Do you believe in God and why

[thaibeachlovers]

14 hours ago, WhereIsMyRyeBread said:

Paradox is the name of the game, I'd be weary of anyone who argues in absolute terms either way as all we have are our thoughts.

There definitely  seems to be a design behind it and therefore an intelligence, call it God or call it some force or underlying laws of the realm of reality we're yet to understand.
There's an increasing number of people who believe we live inside a computer program!  A guess good as any.

 

If we are in the Matrix, then the programmer is "God". NB the people in the Matrix had free will within the rules of the Matrix.

[thaibeachlovers]

14 hours ago, mauGR1 said:

I absolutely love paradoxes, as much as good music or art.

Perhaps the whole existence is a paradox in itself, as your post reminds me of the apparent reality that we have a sort of "unity of intents" and in the same time a "conflict of interests" between one's physical body and his inner selves.

Perhaps "God" is just dreaming us, and the universe ends when God wakes up. Everything in the universe is just electricity in formation.

[Logosone]

On 5/7/2020 at 10:32 AM, mauGR1 said:

How do you know ?

In my opinion God, gods, angels spirits forces of various kind etc. are largely omitted in Buddha's teachings, for the simple reason that in his specific philosophy of self-realisation are not necessary.

I'll go further, and repeating myself, apparently Buddha was disappointed by the organised religion, in fact he was foreseeing how humankind would have evolved both materially and spiritually,

What He did, is to free mankind from some ideological chains. But people love and hate chains, don't they.

The "moral atheists", the ones who don't believe in God, but are proud of their humanistic set of morals, owe a lot of their "free thinking" to innovators like Jesus or Buddha.

As for organised religion, they are like any other human association, it needs a hierarchy, and it becomes a clash of egos, in the best of the cases, and down goes the divine inspiration, and the ugly head of materialism takes charge.

 

Two reasons. First there are scriptures which report what the Buddha said. There is the Cula-Malunkyovada Sutra about the impossible questions which the Buddha refused to answer. 

 

Thich Nhat Hanh, in a commentary on the Sutra, explained:

 

“The Buddha always told his disciples not to waste their time and energy in metaphysical speculation. Whenever he was asked a metaphysical question, he remained silent. Instead, he directed his disciples toward practical efforts.”

 

It would appear that Buddha did not wish his disciples to waste time on speculation about the other world, angels, demons and the like.

 

The second reason is that an examination of the angels, demons and levels of hell in the various Buddhist traditions, say the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, Chinese Buddhist Tradition and such, clearly show that these angels, demons and hells, have a clear provenance in beliefs held prior to the arrival of Buddhism. The angels, demons and hells, basically merged with Buddhism, based on where Buddhism ended up.

 

So that is why I do not think the Buddha was concerned with metaphsyical worlds, angels, demons and hell. He is on record as having refused to talk about other worlds, and also the origin of the demons, angels and hell can be traced outside Buddhism.

 

You can find that sutra, on the impossible questions, here btw:

https://buddhaweekly.com/four-questions-buddha-not-answer-cosmos-finite-space-universe-finite-time-self-different-body-buddha-exist-death/

 

Edited May 9, 2020 by Logosone

[fredwiggy]

Ask God to dream me a world record bass. He hasn't answered me about one yet   .

Edited May 9, 2020 by fredwiggy

[thaibeachlovers]

13 hours ago, mauGR1 said:

Every person with a heart would feel depressed just looking at the material, ruthless world we are living in.

When i am really tired, i imagine sitting on the sunny side of the moon, and look at our planet. Having a good laugh at how some people think they are so important. Legends in their own mind.

Thanks God there are many ways to look at the "reality".

That's why the Buddha sought a way to supersede the reality of life by achieving Nirvana. If we can achieve spirituality we control our emotions.

[fredwiggy]

Just now, thaibeachlovers said:

That's why the Buddha sought a way to supersede the reality of life by achieving Nirvana. If we can achieve spirituality we control our emotions.

Buddha didn't speak much about Gods , just saying they were not of much use to mankind and his followers aren't believers either. Is Buddha and all of his deceased followers in hell?

Edited May 9, 2020 by fredwiggy

[thaibeachlovers]

11 hours ago, Sunmaster said:

Maybe not depressed, at least not in my case. I do get very frustrated when I'm confronted with world events and blatant injustices that seem so common in our society. For that reason I prefer not to taint my consciousness with the negative news. Reality though, is that I don't try to find news, but the news find me...unfortunately.
I don't think it means I'm sticking my head in the sand. I consider it as selecting the quality of information that enters my brain. Getting all worked up about some act of police brutality in Detroit for example, does absolutely nothing for my own peace of mind, nor can I change or do anything to right the wrong. I rather work in my garage, garden or read a good book. I recently distanced myself from a couple of friends on facebook who were spreading some conspiracy theories (5G and vaccines). I really couldn't stand the whining anymore.

Perhaps that is also one of the reasons I can keep my optimism alive. Or maybe I'm just a selfish and naive <deleted>. LOL
I do believe that in the grand scheme of things, the best and the worst things that happen to us, are relatively irrelevant, and that in the end, everything will turn out in the best way possible. After all, we're all headed towards the "Omega point", the point of cosmic perfection. 
 

I get a lot less angry since I no longer watch tv news. Tv news is designed to make us upset and angry. Why else would they tell us how many people died in a car accident thousands of miles away, or about atrocities in a country we will never visit and can not do anything about?

How much good news do they put on it? Sod all.

[Logosone]

18 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Do you ever wonder WHY we can have altered states of mind? If God created life the universe and everything, allowing us to have altered states of mind is a doddle.

A large part of my adult life was spent wondering about that question. 

 

However, creationism, the idea that God created the universe, everything, as described in the bible has of course been proven to be false.

 

If God created the world in 7 days, kindly explain dinosaurs. 

 

Of course now all the Creationists will tell you it's an allegory, it's not meant to be taken the way it is written, etc, and for good reason. It's total nonsense.

[fredwiggy]

Just now, Logosone said:

A large part of my adult life was spent wondering about that question. 

 

However, creationism, the idea that God created the universe, everything, as described in the bible has of course been proven to be false.

 

If God created the world in 7 days, kindly explain dinosaurs. 

 

Of course now all the Creationists will tell you it's an allegory, it's not meant to be taken the way it is written, etc, and for good reason. It's total nonsense.

Nothing has been proven to be false. God created the earth in 7 days, yes, and dinosaurs were the first creatures he put here, along with primitive man. When they became extinct, he created Adam and Eve. With God anything is possible. Creating the universe from his mind shows that .

[mauGR1]

2 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Perhaps "God" is just dreaming us, and the universe ends when God wakes up. Everything in the universe is just electricity in formation.

I believe that the concept of "end" belongs to the physical world, which is just a projection of the spiritual worlds.

Comparing sleep to death can come useful in this regard, when we fall asleep, the physical connection is unplugged, and when we wake up we connect again to the reality of the previous day.

A similar situation may occur when our physical body is finished; we are left with the lessons we have learned, and we carry that spiritual knowledge when we choose another physical form.

I believe that with deep meditation a sort of understanding of those spiritual dynamics can come naturally, but to describe those dynamics with words, may be not that easy.

[giddyup]

1 minute ago, fredwiggy said:

Nothing has been proven to be false. God created the earth in 7 days, yes, and dinosaurs were the first creatures he put here, along with primitive man. When they became extinct, he created Adam and Eve. With God anything is possible. Creating the universe from his mind shows that .

Are you saying that man existed at the same time as dinosaurs?

[fredwiggy]

Just now, giddyup said:

Are you saying that man existed at the same time as dinosaurs?

 

Just now, giddyup said:

Are you saying that man existed at the same time as dinosaurs?

No. Early man was about 2 million years ago. The dinosaurs died 65 million years ago. at the end of the Cretaceous period. By carbon dating (accurate?) they lived for 165 million years.

[Logosone]

On 5/8/2020 at 7:18 AM, thaibeachlovers said:

Can you or any human make a lump of meat live? No, you or any human can not do so. Yet, you think that you are capable of discerning if God exists or not. God, that created life the universe and everything.

Humans know nothing, Jon Snow.

Like I said before, as Nietzsche a human who knew a lot btw, wrote we can not cut our head off and see what remains, we can not prove or disprove if God exists. This is indeed the case.

 

However, if you look at it on a balance of probabilities, and look at the history of beliefs in God, say Christianity, it is actually virtually certain that God does not exist.

 

Organised religion, ideas of God, all these things are human creations, almost always then used to control people through organised religions. Quite clearly man created God. Not the other way around. 

 

You say humans know nothing. Humans know a lot. They know about dinosaurs. The bible, the book of all knowledge supposedly, clearly doesn't. The bible talks about the creation of the world but doesn't mention dinosaurs once. It's the little details.

 

 

 

 

[mistral53]

Best rant ever to clarify the question:

 

Is that what God does? He helps?

Tell me, why didn’t God help my innocent friend who died for no reason while the guilty roam free?

Okay, fine. Forget the one-offs.

How about the countless wars declared in his name?

Okay, fine. Let’s skip the random, meaningless murder for a second, shall we?

How about the racist, sexist, phobia soup we’ve all been drowning in because of Him?

And I’m not just talking about Jesus.

I’m talking about all organized religion, exclusive groups created to manage control, a dealer getting people hooked on the drug of hope, his followers nothing but addicts who want their hit of <deleted> to keep their dopamine of ignorance, addicts afraid to believe the truth, that there is no order, there’s no power, that all religions are just metastasizing mind worms meant to divide us so it’s easier to rule us by the charlatans that want to run us.

All we are to them are paying fanboys of their poorly written sci-fi franchise.

If I don’t listen to my imaginary friend, why the <deleted> should I listen to yours?

People think their worship’s some key to happiness.

That’s just how he owns you.

Even I’m not crazy enough to believe that distortion of reality.

So <deleted> God.

He’s not a good enough scapegoat for me.

 

 

[mauGR1]

15 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

That's why the Buddha sought a way to supersede the reality of life by achieving Nirvana. If we can achieve spirituality we control our emotions.

That's true, and controlling one's emotions seems to be a reasonable goal, but it's not like that's the end of our spiritual development, so i believe that Buddha and other divine forms, who are beyond the human concepts of space and time, are actively helping humankind to transcend the realities of the physical worlds to achieve higher (or broader) levels of consciousness.

[mauGR1]

28 minutes ago, Logosone said:

“The Buddha always told his disciples not to waste their time and energy in metaphysical speculation. Whenever he was asked a metaphysical question, he remained silent. Instead, he directed his disciples toward practical efforts.”

 

It would appear that Buddha did not wish his disciples to waste time on speculation about the other world, angels, demons and the like.

Well, that is my point too, but that's not a reason to believe that Gods, deities, angels or demons don't exist.

It's like if i was giving you lessons of gardening, and i required you not to use your phone during the lessons.

That way, i would be assured to get full your attention, and that's it.

The fact that Gautama Buddha omitted God from his speeches, is NOT a reasonable evidence that he didn't believe in a supreme being, imho.

 

[thaibeachlovers]

11 minutes ago, mauGR1 said:

Well, that is my point too, but that's not a reason to believe that Gods, deities, angels or demons don't exist.

It's like if i was giving you lessons of gardening, and i required you not to use your phone during the lessons.

That way, i would be assured to get full your attention, and that's it.

The fact that Gautama Buddha omitted God from his speeches, is NOT a reasonable evidence that he didn't believe in a supreme being, imho.

 

IMO Nirvana is being one with the supreme being.

[Logosone]

34 minutes ago, fredwiggy said:

Nothing has been proven to be false. God created the earth in 7 days, yes, and dinosaurs were the first creatures he put here, along with primitive man. When they became extinct, he created Adam and Eve. With God anything is possible. Creating the universe from his mind shows that .

No actually the idea of the world being created in 7 days was proven to be completely false.

 

If God put dinosaurs here you would think that the book of God, the bible, would have mentioned that. Would have known that. It didn't.  For obvious reasons. Only through the work of humans were dinosaurs uncovered and then, belateadly, believers came up with explanations, like yours, that God put dinosaurs here. Frankly, it's not at all convincing.

[thaibeachlovers]

42 minutes ago, Logosone said:

A large part of my adult life was spent wondering about that question. 

 

However, creationism, the idea that God created the universe, everything, as described in the bible has of course been proven to be false.

 

If God created the world in 7 days, kindly explain dinosaurs. 

 

Of course now all the Creationists will tell you it's an allegory, it's not meant to be taken the way it is written, etc, and for good reason. It's total nonsense.

Talking again about religion.

It's a pointless discussion if one keeps referencing religious dogma.

[mauGR1]

3 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

IMO Nirvana is being one with the supreme being.

Possibly true, but there may be countless levels of spiritual consciousness, and in fact we already know that we are one with the supreme being.

Yet we are here in a physical world for a reason, and that reason is not necessarily the same for everyone.

[fredwiggy]

7 minutes ago, Logosone said:

No actually the idea of the world being created in 7 days was proven to be completely false.

 

If God put dinosaurs here you would think that the book of God, the bible, would have mentioned that. Would have known that. It didn't.  For obvious reasons. Only through the work of humans were dinosaurs uncovered and then, belateadly, believers came up with explanations, like yours, that God put dinosaurs here. Frankly, it's not at all convincing.

No one has proven anything God's done to be false. Why would the Bible mention dinosaurs? Was it relevant then? This, like I and others have said, is Do you believe in God and why? I believe from faith, and from things I've learned that have convinced me. The universe didn't just happen. Anyone who believes that is a fool. It had to have a creator. Those who believe in God think it was God. There have been miracles that scientists have tried to explain. People have come back from no brain activity and death. Some may have said they saw a light, while others have said they saw heaven. Made up? Perhaps, but all of them? A small child dies and sees ,in heaven, a sister no one told him about, that was stillborn. He also saw his grandfather and described him to his father. A grandfather he never knew. Made up by the preacher father? Perhaps. I look at things every day that show me the diversity of this world, of all the species of animals and plants, that everything needs oxygen, water and food to live. The sun exactly where it should be in relation to the earth. The moon to create the tides. All coincidences? We all evolved from what exactly? Primordial ooze? I myself have got on God's case a lot of times because things in this world are supremely screwed up and he does nothing. Or has he done nothing? He let people do what they want, instead of being sheep following blindly. He wants us to choose between him ,Satan or nothing. That's free will. I choose him. I know there's another place to go after death and I don't need proof. Besides that, I would never gamble with my soul and eternity because I've heard about hell.

Edited May 9, 2020 by fredwiggy

[thaibeachlovers]

34 minutes ago, Logosone said:

Like I said before, as Nietzsche a human who knew a lot btw, wrote we can not cut our head off and see what remains, we can not prove or disprove if God exists. This is indeed the case.

 

However, if you look at it on a balance of probabilities, and look at the history of beliefs in God, say Christianity, it is actually virtually certain that God does not exist.

 

Organised religion, ideas of God, all these things are human creations, almost always then used to control people through organised religions. Quite clearly man created God. Not the other way around. 

 

You say humans know nothing. Humans know a lot. They know about dinosaurs. The bible, the book of all knowledge supposedly, clearly doesn't. The bible talks about the creation of the world but doesn't mention dinosaurs once. It's the little details.

 

 

 

 

You are fixated on religion. Religion has nothing to do with what I'm talking about. I'm discussing the OP, I don't know why you are talking about religion, which is, as you say a man made construct.

God surely exists for those that believe.

Believe or not, it's your choice.

[teatime101]

10 hours ago, mauGR1 said:

so logically we can conclude that not everything can be explained by using logic.

The limitation is in our brainpower, not in reality. 

 

The Big Bang explains the origin, not just of the universe, but of time and space. They are simply dimensions formed with the universe*. The limitation in our brains is that we can't imagine a universe without time and space (or before the Big Bang).

 

*Why does a universe form out of matter/energy, time and space? Saying it was created just pushes the question of origins back another (unnecessary) step. What's particularly dubious is that so many of the 'Creators' we see in world religions are projections from the homo sapien brain into a home sapien god. 

 

 

Edited May 9, 2020 by teatime101

[fredwiggy]

Just now, teatime101 said:

The limitation is in our brainpower, not in reality. 

 

The Big Bang explains the origin, not just of the universe, but of time and space. They are simply dimensions formed with the universe*. The limitation in our brains is that we can't imagine a universe without time and space (or before the Big Bang).

 

*Why does a universe form out of matter/energy, time and space? Saying it was created just pushes the question of origins back another (unnecessary) step. What's particularly dubious is that so many of the 'Creators' we see in world religions are projections from the homo sapien brain into a home sapien god. 

 

 

Believers explain why they believe. Those who believe in a "Big Bang", how impossible that is, believe that it was an explosion, with absolutely no proof. Again, everything is matter, Matter cannot come from nothing. No one has ever proven otherwise. A scientists guess isn't proof.

[Yankeesvsredsox]

no ,Its the biggest myth perpetrated on mankind!

Seeing is believing 

Edited May 9, 2020 by Yankeesvsredsox

[mauGR1]

2 minutes ago, teatime101 said:

The limitation in our brains is that we can't imagine a universe without time and space (or before the Big Bang).

Well, hold on a minute, who is we ?

Actually countless yogis have gone beyond time and space, and come back to us normal folks with descriptions.

I guess you are able to understand why there will never be a physical evidence of what i'm saying.

Believe or not believe, that is the question.

As for the big bang, you may believe that everything which exists has a beginning and an end, and i would agree, but in the case of the universe, it's very difficult to prove.

[Logosone]

59 minutes ago, mauGR1 said:

Well, that is my point too, but that's not a reason to believe that Gods, deities, angels or demons don't exist.

It's like if i was giving you lessons of gardening, and i required you not to use your phone during the lessons.

That way, i would be assured to get full your attention, and that's it.

The fact that Gautama Buddha omitted God from his speeches, is NOT a reasonable evidence that he didn't believe in a supreme being, imho.

 

Well, we know that Buddha rejected the notion of "soul". We know he rejected the Jain theory jiva, the Brahman teaching of atman and purusha. He was against all of that transmigration of a never changing soul. For him there was no independent or permanent self. To the Buddha everything was transient. Everything was dependent origination, and not dependent on a creator of course. But on other, more complex processes and things.

 

The Buddha was more of a doctor. A scientific analyst of suffering and how to end it. The famous poison arrow parable shows his real concern.

 

Having said that Buddha supposedly did talk of Mara, a demon which he would have inherited from the Hindu tradition. Though whether that was a parable or him actually talking about Mara as an entity, as opposed to his weak or bad thoughts, is up for debate.

 

Buddha also talked of a few supernatural things. However, he was not one to make grand speculations about demons and angels. There isn't really anything on that, apart from the above. And of course apart from what many Buddhist traditions then added later, in Japan, Tibet, China and many other places.

 

If you think Buddha believed in a supreme being, where does he say so?

 

 

 

 

Edited May 9, 2020 by Logosone

[fredwiggy]

“The Buddha believed implicitly in the existence of the Gods since they were a part of his cultural baggage, but he didn’t believe them to be much use to mankind. They too were caught up in the world of pain and flux…they were involved in the cycle of rebirth like all other beings and eventually, they would disappear”.................. Gods exist but aren't necessary to achieve enlightenment. Not being necessary tells others exactly that, although you can still be a Buddhist and believe in God. Personal choice, but leaving God out to me tells others to put themselves first...................https://buddhaweekly.com/what-does-buddhism-say-about-the-idea-of-god-best-answer-its-complicated-are-buddhists-theists-atheists-or-non-theists-does-it-even-matter/

Edited May 9, 2020 by fredwiggy

[Relocated]

If I were god, I will do things differently.

I will leave written manifest to show how I made man in detail with diagram. 

So there will be no war between tribes who believe different theory of creation. 

And I will update my creation from time to time to make it up to date. 

For an instance, to control over population of my invention, I will update them not to have sex more than once in three years. 

 

The way man was made now is total disaster. 

 

 

[mauGR1]

5 minutes ago, Logosone said:

If you think Buddha believed in a supreme being, where does he say so?

 

I didn't say that, i am simply acknowledging the fact that God is omitted from his speeches, as far as we know.

From what i gathered, and it's just my theory, he was fed up with the degeneration of Hinduism into sects, superstitions and barbarism, and especially the abuse of animal sacrifices for rites purpose, and similarly to Jesus, gave us a way of self-realisation, to reach higher levels of consciousness without the need of priests as intermediaries.