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the Nature of God

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« Reply #15 on: December 15, 2007, 11:42:22 pm »

Dawn Moline

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   posted 12-01-2004 11:13 PM                       
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Now let me tell you all what I believe about the origins of God. As I said before I don't believe we're all here by accident, I think that there is some divine hand guiding all of this. What sort of hand and where it came from seems to be the ultimate question.
I believe we first have to strip away all the religious dogma from all this to actually get at what God really is.

First off, let's explore time. I don't believe that time moves in a linear fashion as most would have us believe. Time is a river, with currents that circle and ripple and roll back, often to the same shore. (I think that some of you can perhaps already see where I'm going with this). In other words, God didn't neccessarily have to be born in the beginning, before the creation of the universe, in fact, it was more likely that God was born later, well after the Big Bang. For me, it's the most practical solution.

Rockessence is probably correct in assuming that God is most likely an "it" rather than a "he" or a "she," but if God has an essential nature, I'm betting that it's female, not male, contrary to popular belief. God's main function is to create, and, by our very natures, men destroy while women are the ones who do all the creating. In the Bible, Adam is said to be made from God's own image, yet since the Bible was most likely written by men, it's most likely this is not the most objective point of view. Before Christianity, it was commonplace to have the female goddess as the preeminent power, which, to my mind, means that the ancients had some knowledge we've lost. The temperment of God in the Bible, too: angry and impulsive throughout much of the Old Testament, yet distant and remote throughout the New Testament, isn't it much like a woman's temperment..? I know I can get like that at least. I leave it to each of you to draw your own conclusions.

How can God create such beauty and yet also such imperfection?

Well, my own answer happens to be this: first off, God may be all-powerful, but I don't believe that God is perfect. The evidence of that imperfection is all around us. Only an imperfect being would even create all this without taking into consideration all the various flaws seen throughout every creation. Equally, there is no purpose for things like war or famine, disease or pestilence, no purpose for greed or bigotry or envy either. When it comes down to it, it's sheer madness for anyone to even begin to argue that there is, or worse, to cite "God's wrath" about things like Aids, which has killed so many. The only logical explanation is to say that God, an imperfect being, capable of creating much beauty, has to be also quite fallible.

In other words, a very HUMAN God.

Which leads to the most important question: how did God even come into being in the first place?

Science and evolution provide the answer here like they do with so many other things. God was made someplace in the MIDDLE of the story, not the beginning, contrary to popular belief.

My own answer to this goes something like this: sometime in the future, perhaps millions of years from now, a single human, most likely a female, shall evolve into a being, so powerful that it will actually fulfill mankind's greatest fantasies and take on our most cherished role: it will actually BECOME GOD. It will fill the place long left vacant for it in the universe. Naturally, it will be the last of it's kind, and, remembering it's lost humanity, it shall eventually crave more HUMAN company and then come to make all this.

Did God create all of us to be worshiped or did it simply want company? A HUMAN god would have no need for worship, and one that was alone would have no need for vanity, so I'm betting company.

Time, being a river, things flow back to the beginning again and, in that great burst of first light (the Big Bang), the universe will be made for the first time, or, if you prefer, remade, it matters not to me. Yet, it won't be a perfect universe because the being itself isn't perfect, not by a longshot.

Lucifer could rebel once again, or perhaps for the first time. Dinosaurs shall once more roam the earth, or perhaps this will be their first creation. Eve shall take a bite of the apple. God, expecting more from her, will no doubt be all the more disappointed and punish her far greater than Adam (the pain of childbirth).

It's the only logical answer to what has always been the most often asked question: why is there so much pain and suffering in the world? Why does God not do something to stop it, being so all-powerful..?

The answer goes something like this, and, to me, at least, there can only be only one answer, no matter how often we use words like "faith" and "being tested": God is not perfect and some things are beyond even God's control. They have to be. God is or was human, too, and so, we shouldn't blame God for every bad thing that happens to us because God must have been human, too, and so, might deserves just as much sympathy an understanding, as we would grant ourselves. And why not? Imagine the sadness and loneliness of this single being, so set apart from the rest of creation, imagine the isolation. Each of us are pets to a, most liketly, very sad master. It's a hard job being God, I know I certainly wouldn't want to do it.


[This message has been edited by Dawn Moline (edited 12-01-2004).]

 
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« Reply #16 on: December 15, 2007, 11:42:46 pm »

Veronica Poe

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  posted 12-01-2004 11:36 PM                       
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quote:
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2:7.9 The great mistake of the Hebrew religion was its failure to associate the goodness of God with the factual truths of science and the appealing beauty of art. As civilization progressed, and since religion continued to pursue the same unwise course of overemphasizing the goodness of God to the relative exclusion of truth and neglect of beauty, there developed an increasing tendency for certain types of men to turn away from the abstract and dissociated concept of isolated goodness. The overstressed and isolated morality of modern religion, which fails to hold the devotion and loyalty of many twentieth-century men, would rehabilitate itself if, in addition to its moral mandates, it would give equal consideration to the truths of science, philosophy, and spiritual experience, and to the beauties of the physical creation, the charm of intellectual art, and the grandeur of genuine character achievement.
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Sounds rather like something that I happen to believe in myself. I believe that the reason why so many of us "grown-ups" have turned away from the conventional church is that it preaches the dangers that come with "bad" behavior while stressing none of the joys. How long can someone continue to follow such a mesage it only drives home the consequences of "immoral" behavior, and none of the beauty? The only pleasure it seems to promise is in the herafter, and then, only for some of us. Not fair if you ask me.



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« Reply #17 on: December 15, 2007, 11:43:08 pm »

Dawn Moline

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   posted 12-01-2004 11:55 PM                       
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Exactly, Veronica. What I believe is that no organization, religious or otherwise, should tell us the only way we can worship God. I've always believed we have to take things back down to their roots. Christianity was probably very beautiful in the beginning, since then it seems to have been polluted by so many other prejudices and elements so as to rob it of of it's true nature, it's very goodness. It should inspire, not intimidate people towards it's goal...at least that's what I think anyway. 
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« Reply #18 on: December 15, 2007, 11:43:29 pm »

Trent

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   posted 12-02-2004 12:31 AM                       
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The Apocrypha, the books ommitted from the Bible. The ones that concern Jesus were left out because Jesus himself at times advocates that one one doesn't need organized religion to be in tune with God, just lead a decent life. Eliminate the middle man, which, of course didn't fit in with the grand vision.
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« Reply #19 on: December 15, 2007, 11:44:00 pm »

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  posted 12-02-2004 06:04 AM                       
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Dawn,
try this........


"130:1.5 Jesus' last visit with Gadiah had to do with a discussion of good and evil. This young Philistine was much troubled by a feeling of injustice because of the presence of evil in the world alongside the good. He said: "How can God, if he is infinitely good, permit us to suffer the sorrows of evil; after all, who creates evil?" It was still believed by many in those days that God creates both good and evil, but Jesus never taught such error. In answering this question, Jesus said: "My brother, God is love; therefore he must be good, and his goodness is so great and real that it cannot contain the small and unreal things of evil. God is so positively good that there is absolutely no place in him for negativeÊ evil. Evil is the immature choosing and the unthinking misstep of those who are resistant to goodness, rejectful of beauty, and disloyal to truth. Evil is only the misadaptation of immaturity or the disruptive and distorting influence of ignorance. Evil is the inevitable darkness which follows upon the heels of the unwise rejection of light. Evil is that which is dark and untrue, and which, when consciously embraced and willfully endorsed, becomes sin.

130:1.6 "Your Father in heaven, by endowing you with the power to choose between truth and error, created the potential Ênegative of the positive way of light and life; but such errors of evil are really nonexistent until such a time as an intelligent creature wills their existence by mischoosing the way of life. And then are such evils later exalted into sin by the knowing and deliberate choice of such a willful and rebellious creature. This is why our Father in heaven permits the good and the evil to go along together until the end of life, just as nature allows the wheat and the tares to grow side by side until the harvest." Gadiah was fully satisfied with Jesus' answer to his question after their subsequent discussion had made clear to his mind the real meaning of these momentous statements."


and this:........

4. DISCOURSE ON REALITY


130:4.1 The night before they left Alexandria Ganid and Jesus had a long visit with one of the government professors at the university who lectured on the teachings of Plato. Jesus interpreted for the learned Greek teacher but injected no teaching of his own in refutation of the Greek philosophy. Gonod was away on business that evening; so, after the professor had departed, the teacher and his pupil had a long and heart-to-heart talk about Plato's doctrines. While Jesus gave qualified approval of some of the Greek teachings which had to do with the theory that the material things of the world are shadowy reflections of invisible but more substantial spiritual realities, he sought to lay a more trustworthy foundation for the lad's thinking; so he began a long dissertation concerning the nature of reality in the universe. In substance and in modern phraseology Jesus said to Ganid:

130:4.2 The source of universe reality is the Infinite. The material things of finite creation are the time-space repercussions of the Paradise Pattern and the Universal Mind of the eternal God. Causation in the physical world, self-consciousness in the intellectual world, and progressing selfhood in the spirit world -- these realities, projected on a universal scale, combined in eternal relatedness, and experienced with perfection of quality and divinity of value -- constitute the reality of the Supreme. But in an ever-changing universe the Original Personality of causation, intelligence, and spirit experience is changeless, absolute. All things, even in an eternal universe of limitless values and divine qualities, may, and oftentimes do, change except the Absolutes and that which has attained the physical status, intellectual embrace, or spiritual identity which is absolute.

130:4.3 The highest level to which a finite creature can progress is the recognition of the Universal Father and the knowing of the Supreme. And even then such beings of finality destiny go on experiencing change in the motions of the physical world and in its material phenomena. Likewise do they remain aware of selfhood progression in their continuing ascension of the spiritual universe and of growing consciousness in their deepening appreciation of, and response to, the intellectual cosmos. Only in the perfection, harmony, and unanimity of will can the creature become as one with the Creator; and such a state of divinity is attained and maintained only by the creature's continuing to live in time and eternity by consistently conforming his finite personal will to the divine will of the Creator. Always must the desire to do the Father's will be supreme in the soul and dominant over the mind of an ascending son of God.

130:4.4 A one-eyed person can never hope to visualize depth of perspective. Neither can single-eyed material scientists nor single-eyed spiritual mystics and allegorists correctly visualize and adequately comprehend the true depths of universe reality. All true values of creature experience are concealed in depth of recognition.

130:4.5 Mindless causation cannot evolve the refined and complex from the crude and the simple, neither can spiritless experience evolve the divine characters of eternal survival from the material minds of the mortals of time. The one attribute of the universe which so exclusively characterizes the infinite Deity is this unending creative bestowal of personality which can survive in progressive Deity attainment.

130:4.6 Personality is that cosmic endowment, that phase of universal reality, which can coexist with unlimited change and at the same time retain its identity in the very presence of all such changes, and forever afterward.

130:4.7 Life is an adaptation of the original cosmic causation to the demands and possibilities of universe situations, and it comes into being by the action of the Universal Mind and the activation of the spirit spark of the God who is spirit. The meaning of life is its adaptability; the value of life is its progressability -- even to the heights of God-consciousness.

130:4.8 Misadaptation of self-conscious life to the universe results in cosmic disharmony. Final divergence of personality will from the trend of the universes terminates in intellectual isolation, personality segregation. Loss of the indwelling spirit pilot supervenes in spiritual cessation of existence. Intelligent and progressing life becomes then, in and of itself, an incontrovertible proof of the existence of a purposeful universe expressing the will of a divine Creator. And this life, in the aggregate, struggles toward higher values, having for its final goal the Universal Father.

130:4.9 Only in degree does man possess mind above the animal level aside from the higher and quasi-spiritual ministrations of intellect. Therefore animals (not having worship and wisdom) cannot experience superconsciousness, consciousness of consciousness. The animal mind is only conscious of the objective universe.

130:4.10 Knowledge is the sphere of the material or fact-discerning mind. Truth is the domain of the spiritually endowed intellect that is conscious of knowing God. Knowledge is demonstrable; truth is experienced. Knowledge is a possession of the mind; truth an experience of the soul, the progressing self. Knowledge is a function of the nonspiritual level; truth is a phase of the mind-spirit level of the universes. The eye of the material mind perceives a world of factual knowledge; the eye of the spiritualized intellect discerns a world of true values. These two views, synchronized and harmonized, reveal the world of reality, wherein wisdom interprets the phenomena of the universe in terms of progressive personal experience.

130:4.11 Error (evil) is the penalty of imperfection. The qualities of imperfection or facts of misadaptation are disclosed on the material level by critical observation and by scientific analysis; on the moral level, by human experience. The presence of evil constitutes proof of the inaccuracies of mind and the immaturity of the evolving self. Evil is, therefore, also a measure of imperfection in universe interpretation. The possibility of making mistakes is inherent in the acquisition of wisdom, the scheme of progressing from the partial and temporal to the complete and eternal, from the relative and imperfect to the final and perfected. Error is the shadow of relative incompleteness which must of necessity fall across man's ascending universe path to Paradise perfection. Error (evil) is not an actual universe quality; it is simply the observation of a relativity in the relatedness of the imperfection of the incomplete finite to the ascending levels of the Supreme and Ultimate.

130:4.12 Although Jesus told all this to the lad in language best suited to his comprehension, at the end of the discussion Ganid was heavy of eye and was soon lost in slumber. They rose early the next morning to go aboard the boat bound for Lasea on the island of Crete. But before they embarked, the lad had still further questions to ask about evil, to which Jesus replied:

130:4.13 Evil is a relativity concept. It arises out of the observation of the imperfections which appear in the shadow cast by a finite universe of things and beings as such a cosmos obscures the living light of the universal expression of the eternal realities of the Infinite One.

130:4.14 Potential evil is inherent in the necessary incompleteness of the revelation of God as a time-space-limited expression of infinity and eternity. The fact of the partial in the presence of the complete constitutes relativity of reality, creates necessity for intellectual choosing, and establishes value levels of spirit recognition and response. The incomplete and finite concept of the Infinite which is held by the temporal and limited creature mind is, in and of itself, potential evil. But the augmenting error of unjustified deficiency in reasonable spiritual rectification of these originally inherent intellectual disharmonies and spiritual insufficiencies, is equivalent to the realization of actual evil.

130:4.15 All static, dead, concepts are potentially evil. The finite shadow of relative and living truth is continually moving. Static concepts invariably retard science, politics, society, and religion. Static concepts may represent a certain knowledge, but they are deficient in wisdom and devoid of truth. But do not permit the concept of relativity so to mislead you that you fail to recognize the co-ordination of the universe under the guidance of the cosmic mind, and its stabilized control by the energy and spirit of the Supreme.


5. ON THE ISLAND OF CRETE


130:5.1 The travelers had but one purpose in going to Crete, and that was to play, to walk about over the island, and to climb the mountains. The Cretans of that time did not enjoy an enviable reputation among the surrounding peoples. Nevertheless, Jesus and Ganid won many souls to higher levels of thinking and living and thus laid the foundation for the quick reception of the later gospel teachings when the first preachers from Jerusalem arrived. Jesus loved these Cretans, notwithstanding the harsh words which Paul later spoke concerning them when he subsequently sent Titus to the island to reorganize their churches.

130:5.2 On the mountainside in Crete Jesus had his first long talk with Gonod regarding religion. And the father was much impressed, saying: "No wonder the boy believes everything you tell him, but I never knew they had such a religion even in Jerusalem, much less in Damascus." It was during the island sojourn that Gonod first proposed to Jesus that he go back to India with them, and Ganid was delighted with the thought that Jesus might consent to such an arrangement.

130:5.3 One day when Ganid asked Jesus why he had not devoted himself to the work of a public teacher, he said: "My son, everything must await the coming of its time. You are born into the world, but no amount of anxiety and no manifestation of impatience will help you to grow up. You must, in all such matters, wait upon time. Time alone will ripen the green fruit upon the tree. Season follows season and sundown follows sunrise only with the passing of time. I am now on the way to Rome with you and your father, and that is sufficient for today. My tomorrow is wholly in the hands of my Father in heaven." And then he told Ganid the story of Moses and the forty years of watchful waiting and continued preparation.

130:5.4 One thing happened on a visit to Fair Havens which Ganid never forgot; the memory of this episode always caused him to wish he might do something to change the caste system of his native India. A drunken degenerate was attacking a slave girl on the public highway. When Jesus saw the plight of the girl, he rushed forward and drew the maiden away from the assault of the madman. While the frightened child clung to him, he held the infuriated man at a safe distance by his powerful extended right arm until the poor fellow had exhausted himself beating the air with his angry blows. Ganid felt a strong impulse to help Jesus handle the affair, but his father forbade him. Though they could not speak the girl's language, she could understand their act of mercy and gave token of her heartfelt appreciation as they all three escorted her home. This was probably as near a personal encounter with his fellows as Jesus ever had throughout his entire life in the flesh. But he had a difficult task that evening trying to explain to Ganid why he did not smite the drunken man. Ganid thought this man should have been struck at least as many times as he had struck the girl.


6. THE YOUNG MAN WHO WAS AFRAID

130:6.1 While they were up in the mountains, Jesus had a long talk with a young man who was fearful and downcast. Failing to derive comfort and courage from association with his fellows, this youth had sought the solitude of the hills; he had grown up with a feeling of helplessness and inferiority. These natural tendencies had been augmented by numerous difficult circumstances which the lad had encountered as he grew up, notably, the loss of his father when he was twelve years of age. As they met, Jesus said: "Greetings, my friend! why so downcast on such a beautiful day? If something has happened to distress you, perhaps I can in some manner assist you. At any rate it affords me real pleasure to proffer my services."

130:6.2 The young man was disinclined to talk, and so Jesus made a second approach to his soul, saying: "I understand you come up in these hills to get away from folks; so, of course, you do not want to talk with me, but I would like to know whether you are familiar with these hills; do you know the direction of the trails? and, perchance, could you inform me as to the best route to Phenix?" Now this youth was very familiar with these mountains, and he really became much interested in telling Jesus the way to Phenix, so much so that he marked out all the trails on the ground and fully explained every detail. But he was startled and made curious when Jesus, after saying good-bye and making as if he were taking leave, suddenly turned to him, saying: "I well know you wish to be left alone with your disconsolation; but it would be neither kind nor fair for me to receive such generous help from you as to how best to find my way to Phenix and then unthinkingly to go away from you without making the least effort to answer your appealing request for help and guidance regarding the best route to the goal of destiny which you seek in your heart while you tarry here on the mountainside. As you so well know the trails to Phenix, having traversed them many times, so do I well know the way to the city of your disappointed hopes and thwarted ambitions. And since you have asked me for help, I will not disappoint you." The youth was almost overcome, but he managed to stammer out, "But -- I did not ask you for anything -- " And Jesus, laying a gentle hand on his shoulder, said: "No, son, not with words but with longing looks did you appeal to my heart. My boy, to one who loves his fellows there is an eloquent appeal for help in your countenance of discouragement and despair.

Sit down with me while I tell you of the service trails and happiness highways which lead from the sorrows of self to the joys of loving activities in the brotherhood of men and in the service of the God of heaven."

130:6.3 By this time the young man very much desired to talk with Jesus, and he knelt at his feet imploring Jesus to help him, to show him the way of escape from his world of personal sorrow and defeat. Said Jesus: "My friend, arise! Stand up like a man! You may be surrounded with small enemies and be retarded by many obstacles, but the big things and the real things of this world and the universe are on your side. The sun rises every morning to salute you just as it does the most powerful and prosperous man on earth. Look -- you have a strong body and powerful muscles -- your physical equipment is better than the average. Of course, it is just about useless while you sit out here on the mountainside and grieve over your misfortunes, real and fancied. But you could do great things with your body if you would hasten off to where great things are waiting to be done. You are trying to run away from your unhappy self, but it cannot be done. You and your problems of living are real; you cannot escape them as long as you live. But look again, your mind is clear and capable. Your strong body has an intelligent mind to direct it. Set your mind at work to solve its problems; teach your intellect to work for you; refuse longer to be dominated by fear like an unthinking animal. Your mind should be your courageous ally in the solution of your life problems rather than your being, as you have been, its abject fear-slave and the bond-servant of depression and defeat. But most valuable of all, your potential of real achievement is the spirit which lives within you, and which will stimulate and inspire your mind to control itself and activate the body if you will release it from the fetters of fear and thus enable your spiritual nature to begin your deliverance from the evils of inaction by the power-presence of living faith. And then, forthwith, will this faith vanquish fear of men by the compelling presence of that new and all-dominating love of your fellows which will so soon fill your soul to overflowing because of the consciousness which has been born in your heart that you are a child of God.

130:6.4 "This day, my son, you are to be reborn, re-established as a man of faith, courage, and devoted service to man, for God's sake. And when you become so readjusted to life within yourself, you become likewise readjusted to the universe; you have been born again -- born of the spirit -- and henceforth will your whole life become one of victorious accomplishment. Trouble will invigorate you; disappointment will spur you on; difficulties will challenge you; and obstacles will stimulate you. Arise, young man! Say farewell to the life of cringing fear and fleeing cowardice. Hasten back to duty and live your life in the flesh as a son of God, a mortal dedicated to the ennobling service of man on earth and destined to the superb and eternal service of God in eternity."

130:6.5 And this youth, Fortune, subsequently became the leader of the Christians in Crete and the close associate of Titus in his labors for the uplift of the Cretan believers.

130:6.6 The travelers were truly rested and refreshed when they made ready about noon one day to sail for Carthage in northern Africa, stopping for two days at Cyrene. It was here that Jesus and Ganid gave first aid to a lad named Rufus, who had been injured by the breakdown of a loaded oxcart. They carried him home to his mother, and his father, Simon, little dreamed that the man whose cross he subsequently bore by orders of a Roman soldier was the stranger who once befriended his son.

7. AT CARTHAGE -- DISCOURSE ON TIME AND SPACE

130:7.1 Most of the time en route to Carthage Jesus talked with his fellow travelers about things social, political, and commercial; hardly a word was said about religion. For the first time Gonod and Ganid discovered that Jesus was a good storyteller, and they kept him busy telling tales about his early life in Galilee. They also learned that he was reared in Galilee and not in either Jerusalem or Damascus.

130:7.2 When Ganid inquired what one could do to make friends, having noticed that the majority of persons whom they chanced to meet were attracted to Jesus, his teacher said: "Become interested in your fellows; learn how to love them and watch for the opportunity to do something for them which you are sure they want done," and then he quoted the olden Jewish proverb -- "A man who would have friends must show himself friendly."

130:7.3 At Carthage Jesus had a long and memorable talk with a Mithraic priest about immortality, about time and eternity. This Persian had been educated at Alexandria, and he really desired to learn from Jesus. Put into the words of today, in substance Jesus said in answer to his many questions:

130:7.4 Time is the stream of flowing temporal events perceived by creature consciousness. Time is a name given to the succession-arrangement whereby events are recognized and segregated. The universe of space is a time-related phenomenon as it is viewed from any interior position outside of the fixed abode of Paradise. The motion of time is only revealed in relation to something which does not move in space as a time phenomenon. In the universe of universes Paradise and its Deities transcend both time and space. On the inhabited worlds, human personality (indwelt and oriented by the Paradise Father's spirit) is the only physically related reality which can transcend the material sequence of temporal events.

130:7.5 Animals do not sense time as does man, and even to man, because of his sectional and circumscribed view, time appears as a succession of events; but as man ascends, as he progresses inward, the enlarging view of this event procession is such that it is discerned more and more in its wholeness. That which formerly appeared as a succession of events then will be viewed as a whole and perfectly related cycle; in this way will circular simultaneity increasingly displace the onetime consciousness of the linear sequence of events.

130:7.6 There are seven different conceptions of space as it is conditioned by time. Space is measured by time, not time by space. The confusion of the scientist grows out of failure to recognize the reality of space. Space is not merely an intellectual concept of the variation in relatedness of universe objects. Space is not empty, and the only thing man knows which can even partially transcend space is mind. Mind can function independently of the concept of the space-relatedness of material objects. Space is relatively and comparatively finite to all beings of creature status. The nearer consciousness approaches the awareness of seven cosmic dimensions, the more does the concept of potential space approach ultimacy. But the space potential is truly ultimate only on the absolute level.

130:7.7 It must be apparent that universal reality has an expanding and always relative meaning on the ascending and perfecting levels of the cosmos. Ultimately, surviving mortals achieve identity in a seven-dimensional universe.

130:7.8 The time-space concept of a mind of material origin is destined to undergo successive enlargements as the conscious and conceiving personality ascends the levels of the universes. When man attains the mind intervening between the material and the spiritual planes of existence, his ideas of time-space will be enormously expanded both as to quality of perception and quantity of experience. The enlarging cosmic conceptions of an advancing spirit personality are due to augmentations of both depth of insight and scope of consciousness. And as personality passes on, upward and inward, to the transcendental levels of Deity-likeness, the time-space concept will increasingly approximate the timeless and spaceless concepts of the Absolutes. Relatively, and in accordance with transcendental attainment, these concepts of the absolute level are to be envisioned by the children of ultimate destiny.

http://urantiabook.org/newbook/papers/p130.htm


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[This message has been edited by Absonite (edited 12-02-2004).]

 
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« Reply #20 on: December 15, 2007, 11:44:33 pm »

Absonite

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  posted 12-02-2004 07:23 AM                       
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Veronica
Your thinking is superb.......

"How long can someone continue to follow such a message....."


It is very true, Christianity and Judiasm is founded on the negative message.... Thou shalt not.....
It is not the message of truth or divinity. It was designed to appeal to the ignorant minds of a time long ago of relative ignorance and fear when man could understand little of spiritual reality. Since I just posted a long read for Dawn, I hesitate to post more except the insights are so soul stirring, true and profound that I find it impossible not to because it resonates so well with your own thinking. So many on this forum still think in the negative and quote the old and new testament as truth for today. Although humanity itself may take many generations before it can change to what you already know, the individual, like yourself, can proceed at a far greater rate of enlightenment than humanity as a whole. I have used your own insights of positive and negative in order to substantiate and reinforce the path of truth you are already on while you try to make sense of some of these mysteries of the divine. I hope I have chosen well and that it's seed falls onto fertile ground.  Nearly a hundred years ago a new revelation of truth began to appear on earth designed to correct some of the accumulated errors of past generations. As you can see from some of the conversations here, it will take a long time before mankind is able to assimilate it into his reality. The old ways of thinking and the old religions are as you say on the brink of what you have already figured out ......."How long can someone continue to follow such a message....."

103:2.5 The psychology of a child is naturally positive, not ÊnegativeÊ. So many mortals are Ênegative because they were so trained.


**********
*************


1. TRUE VALUES

132:1.1 It was with Angamon, the leader of the Stoics, that Jesus had an all-night talk early during his sojourn in Rome. This man subsequently became a great friend of Paul and proved to be one of the strong supporters of the Christian church at Rome. In substance, and restated in modern phraseology, Jesus taught Angamon:


132:1.2 The standard of true values must be looked for in the spiritual world and on divine levels of eternal reality. To an ascending mortal all lower and material standards must be recognized as transient, partial, and inferior. The scientist, as such, is limited to the discovery of the relatedness of material facts. Technically, he has no right to assert that he is either materialist or idealist, for in so doing he has assumed to forsake the attitude of a true scientist since any and all such assertions of attitude are the very essence of philosophy.

132:1.3 Unless the moral insight and the spiritual attainment of mankind are proportionately augmented, the unlimited advancement of a purely materialistic culture may eventually become a menace to civilization. A purely materialistic science harbors within itself the potential seed of the destruction of all scientific striving, for this very attitude presages the ultimate collapse of a civilization which has abandoned its sense of moral values and has repudiated its spiritual goal of attainment.

132:1.4 The materialistic scientist and the extreme idealist are destined always to be at loggerheads. This is not true of those scientists and idealists who are in possession of a common standard of high moral values and spiritual test levels. In every age scientists and religionists must recognize that they are on trial before the bar of human need. They must eschew all warfare between themselves while they strive valiantly to justify their continued survival by enhanced devotion to the service of human progress. If the so-called science or religion of any age is false, then must it either purify its activities or pass away before the emergence of a material science or spiritual religion of a truer and more worthy order.


2. GOOD AND EVIL

132:2.1 Mardus was the acknowledged leader of the Cynics of Rome, and he became a great friend of the scribe of Damascus. Day after day he conversed with Jesus, and night upon night he listened to his supernal teaching. Among the more important discussions with Mardus was the one designed to answer this sincere Cynic's question about good and evil. In substance, and in twentieth-century phraseology, Jesus said:


132:2.2 My brother, good and evil are merely words symbolizing relative levels of human comprehension of the observable universe. If you are ethically lazy and socially indifferent, you can take as your standard of good the current social usages. If you are spiritually indolent and morally unprogressive, you may take as your standards of good the religious practices and traditions of your contemporaries. But the soul that survives time and emerges into eternity must make a living and personal choice between good and evil as they are determined by the true values of the spiritual standards established by the divine spirit which the Father in heaven has sent to dwell within the heart of man. This indwelling spirit is the standard of personality survival.

132:2.3 Goodness, like truth, is always relative and unfailingly evil-contrasted. It is the perception of these qualities of goodness and truth that enables the evolving souls of men to make those personal decisions of choice which are essential to eternal survival.

132:2.4 The spiritually blind individual who logically follows scientific dictation, social usage, and religious dogma stands in grave danger of sacrificing his moral freedom and losing his spiritual liberty. Such a soul is destined to become an intellectual parrot, a social automaton, and a slave to religious authority.

132:2.5 Goodness is always growing toward new levels of the increasing liberty of moral self-realization and spiritual personality attainment -- the discovery of, and identification with, the indwelling Adjuster. An experience is good when it heightens the appreciation of beauty, augments the moral will, enhances the discernment of truth, enlarges the capacity to love and serve one's fellows, exalts the spiritual ideals, and unifies the supreme human motives of time with the eternal plans of the indwelling Adjuster, all of which lead directly to an increased desire to do the Father's will, thereby fostering the divine passion to find God and to be more like him.


132:2.6 As you ascend the universe scale of creature development, you will find increasing goodness and diminishing evil in perfect accordance with your capacity for goodness-experience and truth-discernment. The ability to entertain error or experience evil will not be fully lost until the ascending human soul achieves final spirit levels.

132:2.7 Goodness is living, relative, always progressing, invariably a personal experience, and everlastingly correlated with the discernment of truth and beauty. Goodness is found in the recognition of the positive truth-values of the spiritual level, which must, in human experience, be contrasted with the negativeÊ counterpart -- the shadows of potential evil.


132:2.8 Until you attain Paradise levels, goodness will always be more of a quest than a possession, more of a goal than an experience of attainment. But even as you hunger and thirst for righteousness, you experience increasing satisfaction in the partial attainment of goodness. The presence of goodness and evil in the world is in itself positive proof of the existence and reality of man's moral will, the personality, which thus identifies these values and is also able to choose between them.

132:2.9 By the time of the attainment of Paradise the ascending mortal's capacity for identifying the self with true spirit values has become so enlarged as to result in the attainment of the perfection of the possession of the light of life. Such a perfected spirit personality becomes so wholly, divinely, and spiritually unified with the positive and supreme qualities of goodness, beauty, and truth that there remains no possibility that such a righteous spirit would cast any Ênegative shadow of potential evil when exposed to the searching luminosity of the divine light of the infinite Rulers of Paradise. In all such spirit personalities, goodness is no longer partial, contrastive, and comparative; it has become divinely complete and spiritually replete; it approaches the purity and perfection of the Supreme.

132:2.10 The possibility of evil is necessary to moral choosing, but not the actuality thereof. A shadow is only relatively real. Actual evil is not necessary as a personal experience. Potential evil acts equally well as a decision stimulus in the realms of moral progress on the lower levels of spiritual development. Evil becomes a reality of personal experience only when a moral mind makes evil its choice.


3. TRUTH AND FAITH

132:3.1 Nabon was a Greek Jew and foremost among the leaders of the chief mystery cult in Rome, the Mithraic. While this high priest of Mithraism held many conferences with the Damascus scribe, he was most permanently influenced by their discussion of truth and faith one evening. Nabon had thought to make a convert of Jesus and had even suggested that he return to Palestine as a Mithraic teacher. He little realized that Jesus was preparing him to become one of the early converts to the gospel of the kingdom. Restated in modern phraseology, the substance of Jesus' teaching was:


132:3.2 Truth cannot be defined with words, only by living. Truth is always more than knowledge. Knowledge pertains to things observed, but truth transcends such purely material levels in that it consorts with wisdom and embraces such imponderables as human experience, even spiritual and living realities. Knowledge originates in science; wisdom, in true philosophy; truth, in the religious experience of spiritual living. Knowledge deals with facts; wisdom, with relationships; truth, with reality values.

132:3.3 Man tends to crystallize science, formulate philosophy, and dogmatize truth because he is mentally lazy in adjusting to the progressive struggles of living, while he is also terribly afraid of the unknown. Natural man is slow to initiate changes in his habits of thinking and in his techniques of living.

132:3.4 Revealed truth, personally discovered truth, is the supreme delight of the human soul; it is the joint creation of the material mind and the indwelling spirit. The eternal salvation of this truth-discerning and beauty-loving soul is assured by that hunger and thirst for goodness which leads this mortal to develop a singleness of purpose to do the Father's will, to find God and to become like him. There is never conflict between true knowledge and truth. There may be conflict between knowledge and human beliefs, beliefs colored with prejudice, distorted by fear, and dominated by the dread of facing new facts of material discovery or spiritual progress.

132:3.5 But truth can never become man's possession without the exercise of faith. This is true because man's thoughts, wisdom, ethics, and ideals will never rise higher than his faith, his sublime hope. And all such true faith is predicated on profound reflection, sincere self-criticism, and uncompromising moral consciousness. Faith is the inspiration of the spiritized creative imagination.

132:3.6 Faith acts to release the superhuman activities of the divine spark, the immortal germ, that lives within the mind of man, and which is the potential of eternal survival. Plants and animals survive in time by the technique of passing on from one generation to another identical particles of themselves. The human soul (personality) of man survives mortal death by identity association with this indwelling spark of divinity, which is immortal, and which functions to perpetuate the human personality upon a continuing and higher level of progressive universe existence. The concealed seed of the human soul is an immortal spirit. The second generation of the soul is the first of a succession of personality manifestations of spiritual and progressing existences, terminating only when this divine entity attains the source of its existence, the personal source of all existence, God, the Universal Father.

132:3.7 Human life continues -- survives -- because it has a universe function, the task of finding God. The faith-activated soul of man cannot stop short of the attainment of this goal of destiny; and when it does once achieve this divine goal, it can never end because it has become like God -- eternal.


132:3.8 Spiritual evolution is an experience of the increasing and voluntary choice of goodness attended by an equal and progressive diminution of the possibility of evil. With the attainment of finality of choice for goodness and of completed capacity for truth appreciation, there comes into existence a perfection of beauty and holiness whose righteousness eternally inhibits the possibility of the emergence of even the concept of potential evil. Such a God-knowing soul casts no shadow of doubting evil when functioning on such a high spirit level of divine goodness.

132:3.9 The presence of the Paradise spirit in the mind of man constitutes the revelation promise and the faith pledge of an eternal existence of divine progression for every soul seeking to achieve identity with this immortal and indwelling spirit fragment of the Universal Father.

132:3.10 Universe progress is characterized by increasing personality freedom because it is associated with the progressive attainment of higher and higher levels of self-understanding and consequent voluntary self-restraint. The attainment of perfection of spiritual self-restraint equals completeness of universe freedom and personal liberty. Faith fosters and maintains man's soul in the midst of the confusion of his early orientation in such a vast universe, whereas prayer becomes the great unifier of the various inspirations of the creative imagination and the faith urges of a soul trying to identify itself with the spirit ideals of the indwelling and associated divine presence.


132:3.11 Nabon was greatly impressed by these words, as he was by each of his talks with Jesus. These truths continued to burn within his heart, and he was of great assistance to the later arriving preachers of Jesus' gospel.


http://urantiabook.org/newbook/papers/p132.htm

1. THE APPROACH TO GOD

5:1.1 The inability of the finite creature to approach the infinite Father is inherent, not in the Father's aloofness, but in the finiteness and material limitations of created beings. The magnitude of the spiritual difference between the highest personality of universe existence and the lower groups of created intelligences is inconceivable. Were it possible for the lower orders of intelligence to be transported instantly into the presence of the Father himself, they would not know they were there. They would there be just as oblivious of the presence of the Universal Father as where they now are. There is a long, long road ahead of mortal man before he can consistently and within the realms of possibility ask for safe conduct into the Paradise presence of the Universal Father. Spiritually, man must be translated many times before he can attain a plane that will yield the spiritual vision which will enable him to see even any one of the Seven Master Spirits.

5:1.2 Our Father is not in hiding; he is not in arbitrary seclusion. He has mobilized the resources of divine wisdom in a never-ending effort to reveal himself to the children of his universal domains. There is an infinite grandeur and an inexpressible generosity connected with the majesty of his love which causes him to yearn for the association of every created being who can comprehend, love, or approach him; and it is, therefore, the limitations inherent in you, inseparable from your finite personality and material existence, that determine the time and place and circumstances in which you may achieve the goal of the journey of mortal ascension and stand in the presence of the Father at the center of all things.


5:1.3 Although the approach to the Paradise presence of the Father must await your attainment of the highest finite levels of spirit progression, you should rejoice in the recognition of the ever-present possibility of immediate communion with the bestowal spirit of the Father so intimately associated with your inner soul and your spiritualizing self.

5:1.4 The mortals of the realms of time and space may differ greatly in innate abilities and intellectual endowment, they may enjoy environments exceptionally favorable to social advancement and moral progress, or they may suffer from the lack of almost every human aid to culture and supposed advancement in the arts of civilization; but the possibilities for spiritual progress in the ascension career are equal to all; increasing levels of spiritual insight and cosmic meanings are attained quite independently of all such sociomoral differentials of the diversified material environments on the evolutionary worlds.

5:1.5 However Urantia mortals may differ in their intellectual, social, economic, and even moral opportunities and endowments, forget not that their spiritual endowment is uniform and unique. They all enjoy the same divine presence of the gift from the Father, and they are all equally privileged to seek intimate personal communion with this indwelling spirit of divine origin, while they may all equally choose to accept the uniform spiritual leading of these Mystery Monitors.


5:1.6 If mortal man is wholeheartedly spiritually motivated, unreservedly consecrated to the doing of the Father's will, then, since he is so certainly and so effectively spiritually endowed by the indwelling and divine Adjuster, there cannot fail to materialize in that individual's experience the sublime consciousness of knowing God and the supernal assurance of surviving for the purpose of finding God by the progressive experience of becoming more and more like him.

5:1.7 Man is spiritually indwelt by a surviving Thought Adjuster. If such a human mind is sincerely and spiritually motivated, if such a human soul desires to know God and become like him, honestly wants to do the Father's will, there exists no negative influence of mortal deprivation nor positive power of possible interference which can prevent such a divinely motivated soul from securely ascending to the portals of Paradise.

5:1.8 The Father desires all his creatures to be in personal communion with him. He has on Paradise a place to receive all those whose survival status and spiritual nature make possible such attainment. Therefore settle in your philosophy now and forever: To each of you and to all of us, God is approachable, the Father is attainable, the way is open; the forces of divine love and the ways and means of divine administration are all interlocked in an effort to facilitate the advancement of every worthy intelligence of every universe to the Paradise presence of the Universal Father.

5:1.9 The fact that vast time is involved in the attainment of God makes the presence and personality of the Infinite none the less real. Your ascension is a part of the circuit of the seven superuniverses, and though you swing around it countless times, you may expect, in spirit and in status, to be ever swinging inward. You can depend upon being translated from sphere to sphere, from the outer circuits ever nearer the inner center, and some day, doubt not, you shall stand in the divine and central presence and see him, figuratively speaking, face to face. It is a question of the attainment of actual and literal spiritual levels; and these spiritual levels are attainable by any being who has been indwelt by a Mystery Monitor, and who has subsequently eternally fused with that Thought Adjuster.


5:1.10 The Father is not in spiritual hiding, but so many of his creatures have hidden themselves away in the mists of their own willful decisions and for the time being have separated themselves from the communion of his spirit and the spirit of his Son by the choosing of their own perverse ways and by the indulgence of the self-assertiveness of their intolerant minds and unspiritual natures.

5:1.11 Mortal man may draw near God and may repeatedly forsake the divine will so long as the power of choice remains. Man's final doom is not sealed until he has lost the power to choose the Father's will. There is never a closure of the Father's heart to the need and the petition of his children. Only do his offspring close their hearts forever to the Father's drawing power when they finally and forever lose the desire to do his divine will -- to know him and to be like him. Likewise is man's eternal destiny assured when Adjuster fusion proclaims to the universe that such an ascender has made the final and irrevocable choice to live the Father's will.

5:1.12 The great God makes direct contact with mortal man and gives a part of his infinite and eternal and incomprehensible self to live and dwell within him. God has embarked upon the eternal adventure with man. If you yield to the leadings of the spiritual forces in you and around you, you cannot fail to attain the high destiny established by a loving God as the universe goal of his ascendant creatures from the evolutionary worlds of space.


http://urantiabook.org/newbook/papers/p005.htm


 
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« Reply #21 on: December 15, 2007, 11:44:56 pm »

Phildonnia
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Here's a (slightly humorous) game for sorting out your ideas concerning God:
http://www.philosophersnet.com/games/god.htm
Thought y'all might enjoy.

 
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« Reply #22 on: December 15, 2007, 11:45:29 pm »

rockessence

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Ab,
Great stuff!


 
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« Reply #23 on: December 15, 2007, 11:45:54 pm »

Valerie

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Well, played that game and took two direct hits and bit the bullet three times. I never do well at games.
Dawn, no offense, but your concept of God sounds a lot more like a science fiction novel than the real deal! I don't know what to think about God other than to say that it's a whole lot bigger than me.
 
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« Reply #24 on: December 15, 2007, 11:46:16 pm »

Morrison

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Am I the only one here who thinks that this discussion might be getting a wee bit blasphemous here? Maybe there are some things we shouldn't be looking too closely at.


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« Reply #25 on: December 15, 2007, 11:46:38 pm »

Stacy Dohm

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Nah, I think God would understand us being curious, he is GOD after all. (He, I think, not she)
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« Reply #26 on: December 15, 2007, 11:47:02 pm »

Calvin Noble

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Dawn, your conception of God does indeed sound more like a science fiction novel than actual fact. In truth, any God capable of creating a universe as vast and diverse as this one is has to be something beyond all our understanding. Even our most sincere words aren't able to do Him justice.
Absonite, I don't understand your hostility towards traditional Christianity. I have read everything you've posted under this and the ark topic and it seems to me anyway that we're talking about the same deity. In what way would you say that the god of the Urantia Papers differs from the god of the Bible?
 
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« Reply #27 on: December 15, 2007, 11:47:41 pm »

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Calvin,
to start with........


Some Apparent Bible Contradictions:

God is satisfied / dissatisfied with his works.
Gen 1:31 / Gen 6:6

God dwells / dwells not in chosen temples.
2 Chron 7:12,16 / Acts 7:48

God dwells in light / darkness.
1 Tim 6:16 / 1 Kings 8:12; Ps 18:11; Ps 97:2

God is seen and heard / invisible and cannot be heard.
Ex 33:23,11; Gen 3:9,10; Gen 32:30; Is 6:1; Ex 24:9-11 / John 1:18; John
5:37; Ex 33:20; 1 Tim 6:16

God is tired and rests / never tired and never rests.
Ex 31:17; Jer 15:6 / Is 40:28

God is everywhere present, sees and knows all things / not everywhere,
neither sees nor knows all things.
Prov 15:3; Ps 139:7-10; Job 34:22,21 / Gen 11:5; Gen 18:20,21; Gen 3:8

God knows the hearts of men / tries men to find out.
Acts 1:24; Ps 139:2,3 / Deut 13:3, 8:2; Gen 22:12

God is / is not all powerful.
Jer 32:27; Mt 19:26 / Judg 1:19

God is unchangeable / changeable.
James 1:17; Mal 3:6; Ezek 24:14; Num 23:19 / Gen 6:6; Jonah 3:10; 1 Sam 2:30,3
1; 2 Kings 20:1,4-6; Ex 33:1,3,17,14

God is just and impartial / unjust and partial.
Ps 92:15; Gen 18:25; Deut 32:4; Rom 2:11; Ezek 18:25 / Gen 9:25; Ex 20:5; Rom
9:11-13; Mt 13:12

God is / is not the author of evil.
Lam 3:38; Jer 18:11; Is 45:7; Amos 3:6; Ezek 20:25 / 1 Cor 14:33; Deut 32:4;
James 1:13

God gives freely to those who ask / withholds blessings.
James 1:5; Luke 11:10 / John 12:40; Josh 11:20; Is 63:17

God can / cannot be found by seekers.
Mt 7:8; Prov 8:17 / Prov 1:28

God is warlike / peaceful.
Ex 15:3; Is 51:15 / Rom 15:33; 1 Cor 14:33

God is cruel, unmerciful, destructive and ferocious / kind, merciful and
good.
Jer 13:14; Deut 7:16; 1 Sam 15:2,3; 1 Sam 6:19; Deut 4:24 / James 5:11; Lam
3:33; 1 Chron 16;34; Ezek 18:32; Ps 145:9; 1 Tim 2:4; 1 John 4:16; Ps 25:8

God's anger is fierce, endures long / is slow and ends quickly.
Num 32:13; Num 25:4; Jer 17:4 / Ps 103:8; Ps 30:5

God commands, approves of and delights in burnt offerings, sacrifices and
holy days / disapproves of and has no pleasure in burnt offerings, sacrifices
and holy days.
Ex 29:36; Lev 23:27; Ex 29:18; Lev 1:9 / Jer 7:22; Jer 6:20; Ps 50:13,14; Is
1:11-13

God accepts / forbids human sacrifices.
2 Sam 21:8,9,14; Gen 22:2; Judg 11:30-32,34,38,39 / Deut 12:30,31

God tempts man / tempts no man.
Gen 22:1; 2 Sam 24:1; Jer 20:7; Mt 6:13 / James 1:13

God cannot lie / God lies by proxy, sends lying spirits.
Heb 6:18 / 2 Thes 2:11; 1 Kings 22:23; Ezek 14:9

God destroys / will not destroy man because of wickedness.
Gen 6:5,7 / Gen 8:21

God's attributes are revealed in his works / attributes cannot be discovered.
Rom 1:20 / Job 11:7; Is 40:28

There is but one God / there is a plurality of gods.
Deut 6:4 / Gen 1:26; Gen 3:22; Gen 18:1-3; 1 John 5:7

Robbery commanded / forbidden.
Ex 3:21,22; Ex 12:35,36 / Lev 19:13; Ex 20:15

Lying approved and sanctioned / forbidden.
Josh 2:4-6; James 2:25; Ex 1:18-20; 1 Kings 22:21,22 / Ex 20:16; Prov 12:22;
Rev 21:8

Hatred of the Edomite sanctioned / forbidden.
2 Kings 14:7,3 / Deut 23:7

Killing commanded / forbidden.
Ex 32:27 / Ex 20:13

Blood shedder must die / must not die.
Gen 9:5,6 / Gen 4:15

Making of images forbidden / commanded.
Ex 20:4 / Ex 25:18,20

Slavery and oppression ordained / forbidden.
Gen 9:25; Lev 25:45,46; Joel 3:8 / Is 58:6; Ex 22:21; Ex 21:16; Mt 23:10

Improvidence enjoined / condemned.
Mt 6:28,31,34; Luke 6:30,35; Luke 12:3 / 1 Tim 5:8; Prov 13:22

Anger approved / disapproved.
Eph 4:26 / Eccl 7:9; Prov 22:24; James 1:20

Good works to be seen of men / not to be seen.
Mt 5:16 / Mt 6:1

Judging of others forbidden / approved.
Mt 7:1,2 / 1 Cor 6:2-4, 5:12

Jesus taught non-resistance / taught and practiced physical resistance.
Mt 5:39; Mt 26:52 / Luke 22:36; John 2:15

Jesus warned followers not to fear being killed / Jesus himself avoided being
killed.
Luke 12:4 / John 7:1

Public prayer sanctioned / disapproved.
1 Kings 8:22,54; Kings 9:3 / Mt 6:5,6

Importunity in prayer commended / condemned.
Luke 18:5,7; Luke 11:8 / Mt 6:7,8

Wearing of long hair by men sanctioned / condemned.
Judg 13:5; Num 6:5 / 1 Cor 11:14

Circumcision instituted / condemned.
Gen 17:10 / Gal 5:2

The Sabbath instituted / repudiated.
Ex 20:8 / Is 1:13; Rom 14:5; Col 2:16

Creation / escape from Egypt reason for Sabbath.
Ex 20:11 / Deut 5:15

No work to be done on Sabbath under penalty of death / Jesus broke the
Sabbath and justified disciples to do same.
Ex 31:15; Num 15:32,36 / John 5:16; Mt 12:1-3,5

Baptism commanded / not commanded.
Mt 28:19 / 1 Cor 1:17,14

Every animal allowed for food / some animals prohibited.
Gen 9:3; 1 Cor 10:25; Rom 14:14 / Deut 14:7,8

Taking of oaths sanctioned / forbidden.
Num 30:2; Gen 21:23,24,31; Gen 31:53; Heb 6:13 / Mt 5:34

Marriage approved / disapproved.
Gen 2:18; Gen 1:28; Mt 19:5; Heb 13:4 / 1 Cor 7:1, 1 Cor 7:7,8

Freedom of divorce permitted / restricted.
Deut 24:1; Deut 21:10,11,14 / Mt 5:32

Adultery forbidden / allowed.
Ex 20:14; Heb 13:4 / Num 31:18; Hos 1:2; Hos 2:1-3

Marriage or cohabitation with a sister denounced / God blessed Abraham's
marriage to sister.
Deut 27:22; Lev 20:17 / Gen 20:11,12; Gen 17:16

A man may / may not marry his brother's widow.
Deut 25:5 / Lev 20:21

Hatred to kindred enjoined / condemned.
Luke 14:26 / Eph 6:2; Eph 5:25,29; 1 John 3:15

Intoxicating beverages recommended / discountenanced.
Prov 31:6,7; 1 Tim 5:23; Ps 104:15 / Prov 20:1; Prov 23:31,32

It is our duty to obey our rulers, who are god's ministers and punish evil
doers only / it is not our duty to always obey rulers who sometimes punish
the good and receive unto themselves damnation therefor.
Rom 13:1-3,6; Mt 23:2,3; 1 Pet 2:13,14; Eccl 8:2,5 / Ex 1:17,20; Dan 3:16,18;
Dan 6:9,7,10; Acts 4:26,27; Mark 12:38-40; Luke 23:11,24,33,35

Women's rights denied / affirmed.
Gen 3:16; 1 Tim 2:12; 1 Cor 14:34; 1 Pet 3:6 / Judg 4:4,14,15; Judg 5:7; Acts
2:18; Acts 21:9

Obedience to masters enjoined / obedience to God only.
Col 3:22,23; 1 Pet 2:18 / Mt 4:10; Mt 23:10; 1 Cor 7:23

There is / is no unpardonable sin.
Mark 3:29 / Acts 13:39

Man created before / after animals.
Gen 2:18,19 / Gen 1:25-27

Planting and harvest always / ceased for seven years.
Gen 8:22 / Gen 41:54,56

Pharaoh's heart hardened by God / pharaoh.
Ex 4:21; Ex 9:12 / Ex 8:15

All / not all cattle, horses died.
Ex 9:3,6 / Ex 14:9

Moses feared / did not fear pharaoh.
Ex 2:14,15,23; Ex 4:19 / Heb 11:27

24,000 / 23,000 died in plague.
Num 25:9 / 1 Cor 10:8

John the Baptist was / was not Elijah.
Mt 11:14 / John 1:21

Joseph's father was Jacob / Heli.
Mt 1:16 / Luke 3:23

Salah's father was Arphaxad / Cainan.
Gen 11:12 / Luke 3:35,36

14 / 13 generations from Abraham to David.
Mt 1:17 / Mt 1:2-6

14 / 13 generations from captivity to Jesus.
Mt 1:17 / Mt 1:12-16

Infant Jesus taken / not taken to Egypt.
Mt 2:14,15,19,21,23 / Luke 2:22,39

Jesus was tempted / not tempted in the wilderness.
Mark 1:12,13 / John 2:1,2

Two different genealogies of Jesus.
Mt 1:1-17 / Luke 3:23-38

Jesus is / is not son of David.
Mt 1:1; Luke 1:32; Rom 1:3 / Mt 22:43-46; Mark 12:36,37

Risen Jesus says touch me / touch me not.
John 20:27 / John 20:17

Jesus preached first sermon on the mount / plain.
Mt 5:1,2 / Luke 6:17,20

John in / not in prison when Jesus went into Galilee.
Mark 1:14 / John 1:43; John 3:22-24

Disciples to go forth with / without staff and sandals.
Mark 6:8,9 / Mt 10:9,10

Woman of Canaan / Greece besought Jesus.
Mt 15:22 / Mark 7:26

Two / one blind men besought Jesus.
Mt 20:30 / Luke 18:35,38

Jesus was crucified at the third / sixth hour.
Mark 15:25 / John 19:14,15

Two / one thieves reviled Jesus.
Mt 27:44; Mark 15:32 / Luke 23:39,40

Satan entered Judas at / before last supper.
John 13:27 / Luke 22:3,4,7

Judas hanged himself / died another way.
Mt 27:5 / Acts 1:18

Potter's field purchased by Judas / chief priests.
Acts 1:18 / Mt 27:6,7

One / two / three / more, women came to sepulchre.
John 20:1; Mt 28:1 / Mark 16:1; Luke 24:10

It was sunrise / before sunrise when they came to the sepulchre.
Mark 16:2 / John 20:1

Two angels standing / one angel sitting, at the sepulchre.
Luke 24:4 / Mt 28:2,5

Two / one angels in the sepulchre.
John 20:11,12 / Mark 16:5

Jesus was to be three / two days, nights in the grave.
Mt 12:40 / Mk 15:25,42,44-46; Mk 16:19

Holy ghost bestowed at / before Pentecost.
Acts 1:8,5; Acts 2:1,4 / John 20:22

Disciples to tarry in Jerusalem / go immediately to Galilee.
Mt 28:10 / Luke 24:49

Jesus first appeared to apostles in room / on a mountain.
Luke 24:33,36,37; John 20:19 / Mt 28:16,17

Jesus ascended from Mount Olivet / Bethany.
Acts 1:9,12 / Luke 24:50,51

Paul's attendants heard miraculous voice and stood / didn't hear and were
prostrate.
Acts 9:7 / Acts 22:9; Acts 26:14

Abraham departed for Canaan / unknown destination.
Gen 12:5 / Heb 11:8

Abraham had two / one sons.
Gal 4:22 / Heb 11:17

Keturah was Abraham's wife / concubine.
Gen 25:1 / 1 Chron 1:32

Abraham had one / six sons at 100, with / without providence.
Gen 21:2; Rom 4:19; Heb 11:12 / Gen 25:1,2

Jacob / Abraham bought a sepulchre from Hamor.
Josh 24:32 / Acts 7:16

God promised Canaan to Abraham and seed forever / Abraham and seed never
received promised land.
Gen 13:14,15,17; Gen 17:8 / Acts 7:5; Heb 11:9,13

Goliath / Goliath's brother was slain by Elhanan.
2 Sam 21:19 / 1 Chron 20:5

Ahaziah began reign in 12th / 11th year of Joram.
2 Kings 8:25 / 2 Kings 9:29

Michal had no / five children.
2 Sam 6:23 / 2 Sam 21:8

David was tempted by the Lord / by Satan, to number Israel.
2 Sam 24:1 / 1 Chron 21:1

Fighting men of Israel 800,000 / 1,100,000, Judah 500,000 / 470,000.
2 Sam 24:9 / 1 Chron 21:5

David sinned numbering Israel / never sinned except concerning Uriah.
2 Sam 24:10 / 1 Kings 15:5

Penalty for David's sin was seven / three years famine.
2 Sam 24:13 / 1 Chron 21:11,12

David took 700 / 7000 horsemen.
2 Sam 8:4 / 1 Chron 18:4

David bought threshing floor for 50 silver / 600 gold shekels.
2 Sam 24:24 / 1 Chron 21:25

David's throne to last forever / was cast down.
Ps 89:35-37 / Ps 89:44

Jesus is / is not equal to God.
John 10:30; Phil 2:5 / John 14:28; Mt 24:36

Jesus is / is not all-powerful.
Mt 28:18; John 3:35 / Mark 6:5

Law was / was not ended by Christian dispensation.
Luke 16:16; Eph 2:15; Rom 7:6 / Mt 5:17-19

Jesus' mission was / was not peace.
Luke 2:13,14 / Mt 10:34

Jesus did / did not receive testimony from man.
John 15:27 / John 5:33,34

Jesus' witness of himself is true / not true.
John 8:18,14 / John 5:31

Jesus died for friends / enemies.
John 15:13; John 10:11 / Rom 5:10

It was lawful / unlawful for the Jews to put Jesus to death.
John 19:7 / John 18:31

Children are / are not punished for parents sins.
Ex 20:5 / Ezek 18:20

Man is / is not justified by faith alone.
Rom 3:20; Gal 2:16; Gal 3:11,12; Rom 4:2 / James 2:21,24; Rom 2:13

It is impossible / possible to fall from grace.
John 10:28; Rom 8:38,39 / Ezek 18:24; Heb 6:4-6; 2 Pet 2:20,21

No man is without sin / Christians are sinless.
Prov 20:9; Eccl 7:20; Rom 3:10 / 1 John 3:9,6,8

Resurrection of the dead / no resurrection of the dead.
Cor 15:52; Rev 20:12,13; Luke 20:37; 1 Cor 15:16 / Job 7:9; Eccl 9:5; Is
26:14

Reward and punishment to be on this world / next world.
Prov 11:31 / Rev 20:12; Mt 16:27; 2 Cor 5:10

Annihilation for all mankind / endless misery for some.
Job 3:11,13-17,19-22; Eccl 9:5,10; Eccl 3:19,20 / Mt 25:46; Rev 20:10,15; Rev
14:11; Dan 12:2

Earth will / will never be destroyed.
2 Pet 3:10; Heb 1:11; Rev 20:11 / Ps 104:5; Eccl 1:4

Evil does not / does happen to the godly.
Prov 12:21; 1 Pet 3:13 / Heb 12:6; Job 2:3,7

Worldly good and prosperity / misery and destruction are the lot of the
godly.
Prov 12:21; Ps 37:28,32,33,37; Ps 1:1,3; Gen 39:2; Job 42:12 / Heb 11:37,38;
Rev 7:14; 2 Tim 3:12; Luke 21:17

Worldly prosperity a reward of righteousness and a blessing / a curse and a
bar to future reward.
Mark 10:29,30; Ps 37:25; Ps 112:1,3; Job 22:23,24; Prov 15:6 / Luke 6:20; Mt
6:19,21; Luke 16:22; Mt 19:24; Luke 6:24

Christian yoke is / is not easy.
Mt 11:28-30 / 2 Tim 3:12; Heb 12:6,8

Fruit of the spirit is love and gentleness / vengeance and fury.
Gal 5:22 / Judg 15:14; 1 Sam 18:10,11

Longevity enjoyed by / denied to the wicked.
Job 21:7,8; Ps 17:14; Eccl 8:12; Is 65:20 / Eccl 8:13; Ps 55:23; Prov 10:27;
Heb 36:14; Eccl 7:17

Poverty is a blessing / riches a blessing / neither a blessing.
Luke 6:20,24; James 2:5; Prov 10:15; Job 22:23,24 / Job 42:12; Prov 30:8,9

Wisdom a source of enjoyment / vexation, grief, sorrow.
Prov 3:13,17 / Eccl 1:17,18

A good name is a blessing / curse.
Eccl 7:1; Prov 22:1 / Luke 6:26

Laughter commended / condemned.
Eccl 3:1,4; Eccl 8:15 / Luke 6:25; Eccl 7:3,4

Rod is remedy for foolishness / there is no remedy.
Prov 22:15 / Prov 27:22

A fool should be / not be answered according to his folly.
Prov 26:5 / Prov 26:4

Temptation desirable / not desirable.
James 1:2 / Mt 6:13

Prophesy is / not sure.
2 Pet 1:19 / Jer 18:7-10

Man's life was to be 120 / 70 years.
Gen 6:3 / Ps 90:10

Fear of man put upon every beast / but not the lion.
Gen 9:2 / Prov 30:30

Miracles proof / not proof of divine mission.
Mt 11:2-5; John 3:2; Ex 14:31 / Ex 7:10-12; Deut 13:1-3; Luke 11:19

Moses was a very meek / cruel man.
Num 12:3 / Num 31:15,17

Elijah went up to heaven / only Jesus ascended to heaven.
2 Kings 2:11 / John 3:13

All scripture is inspired / some scripture is not inspired.
2 Tim 3:16 / 1 Cor 7:6,12; 2 Cor 11:17



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« Reply #28 on: December 15, 2007, 11:48:15 pm »

Calvin Noble

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Member # 2238

Rate Member   posted 12-03-2004 11:46 PM                       
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Absonite,
An impressive list, but those are not literal quotes from the Bible but rather observatons, and so, open to misinterpretation. I'll admit that the Bible is a complex work that has some contradictions in it, however, it does not explain why you believe that the god of Urantia Book is different from the one in the Bible and why you seem to hostile towards the Bible.

What does the Urantia Book say on topics like the flood, Soddom and Gomarrah and Exodus?
 
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« Reply #29 on: December 15, 2007, 11:49:02 pm »

 
Veronica Poe

Member
Member # 2172

  posted 12-04-2004 12:46 AM                       
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Thank you for the compliment, Absonite. A radical new rethinking is in order, if you ask me. Like Dawn said, religion should inspire people to faith, not intimidate them. My own personal opinion is that an overly stringent morality is being forced on all of us these days and some of us (me, for instance), remain most resistant to the message.
Does the Urantia Book have any position on sex and love..? In some cases, the less rules the better...

[This message has been edited by Veronica Poe (edited 12-04-2004).]
 
 
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