Here are my thoughts on Outer Darkness, which might seem heretical to the orthodox Mormons, who believe it to be a place rather than also a state of mind. The Inner Light of the soul that God created is incorruptible, even when a human being is cast into Outer Darkness by his apostasy through acts of rebellion (sins).
Outer Darkness consists of the behavioral and mental negativity such as hate-love, happiness-indifference, sadness-indifference, anger-kindness, jealousy-equanimity, lying-sincerity, miserly-generosity, lust-chastity, and other dualities.
God is the author of good-and-evil, which is not a duality but complementary opposites, for indifference is the true evil. Thus all things are neutral in essence until MAN judges some of them good and their true opposites evil.
This is why acting amorally is evil and acting morally is good.
However, neither acting good or evil but indifferently is a greater sin than picking either good or evil. Choosing devil over God is only a sin when you worship the devil and forget Jesus is lord of us all, but acting devilishly in ignorance is forgiven when you repent of it.
In the final analysis though, Outer Darkness is like wearing black: when you shed the darkness through prayers of earnest repentance, your Inner Light shines.
Showing posts with label dualism. Show all posts
Showing posts with label dualism. Show all posts
20140414
I Believe in a God Unlike the Christian, Jewish and Muslim God
I believe in a God devoid of anthropomorphic qualities that is called the Absolute.
If we have souls, then after death no soul is turned away from return to the Godhead.
For the universe has infinite capacity for these souls because they pass on to another dimension where no soul is limited physically.
Though no soul can have sex because souls can not get pregnant. There is also no need to eat because you are never hungry for physical sustenance.
However, you have to listen to a sermon until God calls to you, "Time to be reborn, pilgrim!"
This dimension is known as a Pure Land but is separate from the many other Buddha worlds called Pure Land of Bliss and their respective Buddhas.
On death, everything will be explained to you: the fallacy of good and evil is merely a tool to separate the monotheistic people who practice dualism from the believers in the Absolute who strive for the non-duality called Shunyata.
Indeed, the Christian Heaven is the closest monotheistic equivalent of the Absolute. For all Buddhists, the Absolute is the closest to God that the faithful attain.
Though Amida Buddha would urge the bodhisattvas reborn in the Pure Land in his sermon to return to the earthly plane to help other lost souls find their way to his Pure Land.
Note too that all souls are finite aspects of the Godhead which itself is almost infinite.
YMMV
Originally posted: October 26, 2012 1256H PDT
If we have souls, then after death no soul is turned away from return to the Godhead.
For the universe has infinite capacity for these souls because they pass on to another dimension where no soul is limited physically.
Though no soul can have sex because souls can not get pregnant. There is also no need to eat because you are never hungry for physical sustenance.
However, you have to listen to a sermon until God calls to you, "Time to be reborn, pilgrim!"
This dimension is known as a Pure Land but is separate from the many other Buddha worlds called Pure Land of Bliss and their respective Buddhas.
On death, everything will be explained to you: the fallacy of good and evil is merely a tool to separate the monotheistic people who practice dualism from the believers in the Absolute who strive for the non-duality called Shunyata.
Indeed, the Christian Heaven is the closest monotheistic equivalent of the Absolute. For all Buddhists, the Absolute is the closest to God that the faithful attain.
Though Amida Buddha would urge the bodhisattvas reborn in the Pure Land in his sermon to return to the earthly plane to help other lost souls find their way to his Pure Land.
Note too that all souls are finite aspects of the Godhead which itself is almost infinite.
YMMV
Originally posted: October 26, 2012 1256H PDT
20130521
Pantheism and Pandeism...
"Pantheismus und Pandeismus, Monismus und Dualismus: alles dies sind in Wirklichkeit nur verschiedene Formen des Gottschauens, verschiedene Beleuchtungsarten des Grundbegriffes, nämlich des Höchsten, von dem aus die verschiedenen Strahlungen in die Menschenseele sich hineinsenken und hier ein Spiegelbild projizieren, dessen Wahrnehmung die charakteriologische Eigenart des Einzelindividuums, die durch zeitliches, familiäres und soziologisches Milieu bedingte Auffassungsgabe vermittelt."
English translation:
"Pantheism and Pandeism, monism and dualism: all these are really just different forms of looking at God, different types of illumination of the basic concept, namely, the Most High, cut from which are the various radiations in the human soul, and in this is projected a mirror image, the perception of the characteristics of the single individual, mediated by temporal, familial and sociological apprehension."
— Paul Friedrich Köhler (1916). Kulturwege und Erkenntnisse: Eine kritische Umschau in den Problemen des religiösen und geistigen Lebens. p. 193.
English translation:
"Pantheism and Pandeism, monism and dualism: all these are really just different forms of looking at God, different types of illumination of the basic concept, namely, the Most High, cut from which are the various radiations in the human soul, and in this is projected a mirror image, the perception of the characteristics of the single individual, mediated by temporal, familial and sociological apprehension."
— Paul Friedrich Köhler (1916). Kulturwege und Erkenntnisse: Eine kritische Umschau in den Problemen des religiösen und geistigen Lebens. p. 193.
20130513
The Short Meditation on the Metaphysics of Non-Duality
Dualism affects the Western mind so much it rejects the truth that good and evil depend on what man creates.
The epitome of dualism is "Either you are for us or against us" which is a logical fallacy since picking sides has dire consequences.
The non-dual approach says, "Who cares is One is not equal to Zero?" They merely represent the Absolute (1) and the void (0) but are in themselves both a duality and a continuum.
Non-dualism does not reject duality, but renders good and evil a subset of the Absolute.
Thus the ultimate truth is that what man creates may be either good or evil. For duality is an exception of limited value.
For example, objectivity is at the core the brief focus on what subjectivity is not. The mind still is subject to the whims of the body i.e. the emotional content of subjectivity.
Thus objectivity is an artifact of logical thought as opposed to subjectivity's ties to the heart-mind and its emotional content.
What ties objectivity and subjectivity together is the mind's ability to view such abtract concepts in terms of wholes.
Thus objectivity is associated with our observation of the world, while subjectivity is associated with introspection on the inner world of the mind.
Ergo nobody has a clearly objective mind, as objectivity is part of the consensual reality shared by everyone.
Indeed, the objective mind has no body since it exists outside the body and its subjective mind.
Yet this apparent duality fades when one looks for the objective mind. Indeed, the objective mind is related to the concept of single-minded focus (samadhi) of Buddhist philosophy.
Thus non-duality encompasses both duality and itself, just as basic goodness includes both what man creates and whether it is good or evil.
The epitome of dualism is "Either you are for us or against us" which is a logical fallacy since picking sides has dire consequences.
The non-dual approach says, "Who cares is One is not equal to Zero?" They merely represent the Absolute (1) and the void (0) but are in themselves both a duality and a continuum.
Non-dualism does not reject duality, but renders good and evil a subset of the Absolute.
Thus the ultimate truth is that what man creates may be either good or evil. For duality is an exception of limited value.
For example, objectivity is at the core the brief focus on what subjectivity is not. The mind still is subject to the whims of the body i.e. the emotional content of subjectivity.
Thus objectivity is an artifact of logical thought as opposed to subjectivity's ties to the heart-mind and its emotional content.
What ties objectivity and subjectivity together is the mind's ability to view such abtract concepts in terms of wholes.
Thus objectivity is associated with our observation of the world, while subjectivity is associated with introspection on the inner world of the mind.
Ergo nobody has a clearly objective mind, as objectivity is part of the consensual reality shared by everyone.
Indeed, the objective mind has no body since it exists outside the body and its subjective mind.
Yet this apparent duality fades when one looks for the objective mind. Indeed, the objective mind is related to the concept of single-minded focus (samadhi) of Buddhist philosophy.
Thus non-duality encompasses both duality and itself, just as basic goodness includes both what man creates and whether it is good or evil.
20100616
Emptiness and Nondual reality
To consider emptiness to be a thing of substantial existence, or as the essence of Buddha Nature, one would have to be a madman who understands nothing at all.
For the mind which continues thinking surely understands nothing, not even that it is empty.
So too is emptiness empty of substance and essence.
Yet this does not imply that ultimate reality is nothingness, but confirms that it, like reality, is empty of substance.
Since everything is empty of substance, being impermanent in nature, what is the difference between self and other, apart from perpetuating the delusion called duality?
The wise come to know that nondual reality encompasses and consists of both duality and nonduality, much like the yin-yang symbol.
How so? Because emptiness, being neither substance nor essence, is inherent in all things.
For the mind which continues thinking surely understands nothing, not even that it is empty.
So too is emptiness empty of substance and essence.
Yet this does not imply that ultimate reality is nothingness, but confirms that it, like reality, is empty of substance.
Since everything is empty of substance, being impermanent in nature, what is the difference between self and other, apart from perpetuating the delusion called duality?
The wise come to know that nondual reality encompasses and consists of both duality and nonduality, much like the yin-yang symbol.
How so? Because emptiness, being neither substance nor essence, is inherent in all things.
20081207
Love is not the cause of despair; rather, it is the duality of love and hate
"...In Italy, a country very far away from us, people are still driven to despair by love." - Stendahl, in The Charterhouse of Parma
At this point in the novel, Stendahl is explaining the suicide of one of the main characters to his French audience.
However, he is also trying to justify his character's suicide by "blaming" love.
It is not love that drives the suicidal, nor does love motivate their path of self-destruction. Rather, it is the duality of love and hate which influences their life choices.
For the challenge is for people to resolve this duality sufficiently to live long, peaceful lives.
At this point in the novel, Stendahl is explaining the suicide of one of the main characters to his French audience.
However, he is also trying to justify his character's suicide by "blaming" love.
It is not love that drives the suicidal, nor does love motivate their path of self-destruction. Rather, it is the duality of love and hate which influences their life choices.
For the challenge is for people to resolve this duality sufficiently to live long, peaceful lives.
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