Is There a Soul?

[Sair]

You have mistakenly presumed that my evidence is “scientific”, or else, you would prefer it to be strictly scientific. On the contrary, my evidence is primarily philosophic. Like scientific evidence, the philosophical postion begins with sense experience, but does not come to rest in the emperiological realm of natural science, but proceeds deeper, into the very nature of the human organism. This position cannot be explained in a single post.

However, the error in reduction of consciousness to brain states can be seen from the following example. As you are typing at your keyboard the related neuro-physiological activity in your brain can be recorded, and the scientific ability to do that is continuously improving. Concomitantly, you can provide a verbal description of what you are consciously experiencing as you type, such as the visual perception of the monitor and keyboard, your fingers responding to the mind’s instruction to hit certain keys, and so on.

The iterations of your conscious experience can be recorded by a secretary. When one compares what the secretary has recorded to the recordings of concurrent brain activity, one sees that the two accounts are starkley different in nature. What two things, though related, could be more different?

Your conscious experience is nothing at all like the registration of the related neuro-physiological activity of your brain.

One may try to reduce human conscious experience to physiology and possibly invoke the principle of parsimony. However, that lacks something of the scientific spirit since it fails to provide any sort of explanation for the radical difference between conscious experiences and brain activity. These stark differences make invocation of the principle of parsimony totally without warrant or logical justification.

The burden of proof, then, falls upon the reductionists, who so far, have nothing to offer.

I suspect someone must already have responded to this, but I’m slowly making my way through the thread and catching up after not having been on the forums for a while.

I think there is some equivocation going on here. You say that the recording of brain activity, I presume in terms of data from instruments that do said recording, bears little resemblance to our subjective experience of what goes on in our own neurochemical pathways. That’s a bit like saying that a painting bears little actual resemblance to the subject being painted, or that a shadow bears little resemblance to the body that casts it, or indeed - and perhaps a better analogy - that the sensation of warmth bears little resemblance to the fire that affords it.

The position of the observer, I am supposing, is key - let’s say I witness an accident. My report of the accident will bear little real resemblance to the experience of the person involved in the accident, but ultimately we were witnessing the same occurrence. I think the same may be said of measuring brainwaves - the observational data from the external observer are always going to be qualitatively different to the internal experience of the subject.

What does it feel like to have molecules passing across synapses, or electrical impulses passing along neurones, and how does this feel different to the influence of one’s soul?

 

[HelenaMT]

The final question I would ask of dualists is this - what do you suppose our experience would be like if we didn’t have a soul? How would we know the difference? This gets right to the guts of the problem, in that we can - obviously - only perceive things from our own perspective, ultimately. How do we examine ourselves objectively from the inside?

Well, to answer the question what would our experience feel like if we didn’t have a soul, I would think it might feel more like Dawkins than St Teresa.

I think this is a really important question. I also think the answer is what separates believers from atheists. Since we can’t really examine ourselves objectively from the inside
out, because as you said , we only perceive things from our own perspective, we will always give more weight to the evidence that more closely matches our own experience.

All of the atheists I know personally have never had any strange experiences, either with something the perceived as divine or with something psychic. Richard Dawkins claims he never had anything close to a mystical experience, even when he put on Persinger’s “god helmet”. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_helmet On the other hand, almost all the believers I know have had such experiences. Not all of them are Christians or even religious.

I could be wrong, but it seems through my own observation that those who have had experiences that they cannot explain by coincidence or that have felt so real to them that they cannot be convinced that they imagined them are the ones that will continue to believe, whether in God, or souls, or what have you, even when they cannot find a scientific explanation to back them up. You’d have to convince them that their brains had glitched or that they were not sane. It’s sort of like trying to convince the lone witness to a murder that the murder didn’t take place just because the jury acquitted the defendant.

 

[RobNY]

itinerant,

I saw this in the beginning of the thread and wanted to comment. You said that we do not think with our brains.

But consider carefully the preposition “with.” Consider how we use “with” to translate the dative of instrument in ancient Greek. i.e., I hit him with my bat. To say that in ancient Greek, it would be sufficient to use the dative case.

Why not say that we think “with our brains,” taking it as a “with” in the instrumental sense?

It seems to me to be wholly unobjectionable to say that we think with our brains-- and we do math with an abacus! The brain and the abacus are instruments by which we (agents) think or do math.

Plus, this harmonizes very well with the Aristotelian manner of speaking of things.

When a materialist says to you that we think with our brains, grant it to him! He’s assuming that the brain is an instrument with which we think, in other words, that strictly speaking the brain is not the mind. And if that’s the case, then we’re already won the debate, haven’t we?

-Rob

 

[itinerant1]

itinerant,

I saw this in the beginning of the thread and wanted to comment. You said that we do not think with our brains.

But consider carefully the preposition “with.” Consider how we use “with” to translate the dative of instrument in ancient Greek. i.e., I hit him with my bat. To say that in ancient Greek, it would be sufficient to use the dative case.

Why not say that we think “with our brains,” taking it as a “with” in the instrumental sense?

It seems to me to be wholly unobjectionable to say that we think with our brains-- and we do math with an abacus! The brain and the abacus are instruments by which we (agents) think or do math.

Plus, this harmonizes very well with the Aristotelian manner of speaking of things.

When a materialist says to you that we think with our brains, grant it to him! He’s assuming that the brain is an instrument with which we think, in other words, that strictly speaking the brain is not the mind. And if that’s the case, then we’re already won the debate, haven’t we?

-Rob

Interesting point, but here are my reasons for what I said.

To restate matters, I said “We don’t think with our brains, but we don’t think without them.” This I explained to mean that the body/brain is a necessary condition only, but not a sufficient condition for thinking. The modern fallacy that says we think with our brains has co-opted the phrase “we think with our brains” and so I would prefer to emphasize the radical difference of my position by saying “we don’t think with our brains”, rather than use the phrase “we think with our brains” but giving it a correct meaning.

Furthermore, another reason why I don’t say “we think with our brains” is because the brain is not really an instrument, in the usual sense, in the thinking process. Properly speaking, the intellect does not use the brain as an instrument. That is, while the intellect is dependent on the brain, that dependency is uniquely an extrinsic only dependency. The extrinsic nature of this relation can get easily lost by saying “We think with our brains.”

 

[itinerant1]

Musings…I find it somewhat perplexing when a Christian needs to be convinced about the reality of his own soul as an entity that is completely spiritual and immortal. I know one can be easily influenced by the materialist spin on scientific data that identifies the human soul or mind with the brain. This materialist view is tantamount to claiming the human person is completely physical in nature and that when his body dies, he no longer exists.

It has even been a fad with some Christian theologians to dodge the whole mind-body problem by denying any immaterial component of human nature, and then place an emphasis on the Resurrection. The inexorable difficulty with this scenario is that when the human being dies, he ceases to exist; there is no longer anything to resurrect. It is a contradiction to say that God can resurrect what does not exist. That is, there is nothing that exists any longer of the deceased person (conceived as being only physical in nature) to be brought back to life.

But can God do what involves an inherent contradiction? St. Thomas Aquinas says, “there does not fall under the scope of God’s omnipotence anything that implies a contradiction.”

So, the Resurrection must be understood as a re-uniting of the spiritual and immortal soul, which cannot die, to a new physical body.

 

[Image_of_God]

I don’t know if anyone has already addressed this (forgive me if anyone has), but it would seem if we are to acknowledge a human being as the same from one moment to the next, that there would have to be a soul (or at least some constant and unchangeable entity). Every moment, every part of the human body changes (we live in what Plato rightfully called the flux). Every organ and cell in the body ages, other cells are reborn. The atoms are not exactly configured in the exact same manner. Even the brain alters from moment to moment. And what about those people who severely change their appearances? Who are we to call them the same person after the alteration, if there is not something constant? We could say that their DNA remains the same, but it certainly does not remain exactly the same. And what about those who suffer dementia or amnesia. There has certainly been a change in the brain there. Yet, we still recognize that person as the same, even though the functioning of their brain has altered drastically. Therefore, the identity of a person does not rest (solely) in the brain as commonly believed.

It would seem that there would have to be a soul. A soul is the identity of a person and more. It remains the same, being spiritual and not part of the flux. It could be likened to the constant in an equation that does not alter, even as all the other variables do. If we hold that there is this constant entity within a person, then it would seem right to maintain that they are the same no matter what happens. From the soul comes the true dignity of a person. Without, it is difficult to argue against very inhuman actions like euthanasia.

 

[itinerant1]

I don’t know if anyone has already addressed this (forgive me if anyone has), but it would seem if we are to acknowledge a human being as the same from one moment to the next, that there would have to be a soul (or at least some constant and unchangeable entity). Every moment, every part of the human body changes (we live in what Plato rightfully called the flux). Every organ and cell in the body ages, other cells are reborn. The atoms are not exactly configured in the exact same manner. Even the brain alters from moment to moment. And what about those people who severely change their appearances? Who are we to call them the same person after the alteration, if there is not something constant? We could say that their DNA remains the same, but it certainly does not remain exactly the same. And what about those who suffer dementia or amnesia. There has certainly been a change in the brain there. Yet, we still recognize that person as the same, even though the functioning of their brain has altered drastically. Therefore, the identity of a person does not rest (solely) in the brain as commonly believed.

It would seem that there would have to be a soul. A soul is the identity of a person and more. It remains the same, being spiritual and not part of the flux. It could be likened to the constant in an equation that does not alter, even as all the other variables do. If we hold that there is this constant entity within a person, then it would seem right to maintain that they are the same no matter what happens. From the soul comes the true dignity of a person. Without, it is difficult to argue against very inhuman actions like euthanasia.

You have brought up not only a good point, but an essential point in regard to the reality of a spiritual soul. All physical things change, including our body, brain, and neurons. Yet it is common human experience that testifies to a basic reality about who each one of is; a reality that does not change. This reality is the ground of the “I”.

The “I”, or the “who I am”, persists as the same “I” through all internal and external changes. This unchanging reality cannot be accounted for in terms of atoms, neurons, or other necessarily changing physical realities. It is the very same “I” that learns new facts, is happy or sad, falls asleep and wakes up, catches a cold, eats breakfast, goes hiking and so on.

Philosophical materialism and materialist theories of evolution can provide no answer or explanation for this common human experience. The only explanation that does not deny common human experience is the positing of a non-physical and spiritual component to human nature; a component radically unlike anything we experience in the world of physical things.

 

[lemondiesel]

You have brought up not only a good point, but an essential point in regard to the reality of a spiritual soul. All physical things change, including our body, brain, and neurons. Yet it is common human experience that testifies to a basic reality about who each one of is; a reality that does not change. This reality is the ground of the “I”.

The “I”, or the “who I am”, persists as the same “I” through all internal and external changes. This unchanging reality cannot be accounted for in terms of atoms, neurons, or other necessarily changing physical realities. It is the very same “I” that learns new facts, is happy or sad, falls asleep and wakes up, catches a cold, eats breakfast, goes hiking and so on.

Philosophical materialism and materialist theories of evolution can provide no answer or explanation for this common human experience. The only explanation that does not deny common human experience is the positing of a non-physical and spiritual component to human nature; a component radically unlike anything we experience in the world of physical things.

dang, this is a much better thread about the soul. I just posted this in the other one so ill just copy and paste. I fully agree with you and the person you quoted.

if the things I’ve posted have already been shared then my apologizes

To find your soul, ask yourself "Am I my perceptions? Am I that which can see, hear, speak, feel? Remember that the blind, deaf, dumb, body-burnt cannot do these things, yet the feeling of “I” does not vanish in them.

Our you your emotions? What is the source of your emotions. You will find that they are physical. Fear essentially is the emotion of flutter in your stomach, a gripping feeling that overtakes your body and makes your hair stand on end, your heart beating faster. Joy makes your heart ache in a mild, pleasurable way, makes your lips smile. Anger is some kind of physical sensation that grips you in some kind of way. These are all connected to your body. You will realize that you are not your body. And if you are not your body, and your emotions are part of your body, then you are not your emotions. You will at some point drop identification with your emotions.

Our bodies must just be something that houses this “I”, temporarily.

 

[redhen]

Lemondiesel is very close to becoming a Buddhist.

dhammawiki.com/index.php?title=5_aggregates

 

[Image_of_God]

You have brought up not only a good point, but an essential point in regard to the reality of a spiritual soul. All physical things change, including our body, brain, and neurons. Yet it is common human experience that testifies to a basic reality about who each one of is; a reality that does not change. This reality is the ground of the “I”.

The “I”, or the “who I am”, persists as the same “I” through all internal and external changes. This unchanging reality cannot be accounted for in terms of atoms, neurons, or other necessarily changing physical realities. It is the very same “I” that learns new facts, is happy or sad, falls asleep and wakes up, catches a cold, eats breakfast, goes hiking and so on.

Philosophical materialism and materialist theories of evolution can provide no answer or explanation for this common human experience. The only explanation that does not deny common human experience is the positing of a non-physical and spiritual component to human nature; a component radically unlike anything we experience in the world of physical things.

dang, this is a much better thread about the soul. I just posted this in the other one so ill just copy and paste. I fully agree with you and the person you quoted.

if the things I’ve posted have already been shared then my apologizes

To find your soul, ask yourself "Am I my perceptions? Am I that which can see, hear, speak, feel? Remember that the blind, deaf, dumb, body-burnt cannot do these things, yet the feeling of “I” does not vanish in them.

Our you your emotions? What is the source of your emotions. You will find that they are physical. Fear essentially is the emotion of flutter in your stomach, a gripping feeling that overtakes your body and makes your hair stand on end, your heart beating faster. Joy makes your heart ache in a mild, pleasurable way, makes your lips smile. Anger is some kind of physical sensation that grips you in some kind of way. These are all connected to your body. You will realize that you are not your body. And if you are not your body, and your emotions are part of your body, then you are not your emotions. You will at some point drop identification with your emotions.

Our bodies must just be something that houses this “I”, temporarily.

I don’t know if you both agree with me, but materialist positions tend to deal with the relationship between the brain and consciousness backwardly: “this is what is happening in the brain and so this must be what’s happening to the consciousness of a person…”. Christian and many other philosophies tend to deal with the relationship in an inverse fashion, and what I believe to be the more correct fashion: “This is what is happening in the consciousness (a more scientific name for soul) and this is the action of the brain in response to it…”. Because many materialist philosophies (like many psychologies) look at the relationship backwardly, many assumptions are made about the consciousness based on how the brain functions which are impossible to prove. We simply cannot prove that because the brain is behaving this way, the consciousness is this way. It is generally assumed to be true. For this reason, I have begun to believe that much of mainstream psychology today is useful, but nonetheless theory. The fact that there is nothing physical about our consciousness and our mental capabilities is oftentimes ignored. Does anyone, by the way, know how they figured out what part of the brain does what?

 

[lemondiesel]

Lemondiesel is very close to becoming a Buddhist.

dhammawiki.com/index.php?title=5_aggregates

Haha, thanks…i guess

I use “Buddhist views” and imply it more towards different planes of dimension for the soul.

I personally believe that my beliefs are more based on ancient Egyptian meditation beliefs, which could be argued as early Buddhist form, but much more complex.

 

[itinerant1]

Our bodies must just be something that houses this “I”, temporarily.

I would not agree with that wording or formulation. It can be overly dualistic or represent an extreme dualism. The ground of the “I”, while not identical with the body, is intimately integrated with the body as its actualizing principle. For instance, when we are angry, physical changes take place in the body, but our rational consciousness is also involved. It is “I” who becomes angry. I am a unity though I am not identified with my body.

The I survives the death of the body, but it remains incomplete without the body. The body is not just a temporary abode or prison house of the soul, though it may seem that way at times.

As I said previously, the “I” is not the feelings, thoughts or emotions that it experiences, but Buddism takes this realization too far in that it claims that even the self is an illusion. Nirvana, rather than being ultimate bliss ends up, in the final analysis, being absolute nothingness and loss of the self. It appears the Buddism has misconceived the highest happiness.

I would contend to the contrary that ultimate bliss involves, rather, possessioin of the fullness of life and being – a perfected body united to a perfected soul, in the presence of and in union with Ultimate Being.

As one of our saints has said “The glory of God is man fully alive.”

 

[itinerant1]

I don’t know if you both agree with me, but materialist positions tend to deal with the relationship between the brain and consciousness backwardly: “this is what is happening in the brain and so this must be what’s happening to the consciousness of a person…”. Christian and many other philosophies tend to deal with the relationship in an inverse fashion, and what I believe to be the more correct fashion: “This is what is happening in the consciousness (a more scientific name for soul) and this is the action of the brain in response to it…”. Because many materialist philosophies (like many psychologies) look at the relationship backwardly, many assumptions are made about the consciousness based on how the brain functions which are impossible to prove. We simply cannot prove that because the brain is behaving this way, the consciousness is this way. It is generally assumed to be true. For this reason, I have begun to believe that much of mainstream psychology today is useful, but nonetheless theory. The fact that there is nothing physical about our consciousness and our mental capabilities is oftentimes ignored. Does anyone, by the way, know how they figured out what part of the brain does what?

There are a number of ways of determining the functions of various parts of the brain. For example, brain injuries provide information as to what functions are impaired when a specific part of the brain is injured; stimulating parts of the brain and determing what effects take place; monotoring nuero-physiological activity in the brain during specific activities, and so on.

Materialist psychologies identify human consciousness and cognitive activiy as a function of the brain. We know, however, that the only physiological evidence there is for the super-ego (or conscience) is that it tends to be soluable in alcohol.

Materialist views cannot account for human experience. This fact is easy to illustrate. Supposing a human subject is in a room with a physiologist who records the neuro-physiological activity of the subject’s brain while the subject verbally describes everything he sees about the room, hears, and feels. A secretary writes down every word the subject iterates.

Now if we compare what the secretary wrote with the data the physiologist recorded they are two radically different accounts. The physiological data is not anything like what the subject consciously experienced and verbally reported.

Hence, it is an unwarranted reductionism that identifies physical brain activity with the human mind. The intellect depends on the sensory data (phantasm) in the brain for concept formation. There is no concept or idea without a corresponding phantasm or image. It must be noted that the intellect depends on the phantasm formed by the body-brain in an external way only.

So, a relative integrity of the brain is required for conceptual thinking but the brain acts as a necessary condition only for thought – it is not a sufficient condition.

Concepts are spiritual not physical so they cannot be produced by the physical brain. We can understand this by realizing that concepts are universals. For example the idea or concept of “tree” is a universal. The copncept of “tree” refers to any kind of plant classified as a tree regardless of the species, color, height, age, size, and so on. “Tree” does not refer to any particular tree but to all trees. The concept is a universal.

Now, every thing in the world is a particular thing. Physical things can only be particular tings. You will never encounter a universal tree. Universals cannot exist in the physical world, which includes the brain. Since the brain is a physical thing it cannot generate a universal concept. Yet universal conepts obviously exist in the human intellefct. Hence the intellect cannot be a physical thing or identified with the brain or its avctivities. The intellect must be non-physical power. Because the intellect is non-physical it is not contrained or bound by the limits of materiality. It can know or become all things “by means of” its universal concepts.

A common problem with modern brain-mind studies is that they do not correctly distinguish between perceptual thinking characteistic of animals, and conceptual thinking, which is unique to humans.

 

[lemondiesel]

I would not agree with that wording or formulation. It can be overly dualistic or represent an extreme dualism. The ground of the “I”, while not identical with the body, is intimately integrated with the body as its actualizing principle. For instance, when we are angry, physical changes take place in the body, but our rational consciousness is also involved. It is “I” who becomes angry. I am a unity though I am not identified with my body.

As I said previously, the “I” is not the feelings, thoughts or emotions that it experiences, but Buddism takes this realization too far in that it claims that even the self is an illusion. Nirvana, rather than being ultimate bliss ends up, in the final analysis, being absolute nothingness and loss of the self. It appears the Buddism has misconceived the highest happiness.

The Spirit is not separate in man, but in fact One. We all have the exact same Spirit in potential residing inside of us. We could look at this almost as a continuing circuit of electricity with light bulbs of differing shapes, sizes and the amount of light they give off. The same electricity fuels all of these bulbs with light, and without electricity you don’t have a light, you merely have a dead clump of the elements put together a certain way. When one lightbulb is removed, it is no longer “living” with light, the same way that without the Spirit/Soul our bodies are nothing but matter that decays upon the Spirit and Soul leaving the body. The way to learning the Cosmic Mysteries is being able to dissociate from the physical body and get in touch with the Spirit, it is the same in all of us, and this Spirit is literally the substance/wisdom/power of God Himself, it contains all knowledge, pure and 100% truthful knowledge, for if a statement is only 99% true, it is still a lie.

As time progresses our Spirit unfolds more and more and as a whole our concept of God reaches a higher and higher nature closer to the truth. In all times there have been men who are advanced thousands of years beyond the rest of the race, the ones we refer to as mystics and prophets and messiahs, including your Jesus.

It appears the Buddism has misconceived the highest happiness.

The belief in reincarnation, or the “Soul” I have been preaching, was a common thing in the time of Jesus. There was no real need to elaborate on common knowledge of the time.

Christianity has come so far from it’s true Mystic teachings. Christianity was an attempt at making the Mystery teachings into a religion, but people as a whole, to this day, 2000 years later, are still not spiritually developed enough to accept the Wisdom of the Mystics.

Not trying to single out Christianity so I will add that the Bible is misinterpreted a LOT, and I am not a Christian but you will see the same things taught in all religions if you know the history and how to read the parables. (this being quite a cause for atheism in the thought of “theres so many religions they must all be man-made.”)

Maybe you have a misconceived happiness by believing in eternal life with God.

Also, if you are going to question the sentence I put in bold, please refrain. I am not here to start a religious battle with you or anyone.

 

[itinerant1]

The Spirit is not separate in man, but in fact One. We all have the exact same Spirit in potential residing inside of us.

I find this rather ambiguous. What is “Spirit in potential”?
What does it mean for all to have the exact same Spirit? Is this a denial of individuality?

the same way that without the Spirit/Soul our bodies are nothing but matter that decays upon the Spirit and Soul leaving the body.

You have made a distinction between Spirit and Soul. What is the difference in your view between Spirit and Soul?

The way to learning the Cosmic Mysteries is being able to dissociate from the physical body and get in touch with the Spirit, it is the same in all of us, and this Spirit is literally the substance/wisdom/power of God Himself, it contains all knowledge…

What does Cosmic Mysteries refer to? What are some examples?

As time progresses our Spirit unfolds more and more

First you referred to Spirit as “literally the substance/wisdom/power of God Himself” now you refer to Spirit as “our Spirit”. This sounds ambiguous if not contradictory.

As time progresses our Spirit unfolds more and more and as a whole our concept of God reaches a higher and higher nature closer to the truth. In all times there have been men who are advanced thousands of years beyond the rest of the race, the ones we refer to as mystics and prophets and messiahs, including your Jesus.

The problem you have here is that the Hebrew prophets and Jesus did not teach anything like what you believe, so if you believe they are advanced by thousands of years, you should learn from them instead.

The belief in reincarnation, or the “Soul” I have been preaching, was a common thing in the time of Jesus. **There was no real need to elaborate on common knowledge of the time. **

This is historically innaccurate. The Jews certainly did not believe in reincarnation. The teachings of Jesus are not consistent with the idea of reincarnation, and St. Paul specifically denies reincarnation when he said it is given to man to die but once and come to judgement.

Christianity has come so far from it’s true Mystic teachings. Christianity was an attempt at making the Mystery teachings into a religion, but people as a whole, to this day, 2000 years later, are still not spiritually developed enough to accept the Wisdom of the Mystics.

What mystics are you referring to?

Catholicism has always had its mystics, great and small, but they do not view Christianity as you do.

Not trying to single out Christianity so I will add that the Bible is misinterpreted a LOT, and I am not a Christian but you will see the same things taught in all religions if you know the history and how to read the parables. (this being quite a cause for atheism in the thought of “theres so many religions they must all be man-made.”).

Your understanding of Christianity and the Bible appears at best to be superficial. There are many things taught in traditional Christianity that are not found in any other religion.

Maybe you have a misconceived happiness by believing in eternal life with God.

There is no misconception on my part. I believe what was taught about happiness and eternal life by the one you admit is at least thousands of years advanced over others, Jesus.

Also, if you are going to question the sentence I put in bold, please refrain. I am not here to start a religious battle with you or anyone.

I don’t need to question what you put in bold. I know your statetment is factually wrong. You should reconsider your sources as they do not seem to be very reliable.

 

[lemondiesel]

The only documented case of a man who reached the pure perfection of uncovering the Spirit, and for this he was known as the Son of God because he was a perfected soul, meaning that the Spirit which is the force of God was pure in him, and we all know this man as Yeshua Ben Yoseph, or as he’s more commonly known Jesus the Christ. He only needed one last incarnation to learn some specific lesson for his Soul to completely unfold leaving only the Spirit making up his personality, and it is why he was able to perform such amazing miracles because as I said, the Spirit is God Himself essentially and is able to alter the illusion we call reality.

We all have our ways of expressing the inexpressible.

Will update my response to your questions once I am out of class, just felt like adding a bit…

 

[lemondiesel]

Text too long, my replies will be in the following two posts.

I find this rather ambiguous. What is “Spirit in potential”?
What does it mean for all to have the exact same Spirit? Is this a denial of individuality?

Jesus was not “God incarnate” anymore than we are all God incarnate. The difference is that Jesus is the only man recorded to have achieved complete Godhead so that his soul was absolutely pure, giving him the power of God. We will all reach this state, and there are a few others who have reached it as well but they are not well known like Jesus.

Accepting Christ to save your soul does not mean believing Jesus was God incarnate, it means attaining the Christ state in order to purify yourself so that you may “enter the Kingdom of Heaven” by dissolving your individuality back into the Primordial Light once you have reached perfection of the soul.

When one reaches a certain point, you are able to dissolve your individuality back into the Primordial Light, merging with God basically experiencing a level of Infinite bliss. You do not have to do this however, and you may choose to continue incarnating to help the race evolve towards perfection/Christ/Godhead. Also, after one reaches perfection and dissolves the individuality, it is not a loss of self so to speak, because as I explained, the Spirit of the race is one power made up of God’s essence

You have made a distinction between Spirit and Soul. What is the difference in your view between Spirit and Soul?

Allow me time to think of how to properly put it in words.

What does Cosmic Mysteries refer to? What are some examples?

How I know all of this I cannot completely tell you, I study the Mysteries and various teachings of Mysticism (as well as my terrible mistake with Baphomet) but almost all of the time I find myself already knowing everything that I read but it is only a reminder so to speak when reading it. Had I not given into my lust for power I would be much further along my journey. As I have only recently gone through the 3rd 7 year cycle of growth, my Spirit is coming to maturity now that my body is done growing, and I am illuminated more and more. I certainly am no Adept, but I am not on the level of the average Joe either. I am an Initiate, and that is all the more information I am able to give you on the subject of how I came to acquiring this knowledge.

I will say however, the way we are able to grasp new knowledge is by unfolding. As we unfold more into the intellectual mind we grasp more “science” but there are still even higher planes of human existence that may be grasped by the unfolding of the soul to reveal the Light of the Spirit within, which is a drop of the substance of God, a substance which is omniscient and that all things can be discovered within.

First you referred to Spirit as “literally the substance/wisdom/power of God Himself” now you refer to Spirit as “our Spirit”. This sounds ambiguous if not contradictory.

We are “Gods.” One just needs time to develop and learn. For example I’ve learned alot from past lives talking with my Guiding Spirit, and you and everyone else carry your development from life to life. Once you reach a certain level of development you will be able to remember most of your past lives from that incarnation on, and it makes things alot easier.

The problem you have here is that the Hebrew prophets and Jesus did not teach anything like what you believe, so if you believe they are advanced by thousands of years, you should learn from them instead.

The modern Christian teaching that we live one life and are then condemned to either Hell or Heaven is, quite honestly, not what Jesus taught. If you look in the bible yourself you will not see Jesus being quoted as saying anything like this.

Muhammad, Buddha, and Jesus for example, all preached (at the core) for a “Golden Rule” way of living. One must look deeper into these religions to find the cores, because they all in fact lead to the same “God” at the end, which is the “God” I believe in. This “God” came before the “Abrahamic God”

This is historically innaccurate. The Jews certainly did not believe in reincarnation. The teachings of Jesus are not consistent with the idea of reincarnation, and St. Paul specifically denies reincarnation when he said it is given to man to die but once and come to judgement.

In the Old Testament in the Book of Job 33:28thish we see a verse saying that a sinner “will deliver his Soul from going into the pit, and his life shall see the light”. Then in the next verse “Lo, all these things worketh God often-times with man.”. In the 30ish verse there is a further explanation to what is meant in the 29ish verse “To bring back his Soul from the pit, to be enlightened with the light of the living.”

“Pit” in the time of the Old Testament was a common expression to refer to the ancient burial places, not Hell. You can see the use of the word “pit” indicating a grave in Ezekiel 32:23, Isaiah 38:18, Isaiah 14:15, and even in the same chapter in the book of Job in the 18th verse.

If you’d like to study a bit more up to date version of the conception of the Abrahamic God, I would suggest you read “A Course in Miracles”.

Your understanding of Christianity and the Bible appears at best to be superficial. There are many things taught in traditional Christianity that are not found in any other religion.

Yes and there are things taught in other traditional religions that are not found in Christianity, but once again, this is MEN trying to expand on what “God (or the Mysteries)” truly is, which all religions have strayed from.

 

[lemondiesel]

Continued…

There is no misconception on my part. I believe what was taught about happiness and eternal life by the one you admit is at least thousands of years advanced over others, Jesus.

That is your belief then and you should allow me to have mine as well, because there is no misconception on my part either, as everything is personal speculation.

I don’t need to question what you put in bold. I know your statetment is factually wrong. You should reconsider your sources as they do not seem to be very reliable.

Haha, I must say, I’m not going to try to convince you of anything. When you grow old and are on the verge of death, you will think of all the possibilities of what’s to come at the “unknown” and perhaps you will think back to this very thread, or at least the ideas contained therein. Assuming you do not die suddenly, as you are still connected to a degree to the earth sphere you will know for yourself and die in peace as you see these things begin to manifest before you.

Until that time, I have no way of proving something to you that can’t be measured, nor comprehended by someone who has not experienced.

 

[lemondiesel]

Wow editing last 2 secs on this forum

You have made a distinction between Spirit and Soul. What is the difference in your view between Spirit and Soul?

The Spirit is the pure essence of God that is within all of us, the main thing that makes us “in God’s image”. The Soul makes up your individuality/ego/personality, and it is the thing that is unfolded/perfected in order that the essence of God can become more and more revealed.

Go back to my example of a lightbulb. Look at the spirit as a light bulb, and the soul being many layers of fabric. As one develops through the incarnations, more and more layers of fabric are dropped off of the lightbulb and more and more light begins to shine through the layers of fabric. The Spirit and Soul both makeup the true man, but the Spirit is unchanging in it’s potential, and it is what makes us all equal deep down.

 

[itinerant1]

Continued…

That is your belief then and you should allow me to have mine as well, because there is no misconception on my part either, as everything is personal speculation…

You are allowed your beliefs, as is everyone. But I certainly have to disagree that all is a matter of personal speculation. A Catholic must take serious exception to your statement because our beliefs are grounded in Revelation. Hence, the fundamentals of our faith are above personal speculation and has the assurance of God’s truthfulness.

Haha, I must say, I’m not going to try to convince you of anything. When you grow old and are on the verge of death, you will think of all the possibilities of what’s to come at the “unknown” and perhaps you will think back to this very thread, or at least the ideas contained therein. Assuming you do not die suddenly, as you are still connected to a degree to the earth sphere you will know for yourself and die in peace as you see these things begin to manifest before you.

Until that time, I have no way of proving something to you that can’t be measured, nor comprehended by someone who has not experienced.

LOL. Too bad you are not up for discussion. The issue of reincarnation is easily resolved through historical study. We know it was believed amongst the Greeks such as Pythagoras and philosophers later influenced by him in this matter, but it was not a Jewish belief in Palestine, not with the prophets, not with Jesus, and not with the apostles. It is a simple matter of historical research.