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Replying to theophile in post #51]
All I'm saying is that I don't think tehom is meant to be a god or a goddess here. She simply represents primordial waters / the abyss.
I understand that but am pushing further re what the primordial waters / the abyss represent.
Presently you appear to have been saying that it represents - not an aspect of the source creator, but some "other" entity otherwise unrelated. The "Woman" for the "Man".
If we are to go by "images of" and extend that pattern back to the source, then the "Father/Man" and the "Mother/Woman" need to be seen as something created in the image of the Source Creator and are therefore projected aspects of that one being, rather than unrelated entities.
This entails removing the "super" from the natural and being able to explain/account for the same thing (the existence of the universe).
Sure, but that wouldn't be biblical theology, or what Genesis 1 says.
Really? I would say then that it is all about perspective as I clearly see that Genesis isn't saying "God is supernatural."
Granted, I do understand how folk can "see" it that way in the reading of it, but the point is, it doesn't HAVE to be "seen" that way at all.
That said, although not explicit in Genesis 1 or anywhere else in the bible, I would venture that the spirit of God emerged from the deep as well. So if I had to pick a single substance, it would be matter (in motion), which eventually gave rise to spirit, including the spirit of God.
That pov has some validation in the script mentioned in a post I read on this or another thread.
"that ye may know and believe me, and understand that I [am] he: before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me."
It hints that the god speaking is saying "he" was "formed".
Indeed, it suggests that there well could have been an unformed Source Creator before the formed god was formed.
To understand this, it's helpful to think in terms of ideas, which I would further venture are of the same substance as spirit. So what I'm saying here is no different really than matter giving rise to ideas, which we know it can and has via evolution and whatnot. (To be clear, I don't think spirits are ideas per se -- I think ideas are a more general concept. But thinking in terms of ideas is helpful since they are more familiar to us, and as such help us grasp the properties of spirits...)
Sure.
However, the philosophy I follow has it that matter and mind are the same, and in a timeless state between formation of matter into "a universe" of functional forms in which The Mindful Matter can experience being said objects, the mindful matter is eternal and thus timeless.
The "ideas" you mention, come from that Source Creator through the "breath" which is associated with "The Word" and thus the ideas become real as the matter is organized into objective functional forms which the subjective mind can then experience as real "things".
It is a case of "thinking" those things into existence so that they can then be experienced, but it is the mind having the experience which has, is and always will be the actual real thing because the created things are temporal and because they alone could not even be said to be real if there is no mindfulness to acknowledge their realness.
It is the union of the two (as One) that is God, and that humankind is made to follow.
That is an interesting statement. Often the Christian claim is "free will" et al - rather than "being made to follow" but aside from that observation, the claim that in the human instruments of "female and male" there can be observed "God" - while interesting, may be somewhat or even completely off track...."missing the mark" as it were.
How so? We are made in the image of God according to Genesis 1 - male and female we were made. As such, is it not plausible to say that God has male and female components if the image of God is male and female?
How so is because of the identity stamped into the human mind that humans are flesh rather than mind. (spirit).
Mind is what we are, not the organized matter we currently inhabit. In that sense, we are not just the Source Creators "offspring" but quintessentially, we ARE the Source Mind having an experience as human beings.
That is why - when the god of the genesis story refers to Adam and Eve as if they were flesh rather than spirit, we either have an idiot god who doesn't understand that he is talking to minds (spirit) and is under the illusion that he is talking to dust/clay or the god is identifying them as they have identified themselves/each other. Flesh devices who will one day "return to the dust" that they are.
What the minds that they actually are, experience after the death of the "clay vessels" they were temporally housed within, is "another story" - not unrelated, to their human experience, but different.
Overall, the above is something of a commentary on "The Breath of God." accounting for the "mind" aspect of the overall human experience.
Thus, there is no "idiot god" but there is a someone angry/disappointed one who has to bear the overall responsibility for "his" part in the failure of humans to recognize their true selves - re the "breath".
That is the short version of the overall story. Human personalities are being grown for specific purposes.
I'm saying here... Marriage is the unifying mechanism, and what makes the spirit of God one with the deep. It is a critically important metaphysical concept I think... and is why I keep insisting it is two separate things coming together.
From the perspective I outlined, the "two" is an illusion as there really is only "one". Perhaps the illusion itself is something the mother and father gods are also affected by (or had been at that time) but at the Source, there is and can only ever be The One.
The female/male also comes through in the evidence of Nature, not always separate in form either. The coming together has more to do with the results of multiplying (children) and in the children, the parents are represented as "One" and so on and so forth.
Marriage as an institution has more to do with best means of survival within social structures designed in the manner and under the laws that they are.
Humanity is reaching/grasping for a way to make it work - but the manner in which this is done has more to do with lack of recognition that we are all "one" rather that understanding our shared quintessence derives from The One entity, not "The Two unrelated entities".
So while I share your predilection for simplicity, it doesn't really carry much weight when it comes to biblical theology and the concepts at play there.
I don't think the bible (holistically read) is saying anything other than what I am offering as my particular interpretation but do agree that there are parts which appear to lean toward having humans think of themselves as flesh devices and nothing more.
The individual human personality does have the right to think of their self any way they choose.
Now, is this imposing a false image? An unnecessary or uncalled for duality in the Source Creator? Maybe. But I honestly think it's just biblical theology. It's how ancient Israel saw God...
Indeed. And so what is modern humanity to do with such ancient ways of "seeing things"? Redefine the theology to better suit the facts?
God is God. I don't think there are any modern facts that have changed that.
There are as many versions of "God" as there are human personalities and if modern facts cannot be integrated into those versions, then of what use are facts in relation to the subject of "God"?
What we have on offer here is what ancient Israel decided to call God. Now, whether we call that same thing God as well is our choice, and we can certainly decide to see things differently.
As should be clear enough, the ancient garden story alone can be interpreted differently depending upon HOW the individual personality self identifies.
Thinking of oneself as "mind/spirit" having a human experience allows one to form deeper connection with the Source-Mind, by-passing those ideas of "God" which insist that we identify as the human instrument and that there is a "supernatural" cause which prompted the natural universe to come into existence. That idea is simply an unnecessary addition re Occam's Razor, because it clearly can all be explained naturally enough.
(I would further further venture that God is a title we bestow. It's more of an honorific for the One who fills us with awe, and who we can put our trust in and follow. Ideally we would all share belief in this One...)
This aligns with being able to interpret the first law - "Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment." as it means one is free to love the God one has decided on - as it were - aligned also with "I Am That I Am" ( I leave it to you to decide who I am) and therein, I am not obligated to love the God the preacher or any other tells me of. I love the God who loves the me and is capable of showing me that. If that is a "different" God to that of what the preacher or any other tells me, this in itself has no bearing on the love being experienced mutually in the relationship I have with "my" God.
I'm just conveying God as presented in Genesis 1 and the bible more broadly. I'm not trying to redefine anything. That said, I do think the God presented there goes against the grain of popular theology and Christian belief. Very much so. For instance, God is not the creator of all that is. It is quite clear in Genesis 1 that God did not create tehom or her waters, so anyone who says otherwise is the one trying to redefine things and add to the text what isn't there.
Re that, re what I have offered, the God you are focused on, is not the Source Creator, but a creation of the Source Creator.
That in itself is not here nor there unless that God is not being an accurate and honest ambassador to the Source Creator and/or those who are focused on that Created God, are not being accurate an honest ambassadors to that God.
I skip those potential drawbacks by identifying with and focusing upon the Source God but acknowledge that there is biblical writ which suggests that the Biblical God has at least made genuine effort to accurately personify the Source God re the ambassador aspect.
