenting on your post, not discussing with you.

right…
I was having a discussion with several others about the texts.
You “comment” on my post concerning that topic.
You then make “comments” addressing parts of the text ie the dss.

So what are we doing now? Do you make it a habit to argue semantics?

Wealthy have had all the power and advantages for all times. Wealth has influenced policies, morals, and religious institutions in all times.

Not true. There are many religions that in their infancy weren’t influence by wealth at all. In fact I believe buhhism still isn’t influenced by wealth.

I believe power corrupts and I would think those in the Council of Nicea were influenced in thier choices by their personal prejudices and circumstances.

Actually the text that were voted on we do know about since they are written in the notes. Please do tell me though which gnostic pieces you think should have been included? That the powers that be excluded because of corruption.

We only know of books that they mentioned. We will never know of texts, writings, beliefs that they shut down or destroyed without public notice.

Actually the church was known to keep many documents that contradicted orthodoxy. I will say the few existing text that we have that are gnostic I must say are laughable at best. for instance the gospel of Thomas says that women must become men to go to Heaven.

My beliefs are my own. They need nothing else to stand on. My God is my God. No one can say it is false.

That does not exempt your God from being false though.

You can believe me to be incorrect but your believing so does not diminish my God or my belief. That is what makes my statement true.

I never said you were incorrect. I pointed out though that your logic leaves God as Amoral. Which allows anyone to be right in their own God’s eyes.

Truth is only the truth as we know it today.

Your own statement of reading everything makes it an impossibility for you to ever know what is your truth if you are going to base your truth on reading everything. That won’t ever happen.

Hence my comment about always pursuing truth in the matter. I can however read all the material that is available to me on this subject and determine truth. Which was the point in saying that you have to read all the evidence on the subject.

I can find truth for me.

perhaps the subject of the OP. the child molester, and murders found their own truth? Are you willing to accept that?

Truth isn’t relative as you are claiming.

doesn’t matter by now does it?

Is that your way of saying you have your perceptions and have no interest in changing them?

you said, “you assume.” You have no idea what I assume.

Assume = judge? funny I thought it meant I was taking liberty in understanding your point.

sure… you textual critic snob you.

ah yes. the ad hom…

you got me there, I probably am coming across that way.

Honesty but no apology? Atleast I did apologize, or try to say that isn’t what I am trying to do.

How I read it was you trying to get into a pissing contest. It is all that perception thing.

And I hope that by the third post I have cleared it up. Other wise I think we are in a pissing contest over semantics.

No. I am not arguing anything about secret texts. I am stating that basing a belief on a tooled document wherein knowledge perhaps pertaining to its foundations are not shared, it might not be a document with the highest integrity.

Yes, but that is speculation. Similiar to why won’t the government unlock the JFK files.

To comment on the actual thread topic, Satan the ideal, was created by the Church. He was not mentioned as an evil being and punisher of the sinners until much later.

I don’t think the scriptures actually present Satan as a punisher of sinners. God is always the judge. Most references in the Bible refer to satan as a deceiver, or an adversary to God. As I stated in a previous post He played a very insignificant role in ancient hebrew theology.

I am open to the belief in God, Gods, other spiritual beliefs. I have reservations about some of the scriptures which is why I try to stay open.

I am open to which is why I stated I am looking for truth, and I think that is what Christianity should be about. After all Paul states.

1Co 15:17 And if Christ is not raised, your faith is foolish; you are yet in your sins.
1Co 15:18 Then also those that fell asleep in Christ were lost.
1Co 15:19 If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.

So I am always open to truth.

I don’t know if Satan is used to try to scare people into doing good “or else.” Jews don’t do Heaven or Hell because you should be your best self on earth because it is the right thing to do, not because you fear punishment.

actually jews to believe in they go Heaven.

If there is a good and wonderful God then I question why is there evil.

But then I also question why you have to accept Jesus as a savior? I have met wonderful Bhuddists who truly lead exemplary lives and I find it hard to believe they are going to burn in Hell for their beliefs. And what about natives in Papua New Guinea? Are they going to live their lives and burn because they may not have even heard of God?

I have avoided these topics for a reason. I will state though that the idea of flames in Hell with people burning is a false premise in my understanding of the scriptures. However as I beginning to understand Hell I think it is much more terrifying than that. If I told you…
You probably would think it sounds better than flames (I thought the same at first, but now I am very troubled by the concept).

I am surely off topic. My apologies.

ehh… technically every religious post in this thread is OT.

at this point perhaps we can move past our “perceptions” of each others posts and have an interesting conversation.

[Hanzo]

[quote]Winger11 wrote:
“The Problem of Evil” is the offical name for this question, or the Epicurean riddle, (If there is a God that is omniscient and benificent why is there evil/suffering,etc?) and it’s a pretty good beginning for an argument against the existence of God. I think it goes like this:

If God exists, then God is omnipotent, omniscient, and morally perfect.

If God is omnipotent, then God has the power to eliminate all evil.

If God is omniscient, then God knows when evil exists.

If God is morally perfect, then God has the desire to eliminate all evil.

Evil exists.

If evil exists and God exists, then either God doesn’t have the power to eliminate all evil, or doesn’t know when evil exists, or doesn’t have the desire to eliminate all evil.

Therefore, God doesn’t exist
(From the Stamford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)

I suppose the title of the thread is in fact does SATAN exist but as we’ve seen, he plays hockey.[/quote]

This is a straw man argument against God. It is essentially an argument against the attributes of God rather than an argument against his existence i.e it is claimed thatGod lacks this attribute therefore he doesn’t exist. Even so, the existence of evil doesn’t necessariy undermine the attributes of God. Theodicy is a very long winded subject but suffice to say that man does not fully understand God’s intentions, nor do we know whether evil and despair may in fact lead to some distant good (the beatitudes come to mind).

[jtrinsey]

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
How is his name pronounced? I have never met or heard or anyone with that last name! Although I did meet a husband and wife who actually changed their names to Nick and Nikki Danger. so sad.

[/quote]

I believe that is Miroslav sha-TAN.

[Hanzo]

[quote]nephorm wrote:

But we could conceive of a Universe in which men become progressively more good as generations pass. “Ultimate good” is by definition fixed, but the most deficient good, or the worst evil, would become less and less distant from ultimate good on the continuum. There is no guarantee of an equal and opposite evil to oppose good. Absence of good isn’t evil anyway, if evil is an active force, and lack of good is merely impersonal.
[/quote]

Good and evil may in fact not be seperate qualities depending on how one view human nature. If as per the Hobbesian state of nature man is inherently selfish (and thus potentially) then good is the quality that allows man to override their inherent bias towards selfishness and do good onto unto others. Doing evil then is a reversion to the original state of nature which in our current day and age appears to be evil. As such evil is the failure to adhere to the law of man (and goodness)by reverting back to the state of nature.

Evil is pretty much a societal construct to quantify the lack of goodness of an action. An action can only be measured in terms of relative goodness where one action can only be said to be less good than other. Indifference to one’s fellow man is not an active force yet it is often considered to be a form of evil as it is less good than the least good “good act”.

Goodness then can include both good and evil, which are social expressions used to quantify actions as either being good or lacking good.

[OctoberGirl]

[quote]haney1 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
haney1 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
haney1 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
haney,

You may say you are not getting pissy, but it is how you are coming across.

How many times do I have to state my intentions?

I wasn’t trying to interpret your intentions.

I never said you were. The fact that I stated them should have cleared up your misconceptions about my tone. sadly you keep talking about how it is coming across.

You said
“Are you seriously trying to quantify your intelligence against jsbrooks on an internet forum?”

I said your intelligence.

And I adressed the other part of your reference. If it was about me only than you should have just stated

“Are you seriously trying to quantify your intelligence on an internet forum?”

I addressed all of your context. not part of it.

again, you misunderstand what is typed.

Look I am not interested in ignoring parts of your post because that isn’t what you meant to say. Say what you mean, and leave out the unimportant parts. If JSbrook was unimportant to your point than don’t include him in it.

you referenced the Dead Sea Scrolls as a resource. It is an incomplete and homogenized resource. The public only knows what the project wants them to know. The Dead Sea Scrolls been tooled. My point being, it is a manufactured truth.

That is pure speculation, and would not stand up. [/quote]

It is not. The project already stated that Dead Sea Scrolls were not shared with the public in their entirety.

[quote]I don’t need a book to know what is right for me.

what does that have to do with anything I have said? I didn’t know I was telling anyone to believe the Bible. In fact I have not claimed inerrency. I am merely arguing for the integrity of the transmitted text.

So I am calling red harring on this statement.[/quote]

It isn’t a red herring. I mentioned the Bible in referenced as a resource. It is a tooled document. The integrity of the document is relevant to the foundation.

[quote]I actually am not certain what you mean by smoking gun.

I.E. there is a big cover up of all of Christiandom since we don’t know what the vatican is hiding. [/quote]

I don’t have a lot of faith in the Vatican.

[quote]you asked me to prove the Vatican had secret texts.

Actually no I didn’t.

You said
“There are many secret texts that will never be available to the public.”

I said
“such as?”
My question was specifically what documents are hidden that we should be concerned with? If you couldn’t name any than you are arguing from silence.[/quote]

How do you know what you don’t know? The Vatican has stated there are secret texts. That means they are SECRET. I have no idea what the names of the secret texts are.

“My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.” As I stated previously.

[quote]My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.

Then you are arguing from silence. Which is a weak argument for Christians and non believers a like.

That was me commenting on your post, not discussing with you.

right…
I was having a discussion with several others about the texts.
You “comment” on my post concerning that topic.
You then make “comments” addressing parts of the text ie the dss.

So what are we doing now? Do you make it a habit to argue semantics?[/quote]

I didn’t consider that an argument of semantics. But it is a dead issue.

[quote]Wealthy have had all the power and advantages for all times. Wealth has influenced policies, morals, and religious institutions in all times.

Not true. There are many religions that in their infancy weren’t influence by wealth at all. In fact I believe buhhism still isn’t influenced by wealth.[/quote]

Bhuddha was a wealthy prince.

[quote]I believe power corrupts and I would think those in the Council of Nicea were influenced in thier choices by their personal prejudices and circumstances.

Actually the text that were voted on we do know about since they are written in the notes. Please do tell me though which gnostic pieces you think should have been included? That the powers that be excluded because of corruption.[/quote]

You are basing it on what information has been provided from a council of wealthy, privileged men. Perhaps you believe that all there was to consider has been made public. I don’t believe that the council referenced every writing put forth for consideration.

[quote]We only know of books that they mentioned. We will never know of texts, writings, beliefs that they shut down or destroyed without public notice.

Actually the church was known to keep many documents that contradicted orthodoxy. I will say the few existing text that we have that are gnostic I must say are laughable at best. for instance the gospel of Thomas says that women must become men to go to Heaven. [/quote]

There are crazy canons in the Bible that was constructed. Again, this is a tooled document.

But I don’t think we are debating that.

This too is a dead issue.

[quote]My beliefs are my own. They need nothing else to stand on. My God is my God. No one can say it is false.

That does not exempt your God from being false though.[/quote]

My God is not for you to judge. My God if I have one, is my own. You can claim my God, or anyone else’s God to be false, but that doesn’t mean it is so.

[quote]You can believe me to be incorrect but your believing so does not diminish my God or my belief. That is what makes my statement true.

I never said you were incorrect. I pointed out though that your logic leaves God as Amoral. Which allows anyone to be right in their own God’s eyes. [/quote]

my logic does not leave God as immoral or amoral. You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.

[quote]Truth is only the truth as we know it today.

Your own statement of reading everything makes it an impossibility for you to ever know what is your truth if you are going to base your truth on reading everything. That won’t ever happen.

Hence my comment about always pursuing truth in the matter. I can however read all the material that is available to me on this subject and determine truth. Which was the point in saying that you have to read all the evidence on the subject.[/quote]

That may be how you find your truth, it may not be the same for others.

[quote]I can find truth for me.

perhaps the subject of the OP. the child molester, and murders found their own truth? Are you willing to accept that? [/quote]

I don’t have to accept or agree with anyone else’s truth. I can judge a crime. People justify their actions and not all actions rise to the level of felony. Do I judge their truth? Would it matter? No. I can judge the actions in relation to law.

Truth isn’t relative as you are claiming.

I eat meat. Not all cultures do because their truth is all living creatures are sacred. That is their truth. It is relative to cultures, ethnicities, social strata, sex, and age just to name a few factors.

[quote]doesn’t matter by now does it?

Is that your way of saying you have your perceptions and have no interest in changing them?

you said, “you assume.” You have no idea what I assume.

Assume = judge? funny I thought it meant I was taking liberty in understanding your point.

sure… you textual critic snob you.

ah yes. the ad hom…

you got me there, I probably am coming across that way.

Honesty but no apology? Atleast I did apologize, or try to say that isn’t what I am trying to do. [/quote]

what do I have to apologize for?

[quote]How I read it was you trying to get into a pissing contest. It is all that perception thing.

And I hope that by the third post I have cleared it up. Other wise I think we are in a pissing contest over semantics.

No. I am not arguing anything about secret texts. I am stating that basing a belief on a tooled document wherein knowledge perhaps pertaining to its foundations are not shared, it might not be a document with the highest integrity.

Yes, but that is speculation. Similiar to why won’t the government unlock the JFK files.[/quote]

It isn’t speculation. The Bible was created by men. Completely true. Men are subjective. Completely true.

[quote]To comment on the actual thread topic, Satan the ideal, was created by the Church. He was not mentioned as an evil being and punisher of the sinners until much later.

I don’t think the scriptures actually present Satan as a punisher of sinners. God is always the judge. Most references in the Bible refer to satan as a deceiver, or an adversary to God. As I stated in a previous post He played a very insignificant role in ancient hebrew theology.

I am open to the belief in God, Gods, other spiritual beliefs. I have reservations about some of the scriptures which is why I try to stay open.

I am open to which is why I stated I am looking for truth, and I think that is what Christianity should be about. After all Paul states.

1Co 15:17 And if Christ is not raised, your faith is foolish; you are yet in your sins.
1Co 15:18 Then also those that fell asleep in Christ were lost.
1Co 15:19 If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.

So I am always open to truth. [/quote]

I am open to differing opinions. I have my own truths and leave others to theirs.

[quote]I don’t know if Satan is used to try to scare people into doing good “or else.” Jews don’t do Heaven or Hell because you should be your best self on earth because it is the right thing to do, not because you fear punishment.

actually jews to believe in they go Heaven.[/quote]

Jews do not believe in a Christian heaven.

[quote]If there is a good and wonderful God then I question why is there evil.

But then I also question why you have to accept Jesus as a savior? I have met wonderful Bhuddists who truly lead exemplary lives and I find it hard to believe they are going to burn in Hell for their beliefs. And what about natives in Papua New Guinea? Are they going to live their lives and burn because they may not have even heard of God?

I have avoided these topics for a reason. I will state though that the idea of flames in Hell with people burning is a false premise in my understanding of the scriptures. However as I beginning to understand Hell I think it is much more terrifying than that. If I told you…
You probably would think it sounds better than flames (I thought the same at first, but now I am very troubled by the concept).[/quote]

I didn’t understand what you are saying here. Do you mean you don’t believe unbelieving innocents will go to Hell or do you believe the acceptance of Christ is imperative to salvation?

I am in awe of those with pure faith. It is a wonderful thing to see no matter the faith.

I believe there are more decent and good people than cruel and criminal.

[quote]I am surely off topic. My apologies.

ehh… technically every religious post in this thread is OT.[/quote]

So you don’t think the intention of the OP was to actually discuss whether Satan is the influence of evil?

[quote]at this point perhaps we can move past our “perceptions” of each others posts and have an interesting conversation.
[/quote]

I believe in Santa.

[nephorm]

My argument was with the deduction that ultimate good entails ultimate evil.

[quote]Hanzo wrote:
Good and evil may in fact not be seperate qualities depending on how one view human nature. If as per the Hobbesian state of nature man is inherently selfish (and thus potentially) then good is the quality that allows man to override their inherent bias towards selfishness and do good onto unto others. Doing evil then is a reversion to the original state of nature which in our current day and age appears to be evil. As such evil is the failure to adhere to the law of man (and goodness)by reverting back to the state of nature. [/quote]

Hobbes has a greater problem with good and evil than you indicate here. As someone who believed in the mechanical operation of the soul, good and evil were fit only to be defined axiomatically and not discovered dialectically.

And we don’t gain anything by the redefinition. Hobbes gains a framework from which he can construct principles of government with mathematical precision. He has a practical reason to do what he does.

At any rate, arguing with Protagoras that “man is the measure of all things” is attractive and easy. As Pascal said, “evil is easy, and has infinite forms.” It ignores that human beings are served better by certain ways of life than others, and that there might be an end or perfection to man. It bypasses the heavy lifting of trying to figure out what objective morality might be.

Evil is pretty much a societal construct to quantify the lack of goodness of an action. An action can only be measured in terms of relative goodness where one action can only be said to be less good than other. Indifference to one’s fellow man is not an active force yet it is often considered to be a form of evil as it is less good than the least good “good act”.

Your definition is circular. Evil is anything that isn’t good. Ex: Indifference to suffering can be said to be evil, because it has no element of good.
Yes, I qualified the example to include “to suffering,” because without a little specificity the example really loses any meaning whatsoever.
At any rate, there is still the problem of actions that are actively perverse, such as the cast of characters in the OP. Perhaps I just don’t see what you’re getting at.

[quote]
Goodness then can include both good and evil, which are social expressions used to quantify actions as either being good or lacking good. [/quote]

So my next question to you should be “is the Good one?” And then we start a Platonic dialog. If you’re making this argument seriously, as opposed to just putting it forth as an alternative, I think you really ought to reexamine your first principles.

[nephorm]

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
I eat meat. Not all cultures do because their truth is all living creatures are sacred. That is their truth. It is relative to cultures, ethnicities, social strata, sex, and age just to name a few factors.[/quote]

OctoberGirl: I usually enjoy your posts. Please don’t take this as an attack.

Please don’t play games with the language. The truth must be things that are, and perceptions are those things we think might be. The truth is that some cultures perceive all living creatures to be sacred. And the reality, the truth, might be that they are or are not. But that is not given to us to know.

Perception is not reality. Perception is our opinion of reality. Yes, the truth is so difficult to get to; but claiming that it is all relative, eventually one has only to look forward to an abyss, or cleverness used felicitously.

[haney1]

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
It is not. The project already stated that Dead Sea Scrolls were not shared with the public in their entirety.
[/quote]

So you are saying that we don’t have all of the dss. hebrew OT text? I admit they have not released all of the documents, but those documents are claimed to be about the lifestyle, and rules of the essenes. So unless you can prove that there is still some missing text that pertains to the OT then it is speculation on your part.

It isn’t a red herring. I mentioned the Bible in referenced as a resource. It is a tooled document. The integrity of the document is relevant to the foundation.

It is a red harring. I never said you needed it. It was a comment that came out of know where.

I don’t have a lot of faith in the Vatican.

Ok. but that doesn’t prove there was any tampering. They don’t say why they won’t release them.

How do you know what you don’t know? The Vatican has stated there are secret texts. That means they are SECRET. I have no idea what the names of the secret texts are.

“My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.” As I stated previously.

You do realize they could also just be documents that have no purpose or impact on Christiandom. It is an argument from silence.

Bhuddha was a wealthy prince.

outside of him name someone in that religion who had money that is a major influence. Most buddhist monks give up all the pleasures of life. Muhumad was poor. Jesus was poor, the apostle were poor.

You are basing it on what information has been provided from a council of wealthy, privileged men. Perhaps you believe that all there was to consider has been made public. I don’t believe that the council referenced every writing put forth for consideration.

once again that is an argument from silence. If I did that to prove Christianity I would have atheist coming out of the wood work.

There are crazy canons in the Bible that was constructed. Again, this is a tooled document.

Then please tell me what you think needed to be included. There are still plenty of gnostic documents out there.
If you are going to make the assertion then please tell me what is missing.

My God is not for you to judge. My God if I have one, is my own. You can claim my God, or anyone else’s God to be false, but that doesn’t mean it is so.

that doesn’t make it not so either.

my logic does not leave God as immoral or amoral. You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.

No the problem is I do get what you’re saying, but I think you are missing my point.

If God is “You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.”

Then for each person it is subjective to what they believe. So God is subjected to the moral’s that the individual wants to attribute to Him. There for God as a whole to all would be Amoral.

If God is all things to all people then He is indifferent to all things.

That may be how you find your truth, it may not be the same for others.

look truth is truth. If it wasn’t then the statement 2+2 = 5 because that is truth to me would be correct.

I don’t have to accept or agree with anyone else’s truth. I can judge a crime. People justify their actions and not all actions rise to the level of felony. Do I judge their truth? Would it matter? No. I can judge the actions in relation to law.

You don’t have to accept truth or facts or anything else. That however doesn’t diminish the correctness of certain said statements, and the falsehood of others.

I eat meat. Not all cultures do because their truth is all living creatures are sacred. That is their truth. It is relative to cultures, ethnicities, social strata, sex, and age just to name a few factors.

That is a belief and doesn’t fit in the same category as truth.

Yes, but that is speculation. Similiar to why won’t the government unlock the JFK files.

It isn’t speculation.

It would be speculation. You are saying that documents which neither of have seen (which may or may not have to do with the subject at hand) are reason to doubt a document.

The Bible was created by men.

The early church ong before the council of nicea revered the scriptures as inspired by God not man.

The Hebrews thought the same thing.

To comment on the actual thread topic, Satan the ideal, was created by the Church. He was not mentioned as an evil being and punisher of the sinners until much later.

I don’t think the scriptures actually present Satan as a punisher of sinners. God is always the judge. Most references in the Bible refer to satan as a deceiver, or an adversary to God. As I stated in a previous post He played a very insignificant role in ancient hebrew theology.

Jews do not believe in a Christian heaven.

never said they did.

I didn’t understand what you are saying here. Do you mean you don’t believe unbelieving innocents will go to Hell or do you believe the acceptance of Christ is imperative to salvation?

Define unbelieving innocents.
Define what would qualify someone to be considered innocent. I know what the Bible qualifies, and I’m sure your definition is different

I am in awe of those with pure faith. It is a wonderful thing to see no matter the faith.

I’m not. pure faith lacks reason, which leads to religion.

I believe there are more decent and good people than cruel and criminal.

I would agree that most are descent, but by whose standards?

So you don’t think the intention of the OP was to actually discuss whether Satan is the influence of evil?

HH? who knows what his intentions in the thread are.

[/quote]
I believe in Santa. [/quote]
This is why relative truth can be dangerous.

[AJL_1240]

You may say you are not getting pissy, but it is how you are coming across.

How many times do I have to state my intentions?

I wasn’t trying to interpret your intentions.

I never said you were. The fact that I stated them should have cleared up your misconceptions about my tone. sadly you keep talking about how it is coming across.

You said
“Are you seriously trying to quantify your intelligence against jsbrooks on an internet forum?”

I said your intelligence.

And I addressed the other part of your reference. If it was about me only than you should have just stated

“Are you seriously trying to quantify your intelligence on an internet forum?”

I addressed all of your context. not part of it.

again, you misunderstand what is typed.

Look I am not interested in ignoring parts of your post because that isn’t what you meant to say. Say what you mean, and leave out the unimportant parts. If JSbrook was unimportant to your point than don’t include him in it.

you referenced the Dead Sea Scrolls as a resource. It is an incomplete and homogenized resource. The public only knows what the project wants them to know. The Dead Sea Scrolls been tooled. My point being, it is a manufactured truth.

That is pure speculation, and would not stand up.

It is not. The project already stated that Dead Sea Scrolls were not shared with the public in their entirety.

I don’t need a book to know what is right for me.

what does that have to do with anything I have said? I didn’t know I was telling anyone to believe the Bible. In fact I have not claimed inerrency. I am merely arguing for the integrity of the transmitted text.

So I am calling red herring on this statement.

It isn’t a red herring. I mentioned the Bible in referenced as a resource. It is a tooled document. The integrity of the document is relevant to the foundation.

I actually am not certain what you mean by smoking gun.

I.E. there is a big cover up of all of Christiandom since we don’t know what the vatican is hiding.

I don’t have a lot of faith in the Vatican.

you asked me to prove the Vatican had secret texts.

Actually no I didn’t.

You said
“There are many secret texts that will never be available to the public.”

I said
“such as?”
My question was specifically what documents are hidden that we should be concerned with? If you couldn’t name any than you are arguing from silence.

How do you know what you don’t know? The Vatican has stated there are secret texts. That means they are SECRET. I have no idea what the names of the secret texts are.

“My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.” As I stated previously.

My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.

Then you are arguing from silence. Which is a weak argument for Christians and non believers a like.

That was me commenting on your post, not discussing with you.

right…
I was having a discussion with several others about the texts.
You “comment” on my post concerning that topic.
You then make “comments” addressing parts of the text ie the dss.

So what are we doing now? Do you make it a habit to argue semantics?

I didn’t consider that an argument of semantics. But it is a dead issue.

Wealthy have had all the power and advantages for all times. Wealth has influenced policies, morals, and religious institutions in all times.

Not true. There are many religions that in their infancy weren’t influence by wealth at all. In fact I believe buhhism still isn’t influenced by wealth.

Bhuddha was a wealthy prince.

I believe power corrupts and I would think those in the Council of Nicea were influenced in thier choices by their personal prejudices and circumstances.

Actually the text that were voted on we do know about since they are written in the notes. Please do tell me though which gnostic pieces you think should have been included? That the powers that be excluded because of corruption.

You are basing it on what information has been provided from a council of wealthy, privileged men. Perhaps you believe that all there was to consider has been made public. I don’t believe that the council referenced every writing put forth for consideration.

We only know of books that they mentioned. We will never know of texts, writings, beliefs that they shut down or destroyed without public notice.

Actually the church was known to keep many documents that contradicted orthodoxy. I will say the few existing text that we have that are gnostic I must say are laughable at best. for instance the gospel of Thomas says that women must become men to go to Heaven.

There are crazy canons in the Bible that was constructed. Again, this is a tooled document.

But I don’t think we are debating that.

This too is a dead issue.

My beliefs are my own. They need nothing else to stand on. My God is my God. No one can say it is false.

That does not exempt your God from being false though.

My God is not for you to judge. My God if I have one, is my own. You can claim my God, or anyone else’s God to be false, but that doesn’t mean it is so.

You can believe me to be incorrect but your believing so does not diminish my God or my belief. That is what makes my statement true.

I never said you were incorrect. I pointed out though that your logic leaves God as Amoral. Which allows anyone to be right in their own God’s eyes.

my logic does not leave God as immoral or amoral. You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.

Truth is only the truth as we know it today.

Your own statement of reading everything makes it an impossibility for you to ever know what is your truth if you are going to base your truth on reading everything. That won’t ever happen.

Hence my comment about always pursuing truth in the matter. I can however read all the material that is available to me on this subject and determine truth. Which was the point in saying that you have to read all the evidence on the subject.

That may be how you find your truth, it may not be the same for others.

I can find truth for me.

perhaps the subject of the OP. the child molester, and murders found their own truth? Are you willing to accept that?

I don’t have to accept or agree with anyone else’s truth. I can judge a crime. People justify their actions and not all actions rise to the level of felony. Do I judge their truth? Would it matter? No. I can judge the actions in relation to law.

Truth isn’t relative as you are claiming.

I eat meat. Not all cultures do because their truth is all living creatures are sacred. That is their truth. It is relative to cultures, ethnicities, social strata, sex, and age just to name a few factors.

doesn’t matter by now does it?

Is that your way of saying you have your perceptions and have no interest in changing them?

you said, “you assume.” You have no idea what I assume.

Assume = judge? funny I thought it meant I was taking liberty in understanding your point.

sure… you textual critic snob you.

ah yes. the ad hom…

you got me there, I probably am coming across that way.

Honesty but no apology? At least I did apologize, or try to say that isn’t what I am trying to do.

what do I have to apologize for?

How I read it was you trying to get into a pissing contest. It is all that perception thing.

And I hope that by the third post I have cleared it up. Other wise I think we are in a pissing contest over semantics.

No. I am not arguing anything about secret texts. I am stating that basing a belief on a tooled document wherein knowledge perhaps pertaining to its foundations are not shared, it might not be a document with the highest integrity.

Yes, but that is speculation. Similiar to why won’t the government unlock the JFK files.

It isn’t speculation. The Bible was created by men. Completely true. Men are subjective. Completely true.

To comment on the actual thread topic, Satan the ideal, was created by the Church. He was not mentioned as an evil being and punisher of the sinners until much later.

I don’t think the scriptures actually present Satan as a punisher of sinners. God is always the judge. Most references in the Bible refer to satan as a deceiver, or an adversary to God. As I stated in a previous post He played a very insignificant role in ancient hebrew theology.

I am open to the belief in God, Gods, other spiritual beliefs. I have reservations about some of the scriptures which is why I try to stay open.

I am open to which is why I stated I am looking for truth, and I think that is what Christianity should be about. After all Paul states.

1Co 15:17 And if Christ is not raised, your faith is foolish; you are yet in your sins.
1Co 15:18 Then also those that fell asleep in Christ were lost.
1Co 15:19 If in this life only we have hope in Christ, we are of all men most miserable.

So I am always open to truth.

I am open to differing opinions. I have my own truths and leave others to theirs.

I don’t know if Satan is used to try to scare people into doing good “or else.” Jews don’t do Heaven or Hell because you should be your best self on earth because it is the right thing to do, not because you fear punishment.

actually jews to believe in they go Heaven.

Jews do not believe in a Christian heaven.

If there is a good and wonderful God then I question why is there evil.

But then I also question why you have to accept Jesus as a savior? I have met wonderful Bhuddists who truly lead exemplary lives and I find it hard to believe they are going to burn in Hell for their beliefs. And what about natives in Papua New Guinea? Are they going to live their lives and burn because they may not have even heard of God?

I have avoided these topics for a reason. I will state though that the idea of flames in Hell with people burning is a false premise in my understanding of the scriptures. However as I beginning to understand Hell I think it is much more terrifying than that. If I told you…
You probably would think it sounds better than flames (I thought the same at first, but now I am very troubled by the concept).

I didn’t understand what you are saying here. Do you mean you don’t believe unbelieving innocents will go to Hell or do you believe the acceptance of Christ is imperative to salvation?

I am in awe of those with pure faith. It is a wonderful thing to see no matter the faith.

I believe there are more decent and good people than cruel and criminal.

I am surely off topic. My apologies.

ehh… technically every religious post in this thread is OT.

So you don’t think the intention of the OP was to actually discuss whether Satan is the influence of evil?

at this point perhaps we can move past our “perceptions” of each others posts and have an interesting conversation.

I believe in Santa.
haney1 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
It is not. The project already stated that Dead Sea Scrolls were not shared with the public in their entirety.

So you are saying that we don’t have all of the dss. hebrew OT text? I admit they have not released all of the documents, but those documents are claimed to be about the lifestyle, and rules of the essenes. So unless you can prove that there is still some missing text that pertains to the OT then it is speculation on your part.

It isn’t a red herring. I mentioned the Bible in referenced as a resource. It is a tooled document. The integrity of the document is relevant to the foundation.

It is a red harring. I never said you needed it. It was a comment that came out of know where.

I don’t have a lot of faith in the Vatican.

Ok. but that doesn’t prove there was any tampering. They don’t say why they won’t release them.

How do you know what you don’t know? The Vatican has stated there are secret texts. That means they are SECRET. I have no idea what the names of the secret texts are.

“My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.” As I stated previously.

You do realize they could also just be documents that have no purpose or impact on Christiandom. It is an argument from silence.

Bhuddha was a wealthy prince.

outside of him name someone in that religion who had money that is a major influence. Most buddhist monks give up all the pleasures of life. Muhumad was poor. Jesus was poor, the apostle were poor.

You are basing it on what information has been provided from a council of wealthy, privileged men. Perhaps you believe that all there was to consider has been made public. I don’t believe that the council referenced every writing put forth for consideration.

once again that is an argument from silence. If I did that to prove Christianity I would have atheist coming out of the wood work.

There are crazy canons in the Bible that was constructed. Again, this is a tooled document.

Then please tell me what you think needed to be included. There are still plenty of gnostic documents out there.
If you are going to make the assertion then please tell me what is missing.

My God is not for you to judge. My God if I have one, is my own. You can claim my God, or anyone else’s God to be false, but that doesn’t mean it is so.

that doesn’t make it not so either.

my logic does not leave God as immoral or amoral. You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.

No the problem is I do get what you’re saying, but I think you are missing my point.

If God is “You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.”

Then for each person it is subjective to what they believe. So God is subjected to the moral’s that the individual wants to attribute to Him. There for God as a whole to all would be Amoral.

If God is all things to all people then He is indifferent to all things.

That may be how you find your truth, it may not be the same for others.

look truth is truth. If it wasn’t then the statement 2+2 = 5 because that is truth to me would be correct.

I don’t have to accept or agree with anyone else’s truth. I can judge a crime. People justify their actions and not all actions rise to the level of felony. Do I judge their truth? Would it matter? No. I can judge the actions in relation to law.

You don’t have to accept truth or facts or anything else. That however doesn’t diminish the correctness of certain said statements, and the falsehood of others.

I eat meat. Not all cultures do because their truth is all living creatures are sacred. That is their truth. It is relative to cultures, ethnicities, social strata, sex, and age just to name a few factors.

That is a belief and doesn’t fit in the same category as truth.

Yes, but that is speculation. Similiar to why won’t the government unlock the JFK files.

It isn’t speculation.

It would be speculation. You are saying that documents which neither of have seen (which may or may not have to do with the subject at hand) are reason to doubt a document.

The Bible was created by men.

The early church ong before the council of nicea revered the scriptures as inspired by God not man.

The Hebrews thought the same thing.

To comment on the actual thread topic, Satan the ideal, was created by the Church. He was not mentioned as an evil being and punisher of the sinners until much later.

I don’t think the scriptures actually present Satan as a punisher of sinners. God is always the judge. Most references in the Bible refer to satan as a deceiver, or an adversary to God. As I stated in a previous post He played a very insignificant role in ancient hebrew theology.

Jews do not believe in a Christian heaven.

never said they did.

I didn’t understand what you are saying here. Do you mean you don’t believe unbelieving innocents will go to Hell or do you believe the acceptance of Christ is imperative to salvation?

Define unbelieving innocents.
Define what would qualify someone to be considered innocent. I know what the Bible qualifies, and I’m sure your definition is different

I am in awe of those with pure faith. It is a wonderful thing to see no matter the faith.

I’m not. pure faith lacks reason, which leads to religion.

I believe there are more decent and good people than cruel and criminal.

I would agree that most are descent, but by whose standards?

So you don’t think the intention of the OP was to actually discuss whether Satan is the influence of evil?

HH? who knows what his intentions in the thread are.

I believe in Santa.
This is why relative truth can be dangerous.

I love when these long arguments get quoted so I have to scroll down for an hour to get to the next post.

[jsbrook]

[quote]haney1 wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
haney1 wrote:
jsbrook wrote:
Misleading, what?

misleading in the sense that you assume I didn’t use primary sources as well. I assumed your class looked at primary sources.

I didn’t criticize your study or methodology. I simply I said I put my faith in the primary sources which I’ve read and not in lectures or secondary materials. As I took it you where criticizing my study and calling IT inferior.

all primary sources used in class room or personal study usually come from a text book rather than the original letter/essay the primary author wrote.

I seriously doubt you read the entire notes of the nicean council. as well as Eusebius, Justin martyr. Or wonder why Marcion or many of the early “heretics” rewrote the original NT to suite their philosphy. Seriously we are talking about almost four centuries of history. to claim to have put your faith in primary sources is to imply that you have weighed all the evidence. Something I doubt happened in a college classroom.

I could be wrong you could be an avid student like myself who is always studying this. I will admit I have not read all the primaries mostly because I don’t read greek fluently. So I am forced to trust secondaries in many cases. As I am sure you are forced to as well.

Uh, they were the actual primary sources.

Did I say they weren’t???
ah no this is what I said

“I assumed your class looked at primary sources.”

Some of it was excerpts, yes. I didn’t read everything in it’s entirety. And reproductions. I highly doubt you read many/any of the original scrolls in their entirety either.

Congratulations you confirmed something I said in my post!

I said
" I will admit I have not read all the primaries mostly because I don’t read greek fluently."

meaning not all have been translated yet, or if they have I have not got to them yet.

What I read was still primary sources because they are in the words of the individuals and participants. Letters from the Pope, St Augustine, and yes, the notes of Nicean council [if not the entire thing], etc…

Great! I have not said you haven’t. So what is the point of this paragraph?

So this post was a counter argument to what?

Um, you wrote wrote: “all primary sources used in class room or personal study usually come from a text book rather than the original letter/essay the primary author wrote”

And my post was trying to say [surely it did say at least in part] that these sources did not come from a textbook [we did not use a textbook] and WERE the original letters and essays of the primary author [yes translated to english and occasionally excerpted but MOSTLY/PREDOMINANTLY in their entirety]. Anyhow, I thought we weren’t going to argue…Let’s let this die now.

[mertdawg]

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
You are basing it on what information has been provided from a council of wealthy, privileged men. Perhaps you believe that all there was to consider has been made public. I don’t believe that the council referenced every writing put forth for consideration.
[/quote]

Which members of the Nicaean council were wealthy? There was no feudal system at that time. The actual representatives there were basically property-less monastics who gave away everything in their lifetime. Priests and Bishops did not rise to the level of the nobility until 1100+.

[OctoberGirl]

[quote]nephorm wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
I eat meat. Not all cultures do because their truth is all living creatures are sacred. That is their truth. It is relative to cultures, ethnicities, social strata, sex, and age just to name a few factors.

OctoberGirl: I usually enjoy your posts. Please don’t take this as an attack.

Please don’t play games with the language. The truth must be things that are, and perceptions are those things we think might be. The truth is that some cultures perceive all living creatures to be sacred. And the reality, the truth, might be that they are or are not. But that is not given to us to know.

Perception is not reality. Perception is our opinion of reality. Yes, the truth is so difficult to get to; but claiming that it is all relative, eventually one has only to look forward to an abyss, or cleverness used felicitously. [/quote]

I can see what you are saying. But I think you can also see what I am getting at.

Who decides what the absolute truth is?

And I don’t know who is able to winnow perception out of their reality.

How do you do that?

[OctoberGirl]

[quote]haney1 wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
It is not. The project already stated that Dead Sea Scrolls were not shared with the public in their entirety.

So you are saying that we don’t have all of the dss. hebrew OT text? I admit they have not released all of the documents, but those documents are claimed to be about the lifestyle, and rules of the essenes. So unless you can prove that there is still some missing text that pertains to the OT then it is speculation on your part.[/quote]

My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.

[quote]I don’t have a lot of faith in the Vatican.

Ok. but that doesn’t prove there was any tampering. They don’t say why they won’t release them. [/quote]

And why won’t they? Religion was created to keep the poor happy with their lot in life. But again, this is off topic.

[quote]How do you know what you don’t know? The Vatican has stated there are secret texts. That means they are SECRET. I have no idea what the names of the secret texts are.

“My point being, we don’t know what we don’t know.” As I stated previously.

You do realize they could also just be documents that have no purpose or impact on Christiandom. It is an argument from silence.[/quote]

They could be, but then why not release them?

[quote]Bhuddha was a wealthy prince.

outside of him name someone in that religion who had money that is a major influence. Most buddhist monks give up all the pleasures of life. Muhumad was poor. Jesus was poor, the apostle were poor. [/quote]

You brought up Bhuddha. But those higher in the priest classes if you look back, have always had creature comoforts. The Pope is wearing gold, jewels and designer shoes.

[quote]You are basing it on what information has been provided from a council of wealthy, privileged men. Perhaps you believe that all there was to consider has been made public. I don’t believe that the council referenced every writing put forth for consideration.

once again that is an argument from silence. If I did that to prove Christianity I would have atheist coming out of the wood work. [/quote]

I have my reservations about the creation of the Bible, you don’t appear to. So I don’t think we are going to come to an understanding on this.

[quote]There are crazy canons in the Bible that was constructed. Again, this is a tooled document.

Then please tell me what you think needed to be included. There are still plenty of gnostic documents out there.
If you are going to make the assertion then please tell me what is missing.[/quote]

Why, that wouldn’t be for me to decide? my issue isn’t just what they declared they weren’t included, although why not the Book of Mary? But that there are writings that weren’t considered by men. This also seems to be an agree to disagree thing. Done.

[quote]my logic does not leave God as immoral or amoral. You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.

No the problem is I do get what you’re saying, but I think you are missing my point.

If God is “You still don’t get it that God is an intimate and personal experience and not for you to judge.”

Then for each person it is subjective to what they believe. So God is subjected to the moral’s that the individual wants to attribute to Him. There for God as a whole to all would be Amoral.

If God is all things to all people then He is indifferent to all things.[/quote]

only in your interpretation. Another agree to disagree thing.

[quote]That may be how you find your truth, it may not be the same for others.

look truth is truth. If it wasn’t then the statement 2+2 = 5 because that is truth to me would be correct. [/quote]

so you can now make an equation for spiritual truth? This is not going anywhere because I fundamentally do not agree with you. My belief system is different than yours. My truth in what is spiritual and related to a God is different than yours.

[quote]I don’t have to accept or agree with anyone else’s truth. I can judge a crime. People justify their actions and not all actions rise to the level of felony. Do I judge their truth? Would it matter? No. I can judge the actions in relation to law.

You don’t have to accept truth or facts or anything else. That however doesn’t diminish the correctness of certain said statements, and the falsehood of others. [/quote]

I have no idea what you were trying to say here.

[quote]I eat meat. Not all cultures do because their truth is all living creatures are sacred. That is their truth. It is relative to cultures, ethnicities, social strata, sex, and age just to name a few factors.

That is a belief and doesn’t fit in the same category as truth. [/quote]

we are talking spiritual truth here. That is based on belief.

[quote]Yes, but that is speculation. Similiar to why won’t the government unlock the JFK files.

It isn’t speculation.

It would be speculation. You are saying that documents which neither of have seen (which may or may not have to do with the subject at hand) are reason to doubt a document. [/quote]

I believe it is a reason to consider when contemplating the document.

[quote]The Bible was created by men.

The early church ong before the council of nicea revered the scriptures as inspired by God not man.

The Hebrews thought the same thing.[/quote]

And when were the books of the Bible written? Were they contemporaneous?

[quote]I didn’t understand what you are saying here. Do you mean you don’t believe unbelieving innocents will go to Hell or do you believe the acceptance of Christ is imperative to salvation?

Define unbelieving innocents.
Define what would qualify someone to be considered innocent. I know what the Bible qualifies, and I’m sure your definition is different[/quote]

Hadn’t I mentioned the natives of Papua New Guinea? Suppose they live their lives as good people among their people. They have no notice of God, no belief in God. Will they burn?

[quote]I am in awe of those with pure faith. It is a wonderful thing to see no matter the faith.

I’m not. pure faith lacks reason, which leads to religion.[/quote]

Well thanks for the input. That was me merely stating something personal I have enjoyed in others of pure faith. It is a wonderful and comforting thing to see. I think zealotry is the downfall of religion, not those of faith.

[quote]I believe there are more decent and good people than cruel and criminal.

I would agree that most are descent, but by whose standards? [/quote]

again just a personal observance of mine. I hadn’t actually meant for it to be a subject of debate.

[quote]I believe in Santa.
This is why relative truth can be dangerous.[/quote]

uh that was humor.

But please, if you want to attack the Santa statement and turn it into a dangerous statement, that might be humorous.

Did you want to get back on topic now?

We won’t agree on anything. So this is pointless

[OctoberGirl]

[quote]mertdawg wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
You are basing it on what information has been provided from a council of wealthy, privileged men. Perhaps you believe that all there was to consider has been made public. I don’t believe that the council referenced every writing put forth for consideration.

Which members of the Nicaean council were wealthy? There was no feudal system at that time. The actual representatives there were basically property-less monastics who gave away everything in their lifetime. Priests and Bishops did not rise to the level of the nobility until 1100+. [/quote]

They were bishops. They were well educated and they had wealth, whether from their church or families. Also, many bishops came from wealthy families.

[Beowolf]

[quote]PGJ wrote:
Headhunter wrote:
CELTIC-DEVIL wrote:
THis is a terrible thing for sure,

But I’m not so sure the recent trend of posting up human tradgedies in relation to child molestation is a good one.

It’s a terrible crime for sure, but there have been quite a few threads lately on basically the same thing. Sure, we need to be aware of the dangers out there and I can understand why people feel angry about these crimes…i feel angry… but i gotta wonder what the point of all these similar threads is…

The more people that are aware of this real tragedy in our society, the more likely it is that it will be dealt with. Most of us don’t want to think about such things, I know. But it won’t go away by simply ignoring it or being oblivious.

Great point. Satan does exist. People want to sugar coat that fact by calling it a “psychological disorder”. It’s pure evil. Plain and simple. Ignoring it won’t make it go away. Giving it a clinical name only justifies it. Just like some people are filled with the Holy Spirit, some people are filled with the spirit of Satan.

I expect the athiests to chime in very soon with mounds of scientific evidence to disprove this.
[/quote]

We don’t seek to justify it. I think calling it Satanic possession justifies it much more than saying he was just a sick, disturbed fucking person.

Christians use the term Satan to define evil, but some use it as an excuse for evil deeds. In your interpretation, you are using it similarly to how atheists would just say “Wow, what a sick fuck.”.

[JeffR]

No.

JeffR

[nephorm]

[quote]OctoberGirl wrote:
I can see what you are saying. But I think you can also see what I am getting at.
[/quote]

I see what you’re getting at, but I think it is a quagmire. Relativism is an abyss.

Who decides what the absolute truth is?

Short answer: no one decides it. It is, independent of decision. So there are some things that we can reasonably determine are beyond our rational powers (“Quid sit deus?”), at least in their entirety. And there are other things that are well within our grasp. At least the ardent pursuit of truth is honest and careful, and still allows us to make moral decisions that are based on more than personal preference.

And I don’t know who is able to winnow perception out of their reality.

How do you do that?

Very carefully.

[OctoberGirl]

[quote]nephorm wrote:
OctoberGirl wrote:
I can see what you are saying. But I think you can also see what I am getting at.

I see what you’re getting at, but I think it is a quagmire. Relativism is an abyss.[/quote]

Relativism exists and is inherent in the dealings of life.

[quote]Who decides what the absolute truth is?

Short answer: no one decides it. It is, independent of decision. So there are some things that we can reasonably determine are beyond our rational powers (“Quid sit deus?”), at least in their entirety. And there are other things that are well within our grasp. At least the ardent pursuit of truth is honest and careful, and still allows us to make moral decisions that are based on more than personal preference.[/quote]

There are always some who believe they have the answers. There are some who seek the answers.

[quote]And I don’t know who is able to winnow perception out of their reality.

How do you do that?

Very carefully.[/quote]

I have not been able to set aside my perceptions, my influences. Wouldn’t that be an artificial foundation for my reasoning if I did?

The way to reason is to compare with what you know, experience, observe. I don’t think you are suggesting that I turn to someone else’s truth as stated and accept that truth?

If nothing else this topic the satan and the perception, is a good example of how things differ among people.