The Destruction of God?

[Bobbieaware]

2 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

One presumably reads carefully enough to distinguish between metaphorical and real references.  One must distinguish, for example, between the actual, physical country France, and the metaphorical claim by the late Charles de Gaulle, saying Je suis la France "I am France."  [if you are really sharp you will see right away that his very name de Gaulle means "of France," so that he meant the phrase to be taken both literally and figuratively, a pun]

Thus, when Jesus declares himself to be the Light of the World, we do not take that to mean that he is sunlight, but a very different kind of light, a holy light which can penetrate our souls.  Yet he is not the light, but rather it is a power which he has and can project.  Similarly, the Holy Spirit has a spirit body, but he can also project power over vast distances and to vast numbers of people simultaneously.  How that is done, and what sort of power it is, we do not understand.  The "Force" in the Star Wars series is similarly employed.

I’m perplexed, wondering why you are ignoring the blaringly obvious? Why the ignoring of the “800 pound gorilla in the room?” In this case, our 800 pound gorilla is the account of the first vision in the canonized Joseph Smith History. When the presence of the Father and the Son began to descend upon Joseph he saw a pillar of light, above the brightness of the sun. After that intensely bright holy light rested upon him he saw two personages “whose brightness and glory defy all description.” Now I truly hope you’re not going to tell me the astonishingly brilliant pillar of light, and the indescribably bright light that emanated from the resurrected celestial bodies of the Father and the Son, were mere figments of Joesph Smith’s imagination, are you?

I’m sorry if I sound like an unsophisticated dullard at the moment, but I believe there is an very real spiritual light (remember, all spirit is material) that eminates from the glorified bodies of the Father and the Son and that the light that fills them to overflowing radiates out to fill the immensity of space.

If you can believe spiritual “power” can eminate from God to fill the immensity of space, why is it so hard to believe light — a form of power or energy — can also eminate from their beings? For crying out loud, even our sun — an apparently inanimate object that God created for our needs— sends light rays out that fill the immensity of space. If God can create suns that actually do, in real time, fill the sidereal universe with light, why is it so hard to believe the creator of all these suns is himself filled to an infinite and eternal degree with a higher form of light that also fills space ? In fact, if you examine our mortal human bodies with the right kind of optical equipment you’ll see that even we have light energy issuing from our fallen bodies.

I hope you’ll forgive me if I believe that God’s body is filled with infinite and eternal power and light (actually power and light are interchangeable) and that the light within him is so powerful it fills the immensity of space. 

 

 

[Robert F. Smith]

1 hour ago, Bobbieaware said:

I’m perplexed, wondering why you are ignoring the blaringly obvious? Why the ignoring of the “800 pound gorilla in the room?” In this case, our 800 pound gorilla is the account of the first vision in the canonized Joseph Smith History. When the presence of the Father and the Son began to descend upon Joseph he saw a pillar of light, above the brightness of the sun. After that intensely bright holy light rested upon him he saw two personages “whose brightness and glory defy all description.” Now I truly hope you’re not going to tell me the astonishingly brilliant pillar of light, and the indescribably bright light that emanated from the resurrected celestial bodies of the Father and the Son, were mere figments of Joesph Smith’s imagination, are you?

I’m sorry if I sound like an unsophisticated dullard at the moment, but I believe there is an very real spiritual light (remember, all spirit is material) that eminates from the glorified bodies of the Father and the Son and that the light that fills them to overflowing radiates out to fill the immensity of space.

If you can believe spiritual “power” can eminate from God to fill the immensity of space, why is it so hard to believe light — a form of power or energy — can also eminate from their beings? For crying out loud, even our sun — an apparently inanimate object that God created for our needs— sends light rays out that fill the immensity of space. If God can create suns that actually do, in real time, fill the sidereal universe with light, why is it so hard to believe the creator of all these suns is himself filled to an infinite and eternal degree with a higher form of light that also fills space ? In fact, if you examine our mortal human bodies with the right kind of optical equipment you’ll see that even we have light energy issuing from our fallen bodies.

I hope you’ll forgive me if I believe that God’s body is filled with infinite and eternal power and light (actually power and light are interchangeable) and that the light within him is so powerful it fills the immensity of space. 

I'm not sure what the problem is, since I agree with nearly all of that.  I was merely distinguishing between metaphorical light and actual light (of whatever kind).  You previously interpreted some light references literally, when it is obvious that they were meant to be taken figuratively.  The same applies in many circumstances, and we must be prepared to distinguish among them.  Such questions are regularly addressed in college English literature classes -- particularly when dealing with poetry.  When, for example, Shakespeare refers to his beloved in a sonnet, saying, "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"  He is not suggesting that she is a summer's day, but rather that she has some positive qualities of a nice summer's day.  When Genesis says that Eve is made from Adam's rib, that is not meant to be taken literally, but figuratively.

I have no problem with Joseph's First Vision actually featuring a powerful shaft of light in which two glorious personages appear to him, and can't imagine why you think I do.  However, that does not mean that extravagant claims about that light need to be made by us, i.e., going much further than Joseph himself did in embroidering the account.

[CV75]

10 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Uh ok, I will spill the beans now.  IN MY OPINION God IS mankind.  What the church worships is HUMANITY as exemplified by the MAN OF HOLINESS.  We worship the FAMILY as an ideal paradigm in the Godhead and what could be the ideal society in our church.  We are Adam and Eve and we are Gods in embryo- all of us because we all fall and can become ideal humans because being ideal humans entails both fall and glorification through creating our own worlds without number.  You cannot create worlds without progression out of the dirt and then into the stars

I've often thought that the Ideal Human is perfectly integrated with all things (D&C 88:13). The light of Christ is the medium or vehicle through which this happens, and shining in the darkness defines (illuminates) existence (93:38). This definition and illumination requires opposition (contrast and complement): "what is" and "what isn't". Shining in the darkness is the epitome of opposition; light comprehends darkness while darkness does not comprehend light. In comprehension we have existence, and in incomprehension we do not. Thought creates all things and God creates thought.

Even Adam before the Fall applied 88:13 in his stewardship in that he named (defined) all the animals, tended (gave light to) all the garden, and partook (received light from) of all garden (ate the fruit, found pleasure in all the flora and fauna). From 93:33, "man is spirit" -- to me that is interesting phrasing. He is not "a" spirit, but spirit. Spirit is the basic material from which all things are made; the light of Christ comes from His spirit and permeates all other things which are also spirit. Adam and his posterity are unique in that they are forms of spirit that knowingly and actively receive the light, and in doing so see how they integrate, or are in the midst, of all things.

Musings from my vacation...

[Bernard Gui]

11 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Now THAT is straight Wittgenstein

Thanks for the very interesting comments. I wonder whether we should apply Wittgenstein to Lehi or Lehi to Wittgenstein. After all,

one of them saw God and lived.

[Bernard Gui]

13 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Well, yes, but Satan is coeternal with God, as are we all.  He has a spirit body encasing his intelligence.  He chose to be the opponent of God (free agency you know), in a universe which is already ruled by the Law of Opposition.  Indeed his name is really a title, "Adversary, Opponent," and is normally accompanied in Hebrew with the definite article, has-Satan, "The-Opponent."**  That is his job, and it is absolutely essential in both a real and ritual sense.  His performance in the Garden is a ritual, as it is in Job.*

*  Richard Medina, “Job’s Entrée into a Ritual of Mourning as Seen in the Opening Prose of the Book of Job,” Die Welt des Orients, 38 (2008):199, “Through stylized movements, acts and speech, they enter into the liminal state . . , decouple from the sphere of day-to-day life and adopt a transitory ritual identity.”

**  Cf. Robert F. Smith, “Śaṭan: Notes on the Gods,” 2012 (version 2), online at https://www.scribd.com/doc/58985133/Satan-Notes-on-the-Gods .

Would you say then that Satan’s role as the Champion of Opposition was cast before his spiritual embodiment?  At what point did he exercise that agency? Does this have to happen every time a new world is created?

In the Sunday School lesson on the Fall last week the comment was made (it is often made in such discussions) that Satan was fooled by God because he erroneously thought that enticing the humans to disobey would ruin the Plan. Or, that Satan’s Plan was foiled because he didn’t really know of the efficacy of the Atonement. It occurred to me that this could not be the case because he was in on the planning from the start and was quite aware of what was at stake...enough so to present a counter plan. Since he did not suffer the veil of forgetfulness (unless he is an idiot), he knew perfectly well what the outcome would be. His own words reveal his knowledge of the Law of Opposition. 

So, the question is, what is his motivation to be the contrarian? What’s in it for him? Revenge? Spite? A moment in the spotlight?

BTW, he is very good at his job.

Edited February 6, 2018 by Bernard Gui

[Calm]

There is nothing to suggest that Satan has wisdom and would not be able to talk himself into believing something untrue or even that he even had enough comprehension of the mercy and love of God after he had turned away from God that he could even grasp the basics of how the Plan actually works....and therefore he might very well be able to convince himself he could foil the Plan just as many convince themselves in mortality that they can change things when they have no actual ability to do so.

Edited February 6, 2018 by Calm

[Bernard Gui]

23 hours ago, Calm said:

In my view...

All existence, no.  All progression, yes.

Without agency, I believe we would all be stagnant intelligences doing nothing save whatever eternal intelligences do in their version of couch potatoing.

Think of it as if we were eternal rocks...perhaps we could change from a rock to a pile of sand, but we would be forever acted upon while never acting.

However, is that not simply describing the conditions for which Lehi said there would be no creation?

Quote

And if these things are not there is no God. And if there is no God we are not, neither the earth; for there could have been no creation of things,

 

[Bernard Gui]

15 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Uh ok, I will spill the beans now.  IN MY OPINION God IS mankind.  What the church worships is HUMANITY as exemplified by the MAN OF HOLINESS.  We worship the FAMILY as an ideal paradigm in the Godhead and what could be the ideal society in our church.  We are Adam and Eve and we are Gods in embryo- all of us because we all fall and can become ideal humans because being ideal humans entails both fall and glorification through creating our own worlds without number.  You cannot create worlds without progression out of the dirt and then into the stars.

We are in a constant state of progression or are in a state of regression.  You see both kinds of humans in this world.  God is the Ideal Human.  Is there an actual Divine Person we worship as our "Father"?  I say yes undeniably.

How do I know that? Because I feel it in my heart- there is an Intelligence I take to be human deep within me- or outside- but it seems to know things I cannot know- with whom I can communicate.  It gives me answers to my problems, gives me peace, and answers and help when I pray.

Of these things I am certain.

Philosophically, I can take that pure experienced phenomenon and interpret it in many many ways, of which the LDS has the best possible interpretation, in my mind and at my present state of progression.

So for me the answer to the first question is "yes", with all the ambiguity that attends that simple answer.  Both- God and Man are inseparable because God IS MAN metaphorically and actually.

The answer to the second question is "no" because the evolution does not stop at a certain level of progress.  It is DIVINE PAIRS of men and women "all the way down" (and up!!) into infinity. 

At least as far as we can push the paradigm..... 

 

I like beans.

Going back to the First Presidency declaration, would those attributes with which we are endowed be the same as those Lehi says make sure of the existence of God? I think so. There must be a point in our evolution when we have satisfied the requirements, because we are promised that te time will come when we will be called up. How do you think that determination will be made? What measure can be made of attributes?

Quote

Man is the child of God, formed in the divine image and endowed with divine attributes, and even as the infant son of an earthly father and mother is capable in due time of becoming a man, so the undeveloped offspring of celestial parentage is capable, by experience through ages and aeons, of evolving into a God.

 

Edited February 6, 2018 by Bernard Gui

[Bernard Gui]

23 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

You might want to think of such attributes as analogous to the laws of physics, which demand differentiation (opposition) in all things.  The nature of the universe is such that those attributes and their opposites are artifacts of free agency, and without which there could be no free agency.

But unlike the laws of physics, these attributes with which we are endowed can shrink or expand depending on the use of our agency. Without them there would be no physical laws. With them, we become Gods.

Edited February 6, 2018 by Bernard Gui

[Bernard Gui]

13 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

"Dark matter" is by definition that which has not yet been infused by "light" or "intelligence

Or, dark matter is incapable of illumination by energy or spirit. Outer darkness comes to mind, except there is so darned much of it.

[Bernard Gui]

14 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

One cannot progress without room to do so.    "Behold- here is matter unorganized"- if there is matter unorganized, then it is "unknowable"- precisely BECAUSE it is now unorganized.  It doesn't exist yet!  It is without name, cannot be classified, known, or analyzed, nor published in scientific literature because it is yet "unknown"

 So "God knows all there is to be known" because God organizes what IS knowable.  God's human mind is the most intelligent possible human mind and is always discovering/organizing what to us is "truth".  What is knowable is not fixed, because new worlds are always being created.  He organizes through the Word- which is how knowledge is communicated.  If we do not have a word for "day" we do not have "knowledge" of what a "day" is.  The cycle of darkness and light- God organized and CALLED it the "first day" = social constructivism through language!

So yes God "knows all" but is constantly organizing more which can become known.   Think of Einstein raised to infinity.  Einstein "organized" the theory of relativity about which we are still learning, and he organized it creating a new paradigm- a new way of organizing information about the universe.  So Einstein and all of us in our own lives are mini-gods organizing our worlds without number, but Einstein's "world" is big enough to not even be fully explored by all science yet.

And so with God, on an infinitely bigger scale!  He organizes the Paradigm of all possible paradigms in his "worlds without number"

So yes, he is "omniscient" in the sense he knows all that can possibly be known, but yet is always adding to what can eventually be known, named, classified, and analyzed which is what constitutes what we call "knowledge"

One cannot have omni-SCIENCE when science is not yet done!   

(nor will it ever be......  )

 

So, eternal progression is simply increasing one’s vocabulary, as it were. 

[Eek!]

14 hours ago, mfbukowski said:

Uh ok, I will spill the beans now.  IN MY OPINION God IS mankind.  What the church worships is HUMANITY as exemplified by the MAN OF HOLINESS....

God and Man are inseparable because God IS MAN metaphorically and actually.

Verrrrrry interesting.

Dude, sometimes you just blow me away.  

[Bernard Gui]

12 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

Similarly, the Holy Spirit has a spirit body, but he can also project power over vast distances and to vast numbers of people simultaneously.  How that is done, and what sort of power it is, we do not understand.  The "Force" in the Star Wars series is similarly employed.

What are you saying? Everyone knows the midi-chlorians are what make it all work. 

[Bernard Gui]

12 hours ago, Exiled said:

What if the devil didn't want to entice people to do wickedly any more?  What if he refused to play along in order to frustrate God's purposes?  Would God step in at that point or hire someone else to offer the evil alternative so his purposes wouldn't be thwarted?

There would still be agency and opposition. His very existence depends on them. 

[Bernard Gui]

11 hours ago, Josh Khinder said:

Mormon leaders have taught God is not all knowing

God himself is increasing and progressing in knowledge, power, and dominion, and will do so, worlds without end." Wilford Woodruff, Journal of Discourses Vol. 6:120

"Jan 7-8, 1960 - First Presidency decides that Bruce R. McConkie’s Mormon Doctrine “must not be re-published, as it is full of errors and misstatements, and it is most unfortunate that it has received such wide circulation.” They are exasperated that McConkie and his publisher released the book without pre-publication publicity or notifying First Presidency. Even his father-in-law, senior apostle, Joseph Fielding Smith, “did not know anything about it until it was published.” This is McConkie’s way to avoid repetition of Presidency’s stopping his pre-announced Sound Doctrine three years earlier.

Committee of two apostles (Mark E Petersen and Marion G Romney) reports that McConkie’s Mormon Doctrine contains 1,067 doctrinal errors. For example, page 493 said: “Those who falsely and erroneously suppose that God is progressing in knowledge and gaining new truths cannot exercise sufficient faith in him to gain salvation until they divest themselves of their false beliefs.” However, McConkie is affirming doctrine of omniscience officially condemned by previous First Presidency and Quorum of the Twelve Apostles in 1865.”

Ahhh....there must be opposition in all things. Even with books by General Authorities.

This sounds like a great topic for a new thread. You could start it......

Edited February 6, 2018 by Bernard Gui

[Bernard Gui]

1 hour ago, Calm said:

There is nothing to suggest that Satan has wisdom and would not be able to talk himself into believing something untrue or even that he even had enough comprehension of the mercy and love of God after he had turned away from God that he could even grasp the basics of how the Plan actually works....and therefore he might very well be able to convince himself he could foil the Plan just as many convince themselves in mortality that they can change things when they have no actual ability to do so.

Convinced himself and billions of his Father’s children. I think there is much more at play than self-deception.

As we pray, “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference.”

Edited February 6, 2018 by Bernard Gui

[Bernard Gui]

Does no one else find it fascinating that two prophets could countenance conditions in which God’s power and glory could be destroyed? Even in the hypothetical?

[Calm]

Thought experiments have been popular for a long, long time.

[CV75]

6 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

Does no one else find it fascinating that two prophets could countenance conditions in which God’s power and glory could be destroyed? Even in the hypothetical?

As a hypothetical, it would be reductio ad absurdum. As an "actual," it is reflective of Satan's plan.

[Bobbieaware]

15 hours ago, Robert F. Smith said:

I'm not sure what the problem is, since I agree with nearly all of that.  I was merely distinguishing between metaphorical light and actual light (of whatever kind).  You previously interpreted some light references literally, when it is obvious that they were meant to be taken figuratively.  The same applies in many circumstances, and we must be prepared to distinguish among them.  Such questions are regularly addressed in college English literature classes -- particularly when dealing with poetry.  When, for example, Shakespeare refers to his beloved in a sonnet, saying, "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"  He is not suggesting that she is a summer's day, but rather that she has some positive qualities of a nice summer's day.  When Genesis says that Eve is made from Adam's rib, that is not meant to be taken literally, but figuratively.

I have no problem with Joseph's First Vision actually featuring a powerful shaft of light in which two glorious personages appear to him, and can't imagine why you think I do.  However, that does not mean that extravagant claims about that light need to be made by us, i.e., going much further than Joseph himself did in embroidering the account.

Let’s go one step at a time. The scriptures teach us within Christ “dwells all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.” In direct connection with his possession of the all fulness of the Godhead bodily, the resurrected Lord testified that the Father had given unto him “all power in heaven and earth.”

 In light of the of the foregoing testimonies of scripture concerning the extent of the power of Christ, do you believe he has the ability, if he so chooses, to extend the light that Joseph beheld emanating from the bodies of the Father and the Son into an area much larger than the Sacred Grove? In other words. if the Lord wanted to bathe the entire area of metropolitan of Salt Lake City in the same heavenly light, do you think he is able to do it? 

P.S. In asking this question I’m being quite serious and hope you won't blow it off because you think it’s too naive and childish to have to answer. I’m hoping to get a simple yes or no answer with any explanatory information you might want to add.

 

[mfbukowski]

12 hours ago, CV75 said:

I've often thought that the Ideal Human is perfectly integrated with all things (D&C 88:13). The light of Christ is the medium or vehicle through which this happens, and shining in the darkness defines (illuminates) existence (93:38). This definition and illumination requires opposition (contrast and complement): "what is" and "what isn't". Shining in the darkness is the epitome of opposition; light comprehends darkness while darkness does not comprehend light. In comprehension we have existence, and in incomprehension we do not. Thought creates all things and God creates thought.

Even Adam before the Fall applied 88:13 in his stewardship in that he named (defined) all the animals, tended (gave light to) all the garden, and partook (received light from) of all garden (ate the fruit, found pleasure in all the flora and fauna). From 93:33, "man is spirit" -- to me that is interesting phrasing. He is not "a" spirit, but spirit. Spirit is the basic material from which all things are made; the light of Christ comes from His spirit and permeates all other things which are also spirit. Adam and his posterity are unique in that they are forms of spirit that knowingly and actively receive the light, and in doing so see how they integrate, or are in the midst, of all things.

Musings from my vacation...

The naming function is what is it is all about.  Creation in language is creation in knowledge.  Without names of things we cannot share information.  Ultimately naming everything creates an artificial human world which we take to be the "natural" world and we end up living in that human created world.  This is what Mormonism celebrates really- the creation of the world through intelligence and communication by a God who is human.  It is metaphor and "truth" at the same time.  "The glory of God is intelligence, = light and truth"

By the WORD were all things created.  The world as we know it is a socially created world of language and human communication through culture.  This is a fabulously Mormon universe and I think honestly you are one of the few around here who get it. It seems many here are still caught up in sectarian dualism and see this scientifically

[mfbukowski]

10 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

Thanks for the very interesting comments. I wonder whether we should apply Wittgenstein to Lehi or Lehi to Wittgenstein. After all,

one of them saw God and lived.

Read from the best books and organize matter unorganized through intelligence which is light and truth.

All W says is that everything  was created by the Word.  Sounds good to me.

Edited February 6, 2018 by mfbukowski

[Bernard Gui]

5 minutes ago, mfbukowski said:

Read from the best books and organize matter unorganized through intelligence which is light and truth.

All W says is that everything  was created by the Word.  Sounds good to me.

Indeed. Verified by all the Prophets from the Beginning.

[Bernard Gui]

2 hours ago, CV75 said:

As a hypothetical, it would be reductio ad absurdum. As an "actual," it is reflective of Satan's plan.

Do you see it as an actual?

[mfbukowski]

10 hours ago, Bernard Gui said:

I like beans.

Going back to the First Presidency declaration, would those attributes with which we are endowed be the same as those Lehi says make sure of the existence of God? I think so. There must be a point in our evolution when we have satisfied the requirements, because we are promised that te time will come when we will be called up. How do you think that determination will be made? What measure can be made of attributes?

 

He will know it when He sees it.  But I am certain you gotta get this stuff first and get beyond the world.    We are to overcome the world and know it as it is in true experience and not as it is spoken.  We have to get past Babel and back to Adamic.