A question on Armageddon

Chickasaw.

I can relate. I have strong intuitive impulses which my Left Brain hemisphere struggles to keep in check.

 

Yes, the essence is to the thing-in-itself to borrow from Kant, which is the quantum information of the object itself. It is the scratch, the shape of the table, the fact that it floats if you need to now use it as a raft----and that this unique individual object remains consistent from one moment to the next despite the uncountable collapses into physical particles of each moment which actually allows that table to physically manifest, even as, due to quantum randomness stray particles might collapse somewhere else in space-time. And that the table changes through time---the scratch, the water soaked into the wood when it becomes a raft, etc. (which changes parts of that information).

 

???????????? This appears to be a triplicate of excerpts from my past posts. What's the point?

 

I am somehow trapped in a world of trying to sort out 2000 years of interpretations on the the teachings of Jesus Christ ie Yesua, Saint Issa and so on. I know that the Catholic Church has revised events gathered in history to serve the churches message. It would be refreshing to return to Yesua as a Nazarene Jew, from the House of David, and or his brother James the just. If there could be a world conference to discuss he message of Jesus and purge all of the crap in the Bible, so the we can arrive at world peace. Hot button issues like the Virginity of Meriiam, Humanity before Adam and Eve, Noahs Ark, and so on continues to be issues for discussion. The religion has evolved to a genocidal army destined to destroy all opposing interpretations, practicing genocide against Jews, Muslims, and aboriginal peoples. The list goes on and on and is disgusting. the Bible needs to be purged of all irrelevant crap and re-written to give goals for man to achieve salvation.The real message in the new bible could be reduced to a pamphlet of relevant principles. Then science and religion could work in cooperation to the betterment of mankind. Galileo and Copernicus would undoubtedly agree. The pueblo indians would be at peace also, and not fearing damnation from so-called Christians.

 

Good luck. A worthy but ambitious endeavor! (I won't say "hopeless") Those "hot button" issues have been the source of intense division among Christian sects for a long time. Fundamentalists split off in 1878, with the Niagra conference, and are pretty firm in their beliefs, more broadly shared with Evangelicals. It would probably take a religious war or two to get them to the table! Of course, then there are the Catholics, whose conservative and liberal factions seem also to be at odds.

 

I have a good friend who I believe is Chickasaw or part Chickasaw. I supported her during her hanblechiya at Bear Butte.

You know, if you accepted Tunkashila into your heart your life would change for the better. So many good things would come to you. You must follow the Great Spirit or so many bad things will come to you.

Here, kneel with me and let's pray...


I'M JOKING! (of course). It is true about my friend though, and I did support her. I am pretty sure she is Chickasaw, or possibly Chickasaw and Lakota. She moved to Oklahoma back in about 2007 or so though to be with her kids and grandchildren. today we communicate on FB.

Have you ever attended any traditional ceremonies? I don't know if the Chickasaw today have something that would be comparable to the Lakota yuwipi or House Ceremony, or if there are yuwipi men that follow the Lakota tradition. Or even where you live and if there is enough of a Native community to have house ceremonies there. Though they do try to weed out people at the start that are there just to see the show or even try to disprove what is happening. You have to go with a sincere intention of praying for the people and who the ceremony is for. But I can't see someone going to one and coming out afterwards saying, yeah, none of that spirit stuff is real.

There will be one side of your brain trying to figure out, What just happened? How could they do this? Did I really see that? How could someone do this, surely there was a trick, how did this happen? There are yuwipi men, that, as it has been explained to me, are not yet confident in the abilities to perform and their ceremonies are not as powerful as those of others, but they are still pretty amazing. And of course, there are some fake yuwipi men, and when they are discovered, there is a lot of anger, and threats, and they might even disappear.

But its not just what happens in the ceremony, but what happens around the ceremony and how that impacts the people. My brother was trying to find a job, but not just a job, but a job that had health insurance good enough to give the proper care he needed for a thyroid issue, and I invited him to a yuwipi. The next day after the yuwipi, I was coincidentally watching a performance of an eagle dance at a Native American crafts and goods expo, and during the ceremony he called me to tell me that an eagle had just flew down alongside his car and went with him even as he turned and then he got a call with a job offer to a company that did provide such insurance. A decade ago my wife and I were having some issues and we did opagi to a local yuwipi man. Seven days before the ceremony an elk came into the neighborhood, jumped into the yard of a young man that I have brought to ceremony a few times, as he was there, and then jumped the fence into a schoolyard. The schoolyard was then surrounded by cops, game wardens, dog catchers and TV news crews. I have a video of the elk, from a local News channel (I actually pulled it from YouTube, so I hope the link still works) and I have a copy of the news story from their page (I was away from home at the time.) The news story ends with, Authorities hope the elk made it back to the wilderness. In other words it disappeared. One of the neighbors later told me that they had seen the elk in my backyard, at my apple tree, which just so happens to be where I put my tobacco ties that I have prepared. Oddly enough, this is different from where everyone else saw the elk as I understood that it went straight from the top of the hill, down a street to the south of me, where it jumped into my friend's yard, and into the schoolyard. That was one of many things that happened around that ceremony, and much of it in terms of 4's and 7's which you may know as significant. There was so much stuff happening I actually thought I should write a book about it. I live in a Western suburb of Denver, but I am certainly far enough into the city that it is uncommon for such wildlife to walk around. But the story of elk for me goes back further in these weird ways--but that's another story.

As I said, I have tons of these stories, and even going back to the Philippines. In fact, it was actually that ceremony that was the start of my wife getting onto her path as a healer. She didn't really want to be a healer, and she spent many years trying to stay away from that gift. When I started going to ceremony she made a point to not get involved. That is why when I went to my first sundance, she did not go. My sister-in-law was visiting so I just took her.

During the yuwipi, her mom, who died when she was quite young, came into the ceremony, and held my wife. She started healing family members after that, and was more appreciative of the ceremonies I went to. The problem is, she had no community, no creed, no ceremonies to attend as the Spanish had destroyed all those traditions when they colonized the Philippines. The only knowledge she had was intuitive. I would guide her with what I knew and told her she had to connect with her ancestors. Anyway, eventually she understood that she had to embrace this gift, and use it to heal other people. As she explains it, she just does what she is told to do. I assist her when she heals, and I will see her do things and afterwards explain to her, do you know what that is or means? One time she started beating on a singing bowl that I had, and afterwards I pulled up a YouTube video of a Bontoc healing ceremony, or maybe it was a Dayak ceremony, and pointed out that the beat and sound was exactly as she was doing.

Being that these ceremonies are alien to mainstream life in the Philippines, and that religion is of the community, I would find it difficult to argue that she is following cultural expectations and participating in a religion. She often sees these things in the perspective of Catholicism, but it is her ancestors that are guiding her, and while she may use some christian motifs that give meaning to her, she does things, that are alien to those traditions, without even the knowledge about what she is doing. She actually goes on a shamanic spirit journey, and would have no idea what it was if I hadn't explained it to her.

 

Must be the Lakota part that's worshiping Tunkashila, aka Wakan Tanka (Great Spirit or Great Mystery). It means "Grandfather" in Lakota. Us Chickasaws worshipped Aba Binniꞌliꞌ (Sitting or Dwelling Above) , AKA Inki Abu (Father Above) as our High God--a sky god who incorporats but transcends other deities and is present in the sacred fire. I've always been a little suspicious of the name, since "Aba' was also Jesus' name for His Dad. (Maybe some missionaries at work?) We also worshiped other sky god (sun, clouds,and clear sky) Anyhow, I learn from this religion and have incorporated some of it into my concept of the divine.

How could I be a Chickasaw and not have attended a traditional ceremony? The big one is the Green Corn Festival in the late summer, complete with a two-day fast, stomp dancing, ball games and giving thanks to Aba Binni'li for the harvest. It is quintessentially religious in terms of the 4 Cs. It is emotionally quite powerful. I have no problem understanding spirituality. I'm a borderline mystic and feel in close contact with God, which I see everywhere. ("The kingdom of the Father is spread out everywhere upon the earth, and people do not see it" (Thomas, 113). My difference with you is that I see this as analytically separate from, but coextensive with, religion. It's a communally shared experience, as well as one which we experience in solitude--and the beliefs and rituals associated with it are culturally molded. As a former Catholic, I experienced the power of the Eucharist as I ingested the body and blood of Jesus. Today, it strikes me as remarkable that rational people can actually believe the wafer and wine are Jesus. It looks and tastes like bread and wine, and I used to spend the rest of the mass trying to scrape it off the roof of my mouth, since it couldn't touch hands and teeth. But I think the Spirit behind it is very real.

What you're talking about is the phenomenon Jung called "synchronicity". Enough people have noticed the same eerie coincidences that the phenomena attracted his attention. Not the sort of thing the general scientific community pursues, since they tend to occur unexpectedly, can't be replicated at will, and currently don't fit existing paradigms. I've had enough of them myself to give them some credence. Maybe in our lifetimes we'll see some published research on it. For now, the best we have to go on is the book by physicist Wolfgang Pauli and Jung, The Interpretation of Nature and the Psyche, otherwise known as "the Pauli/Jung conjecture". I've sometimes made life-changing decisions on the basis of such "coincidences', but with the awareness that they might be just that. I don't want to become like my aunt who sees owls hitting the door as an omen of death, etc. Sometimes a coincidence is just a coincidence.

Putting aside the possible guidance of her departed ancestors, is it possible your wife might have been exposed to such notions in her family of origin or encountered them on TV? We live in a multi-cultural world where influences of unknown origin to us are part of everyday life. Where did I suddenly go mystical and experience a magical mystery tour of the world religions? It seemed like an encounter from the beyond, but I'm willing to entertain the possibility of a psychological phenomenon. (perhaps a psychotic break?).

 

Perhaps a good resource, if you haven't seen it, is, Stephen Mitchell's, The Gospel According to Jesus--A new translation and guide to his essential teachings for believers and unbelievers

 

But they weren't fighting over that. They were fighting mostly over territory, and god was the supernatural backup to give them victory.

For me, in the last analysis, I do--but after lots of study of the works of leading scholars, on the basis of the historical context. It's inevitably a judgment call, like the political one of who decides what political party or candidate is the best. I take it, you also make such decisions, and have the impression Christianity isn't on your favored list.

True, but it may be central to it. It is for me. The values are the important thing. I take fellowship with a group of atheists and agnostics who share my values, although not my beliefs. They seeking to live moral lives in harmony with their fellow humans, and I consider them soul brothers and sisters. As Saint Justin Martyr used to say "those who lived according to reason are Christians, even though accounted atheists".The Significance of St. Justin Martyr | EWTN Pope Francis seems to agree.

To me, it means that Love is God's essence. Love is an essential attribute of God, and a core aspect of His character. D.A. Carson, The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God. Bishop Spong pointed out the it would be incorrect to conclude the converse--that Love is God.

Only if you view them as mutually exclusive. Matter and energy are inter-related and interchangeable. Yet analytically, each has an entitivity apart from the other. God is present throughout the universe, but the universe is not God, and an aspect of God exists beyond the material universe. Panentheism considers God and the world to be inter-related with the world being in God and God being in the world--and beyond. "God is all" would be descriptive of pantheism but not panentheism.
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Thank you Mountain Valley Wolf. I need something juicy to read while I watch the rain fall. Wally

 

Yes, I was just joking about prosyletizing.. Wakan Tanka can also include Unchi Makha (grandmother earth), Taku Shkan Shkan (the animating force of the universe) and an assortment of other beings. I find it interesting but very sad that some Nations have lost so much of the language and ceremonies that they do ceremonies and prayers in Lakota. I even attended a sweat lodge in Hawaii performed by Hawaiians that used all the Lakota songs and phrases. Perhaps in that case they were just performing a Lakota ceremony. But I am aware that there are tribes that do Lakota ceremony and prayer songs because they have lost their own.

The influence of missionaries is very sad. I can say that the use of Tunkashila in reference to an aspect of Wakan Tanka is unlikely to be from Christian influence because there is linguistic, mythical and other evidence that the Lakota and other Sioux tribes used to paint large rocks red and treat these Tunka as Wakan Tanka, and even the stones in the sweat lodge are referred to as tunakshila (or grandfathers) (or plural as tunkashilapi). It is said that of all the people, two-legged, four-legged, flying, swimming, standing, etc, rocks and stones are the oldest, and know everything that has happened, so they are referred to as tunkashila. There are elders who say that in the story of the White Buffalo Calf Woman (Pte Shka), when she came to teach the Lakota, the part about one of the boys lusting after her, and he was killed, was never part of the real story, but was instead added by the missionaries.

This reminds me of another nondualistic aspect of spirituality----that in a spirituality you are never outside of the realm of god or spirit in terms of a secular and nonsecular. You may be out of alignment with it, but you are never separated from it. I think religions such as the Abrahamic religions give lip service to this, but don't always understand it that way. In college I used to ask Christians and people of other faiths, if God was everywhere, was God in the brain of Hitler? How about the gas chambers? How about the gas of the gas chambers?

 

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Not at all. My contention is that in the context of all war, religion has not been a primary cause of most. In the Crusades, it did play a primary role, as it did in the Seven Years War, the Second War of Kappel, the French Wars of Religion, the Seven Years War, the Muslim conquests, etc. But even in those involved a more complex set of independent variables. And the important thing, in terms of the thread topic, is that most wars whether or not motivated by religion, were not primarily fought over religious issues or differences.

Certainly not. While we can't get into the head of Urban II, one would hope that protecting the "Holy Land" had something to do with it. Cynical historians think he was also motivated by a desire to strengthen the papacy in Italy, and to boost his position as head of the Church. In particular, he saw an opportunity to reunite the western and eastern churches which had been divided since 1054 and to bolster his position vis-a--vis the Frankish Holy Roman Emperor. Would you consider those to be primarily religious motives?

Here again, I wouldn't characterize that conflict as primarily religious, although it is fought between groups which are of different religions. I'd trace the roots to the aftermath of World War II, when the western powers (and Russia!) decided it would be good to give the Zionists a homeland in Palestine, which was already occupied by Arabic-speaking Muslims. Jews have the unique status of having an ethnic identity coextensive with a religion. The Palestinians didn't take it lying down, and there ensued decades of off-and-on warfare and violence in which millions were displaced, thereby nursing grievance. Hamas is a relative newcomer to the conflict--founded in 1987. As its official name, the Islamic Resistance Movement, suggests, it combines religious appeals with Palestinian nationalism, in jihad against the Zionists and resistance to the peace process. It receives funding and direction from Iran. The recent atrocities that triggered the latest round of conflict may have been prompted by a desire of Iran to undermine the growing rapprochement between Israel and Muslim Arab states. So religion is in there, since it serves as the source of legitimacy for the Iranian regime and Hamas. I wouldn't say it's the main factor. One could legitimately say that it was a necessary, though not sufficient, cause, in that if Iran and Hamas were Hindu or Buddhist it might not have happened. But when two entities try to occupy the same space at the same time, conflict is likely to ensue, no matter what the group affiliations might be. Religion is a potent force for rallying and directing troops, and politicians and generals have learned to use it skillfully.

Dogma is always a potential source of conflict. I'd include political ideologies under that label: Marxism-Leninism, National Socialism, etc. i regard them as secular religions, but don't feel like reopening that round of discussion.

No. The Bible should be taken seriously but not literally. I take an historical-metaphorical approach to it, especially the OT, which was developed over many centuries by many human authors with different agendas, some questionable. The God described in the Torah began His career as a tribal war god--like Marduk, Indra, Zeus and the rest, and mellowed over the centuries. During the Axial Age, His passion for social justice came out, and I find the eloquent writings of Amos and other prophets compelling. I'm speaking metaphorically, of course, since the Figure described reflected changing cultural perceptions. As a Christian, I view the whole thing with a hermeneutic of love embodied in the teachings attributed to Jesus.

I don't presume to know what the real God is like, but the One I worship is the summation of human idealism. For Christians who have been taught to read only the Bible without historical grounding, it can become a jumble of mixed messages easily misused to justify violence and atrocities. Unfortunately, Christians have often pushed Love aside for one of the other attributes, as the central message of Jesus is obscured by the emphases on those "other attributes".

Christianity is unique in yoking together the sacred book of the Jews with subsequent writings called the New Testament. Any religion which is book-oriented invites disputes over the interpretation of words.
Schisms in Buddhism (Chapter 3) - Sacred Schisms
Violence and Buddhism Are Opposites - or Are They?
At first, Christians had no writings of their own, and used only the OT. They were, in fact, Jewish Christians who worshiped in the synagogues along with other Jews. But as conflicts with the orthodox Jews increased and they developed their own scriptures (the "New Testament" canon) they had to figure out how much of the OT to accept. Early on, they jettisoned the dietary laws and the requirement of circumcision, thereby facilitating recruitment of Gentiles. Within a century, Christianity was a predominantly Gentile religion. New doctrines developed concerning where the Old Testament fit in. They came to believe in a New Covenant instituted by Jesus at the Last Supper, in which Jesus' sacrifice set humanity on a new course. Some (Evangelicals) even developed the idea that God operated through different "dispensations" during different periods of history, explaining what otherwise might seem to be divine personality changes. But most think at least some parts of the OT (e.g., the Ten Commandments) are still binding on Christians. Anyhow, most Christians do believe that God sometimes uses "tough love" for our benefit, and that there will be bad consequences (justice) for folks who defy the rules .

Analytically distinct.

 

The problem with this is that this dualism presents us with a black and white universe. The trickster is evil, and so is Eve. It is only man chasing after the ego-ideal of his superego that is good (see sometimes I use Freud too). As one author wrote (and I paraphrase because I can't remember who and the exact quote): "Under the male god, everything shone in the light of the sun, and shadows were distinct and black and white stood out as clear as day. Under the goddess it was like the light of the moon and there where shades of gray and white in between the black and white." (I believe this was a Jungian psychologist in a book about the Great Mother, (Though it is not, The Great Mother, by I believe a different Jungian psychologist. I will have to look in my library, the title may have referenced good and evil. So, he didn't refer to the superego as I did here.)

But good and bad is not a black and white issue. And thank god our justice system is not based on Old Testament law. In one of my old posts here on HF you can find an article I wrote about multiplicity and Taoism. From our perspective, we may see the yin and yang as a very dualistic concept, and label Taoism as dualistic religion. I argue that it wasn't. So you didn't have this ever pressing need to be good in order to gain the graces of God, instead Taoism came to us from this Eastern Siberian indigenous spirituality, and the goal was to find a balance with the universe. And I think this is really what is important in life, not to try to achieve an impossible ego-ideal, but rather to find a balance. (But be forewarned to anyone who goes looking for my old posts and leaves this Christian corner of HipForums---I am an old hippie, and my wife is too (though she won't admit it), and we believe in free love----as my grandson discovered one time, as I left my computer open and he started reading...)

I agree with this. But in my opinion, religion passes judgement because it is far more logosummonist than spirituality. A very important thing in religion is how you live your life and this determines your graces or how you spend time in this world and in eternity, or for example, whether you break the karmic chain. The focus in spirituality is your connection to spirit. There is not much in the way of judgement. Sure, there are ethics and morals as you have pointed out, But that is an issue for the community, not for the spirituality. You can turn to spirit or god to seek help to fix things, or right the wrongs you have done, or whatever, and of course, when you make a promise to spirit in spirituality, it is a serious matter, but the consequences of not keeping your side of the bargain are what you face (and then there is ceremony to fix that even LOL)

I have to go, I will finish the last two points later.

 

No, no formal announcement or proclamation is necessary. But in the context of the thread, I don't think that the passages in Revelation concerning Armageddon necessarily envisioned a war among rival religions. I explained the history of the passages. Some people may understand them that way, but they're wrong.

Yes, I think it probably would. There definitely are religious elements involved in the conflict. If the lawyers and dockworkers were Jewish and the current landowners were Hindu, the conflict would probably take on religious overtones. Or if the lawyers and dockworkers were black, probably same difference.

Of course. Religion as a potent or impotent force for anything disappears if the basis for religious identity is removed. But for it to be a source of conflict, something else is usually required--e.g., a doctrine that other religions must be eliminated.

Dogma is defined as "a principle or set of principles laid down by an authority as incontrovertibly true". In communist countries, Marxism-Leninism, or "scientific socialism' is laid down by the communist party as incontrovertibly true. In Nazi Germany, the paramount importance of race national destiny were taken as incontrovertibly true. Human revision of totalitarian ideology is extremely difficult, and would come about only from within the party. Many scholars consider God unnecessary for religion.

Next you seem to think the Old Testament was developed over many centuries by many human authors with different agendas, some questionable; and the new Testament wasn't.
God somehow changed over time and while he was mean and nasty at times in the OT, he changed in the NT.
So you disregard the OT, on which Christianity is based, and live solely by the NT, which has no real meaning without the OT.
I can overlook that somewhat as I believe you have stated that you don't think Jesus was divine anyway, just another philosopher.

You worship god?
And you accept that god can become vengeful, angry, jealous etc. "for our own good" and if we defy his rules, which you seem to suggest change over time, there will be bad consequences (justice)?
I have no interest in such a god.

Finally I have no idea what "Analytically distinct" means in relation to god being separate from the rest of the universe. Please explain.[/QUOTE]