Jesus- his philosophy- and Human enlightenment.

[Darius11 12]

I have been thinking about Jesus’ philosophy a lot lately. No matter who you believe he was I believe most agree his ideas were noble.
I also have this dream that someday (not in my lifetime) we will know each other as earthlings and nothing else. The idea of turning the other cheek goes against every part of me, but I have to say I think it is the only way to help us evolve.

That means even in the times of oppression, fear, hardships, and even at the murder of the ones you love and even your self you must remain peaceful. I think it is only when people realize their own faults is when a person can change. It would take generations of sacrifice but I believe he had it right it is the only way we will ever evolve and become truly brothers and sisters.

Will we ever live in a world where we hold no hate, or aggression towards one another? Most violence and acts of desperation our result of poverty, but Jesus had that covered too. Help the poor, don’t judge.

It is really our pride, sense of entitlement, and greed that stops most of our spiritual progression. I don’t hold my self immune to any of these, but I can’t help to think what if we all were immune to these needs.
What if we could stop being selfish?

What do you think?

I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." - Kurt Cobain

[nerdgirl 0]

Quote

It is really our pride, sense of entitlement, and greed that stops most of our spiritual progression. I don’t hold my self immune to any of these, but I can’t help to think what if we all were immune to these needs.
What if we could stop being selfish?

What do you think?

I think you're asking some genuinely interesting questions.

The folks who I (owned as my own opinion) most closely come to living a life modelled on the teachings of Jesus Christ are the Catholic Workers. They live in the world (rather than separate) and truly serve the poor. They acknowledge their struggles because sometimes serving the poor (& destitute & mentally problematic & homeless & abused & substanced abusing/abused) can be damned tough. It takes more patience than I have.

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[Ion01 1]

How does turning the other cheek help one to evolve? This concept is completely against evolution. Evolution is survival of the fittest. How can the most fit move forward if they turn the other cheek and are ultimately stiffled in their attempts to be productive and carry on their genes? This even works within the corporate world which is a very cut throat place. If one continually turns the other cheek they may end up poor and un-able to have the same number of kids as the rich cut throat executive thierfore the rich "less evolved" persons genes carry on. This is ultimately why morality cannot be a result of evolution because it is counter to the way evolution works.

[freefal 0]

The notion of "survival of the fittest" applies well to animals, but as humans we are much more intelligent than that. We understand that every human being has worth and therefore should be respected for simply being human. This helps our species “evolve” at a different level that that of the other animals on this planet.

"Ignorance is bliss" and "Patience is a virtue"... So if you're stupid and don't mind waiting around for a while, I guess you can have a pretty good life!

[diverborg 0]

Quote

How does turning the other cheek help one to evolve? This concept is completely against evolution. Evolution is survival of the fittest. How can the most fit move forward if they turn the other cheek and are ultimately stiffled in their attempts to be productive and carry on their genes? This even works within the corporate world which is a very cut throat place. If one continually turns the other cheek they may end up poor and un-able to have the same number of kids as the rich cut throat executive thierfore the rich "less evolved" persons genes carry on. This is ultimately why morality cannot be a result of evolution because it is counter to the way evolution works.

I may be wrong here, but I don't think Darius necessarily meant a Darwinian approach to the word evolution in his post. The term evolve has been around longer than Darwin and has more than one implication.

BTW Darius, good post!

[happythoughts 0]

Quote

The notion of "survival of the fittest" applies well to animals, but as humans we are much more intelligent than that. We understand that every human being has worth and therefore should be respected for simply being human. This helps our species “evolve” at a different level that that of the other animals on this planet.

Ghenghis

Quote

Genghis Khan, the fearsome Mongolian warrior of the 13th century, may have done more than rule the largest empire in the world; according to a recently published genetic study, he may have helped populate it too.

An international group of geneticists studying Y-chromosome data have found that nearly 8 percent of the men living in the region of the former Mongol empire carry y-chromosomes that are nearly identical. That translates to 0.5 percent of the male population in the world, or roughly 16 million descendants living today.

Quote

Khan's empire at the time of his death extended across Asia, from the Pacific Ocean to the Caspian Sea. His military conquests were frequently characterized by the wholesale slaughter of the vanquished. His descendants extended the empire and maintained power in the region for several hundred years, in civilizations in which harems and concubines were the norm. And the males were markedly prolific.

While we may be more intelligent than the animals, that just means better tools. At this moment, the less armed are exterminated at will.

[Darius11 12]

I do mean evolve in a spiritual sense as in become enlightened.
In natures rule a lot of us would be killed. Look at Stephen hawking. If we were only motivated like animals then it would be common that someone like him would be killed.

We have learned that for the better of our society we must go against some of our instincts. Monogamy and a stable family is not a natural state, yet it is our norm because it helps the species as a whole. We produce better offspring’s, and we still get to live and have good life when we are old and no longer dominant.

The best part of being human is we get to decide.
The worst part of being human is we get to decide.

I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." - Kurt Cobain

[Darius11 12]

Quote

BTW Darius, good post! Revenge is probably the most difficult human emotion we have to try to overcome. But a huge part of the worlds problems could be solved if we could forgive for past wrongs and move on. To err is human, to forgive is divine.

Thank you.


When you feel wronged it is so hard to just sit there and think of the good your doing for generations ahead of you by being an example of peace.

I can not do it my self, but I think I am beginning to see I should try more often.

I'd rather be hated for who I am, than loved for who I am not." - Kurt Cobain

[downwardspiral 0]

I feel exactly as you do and it is shocking to find sooo many people who are resistant to such evolution. Even if it is the path to true happiness. However I have come to the conclusion that I do not have to teach others to follow this path. I simply follow the path my self and others will follow whether they intend to or not as we are all interconnected.

So lead from the front my friend.

www.FourWheelerHB.com

[BikerBabe 0]

By the way, forgiveness (the kind that Jesus advocated) does NOT mean forgetting. It doesn't even necessarily mean repairing or mending the relationship that was hurt by the wrong done to you.

So many people choose not to forgive because they think it means they have to play nice and forget the original transgression. It's not that at ALL.

Forgiveness is NOT minimizing the seriousness of the transgression. Forgiveness doesn't mean you instantly trust the person who hurt you.

Forgiveness isn't for the person who hurt you. Forgiveness is for YOU.

Vengeance is for God to take care of.

Basically, ALL of Jesus's teachings can be summed up in one passage, one bit of the bible that so many people who claim to be "christian" seem to forget so often. It's in most of the Gospels, in some form, and it's called the Great Commandment:

"Jesus replied, 'You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: Love your neighbor as yourself.'" (Matthew 22:37-39)

It's the golden rule, do unto others as you'd have them do unto you. Think how it would be if we truly lived by this commandment.

Never meddle in the affairs of dragons, for you are crunchy and taste good with ketchup!

[gravitysurfer 0]

Quote

I think you're asking some genuinely interesting questions.

The folks who I (owned as my own opinion) most closely come to living a life modelled on the teachings of Jesus Christ are the Catholic Workers. They live in the world (rather than separate) and truly serve the poor. They acknowledge their struggles because sometimes serving the poor (& destitute & mentally problematic & homeless & abused & substanced abusing/abused) can be damned tough. It takes more patience than I have.

VR/Marg

Good example.

One major difference in their theology though, as I understand it, is the need for absolution from a human being (read: Priest). Christ taught that only 'One' could judge and forgive of spiritual sins. In fact he quite often spoke against the Pharisees and the religious 'elite'.

aloha.

[Ion01 1]

Quote

I do mean evolve in a spiritual sense as in become enlightened.
In natures rule a lot of us would be killed. Look at Stephen hawking. If we were only motivated like animals then it would be common that someone like him would be killed.

We have learned that for the better of our society we must go against some of our instincts. Monogamy and a stable family is not a natural state, yet it is our norm because it helps the species as a whole. We produce better offspring’s, and we still get to live and have good life when we are old and no longer dominant.

The best part of being human is we get to decide.
The worst part of being human is we get to decide.

Yet some people want the ability to abort children is there are found to have some desease or something like Hawking did. To miss out on such an influential mind because someone didn't want to raise someone with a desease or problem of some sort is such a horrible thing!

[SpeedRacer 1]

as for the "turn the other cheek" idea:

Look at what happens when people DON'T follow Christ's idea.

You get never-ending cycles of senseless war.
Unfortunately for the world, people love vengeance so much that they will even sacrifice their children to it. Vengeance is their god, in place of the REAL God.

Maybe Jesus really did know what he was talking about.

Speed Racer
--------------------------------------------------

[LOSTandCRAZY 0]

Plus, Jesus got to hang out with PROSTITUTES.....


How cool was THAT? After 40 days in the hills, I'd walk on water for one of those, myself.

"Get these balls!"

[nerdgirl 0]

Quote

How does turning the other cheek help one to evolve? This concept is completely against evolution. Evolution is survival of the fittest. How can the most fit move forward if they turn the other cheek and are ultimately stiffled in their attempts to be productive and carry on their genes? This even works within the corporate world which is a very cut throat place. If one continually turns the other cheek they may end up poor and un-able to have the same number of kids as the rich cut throat executive thierfore the rich "less evolved" persons genes carry on. This is ultimately why morality cannot be a result of evolution because it is counter to the way evolution works.

Perhaps if you re-consider your hypothesis a little you may see where/how compassion/altruism/cooperation is completely consonant with evolution and benefit the long term survival of the human species (think about reproduction and enabling your progeny to survive and reproduce in the future just to start, along with cooperative building).

And that's not just speculation on my part.

The disparate fields of sociobiology, philosophy, evolutionary psychology, & economic game theory deal directly with this.

Just a few examples off the top of my head (when I first put responded to another thread :

Moral (or usually expressed as the positivist “cooperative behavior”) has been shown to be an evolutionary trait that benefits human survival, e.g., “the Grandmother (& Grandfather) Hypothesis.”

Reciprocal Altruism, which traces its citation lineage to Darwin.

Myriad examples of altruistic behavior have been observed in creatures from primates to birds to ants, all with benefits.

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[nerdgirl 0]

Quote

Quote

The folks who I (owned as my own opinion) most closely come to living a life modelled on the teachings of Jesus Christ are the Catholic Workers. They live in the world (rather than separate) and truly serve the poor. They acknowledge their struggles because sometimes serving the poor (& destitute & mentally problematic & homeless & abused & substanced abusing/abused) can be damned tough. It takes more patience than I have.

Good example.

One major difference in their theology though, as I understand it, is the need for absolution from a human being (read: Priest). Christ taught that only 'One' could judge and forgive of spiritual sins. In fact he quite often spoke against the Pharisees and the religious 'elite'.

You very well may correct w/r/t that specific aspect. I honestly don't know.

VR/Marg

Act as if everything you do matters, while laughing at yourself for thinking anything you do matters.
Tibetan Buddhist saying

[SpeedRacer 1]

Quote

Quote

I think you're asking some genuinely interesting questions.

The folks who I (owned as my own opinion) most closely come to living a life modelled on the teachings of Jesus Christ are the Catholic Workers. They live in the world (rather than separate) and truly serve the poor. They acknowledge their struggles because sometimes serving the poor (& destitute & mentally problematic & homeless & abused & substanced abusing/abused) can be damned tough. It takes more patience than I have.

VR/Marg

Good example.

One major difference in their theology though, as I understand it, is the need for absolution from a human being (read: Priest). Christ taught that only 'One' could judge and forgive of spiritual sins. .

Well, in the Catholic church it is God who does the forgiving, not the priest. Protestants do not confess their sins in front of a priest, they're supposed to do it in prayer though. Catholics do the sacrament of confession in front of a priest because it forces you to come to grips with your problem if you have to outwardly vocalize it. It's really just two different ways of doing the same thing, since in both cases it is God who does the forgiving.

Speed Racer
--------------------------------------------------

[gjhdiver 0]

You don't need Jesus (for whom funnily enough, no reliable contemporary accounts other than the bible exist, a little fishy eh ?).

All you need is the Wiccan rede;

"Be it harm none, do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law".

Follow that, and you can lead a life free of superstition and fear, and nobody has to get nailed to anything. As far as religion goes, any time people start collecting around a superstition in large numbers, bad things happen to good people.

[billvon 2,400]

>"Be it harm none, do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law".

"Ascribe not to any soul that which thou wouldst not have ascribed to thee, and say not that which thou doest not . . .Blessed is he who preferreth his brother before himself."

"Hurt not others in ways that you yourself would find hurtful."

"Therefore all things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them: for this is the law and the prophets."

"Do not do to others what you do not want them to do to you."

"Do for one who may do for you, that you may cause him thus to do."

"None of you [truly] believes until he wishes for his brother what he wishes for himself."

"What is hateful to you, do not to your fellow man. This is the law: all the rest is commentary."

"The basis of Sufism is consideration of the hearts and feelings of others. If you haven't the will to gladden someone's heart, then at least beware lest you hurt someone's heart, for on our path, no sin exists but this."

Whatever means someone uses to choose that path is a good one. It is the choice of the path, not the choice of the religion, philosophy or creed that offers that path as an option, that determines the worth of a person's morality.

[maadmax 0]

Good Post! Along with giving us the Truth and showing us the way to live, He has removed the obstacles of our past failures, allowing for a personal relationship with God.

[jclalor 12]

Why do we need any God or the bible to show us the proper way to treat one another? Thier has been more people slaughtered and more repression handed out in the name of god (Gods) than any other cause.
The day we all fully evolve from believing that someone in the sky is watching our every move, the better off we will be.
While Jesus indeed had some good things to say he also endorsed a god that was racist, cruel,
homophobic, sexist, unjust, etc. etc. etc.

[jclalor 12]

While some Catholics do very commendable work, Mother Teresa was a complete fraud.
From Christopher Hitchens:

I think it was Macaulay who said that the Roman Catholic Church deserved great credit for, and owed its longevity to, its ability to handle and contain fanaticism. This rather oblique compliment belongs to a more serious age. What is so striking about the "beatification" of the woman who styled herself "Mother" Teresa is the abject surrender, on the part of the church, to the forces of showbiz, superstition, and populism.


It's the sheer tawdriness that strikes the eye first of all. It used to be that a person could not even be nominated for "beatification," the first step to "sainthood," until five years after his or her death. This was to guard against local or popular enthusiasm in the promotion of dubious characters. The pope nominated MT a year after her death in 1997. It also used to be that an apparatus of inquiry was set in train, including the scrutiny of an advocatus diaboli or "devil's advocate," to test any extraordinary claims. The pope has abolished this office and has created more instant saints than all his predecessors combined as far back as the 16th century.


As for the "miracle" that had to be attested, what can one say? Surely any respectable Catholic cringes with shame at the obviousness of the fakery. A Bengali woman named Monica Besra claims that a beam of light emerged from a picture of MT, which she happened to have in her home, and relieved her of a cancerous tumor. Her physician, Dr. Ranjan Mustafi, says that she didn't have a cancerous tumor in the first place and that the tubercular cyst she did have was cured by a course of prescription medicine. Was he interviewed by the Vatican's investigators? No. (As it happens, I myself was interviewed by them but only in the most perfunctory way. The procedure still does demand a show of consultation with doubters, and a show of consultation was what, in this case, it got.)

According to an uncontradicted report in the Italian paper L'Eco di Bergamo, the Vatican's secretary of state sent a letter to senior cardinals in June, asking on behalf of the pope whether they favored making MT a saint right away. The pope's clear intention has been to speed the process up in order to perform the ceremony in his own lifetime. The response was in the negative, according to Father Brian Kolodiejchuk, the Canadian priest who has acted as postulator or advocate for the "canonization." But the damage, to such integrity as the process possesses, has already been done.

During the deliberations over the Second Vatican Council, under the stewardship of Pope John XXIII, MT was to the fore in opposing all suggestions of reform. What was needed, she maintained, was more work and more faith, not doctrinal revision. Her position was ultra-reactionary and fundamentalist even in orthodox Catholic terms. Believers are indeed enjoined to abhor and eschew abortion, but they are not required to affirm that abortion is "the greatest destroyer of peace," as MT fantastically asserted to a dumbfounded audience when receiving the Nobel Peace Prize*. Believers are likewise enjoined to abhor and eschew divorce, but they are not required to insist that a ban on divorce and remarriage be a part of the state constitution, as MT demanded in a referendum in Ireland (which her side narrowly lost) in 1996. Later in that same year, she told Ladies Home Journal that she was pleased by the divorce of her friend Princess Diana, because the marriage had so obviously been an unhappy one …

This returns us to the medieval corruption of the church, which sold indulgences to the rich while preaching hellfire and continence to the poor. MT was not a friend of the poor. She was a friend of poverty. She said that suffering was a gift from God. She spent her life opposing the only known cure for poverty, which is the empowerment of women and the emancipation of them from a livestock version of compulsory reproduction. And she was a friend to the worst of the rich, taking misappropriated money from the atrocious Duvalier family in Haiti (whose rule she praised in return) and from Charles Keating of the Lincoln Savings and Loan. Where did that money, and all the other donations, go? The primitive hospice in Calcutta was as run down when she died as it always had been—she preferred California clinics when she got sick herself—and her order always refused to publish any audit. But we have her own claim that she opened 500 convents in more than a hundred countries, all bearing the name of her own order. Excuse me, but this is modesty and humility?

The rich world has a poor conscience, and many people liked to alleviate their own unease by sending money to a woman who seemed like an activist for "the poorest of the poor." People do not like to admit that they have been gulled or conned, so a vested interest in the myth was permitted to arise, and a lazy media never bothered to ask any follow-up questions. Many volunteers who went to Calcutta came back abruptly disillusioned by the stern ideology and poverty-loving practice of the "Missionaries of Charity," but they had no audience for their story. George Orwell's admonition in his essay on Gandhi—that saints should always be presumed guilty until proved innocent—was drowned in a Niagara of soft-hearted, soft-headed, and uninquiring propaganda.

One of the curses of India, as of other poor countries, is the quack medicine man, who fleeces the sufferer by promises of miraculous healing. Sunday was a great day for these parasites, who saw their crummy methods endorsed by his holiness and given a more or less free ride in the international press. Forgotten were the elementary rules of logic, that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and that what can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. More than that, we witnessed the elevation and consecration of extreme dogmatism, blinkered faith, and the cult of a mediocre human personality. Many more people are poor and sick because of the life of MT: Even more will be poor and sick if her example is followed. She was a fanatic, a fundamentalist, and a fraud, and a church that officially protects those who violate the innocent has given us another clear sign of where it truly stands on moral and ethical questions.

Correction, Oct. 21, 2003: This piece originally claimed that in her Nobel Peace Prize lecture, Mother Teresa called abortion and contraception the greatest threats to world peace. In that speech Mother Teresa did call abortion "the greatest destroyer of peace." But she did not much discuss contraception, except to praise "natural" family planning.

[philh 0]

Turning the other cheeck can work in some circumstances. Witness Gahndis work in India and MLK in the USA.
However I doubt it would have worked against the Nazis or the Hutu power movement in Rwanda.
I think the lesson here is beware of dogma.

Even if most violence isa reuslt of poverty thhat doesnt mean we can agree the best way of elimating poverty. If poverty is a relative measure then its not unlikley to believe we never will . Furthermore not all violence is inpsired by poverty. Witness the 9/11 hijackers, most of them were from well to do back grounds.

[pirana 0]

Quote

The best part of being human is we get to decide.
The worst part of being human is we get to decide.

And therein lies the biggest challenge. We are all free to decide as individuals; and getting everybody to agree on any one thing; much less to always turn the other cheek, or never seek revenge, or only take what you need, or always be kind to strangers, or never covet they neighbor's wife, . . . well, good luck with that.

It is hard to imagine what could possibly take place that would convince people to never be greedy, vengeful, etc. They are survival remnants. Yes, we have reigned them in to some degree enabling a far more stable society than at any time in the past. But why do people automatically think that an evolving culture will or should necessarily be more peaceful?

The results say the opposite is true. As we have devised ever more powerful means of destruction, we have always been more than willing to put them to use. And I believe we just finished the bloodiest millenia in history.

Nope, I'm not sure what cultural evolution exactly means, or what it means for the future; but I hardly think it means more peace.

I see the turn-the-other-cheeek crowd as forgiving themselves right out of existence. They are too easy as prey.

" . . . the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging them and kicking them into obedience." -- Aldous Huxley

[SpeedRacer 1]

Quote

Turning the other cheeck can work in some circumstances. Witness Gahndis work in India and MLK in the USA.
However I doubt it would have worked against the Nazis or the Hutu power movement in Rwanda.
I think the lesson here is beware of dogma.

Even if most violence isa reuslt of poverty thhat doesnt mean we can agree the best way of elimating poverty. If poverty is a relative measure then its not unlikley to believe we never will . Furthermore not all violence is inpsired by poverty. Witness the 9/11 hijackers, most of them were from well to do back grounds.

yep.

“Most wars are started by well-fed people with time on their hands to dream up half-baked ideologies or grandiose ambitions, and to nurse real or imagined grievances.”

-Thomas Sowell

Speed Racer
--------------------------------------------------