h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

my understanding is that one must seek forgiveness and be truly penitent in order to be forgiven

Glubb. This isn't a 'sense' of the word "forgiven", but an account of the way in which it applies to the relation between God and creation. This is specifically how the word applies to a timeless being, as you require.

toxx

C.Horse

I think that is something we have from the era when priests wanted people to think that they (the priests) were the only way to forgiveness via confession and acts of contrition. Just a power thing really, and not biblical as far as I can see. According to Jesus, just quietly saying: 'God be merciful to me, a sinner' was better than an elaborate performance!

HS knows this stuff better than I do. I hope she will correct me if I'm wrong. AS too, for that matter.

toxx

didn't jesus forgive one bloke that was being crucified with him and not the other

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But the same argument applies. What mediates the system of personal causation? And what mediates the connection between the two systems?

Noggin

Nah, he forgave da dudes dat woz crucifyin him - more strictly, he asked his ol' man to do it. He told one a da guyz wiv 'im that they were headin' for paradise. Soundz kinda cool ter me.

toxx

Noggin. We've been here before. What mediates the system of material causation, for that matter? We just don't know, and maybe it's the same mediator that applies in the case of personal causation - it's just the agent that is different.

toxx

Hi Toxx!
Well, it's not *just* a power thing. Jesus said it in the 'Our Father': when we pray we should ask God to 'forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us'. So what crazyhorse says has good foundations.

I think it wasn't a power thing at all, actually. But that's enough for now.

Re-reading the above I realise I might have misunderstood both crazyhorse and Toxxin. But someone will correct me, I suppose...

Andrew S

>>And I like the landwights and trolls! Your description strikes a chord somewhere. It has a Tolkeinish feel to it... actually, I suppose it's the other way around(?)<<

Yes, Tolkein was a very fine AS scholar, and his creations are all to be found in the sagas and the eddas.

Jez

Esty and Coren

>>> a gloriously improbable story about giants, and cows and eyebrows
What would that be? Sounds interesting.<<

I'll try and find the url of the Internet Source Book, which has sacred texts from all over the world.

The Eddas and the Sagas are a bit long to hunt through without a pointer.

Unless HS gets there first with a reference?

Jez

Astro-logica

>>Jez would say;

'I just see them (the gods). I can't explain it to anyone, but I just do.'<<

Actually, I normally only hear them. I have very occasionally seen one or two of them

And my resident 'house-ghost' smells of lavender and wears blue.

But I have had lucid dreams, and although I don't trust them on their own, I have checked what I have 'seen' or 'heard' against the experiences of others and trust those I can cross-check.

Jez

Esty and Coren

>>>a triple O god
That would be omnipotent, omniscient, and what?<<

Omnipresent, usually

Big G is another term some of us use for the monotheistic god.

Jez - polytheist heathen and non-wiccan witch

AS.

That part of the prayer and your remark remind me of my favourite epitaph.

"Here lies Martin Elginbrod.
Have mercy on his soul, oh God -
as he would do, if he were God
and you were Martin Elginbrod."

Can you really equate human and divine mercy in that way?!

toxx

glubbdubdrib, I disagree with you, God's love does not render the world meaningless, because God's love is of a different sort from human love. It is true that the love of people for each other is a "positive reaction to another's existence", ideally, though I'd argue that the love of family, parents/children/siblings is different... But the love of God is different, as God is different. I think it's a wonderful difference!

That's a marvellous poem, Heathen Sceptic. Is it T S Eliot?

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Was it really seen this way by any more than a minority of (may I say) gullible people? It is my view that such things are profoundly political, and most of those involved (especially the leaders of society) know that...

Omnipresent, I believe.

EVERYONE is careful around trolls.

i think my favourite epitaph reads"here lies an atheist,all dressed up and no place to go"