Posted by Sambersil on November 02, 2000 at 20:26:22:
In Reply to: Drawing collaborative conclusions? posted by Elizabeth on October 31, 2000 at 14:25:09:
: You responded to me... now I will respond to you.
: You run through a number of arguments here with haste which suggests you are eager to protect something? Is this threatening to your personal beliefs? (Just an educated guess ofcourse.)
No. My personal beliefs relating to God: Consciousness is a system of cause and effect, and God is the consciousness that is the system of cause of effect that is the entire universe. My previous arguments in no way support my personal belief.
: I agree that voting/politics are counter-productive to discovering the truth about God or anything. But by using the word "voting", Bill has selected a loaded term. (Perhaps he has a reason for this?)
Perhaps he does, but since I know nothing about this seminar outside his post, I have to take his word for it that they really vote.
: Does any one person possess the COMPLETE truth? The people in the Jesus seminar are scholars who may (or may not) be genuinely interested in pooling their resources to get at a greater truth than they could reach individually. This might be better termed as drawing collaborative conclusions? When you are looking for answers, other people-- with their different histories and points of view-- are some of the greatest resources for information.
: These people are not handing down an edict or trying to impose their beliefs on you... if your personal beliefs are really that firm, you have no reason to feel threatened by outside ideas. So why not listen and consider?
I respect other people's beliefs. I respect ALL beliefs. Are you suggesting here that I was not listening and considering? I was criticizing not their beliefs, but their method of arriving at them. With the God is not a metaphor thing I wrote - that was quibbling over the definition of "metaphor" rather than the definition of "God". A more correct statement that they could have said, that reflects what I feel they were trying to say, is that God is not a physical person. And before you accuse me of supporting my own beliefs here, I DO believe that God is a physical being, namely, the entire universe. I have no problem with their believing that he is not, however.