On The Deflationary Theory

[Spammer]

Spammer,

 

 

 

God really does have such and such a nature and this nature is absolutely, transcendently true, regardless of what we happen to think of or can say about the matter using language

 

Completely agree.  And per yours and my acceptance of this theory, God's nature as it differs from our understanding is absolutely, transcendentally useless to us until we can perceive it. 

 

Agreed, and we can only perceive it if He reveals Himself to us.  Until then, we wait in faith and hope. For most of us, that self-revelation by God doesn't happen until we're brought into His presence after death.

[Spammer]

spammer,

 

i don't want to offend, and i certainly agree with the notion that you want to dispose of the old and adopt the new - the whole redemption idea that's patently Christian - but ...

 

i can't help but see that line as setting us up to fail.  we'll always worship idols of our own making, then.  we can't understand anything outside of what we can understand.  so as soon as you understand something new about God, and it makes sense to you - BAM!  it's an idol.

 

that feels impossible to me.  i don't know how an impersonal and distant God who is unknowable and incomprehensible could be of any value to me.  how would communication between me and this God work?  how would personal instruction function?

 

the idea that God is perfected Man and that I can be that too makes so much more sense to me.  if that makes me an idol worshipper, then so be it.

 

 

God is unknowable and incomprehensible unless He reveals Himself to you/me.  God is personal, not impersonal.  In fact, God is three persons.  That's our belief.  God is not wholly unknown because He revealed Himself to us.  He was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and was made man and walked among us.  We receive instruction from God through Holy Scripture and the Church.  As baptized, anointed members of Christ's Body, we are also privileged to receive guidance from the Holy Spirit.  It is only God in his essence or nature that for us, until He reveals Himself to us personally, is unknowable or incomprehensible, exactly in keeping with deflationary theory.  

[Spammer]

I'll share the Orthodox view of God. God is Love. He penalizes no one and keeps no one away. He is the Father of the Prodigal Son. We penalize ourselves by engaging in self-serving behaviors that benefit only ourselves. Any separation from God is self-imposed; we make ourselves unable to dwell in His presence. After death, He still welcomes us with arms outstretched, but due to the self-inflicted condition of our souls His presence is painful and we flee from Him. Hell is locked from the inside. Those who lives lives of love that reflect God's nature, Orthodox or not, will dwell in His presence for eternity.

that's a very nice sentiment but it's a bit off topic.

I mentioned that in response to your comment "if He penalizes me for that, then i'm not so sure he's a very good God in the first place." Orthodox teaching does not promote a God that penalizes or punishes or sends people away. God is Love. Hell is a condition of the soul, not a place to which we're assigned or sent. Regardless of whether we believe God is a perfected man or Holy Trinity, those who love as God loves will dwell in his presence. Atheists included. We all see through a glass darkly, deflationary theory, etc.

Edited July 10, 2015 by Spammer

[Mars]

I mentioned that in response to your comment "if He penalizes me for that, then i'm not so sure he's a very good God in the first place." Orthodox teaching does not promote a God that penalizes or punishes or sends people away. God is Love. Hell is a condition of the soul, not a place to which we're assigned or sent. Regardless of whether we believe God is a perfected man or Holy Trinity, those who love as God loves will dwell in his presence. Atheists included. We all see through a glass darkly, deflationary theory, etc.

 

Makes sense - thanks.

[ERayR]

 

i can't worship a God i don't understand.

 

if He penalizes me for that, then i'm not so sure he's a very good God in the first place.

 

I'll share the Orthodox view of God.  God is Love.  He penalizes no one and keeps no one away.  He is the Father of the Prodigal Son.  We penalize ourselves by engaging in self-serving behaviors that benefit only ourselves.  Any separation from God is self-imposed; we make ourselves unable to dwell in His presence.  After death, He still welcomes us with arms outstretched, but due to the self-inflicted condition of our souls His presence is painful and we flee from Him.  Hell is locked from the inside.  Those who lives lives of love that reflect God's nature, Orthodox or not, will dwell in His presence for eternity.  

 

 

Two things: 1)  So now tell me what is love?  God is love is meaningless.  2)  How can a being without body, parts or passion welcome us with arms outstretched?

[mfbukowski]

In the Orthodox tradition, we say that any attempt to carefully and accurately define God based on what makes sense to us only ends up creating a god in our own image; an idol. We end up worshiping ourselves.

This is the crux of where this all goes. Is God unknowable and transcendent or is He our Father who can "take us on his knee" as he does in John 17?

This is precisely Rorty's issue in the "divinization of reality"

THIS is where the correspondence theory leads and why LDS must abandon it. God and reality are out there but unknowable, that is correspondence. For the Pragmatist God and reality are part of our experience and present to us to help solve problems.

And yes if God is a Human, we do indeed worship the Human Ideal, the best Human that could possibly be, the Man Of Holiness, in whose nature we participate.

This is the crux of the thread right here. This is the issue!

Edited July 10, 2015 by mfbukowski

[Tacenda]

 

In the Orthodox tradition, we say that any attempt to carefully and accurately define God based on what makes sense to us only ends up creating a god in our own image; an idol. We end up worshiping ourselves.

This is the crux of where this all goes. Is God unknowable and transcendent or is He our Father who can "take us on his knee" as he does in John 17?

This is precisely Rorty's issue in the "divinization of reality"

THIS is where the correspondence theory leads and why LDS must abandon it. God and reality are out there but unknowable, that is correspondence. For the Pragmatist God and reality are part of our experience and present to us to help solve problems.

And yes if God is a Human, we do indeed worship the Human Ideal, the best Human that could possibly be, the Man Of Holiness, in whose nature we participate.

This is the crux of the thread right here. This is the issue!

 

That's why I say don't put Him in a box, not that you did, but don't define what you don't know for a fact.  It may make sense, talking to Mars here.  But if He's God, can't He be both,  spirit all encompassing and physical?  According to a lot of Christians out there He did both.  He came to the world as a physical being and can, IMO, do that in the hereafter.  How else can He be expected to be with all his children?  IMO. 

[Spammer]

 

 

i can't worship a God i don't understand.

 

if He penalizes me for that, then i'm not so sure he's a very good God in the first place.

 

I'll share the Orthodox view of God.  God is Love.  He penalizes no one and keeps no one away.  He is the Father of the Prodigal Son.  We penalize ourselves by engaging in self-serving behaviors that benefit only ourselves.  Any separation from God is self-imposed; we make ourselves unable to dwell in His presence.  After death, He still welcomes us with arms outstretched, but due to the self-inflicted condition of our souls His presence is painful and we flee from Him.  Hell is locked from the inside.  Those who lives lives of love that reflect God's nature, Orthodox or not, will dwell in His presence for eternity.  

 

 

Two things: 1)  So now tell me what is love?  God is love is meaningless.  2)  How can a being without body, parts or passion welcome us with arms outstretched?

 

 

God is Love is has great meaning from within the traditional Catholic framework.  So does the phrase 'without body, parts or passions'.  Those who don't operate from within that framework find it nonsensical.  They're just words and the meaning of the words varies based on the context.  Nothing I can say will change anything or make a difference since you operate from within an LDS, materialist context.  It's all about paradigm.

[Mars]

That's why I say don't put Him in a box, not that you did, but don't define what you don't know for a fact.  It may make sense, talking to Mars here.  But if He's God, can't He be both,  spirit all encompassing and physical?  According to a lot of Christians out there He did both.  He came to the world as a physical being and can, IMO, do that in the hereafter.  How else can He be expected to be with all his children?  IMO.

 

Sorry, Tacenda - I don't understand what you're asking.

[mfbukowski]

spammer,

 

i don't want to offend, and i certainly agree with the notion that you want to dispose of the old and adopt the new - the whole redemption idea that's patently Christian - but ...

 

i can't help but see that line as setting us up to fail.  we'll always worship idols of our own making, then.  we can't understand anything outside of what we can understand.  so as soon as you understand something new about God, and it makes sense to you - BAM!  it's an idol.

 

that feels impossible to me.  i don't know how an impersonal and distant God who is unknowable and incomprehensible could be of any value to me.  how would communication between me and this God work?  how would personal instruction function?

 

the idea that God is perfected Man and that I can be that too makes so much more sense to me.  if that makes me an idol worshipper, then so be it.

 

God is unknowable and incomprehensible unless He reveals Himself to you/me.  God is personal, not impersonal.  In fact, God is three persons.  That's our belief.  God is not wholly unknown because He revealed Himself to us.  He was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and was made man and walked among us.  We receive instruction from God through Holy Scripture and the Church.  As baptized, anointed members of Christ's Body, we are also privileged to receive guidance from the Holy Spirit.  It is only God in his essence or nature that for us, until He reveals Himself to us personally, is unknowable or incomprehensible, exactly in keeping with deflationary theory.

A beautiful statement with which I agree in principle.

But the words don't make sense when you take it apart bit by bit. I don't know what incomprehensible means, to me there are just not words to describe something. I don't know what an essence is. I don't know what nature means, it is a useless word.

To me, it is a mass of confusion sitting on the top of a topless throne.

[Spammer]

 

In the Orthodox tradition, we say that any attempt to carefully and accurately define God based on what makes sense to us only ends up creating a god in our own image; an idol. We end up worshiping ourselves.

This is the crux of where this all goes. Is God unknowable and transcendent or is He our Father who can "take us on his knee" as he does in John 17?

This is precisely Rorty's issue in the "divinization of reality"

THIS is where the correspondence theory leads and why LDS must abandon it. God and reality are out there but unknowable, that is correspondence. For the Pragmatist God and reality are part of our experience and present to us to help solve problems.

And yes if God is a Human, we do indeed worship the Human Ideal, the best Human that could possibly be, the Man Of Holiness, in whose nature we participate.

This is the crux of the thread right here. This is the issue!

 

 

Using philosophy to carefully define and delimit God's characteristics is a Western approach.  Orthodox theology is apophatic.  We only talk about what God is not.  Ultimately, if the experience of the Orthodox hesychasts are to be believed, we end up lost in the dazzling darkness of the Divine Presence where words don't apply.  Silence is the only appropriate response.  It's apparent that Aquinas had that experience after years of creating his complex scholastic metaphysical system.  One day he just stated that everything he had written up to the point of his overwhelming spiritual experience was dross.  He was silent thereafter.  

 

Deflationary theory tells me we can never know whether God is a human unless He reveals himself to us as human.  Philosophy can't get us there.  Words can't get us there.  We have to experience God's humanness for ourselves.  Until then, we know nothing.  We just hope.  It's no different in Orthodoxy, although we await the revelation of God as Holy Trinity.  This is where the abandonment of correspondence theory leads us.  It leads us to a state of unknowing until God reveals himself to us personally, i.e., he either reveals Himself to us as a man or as the Uncreated Light of Orthodox spirituality or as Something else altogether.  

[Mars]

 

In the Orthodox tradition, we say that any attempt to carefully and accurately define God based on what makes sense to us only ends up creating a god in our own image; an idol. We end up worshiping ourselves.

This is the crux of where this all goes. Is God unknowable and transcendent or is He our Father who can "take us on his knee" as he does in John 17?

This is precisely Rorty's issue in the "divinization of reality"

THIS is where the correspondence theory leads and why LDS must abandon it. God and reality are out there but unknowable, that is correspondence. For the Pragmatist God and reality are part of our experience and present to us to help solve problems.

And yes if God is a Human, we do indeed worship the Human Ideal, the best Human that could possibly be, the Man Of Holiness, in whose nature we participate.

This is the crux of the thread right here. This is the issue!

 

 

3 And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent.

[Spammer]

 

 

spammer,

 

i don't want to offend, and i certainly agree with the notion that you want to dispose of the old and adopt the new - the whole redemption idea that's patently Christian - but ...

 

i can't help but see that line as setting us up to fail.  we'll always worship idols of our own making, then.  we can't understand anything outside of what we can understand.  so as soon as you understand something new about God, and it makes sense to you - BAM!  it's an idol.

 

that feels impossible to me.  i don't know how an impersonal and distant God who is unknowable and incomprehensible could be of any value to me.  how would communication between me and this God work?  how would personal instruction function?

 

the idea that God is perfected Man and that I can be that too makes so much more sense to me.  if that makes me an idol worshipper, then so be it.

 

God is unknowable and incomprehensible unless He reveals Himself to you/me.  God is personal, not impersonal.  In fact, God is three persons.  That's our belief.  God is not wholly unknown because He revealed Himself to us.  He was incarnate of the Virgin Mary and was made man and walked among us.  We receive instruction from God through Holy Scripture and the Church.  As baptized, anointed members of Christ's Body, we are also privileged to receive guidance from the Holy Spirit.  It is only God in his essence or nature that for us, until He reveals Himself to us personally, is unknowable or incomprehensible, exactly in keeping with deflationary theory.

A beautiful statement with which I agree in principle.

But the words don't make sense when you take it apart bit by bit. I don't know what incomprehensible means, to me there are just not words to describe something. I don't know what an essence is. I don't know what nature means, it is a useless word.

To me, it is a mass of confusion sitting on the top of a topless throne.

 

 

i understand.  It is confusing.  They're just fancy words we use in place of "I don't have a clue what God is really like and neither do you, unless God appeared to you and gave you a direct, unmediated experience of Himself".  All we Orthodox know about God is what Jesus taught, the apostles preserved, and handed down to us in the scriptures and Holy Tradition.  That's the source of the words I use.  It's as good a tradition as any, if the measure is the sweetness of our experiences.

Edited July 10, 2015 by Spammer

[mfbukowski]

In the Orthodox tradition, we say that any attempt to carefully and accurately define God based on what makes sense to us only ends up creating a god in our own image; an idol. We end up worshiping ourselves.

This is the crux of where this all goes. Is God unknowable and transcendent or is He our Father who can "take us on his knee" as he does in John 17?

This is precisely Rorty's issue in the "divinization of reality"

THIS is where the correspondence theory leads and why LDS must abandon it. God and reality are out there but unknowable, that is correspondence. For the Pragmatist God and reality are part of our experience and present to us to help solve problems.

And yes if God is a Human, we do indeed worship the Human Ideal, the best Human that could possibly be, the Man Of Holiness, in whose nature we participate.

This is the crux of the thread right here. This is the issue!

That's why I say don't put Him in a box, not that you did, but don't define what you don't know for a fact. 

No box, as you said.

There are no facts, only interpretations. No problems here.

[Tacenda]

 

That's why I say don't put Him in a box, not that you did, but don't define what you don't know for a fact.  It may make sense, talking to Mars here.  But if He's God, can't He be both,  spirit all encompassing and physical?  According to a lot of Christians out there He did both.  He came to the world as a physical being and can, IMO, do that in the hereafter.  How else can He be expected to be with all his children?  IMO.

 

Sorry, Tacenda - I don't understand what you're asking.

 

Thanks for having me clarify, that's so respectful.

 

I am just saying that in some Christian religions, they believe that Jesus is God incarnate.  That God was spirit until He presented Himself on earth in the physical.  So He could save His children.  I know that's not what LDS think.  But I'm combining the two in a way.  I'm asking or saying, why or can't He be both spirit and physical in the heavens?  How else would He be able to be with each of us when we need Him?  In heaven, how is a physical God going to be able to be with billions of His children?  He has to be something more than physical, something far more advanced.  Unless, if I dig deep into LDS beginnings in my mind's eye, my husband is my God and we create our own world then.  He would be closer to home as a God, Joseph Smith and Brigham Young started their worlds while in the world or I should say started their kingdoms while on earth.  By marrying so many wives and having the posterity in a sense.  At least in my readings or my understanding of those readings.  But that is not my belief.  Although, still in LDS thought, that means God is still God and is over many Gods and so on and so on and so on.  Maybe I'm up in the night though. 

 

I'm out of posts so I will have to edit this to answer any more questions or give any more thoughts or apologies for misinformation.  I do need to say, I'm sorry if I've derailed the subject, if so, please move on.     

[mfbukowski]

In the Orthodox tradition, we say that any attempt to carefully and accurately define God based on what makes sense to us only ends up creating a god in our own image; an idol. We end up worshiping ourselves.

This is the crux of where this all goes. Is God unknowable and transcendent or is He our Father who can "take us on his knee" as he does in John 17?

This is precisely Rorty's issue in the "divinization of reality"

THIS is where the correspondence theory leads and why LDS must abandon it. God and reality are out there but unknowable, that is correspondence. For the Pragmatist God and reality are part of our experience and present to us to help solve problems.

And yes if God is a Human, we do indeed worship the Human Ideal, the best Human that could possibly be, the Man Of Holiness, in whose nature we participate.

This is the crux of the thread right here. This is the issue!

 

Using philosophy to carefully define and delimit God's characteristics is a Western approach.  Orthodox theology is apophatic.  We only talk about what God is not.  Ultimately, if the experience of the Orthodox hesychasts are to be believed, we end up lost in the dazzling darkness of the Divine Presence where words don't apply.  Silence is the only appropriate response.  It's apparent that Aquinas had that experience after years of creating his complex scholastic metaphysical system.  One day he just stated that everything he had written up to the point of his overwhelming spiritual experience was dross.  He was silent thereafter.  

 

Deflationary theory tells me we can never know whether God is a human unless He reveals himself to us as human.  Philosophy can't get us there.  Words can't get us there.  We have to experience God's humanness for ourselves.  Until then, we know nothing.  We just hope.  It's no different in Orthodoxy, although we await the revelation of God as Holy Trinity.  This is where the abandonment of correspondence theory leads us.  It leads us to a state of unknowing until God reveals himself to us personally, i.e., he either reveals Himself to us as a man or as the Uncreated Light of Orthodox spirituality or as Something else altogether.

Yes, agreed. All we have is models and paradigms. Let's each go to our own mountain tops to meditate.

But my model makes more sense. ;)

Honestly that is the issue for me. Which communicates better in today's world, pragmatism or scholasticism?

I win.

[Ahab]

In the Orthodox tradition, we say that any attempt to carefully and accurately define God based on what makes sense to us only ends up creating a god in our own image; an idol. We end up worshiping ourselves.

This is the crux of where this all goes. Is God unknowable and transcendent or is He our Father who can "take us on his knee" as he does in John 17?

This is precisely Rorty's issue in the "divinization of reality"

THIS is where the correspondence theory leads and why LDS must abandon it. God and reality are out there but unknowable, that is correspondence. For the Pragmatist God and reality are part of our experience and present to us to help solve problems.

And yes if God is a Human, we do indeed worship the Human Ideal, the best Human that could possibly be, the Man Of Holiness, in whose nature we participate.

This is the crux of the thread right here. This is the issue!

The crux is a little more basic than that, I think, but I'm not quite sure yet about how to summarize it into a neat little package.

The issue is more about how we are able to find out what truth and reality really are, and how our own ideas about what is true and real are subjectively determined.

From each of our individual perspectives, the people who disagree with us are simply considered to be people who disagree with us, and we then either decide on our own to stick to our own ideas or we choose to change our own mind and think what they think.

President Hinckley's book about how we should 'Stand for Something' comes to my mind.

[Spammer]

 

Yes, agreed. All we have is models and paradigms. Let's each go to our own mountain tops to meditate.

But my model makes more sense. ;)

Honestly that is the issue for me. Which communicates better in today's world, pragmatism or scholasticism?

I win.

 

 

My mountaintop is better than any other mountaintop.  Why?  'Cause I say so!     

 

I do think you're on to something at a practical level, though.  Today's world is materialist and pragmatic.  I agree that the old model doesn't speak to a pragmatic materialist.  Oh well.  It speaks to me better than the notion of a god made out of matter always and forever stuck in time and space.  That's because I'm a pragmatic materialist who perceives a contradiction between asserting that 1) a finite, material being stuck in time and space is also 2) without limit, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.  I perceive 1) and 2) to be mutually exclusive.  Thus, I carve out a space for the material, put man and the Incarnate Christ there, and put God outside - however that works out in practice I have no freaking idea, since I can't imagine an immaterial, changeless being who is also Love.  No matter.  The tradition that suits me asserts that God is both Changeless and Love and 'decides', going from one state to another, to enter time and space as a human being.  I don't try to work out the contradiction; I just work through it and accept it anyway because it causes less dissonance than trying to reconcile the notions of finite existence with eternity and limitlessness.  That's the only way I can make being a materialist and a theist work.  Orthodoxy fits the bill.  It's easier than trying to accept a God who is not omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent, a God of limitations.  To me, that is no god.   But it doesn't matter.  In keeping with deflationary theory, all of this is unknowable anyway.  Given my life experiences, Orthodoxy works for me.  Its theology doesn't rely on Greek philosophical categories.  It relies on the direct experience of the church fathers and the saints.  It speaks to me as I exist within the material creation and points me to the God-Man, the God from 'outside' (whatever the heck that means) who became Man and walked among us.  It's how I'm able to still be a Christian and how i prevent returning to atheism.    

Edited July 10, 2015 by Spammer

[tagriffy]

 

I kinda think you just put God in a box, He's incomprehensible IMO, how were you able to define Him to that degree?

 

 

Because that's how he reveals himself to us. Think of it this way. You're just as incomprehensible to me and I to you, until we reveal ourselves to each other.

[Ahab]

Yes, agreed. All we have is models and paradigms. Let's each go to our own mountain tops to meditate.

But my model makes more sense. ;)

Honestly that is the issue for me. Which communicates better in today's world, pragmatism or scholasticism?

I win.

My mountaintop is better than any other mountaintop. Why? 'Cause I say so!

I do think you're on to something at a practical level, though. Today's world is materialist and pragmatic. I agree that the old model doesn't speak to a pragmatic materialist. Oh well. It speaks to me better than the notion of a materialist God. That's because I'm a pragmatic materialist who perceives a contradiction between asserting that a finite, material being is also without limit, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent. Thus, I carve out a space for the material, put man and the Incarnate Christ there, and put God outside - however that works out in practice I have no freaking idea, since I can't imagine an immaterial, changeless being who is also Love. No matter. The tradition that suits me asserts that God is both Changeless and Love. I don't try to work out the contradiction; I just work through it and accept it. That's the only way I can make being a materialist and a theist work. Orthodoxy fits the bill. It's easier than trying to accept a God who is not omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent, a God of limitations. To me, that is no god. But it doesn't matter. In keeping with deflationary theory, all of this is unknowable anyway. Given my life experiences, Orthodoxy works for me. It's how i prevent returning to atheism.

Now to tie that into the Deflationary Theory:

What you think/know is true and real is just that. What you think/know is true and real. In the final analysis with God as your judge he may point out what you are right about and what you are wrong about, or he may simply determine his judgment of you based on all you have done (including all that you thought that led to your other actions, other than thinking) without trying to correct every idea you have that is not right. And then you will respond to his judgment of you however you may choose to respond. And however things turn out for you, however good or however bad, your judgment will be based on how you turned out at the end on that day of judgment, whatever you then think and however you act.

I think that just about sums it all up, as far as each one of us is concerned, individually. For each of us it's all about what we think and what we do, individually. One on one with God.

[Spammer]

 

 

Now to tie that into the Deflationary Theory:

What you think/know is true and real is just that. What you think/know is true and real. In the final analysis with God as your judge he may point out what you are right about and what you are wrong about, or he may simply determine his judgment of you based on all you have done (including all that you thought that led to your other actions, other than thinking) without trying to correct every idea you have that is not right. And then you will respond to his judgment of you however you may choose to respond. And however things turn out for you, however good or however bad, your judgment will be based on how you turned out at the end on that day of judgment, whatever you then think and however you act.

I think that just about sums it all up, as far as each one of us is concerned, individually. For each of us it's all about what we think and what we do, individually. One on one with God.

 

 

Yep, that's precisely what deflationary theory implies.  It's also why Orthodoxy's non-judgmental, non-damning theology suits me.  Until He reveals Himself to you personally, God is in principle unknowable.  We get hints of who and what God is in and through the Incarnate Christ and His teaching.  No hell, no separate kingdoms, God welcomes everyone, including those who all by themselves through their choices transform themselves bit by bit into the kind of souls that are incapable of dwelling in the Presence of God, so they attempt to flee but wherever they go in the next life they can't escape His presence (He is everywhere present and fills all things), so they are in hell.  Even then God still loves them and longs for them to be healed; there's hope for their redemption, should they choose to become such that they live their post-mortal lives sacrificially for and on behalf of others.  Our choices and their transforming impact continue after death.  Mormonism is mostly similar in outlook, except among those who believe that once you're assigned to a kingdom that's it - forever.  There are many Mormons who have the same hope, though, so Mormonism also kind of suits me.  If not for that God is a limited, finite man thing. And that polygamy thing.  And that 'inability without reliance on circular reasoning to determine whether the First Presidency speaking in an official capacity speaks the mind of God or is just offering the opinions of men' thing.  Yes, I realize I just created the need for more threads.  Sorry! 

Edited July 10, 2015 by Spammer

[Mars]

Thanks for having me clarify, that's so respectful.

 

I am just saying that in some Christian religions, they believe that Jesus is God incarnate.  That God was spirit until He presented Himself on earth in the physical.  So He could save His children.  I know that's not what LDS think.  But I'm combining the two in a way.  I'm asking or saying, why or can't He be both spirit and physical in the heavens?  How else would He be able to be with each of us when we need Him?  In heaven, how is a physical God going to be able to be with billions of His children?  He has to be something more than physical, something far more advanced.  Unless, if I dig deep into LDS beginnings in my mind's eye, my husband is my God and we create our own world then.  He would be closer to home as a God, Joseph Smith and Brigham Young started their worlds while in the world or I should say started their kingdoms while on earth.  By marrying so many wives and having the posterity in a sense.  At least in my readings or my understanding of those readings.  But that is not my belief.  Although, still in LDS thought, that means God is still God and is over many Gods and so on and so on and so on.  Maybe I'm up in the night though. 

 

I'm out of posts so I will have to edit this to answer any more questions or give any more thoughts or apologies for misinformation.  I do need to say, I'm sorry if I've derailed the subject, if so, please move on.     

 

 

that's a pretty big can of worms you got there, tacenda.

 

big picture wise, whatever you or anyone else think of God - if it works for you then I'm honestly happy for you.  in some instances, where due decorum and respect is given, i might even share with you what i think and invite you to consider it and change your mind.

Edited July 10, 2015 by Mars

[mfbukowski]

My mountaintop is better than any other mountaintop.  Why?  'Cause I say so!     

 

I do think you're on to something at a practical level, though.  Today's world is materialist and pragmatic.  I agree that the old model doesn't speak to a pragmatic materialist.  Oh well.  It speaks to me better than the notion of a god made out of matter always and forever stuck in time and space.  That's because I'm a pragmatic materialist who perceives a contradiction between asserting that 1) a finite, material being stuck in time and space is also 2) without limit, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.  I perceive 1) and 2) to be mutually exclusive.  Thus, I carve out a space for the material, put man and the Incarnate Christ there, and put God outside - however that works out in practice I have no freaking idea, since I can't imagine an immaterial, changeless being who is also Love.  No matter.  The tradition that suits me asserts that God is both Changeless and Love and 'decides', going from one state to another, to enter time and space as a human being.  I don't try to work out the contradiction; I just work through it and accept it anyway because it causes less dissonance than trying to reconcile the notions of finite existence with eternity and limitlessness.  That's the only way I can make being a materialist and a theist work.  Orthodoxy fits the bill.  It's easier than trying to accept a God who is not omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent, a God of limitations.  To me, that is no god.   But it doesn't matter.  In keeping with deflationary theory, all of this is unknowable anyway.  Given my life experiences, Orthodoxy works for me.  Its theology doesn't rely on Greek philosophical categories.  It relies on the direct experience of the church fathers and the saints.  It speaks to me as I exist within the material creation and points me to the God-Man, the God from 'outside' (whatever the heck that means) who became Man and walked among us.  It's how I'm able to still be a Christian and how i prevent returning to atheism.

MODS THERE IS A PROBLEM WITH THE QUOTE FUNCTION EVERYTHING GETS QUOTED MULTIPLE TIMES, PLEASE FIX I keep getting this messsage" You have posted more than the allowed number of quoted blocks of text"

 

The problem here is in your paradigm!!

 

Look at this first sentence:

 

I do think you're on to something at a practical level, though.  Today's world is materialist and pragmatic.  I agree that the old model doesn't speak to a pragmatic materialist.  Oh well.  It speaks to me better than the notion of a god made out of matter always and forever stuck in time and space.  That's because I'm a pragmatic materialist who perceives a contradiction between asserting that 1) a finite, material being stuck in time and space is also 2) without limit, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.  I perceive 1) and 2) to be mutually exclusive.

God is NOT "made out of matter always forever stuck in time and space" nor IS he any of the rest of it!!

 

You PERCEIVE CONTRADICTION in the ASSERTIONS  That is the point- you perceive it, and the contradiction is in the assertions!! 

 

Assertions about the "reality" of anything including God DO NOT WORK.  You are right- all those assertions contradict each other.

 

So what?

 

The problem is in the abstract assertions- IN THE LANGUAGE you are using!!

 

This is like the Mars radiolab podcast. The thought pathways in your head are not there yet.  You are a brilliant guy, you are just myopic on this problem.  As Mars also said, you are seeing the trees in your way instead of seeing the forest.  Step back and see it in another way!

 

You are stuck in a paradigm and can't get past the categories you see as absolute categories.  If you want to say "God is omnipotent" or "God is not omnipotent" that's fine- he is both.

 

Got that?

 

BOTH.

 

Why?  Because it is only words and highly ambiguous words.  It depends on what you MEAN by "omnipotent".  No he cannot make a boulder so big he can't lift it.  He cannot contradict himself.  OOPS I guess he is NOT omnipotent.

 

He can do everything he wants to do and wills to do.  Uh oh, I guess now he IS omnipotent.   He cannot break commandments.  Why? Because he doesn't want to.  Because it would contradict his purposes.

 

However you want to say that, fine but know it is in your head and your language.  You can make it as complicated as you want or as simple as you want- you create your reality through the words in your head.

 

The whole post is words in your head contradicting each other.  You made up the words, not me, not anyone else. You made up those categories, or worse, "bought into them" because someone told you God has to be "Omnipotent Omnipresent and OMNI EVERYTHING" without understanding that those were contradictions, and YOU accepted those words in you head.

 

Look I agree with you that Orthodoxy is far better at this stuff than Catholicism.  If Mormonism went poof tomorrow, I would probably be "Orthodox" but I would not accept all that mumbo jumbo.  I would believe everything I do today - including accepting the Standard Works as scripture, and probably some other non-standard works I now accept as "scripture" whatever that means (The Didache for sure is scripture as far as I am concerned- it is first century pragmatism in action- the TWO WAYS- look it up if you are not familiar with it.  Original Christianity was Pragmatism, but that is another thread)   We as humans need a faith community in which to serve, so I would probably be a very weird unorthodox Orthodox.    Orthodox churches also preach theosis- an essential to my way of seeing stuff.  So I could do that if I had to.

 

But I don't have to!!  The perfect formulation is right here.  Conceive of God as an immanent, perfected Human and all those alleged "problems" go away.

 

Wittgenstein saw that but could not find it.

 

Rorty saw that but would be out of work if he accepted it.

 

William James saw that but he was back east- and who wants to move to the wilds of Utah? 

 

Very faithful people- that's who!!

Edited July 10, 2015 by mfbukowski

[Spammer]

 

 

The problem here is in your paradigm!!

 

Look at this first sentence:

 

I do think you're on to something at a practical level, though.  Today's world is materialist and pragmatic.  I agree that the old model doesn't speak to a pragmatic materialist.  Oh well.  It speaks to me better than the notion of a god made out of matter always and forever stuck in time and space.  That's because I'm a pragmatic materialist who perceives a contradiction between asserting that 1) a finite, material being stuck in time and space is also 2) without limit, omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent.  I perceive 1) and 2) to be mutually exclusive.

God is NOT "made out of matter always forever stuck in time and space" nor IS he any of the rest of it!!

 

You PERCEIVE CONTRADICTION in the ASSERTIONS  That is the point- you perceive it, and the contradiction is in the assertions!! 

 

Assertions about the "reality" of anything including God DO NOT WORK.  You are right- all those assertions contradict each other.

 

So what?

 

The problem is in the abstract assertions- IN THE LANGUAGE you are using!!

 

This is like the Mars radiolab podcast. 

 

You are stuck in a paradigm and can't get past the categories you see as absolute categories.  If you want to say "God is omnipotent" or "God is not omnipotent" that's fine- he is both.

 

Got that?

 

BOTH.

 

Why?  Because it is only words and highly ambiguous words.  It depends on what you MEAN by "omnipotent".  No he cannot make a boulder so big he can't lift it.  He cannot contradict himself.  OOPS I guess he is NOT omnipotent.

 

He can do everything he wants to do and wills to do.  Uh oh, I guess now he IS omnipotent.   He cannot break commandments.  Why? Because he doesn't want to.  Because it would contradict his purposes.

 

However you want to say that, fine but know it is in your head and your language.  You can make it as complicated as you want or as simple as you want- you create your reality through the words in your head.

 

The whole post is words in your head contradicting each other.  You made up the words, not me, not anyone else. You made up those categories, or worse, "bought into them" because someone told you God has to be "Omnipotent Omnipresent and OMNI EVERYTHING" without understanding that those were contradictions, and YOU accepted those words in you head.

 

Look I agree with you that Orthodoxy is far better at this stuff than Mormonism.  If Mormonism went poof tomorrow, I would probably be "Orthodox" but I would not accept all that mumbo jumbo.  I would believe everything I do today - including accepting the Standard Works as scripture, and probably some other non-standard works I now accept as "scripture" whatever that means (The Didache for sure is scripture as far as I am concerned- it is first century pragmatism in action- the TWO WAYS- look it up if you are not familiar with it.  Original Christianity was Pragmatism, but that is another thread)   We as humans need a faith community in which to serve, so I would probably be a very weird unorthodox Orthodox.    Orthodox churches also preach theosis- an essential to my way of seeing stuff.  So I could do that if I had to.

 

But I don't have to!!  The perfect formulation is right here.  Conceive of God as an immanent, perfected Human and all those alleged "problems" go away.

 

Wittgenstein saw that but could not find it.

 

Rorty saw that but would be out of work if he accepted it.

 

William James saw that but he was back east- and who wants to move to the wilds of Utah? 

 

Very faithful people- that's who!!

 

 

Wait a minute.  Is God the Father a perfect man with flesh and bones or not?  I take that assertion to be doctrinal in Mormonism.  If so, he's located in space.  He's immanent, but localized to a particular space.  If he moves from place to place, is now here when he was once there, then he's in time. Unless, on the other hand, he can cast off that material body at will and become something able to simultaneously be physically present in all spaces and times at once, as he chooses.  If so, then that's a very Orthodox view, insofar as it asserts God is immanent and omnipresent - 'everywhere present and filling all things', as we say.  I realize these are just words, but the words do mean something, don't they?  Does God the Father have a body of flesh and bones or not?  And once He acquired it, has he always had it since and will He always have it now and forever?  That's the Mormonism I was taught and know (same as for every other Mormon I know).  If the Father is both embodied/localized and disembodied/not localized as He wills, that's some other kind of new Mormonism I'm unfamiliar with.  Is that how you conceive the Father?  Just trying to understand.

 

Yes, I know the Didache.  It's a very Catholic document in it's description of a very early form of the liturgical worship found in the Mass/Divine Liturgy and accepted baptismal forms that include both immersion and sprinkling.  

Edited July 10, 2015 by Spammer

[mfbukowski]

Remember I found the church because I already had the philosophy.  I did postgrad work on William James and THEN found the Mormon connection. I had a dual bachelor's from UCLA in philosophy and psychology

 

I went across country to New York to study with this guy, dear old doc McDermott.  Love this guy.  http://davidson-films.myshopify.com/products/william-james-the-psychology-of-possibility-with-john-j-mcdermott

 

So I would be some kind of Pragmatic Christian because I see the strength of Christianity for reasons beyond this thread- primarily love and fellowship and a social trinity, if I were to state it as a Pragmatic non-Mormon Christian.   So yes, Orthodoxy is good, Mormonism is better!