How can I “see” it if it is “unseen”. Perhaps a more logically coherent point might be more effective here.
Well, now you are just being pedantic, rossum. Clearly what the word “unseen” means in Even So’s sentence is something like “on a scale never before witnessed.” Thus, it would be read as “We are going to see evil unleashed on a scale never before seen or witnessed.” There is nothing incoherent about that.
Now you may be attempting to slip in a somewhat relevant – though quite arguable – point by asking how we might recognize evil if it is “unseen,” but I fail to understand why that wouldn’t have been the thrust of your post rather than your choice to focus on inanities.
As to whether evil can be “seen” – again the question revolves around what Even So might mean by the word “seen.” Unless it means something more than mere physical, observable, sensory reality, then I suppose “truth” cannot be “seen” in that sense either. So, do you want to argue truth doesn’t exist because it, like evil, cannot be “seen” in the attenuated sense you seem to imply is the ONLY sense that you consider “coherent?”
Then there is no point in my taking any action, is there? Whatever I do it cannot be avoided.
Whether or not it “cannot be avoided” does not excuse your inaction. Hurricanes and earthquakes cannot be avoided either, but that does not mean you ought to respond passively to warnings from the weather service or geological experts.
Erm… That is not from scripture. Look at the top right of my posts. I am Buddhist, not Christian, so the Bible has no authority for me, unless of course it agrees with scripture.
Well, this is a rather interesting response. Now why can Even So not refer to his/her Bible as “scripture” when speaking to you, but you (in the very next paragraph) refer to Buddhist writings as “scripture” when responding to him/her? Goose and gander, and all that, doesn’t apply to you, then? (Oh, yes, I forgot, truth is “relative.” Does that entail you can permit yourself to do what you chastise others for?)
s/never/ever ? You really need to check your posts more thoroughly before hitting the Submit button. Aside from that, scripture is very clear that all the hells (and all the heavens) are temporary, not eternal.
Now which “scripture” are you referring to, obviously not the “scripture” Even So is not allowed to speak about to you because it is his/her “scripture,” but the one you are permitted to speak of to him/her because it is yours? Goose and gander?
It is inevitable that I will “be good enough”. All living beings attain nirvana eventually.
This is, again, very interesting. I could argue that Heaven is also attained by all human beings eventually, it is just that some will find it so intolerable that their experience of it will be positively hellish. Ergo, the promise of heaven in Christianity is, likewise, universal – it is just that not everyone will enjoy it because their taste for goodness and truth is not so refined as to make the experience “pleasant” for them. I wouldn’t suppose God has any compunction to pander to the enjoyments of the nasty, cruel and downright evil, would you?
Now, I suppose, nirvana may have a similar result, although you might argue that nirvana, by definition, will be a place where the deepest desires of every individual, no matter what those happen to be, will be fulfilled (although I can’t imagine why a Buddhist would even attempt to make that case,) but the question which then looms large is who, precisely, is going to underwrite all these personal utopias? I mean why would any supreme deity go out of their way to enable murderers and rapists to have their every personal whim fulfilled? Perhaps this is the logical result of truth and the good being “relative?” I would suppose that any God worth his salt would have no reason to be that suppliant towards supplicants.
You are assuming that I am Christian; I am not. You should approach this discussion in a very different way if you want to have an impact here.
rossum
This point hinges upon whether personal “beliefs” have any real ontological influence on reality. Merely because you do not happen to believe in something does not falsify it, your statements about absolute truth notwithstanding.
You claim that the Bible (and, by extension, the Christian God) has no “authority” over you.) I would suppose that claim, when viewed objectively, would be like claiming hurricanes, earthquakes and tornadoes have “no authority” over you. You might convince yourself otherwise, but it seems to me that reality – along with hurricanes and tornadoes – has its own way of quickly giving chase to personal beliefs. If God is the omnipotent, omniscient, omnibenevolent source of all that exists, then anything you have to say on the matter would seem inutile, your personal “beliefs” not perturbing reality whatsoever.
I submit that perhaps approaching “this discussion” without restricting the topic or truth of what is being presented merely to what some participants happen to find acceptable should be the way of things. While this method may not have any “impact” for those who suppose the truth is only what they happen to make of it, why should such individuals be the ones to dictate the rules of dscourse?
It may be true that what is said will “have no impact” on those who have made a resolute determination to live inside their own intellectually constructed “eggs of truth” where “all truth is relative,” but if we are concerned at all about the actual truth of things then we can and should continue to speak the truth without fear of treading on eggshells. Pace those who choose to contrive eggs as safe havens constructed of their own “relative” truths.
