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

Triple O Gods only exist in the minds of people who wish them to exist. The question should be - *why* is such a God necessary to these people? And why do they choose to defend such a God when it seems obvious that He is not at all a kind and benevolent God, but rather a very jealous and wrathful God?

It's a bit of denial, imho. Denying that one's god isn't perfect seems how most monotheistic believers tend to think. They *want* their God to be perfect, despite what they are told about Him (and it is always a Him). All these triple-O god religions stem from patriarchal societies from a couple of thousand years ago. What is the relevence of this sort of thinking now-a-days? How are these Gods still relevent?

Just wondering.


az

"All these triple-O god religions stem from patriarchal societies from a couple of thousand years ago. What is the relevence of this sort of thinking now-a-days? How are these Gods still relevent? "

From personal observation of christians over a number of years (including myself when i was one), I'd say they appeal to a number of person needs. I'll use my own journey as an observation:

In my youth, I was guilt ridden and insecure, and preferred a belief system which was black and white. so i adopted fundamentalist evangelical Christianity. That way, I could adopt a set or rules, be accepted within a community (so long as I observed well set out rules which didn't require making my own decisions and therefore getting it wrong and feeling guilty or shamed) and have the pleasure of trying to impose my rules on others on the grounds that they came from god (and how much more of an authority can you get than that?). I had to impose them because, if i didn't, then they might not have come from God. but if they did come from God, then everyone should be following them.

As I grew older, I relaxed and grew more secure and my theology moved into the more liberal. However, because i still was an ardent believer, the basic tenets of a triple O God remained with me, even though I ended up, finally, in a high Anglican 'rainbow' church of the sort which embraced diversity on a scale which welcomed female or gay priests. But what appealed was the thought that there was a god who knew me, personally, and whom i could depend, and who had some sort of control over things in a crazy world.

Until the day I slammed into the triple O dilemma (the proximate cause doesn't matter) when i realised I couldn't believe in a personal God who was omnipotent but still permitted and condoned suffering.

By then, in any case, i had been struggling with the patriarchal attitudes of the church. Seeking solace, I joined the Quakers and became an elder. there, i could believe what I pleased and could spend a few years trying to sort out what I did believe. In the end, I concluded it made more sense to believe in a god who was imperfect. and personal experience led me to have connections with more than one god, and gods of differing genders. and, from there, to 'little gods' and to other spiritual beings. No longer insecure, I no longer felt threatened by any of this, nor of worlds which I often could not classify and could only experience. order and rules, and what most people believed ceased to have any imperitive.

so i have concluded that mainstream religion, especially that of the triple O god, is for those who need such order and security in their lives. But that is just a personal viewpoint.

Yes. This is a problem. Some answers suggest themselves. First, perhaps the existence of a moral community is a considerable step along the way. Just possibly, experience of such a community is the necessary bit of earthly life.

Second. The obvious one, I think: reincarnation. Third. Some substitute for earthly experience which might only be possible because some actual/real thing exists that it is a substitute for. Is this the purgatory or limbo concept?

As I say, I'm no doctrinal expert. I mention this, HS, because of the others (maybe lurkers) who might take an interest in these discussions. I don't want anyone to think that I'm authoritative where I'm not. As long as that's understood, I'm happy to struggle on.

I like your divine hide-and-seek question. The standard reply seems to be in two parts. One is that obvious supernatural happenings would remove our incentive to solve problems. All praise and blame for the consequences of our actions could be attributed to God! After all, whatever we did, He could, and sometimes would intervene. We'd be in a state of permanent ignorance - perhaps the pre-fall state before the knowledge of good and evil. Did X happen because I did Y or because God would have made it happen whatever I did? Intellectual chaos!

The other part is that we wouldn't have a real choice whether to believe in God. I doubt that this in itself is as important as its consequences as set out in the previous paragraph.

toxx

az.

Triple R Laws of Nature (Rational, Repeatable, Reported) only exist in the minds of people who wish them to exist. The question should be - *why* are such laws necessary to these people? And why do they choose to defend such laws when it seems obvious that they are not particularly beneficial to humans, but permit or even encourage nasty things like diseases and weapons of mass destruction?

It's a bit of denial, imho. Denying that one's laws aren't perfect seems how most scientific believers tend to think. They *want* their Laws of Nature to be perfect, despite what they are told about them. All these triple-R law systems stem from paternalistic societies from a couple of thousand years ago. What is the relevence of this sort of thinking now-a-days? How are these laws still relevent?

Just wondering.

toxx

Very funny, toxx.

Your parody of my posting (thank you very much) isn't apt because nobody claims that the triple R laws of Nature (which exist only in people's minds) are perfect.

They are simply goals set for scientists to work towards. As far as I can see. But in what sense is a Triple-O God an ideal that genuinely guides how we understand the universe or the world?

Meanwhile, there is no triple R law of Nature mafia happening, such as is happening Christian-wise in the Vatican.

Now-a-days.


az

We're out there stuggling (in my case anyway) to follow it toxxin

I thought you would be angrier, az. Still, I think I made some part of my point.



I am completely at a loss to understand the existence or origin of the universe without supposing the existence of a God who is independent of the spatio-temporal universe. The triple-O features seem to be the simplest values to attribute, in view of the presumption that there's *nothing* to limit God's capabilities/perfections. That 'nothing' arises from Occam's razor. Any limitations would have to be due to some factor that we don't need in order to explain the evidence.

My approach might be unusual, but I'm working towards an understanding of these things in a way that seems to me rather like what scientists are doing with the laws of nature. I think these laws *are* perfect in their way. They seem to be omnipresent and omnipotent in an understandable sense. Nothing and nowhere escapes the power of gravitation - I suspect. Leibniz even thought that the universe is omniscient in the sense that all parts 'perceive' all others. This seems an odd way of putting it now, but it could be updated; I wonder if it has.

I'm afraid I'm innocent of Church politics. I speak only of God, and not of religions unless I have to. For such a God to have created the universe, He has to have been around before people's minds were. So do the forces of nature, although not our particular ways of codifying them.

There was method in my foolish-seeming parody, so I hope you'll take it as a compliment rather than a put-down. Imitation is, after all, the sincerest form of flattery.
toxx

Thanks, BC. I'm flattered to be read and happy to clarify anything that I haven't communicated properly. As often as not, it's a sign that I don't quite know what I'm talking about myself.

toxx

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That premise comes from the discussion Ramzi had on that forum page I posted the URL to. Ramzi was trying to disprove the premise.

_________________________________

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If by 'solves interpersonal conflicts' we mean 'allows reasoned discussion to replace violent confrontation', then premise 2 no longer has any purchase.>>

Thanks

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Did you, toxx? Sorry to disappoint. But in fact, I have a dying cat that is daily breaking my heart and other RL stressful matters to worry about.

So getting me angry on hootoo is no longer an option, I'm afraid. Also, I am quite immune to false flattery. Thanks anyhow.


az

az. I didn't *intend* to get you angry. I just thought I might be risking it.

You have my sympathies. I've only just learned that my best web buddy is dead. We have/had a joint page of messageboard links on here. I never met him in person, but I'm gonna miss him terribly.

For those who knew him, yup I'm talking about JR. The guy from Northolt. Not anyone of a similar name.

toxx

>

That would be fun, Toxxin! Whenever you have time, good...

(Digression) Talking of Goddesses, I am listening right now to the BBC WS religion programme, which is talking to a group of people in Greece, who worship the 12 Olympian Gods... It's very interesting. (Digression ends.)
I leave the discussion on paleo-archeology to you HS, and Alji, as you are both much more knowledgeable.

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My mother (not a Christian when she said this, BTW, though she did become one later) said that she thought that this world is a school of sorts, and so maybe God does allow suffering (as I am sure God does do) in order to teach, develop or evolve us. Christians, and, I understand, members of other Triple-O faiths, plus many or most pagans, believe we are here on earth for a short time, and will live and develop elsewhere afterwards. It is hard to see or have any idea of life after having moved on, while we're here, but I think it helps to see this as just a preliminary period in our evolution.

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I am sorry, azahar, that's just an assertion, and you don't *know* that! That's what we're here to discuss...
<<(and it is always a Him).>>
No, not always. God doesn't have physical gender, but incorporates both or all, logically. Have you noticed that I, for one, do not refer to God as Him, but as God, Godself etc. That's what many Christians do now, and some always did.

Toxxin, I am so sorry to hear about your friend, and I hope you are feeling a bit better about his death, although I know you will continue to miss him terribly.

Thanks, Adelaide. I'm just about over the first shock now. We were in constant touch on a message service. Incredible how closely it's possible to relate to someone in that way. It was like having a work colleague on the other side of a partition. Communication by text, although just occasionally we spoke on the phone. He was an incredibly shy and reserved guy. The only real world buddy he ever mentioned was from NZ - believe it or not. I imagine that was back in his student days.

Message boards let him get out of his shell as much as anything could. There are about a dozen I have to contact to tell them the sad news. His brother will do the real world stuff. It helps to tell folks.

toxx

It does help, doesn't it? Well, he obviously enjoyed his friendship with you, and that's something good to remember.

"Yes. This is a problem. Some answers suggest themselves. First, perhaps the existence of a moral community is a considerable step along the way. Just possibly, experience of such a community is the necessary bit of earthly life."

one standard Christian theological answer is that, where such people are born or live within a Christian household, they are, in some sense, covered by the beliefs of that household. So the sacrament of baptism covers those who do not have the ability, or are not yet of an age, to make such choices. However, those not in such households are not so covered and, IIRC, Catholic doctrine would, indeed, put them in limbo after death.

There is a doctrine (whether Catholic or Protestant or both I cannot now recall) of 'the harrowing of hell' in which Jesus, between death and resurrection, passed through at least hell (?and limbo) and those who had not heard the gospel during their lifetime had the opportunity to seize salvation at that point. I presume Christian theology would make that occurrance an eternal one - in one of the meanings of that word you had previously mentioned. But that doctrine, to me, seems very much to be grasping at straws.

"Second. The obvious one, I think: reincarnation."

Not, I think, permitted within the range of permissible Christian beliefs, though some do believe this.

" Third. Some substitute for earthly experience which might only be possible because some actual/real thing exists that it is a substitute for. Is this the purgatory or limbo concept?"

As I say, I think it's limbo; IIRC, purgatory is for those Christians to expunge their sins in life before they attain heaven. This latter doctrine seems to me to obviate the Augustinian doctrine that all that is required for salvation is belief in the christ. But there you go: most of the Christian doctrine seems to be a matter of theologians plugging gaps.

"I like your divine hide-and-seek question. The standard reply seems to be in two parts. One is that obvious supernatural happenings would remove our incentive to solve problems. All praise and blame for the consequences of our actions could be attributed to God! After all, whatever we did, He could, and sometimes would intervene. "

AFAIK, toxx, this is what many evangelicals do, in any case.

"We'd be in a state of permanent ignorance - perhaps the pre-fall state before the knowledge of good and evil. Did X happen because I did Y or because God would have made it happen whatever I did? Intellectual chaos!"

Indeed. But i think that is already inherent in the belief in a personal god - the 'lilies of the field/ sparrows falling' sort of thing.

I have mentioned before our own (Heathen) take on this, which I find much more fulfilling: that we are all, the gods included, subject to wryd, which is amoral in the sense that it is a simple web of cause and effect which binds everything in the nine worlds. If I do Y, even if it is response to a god's action X in my life, then Z will occur, for which I have responsibility. There is a god in our pantheon (for whom i will only use a kenning - a Heathen concept common to the ancient literature whereby a god is known by a deed or attribute rather than a name or title) who is well known for shaking up human lives in a major way without any by-your-leave. so when a major life change is foisted upon one of us the question occurs: is this the work of the Ferryman? If it is, and we choose to make contact with him, we may well be guided towards an opportunity to change our life in another direction. But it is our choice whether to make contact, or, if that occurs, whether to grasp that opportunity or ignore it. So our action is our responsibility, regardless.

i would have thought the same thing happens for Christians. However, for them it may be that if they do not do whatever their god wishes them to do their refusal is sinful. But if their god is not clear in his intent in their lives (the hide-and-seek god), then it seems to me remarkably unfair if they are condemned for something they have failed to understand. But (assuming I have got this right) I suppose that means they have to understand the rules of the game - again, this stems from the Augustinian doctrine that, following the grace of belief, there has to be such a pact for continuing grace. Which brings us back to having to obey his rules or else; a proposition you may have realised I and my fellow pagans find immensely distasteful as the whole game seems to us to be rigged.

"The other part is that we wouldn't have a real choice whether to believe in God."

This I find amusing as those of us who refuse to play the game, find we are usually told by Christians that if we exercise our choice not to believe, we'll burn in hell for all eternity. For some reason, that little injunction seems to undermine any suggestion that there is a 'real choice'. In civil law, acts performed under duress are invalid. Are we to say that human-made law is more just in this respect that the Christian view of divine justice?

Many or most pagans believe in reincarnation, Adelaide. I am agnostic on that issue, but it seems to me to have the merit of getting the opportunity to put right mistakes made through the circumstances of your current life e.g. if you are born into slavery or grave disability and your moral choices are severely limited as a result in the current life.

My own take, in this respect, is that, if reincarnation is a reality, I would trust that, after death, I reach a place and state of awareness of what I had tried to achieve in my immediately previous life, and that the choices of what I am born into in the next one are mine to make, dependent upon what I wish to learn. In that respect, I work hand in glove with my gods and the Norns to achieve the maximum learning potential of each life I live, until I reach whatever it is I am seeking to reach. That would seem to me a much more sensible way of going about things than getting one shot, regardless of circumstances, and constantly hampered by a requirement to live by someone else's rules - especially when those rules seem to be unjust in their application.