Free will and original sin

Cypress said:
Your monosyllabic responses and attempts at pithy retorts provide no indication you have any profound knowlege of scripture, theology" and Christian history.

At least Owl and Pendryn are capable of demonstrating they have thought this topic through
Click to expand...

They are capable of cut-n-paste directed dialogs which it s all well and good for their purposes.
I am aiming higher.
 
Celticguy said:
They are capable of cut-n-paste directed dialogs which it s all well and good for their purposes.
I am aiming higher.
Click to expand...
I have never seen you write more than three sentences of cogent English. In fact most of the time I ignore you because you are tepid, boring, and utterly mediocre.

You and a lot of conservatives assume it would be a monumental feat to write more than three sentences in lucid, reasoned, well spoken English. It is obvious Pendryn and Owl are typing their own words and thoughts.

I leave you to your monosyllabic grunts, and sparse and uncreative retorts.
 
Cypress said:
If everyone genuinely modeled their conduct on lives on Siddhartha Gautama, Jesus, Muhammad (at least the ethical principals they taught) the world would be in pretty good shape, imo.

Irrespective of whether one accepts the divinity of Jesus, the NT in it's historical context is one of the most important and radical pieces of literature ever written. And everyone in western civilization - agnostic, atheist, and devout - have been fundamentally influenced by it's ethical code, social critiques, and principal of spritual equality.
Click to expand...

True, but they were exceptional human beings, not the average human being.

Agreed that the NT changed the West, but so did Buddha in the East. Truth is truth.

Did you ever listen to Bill Hick's "It's just a ride?"

 
Dutch Uncle said:
So you believe we're all ambulatory meat computers responding solely to biochemical programming and of no more value than the sum of our basic components? That death is no more than a meat robot burning out like an incandescent light bulb?

I disagree but understand it's a common atheist belief. It allows Socialist Atheists like Mao and Stalin to murder millions of human beings without a second thought.
Click to expand...

Buggered if I know: I just point to what the evidence suggests. You don't half live for competitive aggression - your masters give out prizes or something? The behaviour of state capitalist dictators is your game, not mine, kid. Gods seem unlikely, but if capitalism has managed to survive so long all things are possible! :)
 
Penderyn said:
Buggered if I know: I just point to what the evidence suggests. You don't half live for competitive aggression - your masters give out prizes or something? The behaviour of state capitalist dictators is your game, not mine, kid. Gods seem unlikely, but if capitalism has managed to survive so long all things are possible! :)
Click to expand...

"An absence of evidence is not evidence of absence". Correct, not only do you not know, but neither do I or anyone else. It's all philosophical with no universal "right" or "wrong".

The bolded sentence is nonsensical to me. It's rambling. I understand the buzzwords, but do not understand what you are trying to say. Are you accusing me of something? If so, what? In English, please.....American English. ;)
 
bhaktajan said:
Buddhism says: No Nirvana until Samsara is stopped.
Samsara = the repetious cycle of birth & Death & birth & Death & birth & Death & birth & Death & birth & Death & birth & Death*** et al.

Nirvana = extinction of one's own soul [atma becomes annatma]



***due to duality as basis of material natures' ying-yang structure...it's called "duality" ---ya can't have one opposite without the constant presence of it's concomitant (other) opposite.

duality = the constant inseparable presence of opposites [ie protons and electrons]


IF YOU TAKE A BIRTH AGAIN YOU ARE CARRYING THE KARMA [works] FROM THE PROCEEDING LIFETIME.

IF YOU TAKE A BIRTH AGAIN IN FUTURE, YOU ARE NOT YET WITHOUT SIN [KARMA].


Damn atheists think they will achieve nirvana simply by their dying, out-doing years of a monk's journey.
Click to expand...

We have free will as an individual soul.

If the soul accrues sin [bad-karma] by past works you cannot escape a future birth.

You take a new birth due to your burden of bad-karma [via past acts] ---ergo "Original Sin"

Only when the soul rids itself of both good and bad karma along with the ego's conceits does the aspirant approach a Nirvana state of existence.


Read the above quote for Buddhist talking points inre the soul takes another birth due to the burden of karma-payback.

I am a Hindu, I know very much about Buddhist's goals.
 
Last edited:
Cypress said:
I really cannot accept the Calvinist Protestant interpretation of humans bearing the guilt and stain of original sin, the theology of predestination, and their generally negative view of humanity the human condition. I will always actually feel like Eastern Christianity generally has a more positive perspective on the human condition, a more tenable theology on the question of free will.

Eastern Orthodox Christians say the goal of human life is union with the divine, a process they call theosis. The essence of this process is the ongoing effort to be like Christ. For most, it will take an entire life’s work. Monks have an audacious calling to seek this divine union as a mystical state in this life. But complete theosis can still only come upon death, when one’s bodily existence is subsumed within the life of God.

Most Western Christians, on the other hand, imagine an insurmountable distance between humans and God. Maybe God can touch someone across that gap, but a person can’t become one with God, in part because of the stain of original sin.

In the West, Augustine came up with the predominant way of talking about original sin: as a permanent defect that all humans inherited through Adam and Eve’s mistakes in the Garden of Eden. But most of his writings were not available in Greek until the 13th century and the Orthodox came up with a different take on things.

The Orthodox say Adam and Eve’s disobedience interrupted the process of spiritual maturation that God had planned for them. Other people might deserve God’s punishment, but that’s because of their own sins, not because the inherited the stain of original sin. And the natural human tendency is to move toward God, not to turn away from him.

The Orthodox don’t have as much angst about the paradox of divine sovereignty and free will. To them, free will is actually a sign of our imperfection; if we were perfect, we wouldn’t need any choice, because we would always know what is good.

These differences help explain the intellectual reasons why the Eastern Orthodox world has never had a Reformation. Eastern Christians do fight over theology, but in general, they are more comfortable with paradox and mystery.



Source credit: Molly Worthen, PhD. Religious Historian, University of North Carolina
Click to expand...

NOTHING is free in this life, sadly. Not even your will.:|
 
bhaktajan said:
We have free will as an individual soul.

If the soul accrues sin [bad-karma] by past works you cannot escape a future birth.

You take a new birth due to your burden of bad-karma [via past acts] ---ergo "Original Sin"

Only when the soul rids itself of both good and bad karma along with the ego's conceits does the aspirant approach a Nirvana state of existence.


Read the above quote for Buddhist talking points inre the soul takes another birth due to the burden of karma-payback.

I am a Hindu, I know very much about Buddhist's goals.
Click to expand...

The OP Topic is

FREE WILL

&

Original Sin
 
We are "PERSONA"

The personage of God Almighty is the originating fountain wellspring of "Rasa"

Rasa is a Sanskrit word meaning 'the mellow experienced in the presence of'

ie:
The rasa of Ice cream is ...a cool sweet foamy ambrosial taste of ephemeral palatable stimulus.

The rasa of a Breeze is coporal soothing refreshment.

The rasa of Sun-light is multi-fold still.

The rasa of sex is etc etc etc


We are spirit souls in the material world since time immemorial [Sanskrit, 'samsara'] looking for the source(s) of pleasure.

The personage of God is rasa entoto.




But you need an introduction to get face time.
 
Jack said:
Hmmmm ...
Let's see ... go Upstairs and spend Eternity with Mason and CrocMan, ... or take the Down Escalator and spend it with Porn Stars, Hookers, and Loose Women. (yeah, tough call on that one) :thinking:
Click to expand...

Mason breaks God's and Christ's Commandments every day without repentance. He's condemning himself to ride the Down Escalator until he pulls his head out of his ass, ceases to deliberately break Commandments and truly repents.
 
Free will and determinism are perhaps mutually compatible.

●● An alternative approach is to reject the dilemma itself: Maybe, once we really understand the philosophical issues involved, we will see that free will and determinism are compatible. Not surprisingly, this is known as a compatibilist approach.

● ● The basic idea is well captured in a quote from the American philosopher John Dewey: “What men have esteemed and fought for in the name of liberty is varied and complex—but certainly it has never been a metaphysical freedom of will.”

●● Dewey is emphasizing that metaphysical freedom—freedom from chains of causality—is not the freedom that we care about. What we care about is freedom from tyranny, from oppression, from chains of iron. It may also be freedom from addiction and compulsion. To want those kinds of freedom isn’t to want to be metaphysically independent of cause and effect. Freedom in the sense worth caring about is freedom from coercion, not freedom from causality.



Source credit: Patrick Grimm, professor of philosophy, State University of New York
 
Cypress said:
Free will and determinism are perhaps mutually compatible.

●● An alternative approach is to reject the dilemma itself: Maybe, once we really understand the philosophical issues involved, we will see that free will and determinism are compatible. Not surprisingly, this is known as a compatibilist approach.

● ● The basic idea is well captured in a quote from the American philosopher John Dewey: “What men have esteemed and fought for in the name of liberty is varied and complex—but certainly it has never been a metaphysical freedom of will.”

●● Dewey is emphasizing that metaphysical freedom—freedom from chains of causality—is not the freedom that we care about. What we care about is freedom from tyranny, from oppression, from chains of iron. It may also be freedom from addiction and compulsion. To want those kinds of freedom isn’t to want to be metaphysically independent of cause and effect. Freedom in the sense worth caring about is freedom from coercion, not freedom from causality.



Source credit: Patrick Grimm, professor of philosophy, State University of New York
Click to expand...

NOT to mention the anchovies!
 
Jack said:
Hmmmm ...
Let's see ... go Upstairs and spend Eternity with Mason and CrocMan, ... or take the Down Escalator and spend it with Porn Stars, Hookers, and Loose Women. (yeah, tough call on that one) :thinking:
Click to expand...

The field of activities magnanimously is set up to allow for what ever whims one could desire.

In is written in the ancient books of the orient:

"Whatever state of being one remembers when he quits his body, that state he will attain without fail." [Bg 8.6]

A sage commented on this verse:
The process of changing one's nature at the critical moment of death is here explained. How can one die in the proper state of mind?
...Of course the cumulative effect of the thoughts and actions of one's life influences one's thoughts at the moment of death;
therefore the actions of this life determine one's future state of being. ...
In this universe there are limitless living entities in 8,400,000 species, and all are wandering within this universe.
This is a challenge to so-called scientists and philosophers who presume that there are living entities on this planet only.
They exist on land, in water, in air, in fire and in ether. Thus there are living entities in all types of material elements.
Since the entire material universe is composed of five elements-earth, water, fire, air and ether-why should there be
living entities on one planet and not others?

Living entities are described as ananta, or unlimited; nonetheless, they are said to belong to 8,400,000 species. As stated in the Viṣṇu Purāṇa:

“There are 900,000 species living in the water. There are also 2,000,000 non-moving living entities (sthāvara) such as trees and plants. There are also 1,100,000 species of insects and reptiles, and there are 1,000,000 species of birds. As far as quadrupeds are concerned there are 3,000,000 varieties, and there are 400,000 human species.” Some of these species may exist on one planet and not on another, but in any case within all the planets of the universe-and even in the sun—there are living entities. This is the verdict of Vedic literatures. As Bhagavad-gītā (Bg. 2.20) confirms:

“For the soul there is never birth nor death. Nor, having once been, does he ever cease to be. He is unborn, eternal, ever-existing, undying and primeval. He is not slain when the body is slain.”
Since the living entities are never annihilated, they simply transmigrate from one life form to another. Thus there is an evolution of forms according to the degree of developed consciousness. One experiences different degrees of consciousness in different forms. A dog’s consciousness is different from a man’s. Even within a species we find that a father’s consciousness is different from his son’s and that a child’s consciousness is different from a youth’s. Just as we find different forms, we find different states of consciousness. When we see different states of consciousness, we may take it for granted that the bodies are different. In other words, different types of bodies depend on different states of consciousness.

This is also confirmed in Bhagavad-gītā (Bg. 8.6): yaṁ yaṁ vāpi smaran bhāvam. One’s consciousness at the time of death determines a type of body of the living entity. This is the process of transmigration of the soul. A variety of bodies is already there; we change from one body to another in terms of our consciousness.

Out of the 8,400,000 different species of living beings, there are 400,000 human species. Out of these there are numerous lower forms of human life that are mostly uncivilized. The civilized human beings are those who have regulative principles of social, political and religious life.

The different manifestations of body and senses among the living entities are due to material nature. There are 8,400,000 different species of life, and these varieties are creations of the material nature. They arise from the different sensual pleasures of the living entity, who thus desires to live in this body or that. When he is put into different bodies, he enjoys different kinds of happiness and distress.

Thus, if consciousness is adulterated by some type of material mentality, in the next life he gets a corresponding body. He does not necessarily get a human body again; he can get the body of a cat, dog, hog, demigod or one of many other forms, for there are 8,400,000 species.

There are 8,400,000 species of living beings beginning from the highest intellectual being, Brahmā, down to the insignificant ant, and all of them are enjoying the material world according to the desires of the subtle mind and gross material body. The gross material body is based on the conditions of the subtle mind, and the senses are created according to the desire of the living being.

The Vedas are meant for going back to Godhead, going back home. To revolve in the cycle of transmigration in a series of lives numbering 8,400,000 is an imprisoned life for the condemned conditioned souls. The human form of life is a chance to get out of this imprisoned life, and as such the only occupation of the human being is to reestablish his lost relationship with God.

The living entity thus transmigrates from one body to another in 8,400,000 species of life. But due to his being the part and parcel of the Lord

Every second of human life is meant for making an ultimate solution to the problems of life, i.e. repetition of birth and death and revolving in the cycle of 8,400,000 different species of life. The material body, which is subject to birth and death, diseases and old age, is the cause of all sufferings of the living being, otherwise the living being is eternal; he is never born, nor does he ever die. Being engaged in all these materialistic activities, the living soul entangles himself in the cycle of the law of fruitive actions. This entails the chain of birth and death in the 8,400,000 species of life: the aquatics, the vegetables, the reptiles, the birds, the beasts, the uncivilized man, and then again the human form, which is the chance for getting out of the cycle of fruitive action.

Such a planmaker is thus forced to accept another body in one of the 8,400,000 species of life according to the fruits of the work he has performed. In the next life, persons who are too much attached to family comforts are generally awarded lower species of life on account of sinful acts performed during a long duration of sinful life, and thus all the energy of the human life is spoiled.

Intelligent persons who can see properly may look into the general conditions of the living entities who are wandering in the cycle of the 8,400,000 spieces of life, as well as in different classes of human beings. ... out of the 8,400,000 species of living entities, the human form of life is rare and valuable, and out of those rare human beings those who are conscious of the material problems are rarer still, and the still more rare persons are those who are conscious of the value of the Śrīmad-Bhāgavatam, which contains the messages of the Lord and His pure devotees.

There are bodies, 1,100,000 worms and reptiles, 1,000,000 forms of birds, together there are 8,400,000 varieties of bodies in different planets of the universe, and the living entity is traveling by so many transmigrations according to different modes of enjoying spirit within himself. Even in one particular body the living entity changes from childhood to boyhood, from boyhood to youth, from youth to old age and from old age to another body created by his own action.

In this material world there are 8,400,000 species of life. As spirit souls, they are all transcendental to this material world. Why, then, do they exhibit themselves in different stages of life? The answer is given here: they are under the spell of the three modes of material nature. Because they were created by the material energy, their bodies are made of the material elements.

There are four different divisions of species-living entities which sprout from the earth, living entities born of fermentation or germination, living entities which come from eggs and living entities which come from the embryo. These four divisions of living entities are expanded in 8,400,000 species of life. A person who is freed from material designations can see the same quality of spirit present everywhere or in every manifested living entity.

It is stated clearly herein that the Supreme Personality of Godhead, in His plenary expansion of Supersoul, is present in all living entities. The living entities have 8,400,000 different kinds of bodies, and the Supreme Personality of Godhead is living in every body both as the individual soul and as the Supersoul [param-atma].

Suppose a person enters into a room; that does not mean that the room has become that person. Similarly, that the Supreme Lord has entered into each of the 8,400,000 particular types of material bodies does not mean that each of these bodies has become the Supreme Lord. Because the Supreme Lord is present, however, a pure devotee accepts each body as the temple of the Lord, and since the devotee offers respect to such temples in full knowledge, he gives respect to every living entity in relationship with the Lord.

Just as there are different stages in the growth of a flower—the bud stage, the blooming stage and the full—fledged, grown-up stage of aroma and beauty—similarly, there are 8,400,000 species of bodies in gradual evolution, and there is systematic progress from the lower species of life to the higher. The human form of life is supposed to be the highest, for it offers consciousness for getting out of the clutches of birth and death.

In the Bhagavad-gītā the Supreme Personality of Godhead, Kṛṣṇa, has claimed that He is the father of all living entities, regardless of form. There are 8,400,000 different species of life forms, and Lord Kṛṣṇa claims that He is the father of all. Because the living entities are parts and parcels of the Supreme Personality of Godhead, they are all sons of the Lord, and for their benefit, because they are hovering under the impression that they can lord it over material nature, the Vedas are given to them for their guidance.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top