What are the Gods of man?

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Jerrygg38
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What are the Gods of man?

Post by Jerrygg38 »

Man has many Gods. What are they? Are they valid? Firstly it is clear that the Gods of man are the product of man. Each religion preaches that their particular God is legitimate.Unfortunately they often preach that the other Gods of man are false. This tends to promote hatred and violence. Yet it is clear that all the Gods of man are either all false or all true. The atheist would say that they are all false. I am of the opinion that they are all true.
How can that be? The God of the universe set up a situation in which the judgment of man is by man. This means that man makes his own Gods.
The religions of man tend to be unethical. Somehow a monster God is sentencing some to eternal rewards and others to eternal punishment. As I see it the God of the Universe is quite ethical and therefore puts the judgment of man in the hands of man.
A Christian can achieve the Kingdom of Heaven by accepting Jesus. All the kingdoms exist at the center of our Earth in the higher light speed dimension. Thus the faithful Christian will achieve the Kingdom after purification. The same is true of all the many religions in the world. A person enters a particular kingdom. Then he is absorbed but he will reincarnate over and over again. Thus Heaven is only a temporary stopping point.
Everyone gets the same thing. Some are sentenced to the outer darkness and disintegrate. We are completely separated from the ultimate creator of the Universe. Yet as we study the various holy books there is a clue to what is happening.
Erribert
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Erribert »

Today we have the God called Randomness. It is one of those gods we take for granted, yet cannot fathom. We also have Natural Selection as our choice maker. Many believe in the god of Gravity and Electromagnetism. Both creationists in their own right. Many of these gods also had Greek counterparts. Chronos was our god of Time. Gaia was the goddess of earth. Zeus was electromagnetism. And let’s not forget Chaos who still retains the same name today. We still worship the sun, Ra, and believe in Atun. Cosmology has the creation myth of the Big Bang, caused by the God Singularity. Science is still full of the old gods. The only difference is that they appear impersonal. Still, jump off a ledge, and Gravity becomes very personal.

The book American Gods is a fun read. Old gods v new gods.. I suppose money is also a god to many. Wall Street is a church.

Cheers
Jerrygg38
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Jerrygg38 »

As I see it, the Earth itself is a God. The Sun has a spiritual dimension and to believe that the sun is a God appears true to me. This is because we live in a dual physical/spiritual universe.
The things you mention all have spiritual components. I do not see any spiritual component to money or the wall street church but agree they are false Gods.
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IThink IThinkTooMuch
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by IThink IThinkTooMuch »

There are as many Gods as there are people that believe in God
Spectrum
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Spectrum »

Here is how the idea of God first emerged;
  • Note the original idealization of a God;
    1. The emergence of the idea of a God emerged millions of years ago from a terrible existential crisis [psychology].
    2. In their experience of the terrific forces of nature, humans infer some being greater than themselves.
    3. Then this greater being was anthropomorhized as some sort of deity i.e. God.
    4. The natural one-up [mine better than yours] instinct kicked in and inevitably the idea of God will end up with the ontological God where no one can claim whose is greater than the other.
    5. This inevitable ontological God is the only way out if one resort to the idea of God to deal with the fundamental psychological issue.
The idea of God [illusory] is merely a falsehood and a necessary lie to deal with a fundamental existential psychological issue.

The initial impulse towards a belief in a God was fundamentally a psychological impulse of an existential crisis driven by a zombie parasite.

The solution to a psychological problem therefore should be psychological [as the Buddhists and other Eastern religion has done] rather than merely logical thinking or faith of the Abrahamic theists.

The psychologically necessary gods of man has facilitated the emergence of many 'man-of-God' to abuse the psychological vulnerable theists.
Not-a-theist. Religion is a critical necessity for humanity now, but not the FUTURE.
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Sy Borg
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Sy Borg »

Jerrygg38 wrote: May 28th, 2018, 1:06 pmAs I see it, the Earth itself is a God. The Sun has a spiritual dimension and to believe that the sun is a God appears true to me.
I relate to this. I see the Earth/Moon system as fulfilling all important criteria to be considered our deity, while the Sun can be seen as the deity of the Earth and other planets, and the Sun itself is subject to the supermassive black hole Sagittarius A* in the centre of the Milky Way. Meanwhile the Milky Way is subject to the Laniakea galactic supercluster, and goodness knows what structures superclusters form in the cosmic web.

Each of these entities, including the planet Earth, is massive, complex and powerful beyond the human capacity to comprehend. They created us and sustain us. Ticking a lot of boxes there. Meanwhile we we are the god of our microbes, as is any multicellular organism.

Obviously we are being a little quirky with our sue of the word "god" - or sensible. There's relative omnipresence and omnipotence, plus creation and sustenance, but without the anthropomorphism. "Relative" was emphasised because it's reflective of the fractal nature of reality - the various layers of Russian doll "gods" within "gods".
Dark Matter
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Dark Matter »

God is the object of our ultimate concern.
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Thinking critical
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Thinking critical »

All gods are the gods of man. They are all contingent on cognitive activity, nothing more than a mental construct, an extension of ones ego, the result of an ideology fuelled by religion and ignorance. They are destined to start wars with the intention to unite us all, they have the ability to give life meaning but are themselves meaningless.
Man creates god, then mans belief in god destroys man......
This cocky little cognitive contortionist will straighten you right out
popeye1945
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by popeye1945 »

Mythology, the other man's religion. It is time humanity finally grew up, our having a future depends upon it.
Ecurb
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Ecurb »

popeye1945 wrote: November 19th, 2020, 3:29 am Mythology, the other man's religion. It is time humanity finally grew up, our having a future depends upon it.
By "grow up" I assume you mean recognizing mythology as one of humankind's greatest achievements. I wonder why some people think calling a story a "myth" denigrates tyhe story.
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by popeye1945 »

The history of mythology, it is true was in part to give some sort of orientation and sometimes a soothing fantasy in place of actual knowledge. Sometimes it could be right on the money, when it had to do directly with human experience and behaviours, mainly due to our common biology both geographically and through time. A common biology infers a common psychology, so necessarily it would workout in much the same way both the truths innate to its storyline and the fabrications in place of knowledge.

Many myths are of significant value, and inform our common biology, psychology and behaviours even today. However when considering the most fanciful of these mythologies/religions, it is apparent that the knowledge of the world from which they speak is simply dangerous and silly to entertain today. People have been killing each other over their imaginary friends for eons. Today we have nuclear weapons and terrorism which has it root cause in such mythologies/religions speaking to people today from the seventh century, this is a global mortal threat.
Ecurb
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Ecurb »

Few myths are "soothing fantasies"? What is so soothing about hell fire and damnation? How about being on the side of the Gods even though you know they will lose to the Giants at Ragnorok?

The notion that myth is some sort of primitive and inaccurate science is incorrect, I think. They're more like a primitive history.

I've just been reading C.S. Lewis's "An Experiment in Criticism" (it's not one of his Christian books). IN his chapter on Myth, he claims that myths represent the essence of narrative. That is, a myth can be paraphrsed, in a short, simple version, and will still have emotional resonance to a reader of taste. He offers this version of Orpheus:
There was a man who sang and played the harp so well that even the beasts and trees crowded to hear him. When his wife died, he went down alive to the land of the dead and made music before the King of the Dead till even he had comnpassion and gave him back his wife, on the condition that he led her up out of that land without once looking back to see her until they came to the light. But when they were nearly out, one moment too soon, the man looked back, and she vanished from him forever.
Lewis then quotes Aristotle's synopsis of the Odyssey, which, he claims, could serve as gthe outline for a good story, but would not have emotional resonance in and of itself.

I'm not sure Lewis's definition of myth is a good one, but since myths may have been the first stories, it makes sense that they were (and are) the essential ones.

p.s. Is the Orpheus story "soothing"?
popeye1945
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by popeye1945 »

Ecurb, Hi, I am a Joseph Campbell fan too, mythology is profoundly interesting, and I believe we need a new mythology that will act to reflect what is known today. Mythology is the other man's religion, and they have been killing each other over their imaginary friends for eons. Mythology if it is good will reflect the problems of being human and the trials of being in the world. As long as human nature doesn't change, and it hasn't, mythology, some mythologies, will be life-supporting. I truly believe however that our present mythologies such as those desert religions so valued in the west, are detrimental to the well-being of the world.
Ecurb
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by Ecurb »

popeye1945 wrote: February 7th, 2021, 9:46 am Ecurb, Hi, I am a Joseph Campbell fan too, mythology is profoundly interesting, and I believe we need a new mythology that will act to reflect what is known today. Mythology is the other man's religion, and they have been killing each other over their imaginary friends for eons. Mythology if it is good will reflect the problems of being human and the trials of being in the world. As long as human nature doesn't change, and it hasn't, mythology, some mythologies, will be life-supporting. I truly believe however that our present mythologies such as those desert religions so valued in the west, are detrimental to the well-being of the world.
You're not alone in your desire for a new mythology, popeye. Joseph Smith, L. Ron Hubbard and others agreed. I don't, though. New mythologies smack of charlatanism; myths develop organically over the centuries, and the old ones are the best ones.

American Protestantism (and Fundamentalism) places an unnatural and almost idolatrous emphasis on the Bible. "Sola Scriptura", "the Bible alone" is a common creed here. The notion that the Bible is the essence of Christianity is ridiculous, though. Most of the New Testament (the Gospels, the Pauline Letters, Acts) was written 50-70 A.D. Were the apostles and martyrs whose deeds are recorded in Acts non-Christian because the Bible hadn't been written yet? The Orthodox Bible was finalized at the Council of Carthage, in 390 (around there, anyway). If the Orthodox Church had the authority to determine what got into the Bible and what stayed out, how can Christians assume the orthodoxy of the Bible while denying the authority of the Church?

In addition, for most of Christian history the majority of Christians were illiterate. They learned the stories in Church, or through art works. They practiced the rituals. Jesus specifically commanded his followers to partake in communion (which most Protestants have abandoned). Indeed, the Bible was translated only into Greek and Latin until the 1500s, so the hoi palloi couldn't understand it even if it was read to them.

Finally, the Bible is a complicated book. It contains poetry, traditional mythic histories, biography, and fables. To label the entire thing "mythic" is, I think, careless and incorrect.

Nonetheless, for the well-being of the world, perhaps we should abandon such essential Christian principles as: "Love your neighbor as yourself", "Do unto others as you would have others do unto you", and "Forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us." They don't square with the Capitalist ethic.
popeye1945
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Re: What are the Gods of man?

Post by popeye1945 »

Ecurb, I think the bible should be studied as literature, actually, to understand the culture it is necessary to understand it. I agree it has wonderful literary treasures within. It however, can no longer even pretend to be a guide for a modern humanity. I take it you are religious, so we are probably at odds with each other from the start, as I am an atheist. I believe Joseph Campbell was an atheist, but, he certainly knew the value of myth and ritual. Humanity is foundering right now, really without a functional myth. I have my doubts if humanity will survive much longer at anyrate, so creating a modern myth to carry us into the future may be futile. All we can do is hope for best.
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