sirguessalot

Etched ostrich eggs illustrate human sophistication

the art history lover in me is sure excited to see this one. egads.

yeah, e..."as we call it"

language seems like a wilderness

and yep..."soul"...big wide word

glad to know i see something you see

welcome to babylon, i guess

i agree, dooj...not at odds

...and i salute the partial modifiers ..."most religions" and such.

its just that the opposites of your points are equally as true as the points

(except for your last line about your frustration, perhaps)

and both sound science and sound religion seem to know this.

yet both of them (and therefore all) suffer from reducing "the trouble" and "the problem" down to the wrong thing

...because our "solutions" may solve something for someone in some way...but only perpetuates more problems.

such non-science can cause as much (if not more) harm to authentic religion as the non-religion does.

same non-science versus non-religion...welcome to the jungles of babylon, i guess

just pointing at a whole forest being slashed down in the name of invasive plants

what if a large part of what you gents call "religion" actually agrees with you completely?

and they only seem to disagree because they are decorating and celebrating the experience?

is it possible?

reminds me of a story...

a missionary goes to india to preach the word of God

and meets an old man walking down the road

the old man agrees to listen to his message

so the preacher starts, "in the beginning, God..."

but the old man suddenly walks away

so the preacher moves on with his mission

years later, the old man finds the preacher again

and asks "ok, what's next?"

What good will it do someone that regains touch with that ideal?

not sure how DWW answers all that, nandon, but if i may try...

in general, i think that the capacity for "zero" (silence and stillness) is what makes the difference between a good healer and a violent crusader, for example.

because the practices based on "zero" are vital to becoming self-aware enough to keep from letting one's own desires and unconscious desires and habits run the show. "Zero" is the "solid ground" of self-examination on behalf of all.

as if the world would be a better place if most all religious people, for example, were to rediscover the roots of their own religions...and sit down and shut up a lot more. atheists, too, might stop persecuting monks along with the messianic crusaders.

not that there is anything wrong with activity and language...but without some steady diet of "zeroness" that leads to an examined life...we are mostly sleepwalking...unaware of the mechanisms of our our own egos...and most all the activity and language us simply causing more harm and confusion ...especially if we are trying to fix and save everyone else (aka "log in the eye" metaphor...or twi's example of bible interpretation and resulting lifestyle).

most of us already naturally do "zero" to various degrees...so that is good news...but the original monastics were specialists and masters of it...passionate devotees..."saving the world" by taking responsibility for becoming aware of their own inner workings....becoming less harmful to their neighbor.

this was not as much about theology or concepts or translations...as it was about actual living practices and lifestyles ...involving our bodies, community, sleeping, eating, etc...

better listeners...slow to wrath...slow to fear...more able to make peace between enemies...more able to care for people who are suffering and dying, grieving, widows, orphans, etc...

i dunno, this seems like perhaps the most practical application of "zeroness" there is.

clarity...equanamity...tranquility...insight...wisdom...no drugs required

and considering that the violent crusades and such are essentially quests for the very same things one finds in contemplation

...a simple cost/waste comparison paints a clear picture as to the most effective, most conservative path to doing so

seems to me...if what this "saint paul" and the original christians experienced

was anything like the rest of the world's ancient contemplative and monastic histories...

it was more like an ancient form of what we call "hospice" today

as well as "rites of passage" to help us through all the "little deaths" of life

and the bible is part of a much larger legacy of "books of dying" in this regard

which is basically a re-initiation and continuation of the jewish "arts of dying"

which is perhaps closest to the original "higher reason"

for all religious experiences, practices and lifestyles in the first place

as well as an easy and direct common ground for authentic inter-religious realizations of history

but the depths and degrees of the absence of this overall dimension

in later attempts to resurrect the original knowledge and wisdom from the texts

seems both evident and quite related to the depths and degrees of suffering a religion perpetuates in the world

if so

perhaps vpws doctrine and lifestyle was about as much like saint paul

as it was like a tibetan monk's

as far as i know...the picture already has to be hosted on the web to do what you are looking for

if there is one on the web...

in windows explorer (which is what i am most familar with)...right click the picture and copy and paste the "location" ...which is an html addy...as the "image URL"

...instead of inserting a picture file

there may be other ways...but that is what i know

seems to me vpw may have appropriated it from some christian he read

or from something he included in the advanced class junk table

as an artist...the charts and diagrams of principles and dynamics and such

were certainly a big part of what drew me to pfal

…probably most all of us have some of that in common

world history seems full of them...christianity and ancient jewish history, too

pre- and post-twi...but especially post, ive been able to handle and compare any of them

and i can no longer help but assume

that the overwhelming majority of the "word of God" is/was also pictoral

and the modern Bible cannon includes no pictures

...yet refers to them and same things the pictures refer to throughout the texts

this suggests to me that they were created to be understood in light of each other

as with the rest of pfal texts

the charts of pfal seem as “ungrounded” from the start

for the same reasons the textual interpretations are “ungrounded”

as if one cannot avoid/ignore the overwhelming majority of over 2 millenia of christian and jewish art and history

…as well as the overwhelming majority of the rest of world art and history

…and actually resurrect some ultimate historic Way of life and Bible interpretation

that is so far superior to all of the stuff we avoid/ignore combined

that we are justified knocking on doors in nations all over the world and asking people to copy it.

yet this "trumping by dumping" pattern seems quite common

…and not just with the Bible.

cman

i agree

there is one

and there is many

it also seems that none match

not even the closest copies

whether interpretations of a section of scripture

or interpretations of experience (which includes all scriptures)

why post an argument against the validity of an interpretation

on the basis that "it does or doesnt say this or that"

without having first asking "how?"

let alone trying it?

seems more like a "historical/grammatical/logic hermeneutic"

but only within the bounds of (not in addition to)

"the God (and gods) of the Scriptures of the Hebrews and Christians"

and perhaps its reasonable to add that as with most all christian methods of interpretation

there are also vast bodies of even christian and hebrew thought and experience

that are also not within the bounds of the hermeneutic

...whether for not having heard of them yet...or intentionally...or otherwise

such as the differences between how protestants and catholics interpret

or how evangelical and pentecostals interpret

perhaps its also fair to assume that quite outside of the bounds of any declared hermeneutic

are the overwhelmingly majority of ways we interpret the scripture

our interpretations are influenced by and reference aspects of our experience

our bodies, our minds, our memories, our relationships, our dreams, our visions, even our suffering

would we not do well to include them in our hermeneutic?

...

which is perhaps why better than simply objecting to an interpretation because it dont match

is asking "how?"

maybe we "manifest word of wisdom" simply by asking well?

after all, asking "how" leads things like

"how aware of your own method are you?"

"how aware of my ways are you?"

"how aware of my ways am i?"

"how aware of our ways are we?"

seems as if in our quest for meaning and significance

along with all our other questions (like the 5 Ws)

we all already always also a living "how?"

inner storytellers keep going and going

interpreting the same realities

babbling brooks of living words

choirs of choirs of angels

i can assume...

...that we can agree that there are different methods of interpretation

and that we use different methods of interpretation

...that if our methods of interpretation dont match

then our interpretations wont match

...that objecting to an interpretation simply for not matching

is a recipe for perpetuating unnecessary and unresolvable arguments

...comparing world scripture as a way of deepening one's own faith

does not lead to invalidation of scripture...but confirmation

Bob...and all...

clearly we are all holding the hot edges of a topic where many very old unresolved arguments overlap

...common ground is rare...

i feel lucky if we’ve found even another inch of it...thanks

perhaps like scripture says...

both "always already" new and old

as to be called things like "everpresent" and "eternal"

seems you are starting to tease out some of the details in the "the upper atmospheres" of this sort of stuff, Roy

reminds me of how contemplatives in the east and west explored the diverse range of states of experience...finding ever finer distinctions between the things we call "soul" and "spirit"...or between "psychic" and "subtle" and "causal"

one of the states is where we "witness the witness"

which is like saying that we "see the clear nature on the "face" of our own experience, but are also grounded in the unmanifest mystery that we do not see...which is likely ever to be the vast majority of God."

as if to "know God" is to make peace/unite with the unknowable truth...aka "darkness" and "mystery"

also reminds me of dww's vision of a pane of glass

could not find a single word about zero in "Number in Scripture"

but in the entry for 12, he did write that 12 "completes the circle of the heavens"

that is about as close as he seemed to get

i can suggest starting with a mutual consent based-process for any adult discussion

...including doctrinal..

rather ordinary...and any good marriage or friendship is based on it

illustrated by asking: "any objections to ___________?"

if not...we proceed

if so...we negotiate til we find consent again.

"may i_______?" also works once all parties know how "no" is as important as "yes"

clumsy and countercultural at first...but eventually our original voice and vocabulary jumps right in.

...

so...i'll play canary here and ask:

...do you or does anyone here mind if we attempt to proceed via consent?

if we were in person, i would just wait a moment and give everyone a chance to consider.

here, i may have to wait a week until i felt everyone has had a chance to read and type their objections.

so i hope no one minds that we just pretend a week has passed. you can still say no.

...

and i certainly have no objections to your hermeneutic, Bob...because mine does include them...and not casually.

i mentioned a developmental hermeneutic elsewhere...which i feel is valid and valuable.

but i also ascribe to more of an ecumenical approach.

...

if i may ask...do you have any objections to comparing the world's ancient scriptures as a way to understand the bible?

...or pentecost?

perhaps even using that same historical/grammatical/logic for all of them?

thanks Bob

not much into hashing over spilt milk either.

and i appreciate your attempt to help me understand the explanation, but i also feel i at least owe it to you to say that you did not.

i am already familiar with the interpretations you offered...and the methods...and feel they are valid and vital parts of interpretation...but i can no longer limit my self to them.

thus, my point about not having common methodology being more-or-less of a roadblock to effective mutual scriptural reasoning and such.

almost as if the topic of conversation must first switch to 'interpretive methods' until some common ground is found...prior to comparing interpretations of content.

otherwise we seem to be putting the proverbial 'cart before the horse'...and in a way that perpetuates more of the same religious misunderstanding and conflict most of us seem to have come to accept as a norm.

i am interested in finding a better way than that.

thanks

ha

ok, for fun...

here is an attempt at an example of the post-modern effect on the word "trinity" in marketing:

...just change the graphics from "zero" to "trinity" on the candy bar

or an example of the post-modern effect on triune symbol in marketing:

...just add a triune symbol to the graphics

the curse of me...i tend to ace the tests and drop out of school..as in twi

feels more like bilbo though...a fool passing through the company of wizards and kings and dwarves and elves

ive probably learned the most simply from having friends who are older than me

sign of the times, i guess

i noticed on the page i linked to regarding "Meaning of Numbers In the Bible and Dreams"

that some explanations are quite fleshed out, while others have but a single line.

i wonder if the most developed explanations of a number may be related to the author's preferences

also...i just realized that my bullinger bible which is here with me has a chapter on numbers

...there is no entry for zero

ha...what a pure perfect example of post-modern co-opting of any symbol in history

like how we name a chemical cleaner "fantastik"

or put "glowing auras" around the whopper on the BK commercial

gotta love the age of "toilet art"

...

dww

i could not find anything online about bullinger and zero

but in my search i found this and this

but i will look in his book when i get home tonight and report back

hi robert...thanks for entertaining the questions

and sorry...edited my response to try something else...

...

seems we prefer different methods of interpreting the interpretations of interpretations

and are starting off lacking a common enough ground to go anywhere

correct me if im wrong, but i sense from other posts you are not into doing this

so if there are no objections...i will refrain from attempting to answer your last response to my post

...

except to say to everyone in general, that Peter's whole explanation seems quite strange, no?

i dunno, someone tell me...

and some of what peter said seems even stranger than the rest

specifically "blood, fire, vapor, darkened sun, bloody moons" and such

...

how do the words interpret themselves?

how is "translation" and "interpretation" different?

or "interpretation" and "explanation?"

me too

:)

what if everything in that dream is simply you, ham?

and what if we are also all this space?

as if our original face

is our final destination

and everpresent condition

this "i amness" of jesus...of moses...of buddha...of abraham...