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The Bible has a lot of different names for God to teach people about who and what he is. So you could say all those names explain the concept of God. This lin

by pasta 9y ago

The Bible has a lot of different names for God to teach people about who and what he is. So you could say all those names explain the concept of God. This link provides some examples: https://www.gotquestions.org/names-of-God.html https://www.gotquestions.org/names-of-God.html Edit: maybe more interesting is the Wikipedia articles listing the names of different kinds of religion: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_God https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_God

blowski 9y ago
Within the Christian tradition as I understand it, you could read every single word ever expressed about God and you still wouldn't understand. It's like an ant trying to understand a black hole by crawling around a library.
- wu-ikkyu 9y ago
  >It's like an ant trying to understand a black hole by crawling around a library. Your analagy is akin to The Cloud of Unknowing, a spiritual guide to becoming closer to god by "unknowing", written by a 14th century christian mystic. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cloud_of_Unknowing https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cloud_of_Unknowing
  - deleted 9y ago
    [deleted]
  - 09bjb 9y ago
    Similar to something I read in a Jack Kornfield book the other day, about a Zen tradition called "just sitting" where you dispense with any goals or concepts of enlightenment and, well, just sit. Presumably it gets you somewhere...or nowhere :)
- coliveira 9y ago
  Black holes can be observed. God cannot.
  - 09bjb 9y ago
    Under what religious or philosophical tradition can God not be observed, even partially?
    - coliveira 9y ago
      You tell me. Has any philosophical tradition demonstrated the existence of god outside of the human imagination?
      - 09bjb 9y ago
        That depends on how we define god. Which is what this whole thread seems to be about :) Needless to say, yes, getting people to agree on whether they're talking about the same thing takes a lot of patience. For a certain type of person, definitely worth the effort. Personally I didn't care at all until I had a direct experience that I couldn't explain without "spiritual" vocabulary. And now I'm embroiled in these sorts of debates for fun...
        coliveira 9y ago
        If god is only known as a personal experience that is impossible to fully express; if it is invisible, unexplainable, unprovable, then it has all the properties of things that only exist in our imagination. Believers can give whatever name they want (as they did over the centuries), it doesn't make any difference.
        09bjb 9y ago
        Hmm. "Subjective experience" doesn't feel the same to me as "imagination," but they're related I suppose. My experience of the world is real, as you would probably categorize yours. Invisible and unexplainable, not at all...see the many suggestions on this page. "Unprovable"; 1) if you've experienced it directly, your proof is there but it's limited to one person, 2) all mathematical systems break down when pushed to a limit (Godel's incompleteness theorem, the necessity of different physics/math under different conditions, etc.); we're talking about a way to encompass all of these things while adhering to a concise definition, it's hard. I actually think these academic discussions of "what is god precisely" and "how does it work" only really sway a small subset of people. IMO it's "try these techniques out for yourself and decide for yourself," not "surely this explanation of the entirety of existence will sway you!" I'm with you, I don't think there's a formal text definition of god that ever would have convinced me to "believe." Either you have a notion of a higher power or unitive/connective force and have experienced it, or you haven't and you're working with the evidence you've got (math, the Bible, whatever). Take a few psychedelics or do a bunch of meditation and you'll end up feeling like most practitioners do, which is that you have a strong ineffable experience that doesn't translate well into words. Or don't! God's just a made-up word anyway for an aspect of the universe / human experience that we have a hard time defining (one of my definitions).

by pasta 9y ago

blowski 9y ago

Within the Christian tradition as I understand it, you could read every single word ever expressed about God and you still wouldn't understand. It's like an ant trying to understand a black hole by crawling around a library.

wu-ikkyu 9y ago
>It's like an ant trying to understand a black hole by crawling around a library. Your analagy is akin to The Cloud of Unknowing, a spiritual guide to becoming closer to god by "unknowing", written by a 14th century christian mystic. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cloud_of_Unknowing https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cloud_of_Unknowing
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- 09bjb 9y ago
  Similar to something I read in a Jack Kornfield book the other day, about a Zen tradition called "just sitting" where you dispense with any goals or concepts of enlightenment and, well, just sit. Presumably it gets you somewhere...or nowhere :)
coliveira 9y ago
Black holes can be observed. God cannot.
- 09bjb 9y ago
  Under what religious or philosophical tradition can God not be observed, even partially?
  - coliveira 9y ago
    You tell me. Has any philosophical tradition demonstrated the existence of god outside of the human imagination?
    - 09bjb 9y ago
      That depends on how we define god. Which is what this whole thread seems to be about :) Needless to say, yes, getting people to agree on whether they're talking about the same thing takes a lot of patience. For a certain type of person, definitely worth the effort. Personally I didn't care at all until I had a direct experience that I couldn't explain without "spiritual" vocabulary. And now I'm embroiled in these sorts of debates for fun...
      - coliveira 9y ago
        If god is only known as a personal experience that is impossible to fully express; if it is invisible, unexplainable, unprovable, then it has all the properties of things that only exist in our imagination. Believers can give whatever name they want (as they did over the centuries), it doesn't make any difference.
        09bjb 9y ago
        Hmm. "Subjective experience" doesn't feel the same to me as "imagination," but they're related I suppose. My experience of the world is real, as you would probably categorize yours. Invisible and unexplainable, not at all...see the many suggestions on this page. "Unprovable"; 1) if you've experienced it directly, your proof is there but it's limited to one person, 2) all mathematical systems break down when pushed to a limit (Godel's incompleteness theorem, the necessity of different physics/math under different conditions, etc.); we're talking about a way to encompass all of these things while adhering to a concise definition, it's hard. I actually think these academic discussions of "what is god precisely" and "how does it work" only really sway a small subset of people. IMO it's "try these techniques out for yourself and decide for yourself," not "surely this explanation of the entirety of existence will sway you!" I'm with you, I don't think there's a formal text definition of god that ever would have convinced me to "believe." Either you have a notion of a higher power or unitive/connective force and have experienced it, or you haven't and you're working with the evidence you've got (math, the Bible, whatever). Take a few psychedelics or do a bunch of meditation and you'll end up feeling like most practitioners do, which is that you have a strong ineffable experience that doesn't translate well into words. Or don't! God's just a made-up word anyway for an aspect of the universe / human experience that we have a hard time defining (one of my definitions).