In my old age, I tend to rely more on sarcasm, snarkiness, and snide remarks. If only God was so old...
"Sirs, if you buy this weapon, I guarantee it'll harden the dick of the most confident general!" "I'd like to see that!" "? Just get on with the demonstration. We'll decide who's dick gets hard."
Or, Satan, if that's easier to understand.
“Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful. “ -- Lucius Annaeus Seneca
Love that guy! That's one of my favorite quotes. I just started "Meditations". I found a pdf online.
With all due respect, when you have something taken from you that you can never EVER get back thanks to might makes right, greedy powerlust, you may think differently. I used to think like you, but I have had horrible things done to me simply because people want to and nothing stopped them. If there is no judgement, no justice, and they aren't sorry (they aren't), then the only problem in this equation is me, the one acted against. Without justice, thus it goes for every single person wronged in history. I sympathize with the victims nowadays, and have every expectation of vengeance, and it's not like people couldn't repent if they actually cared to. You can't truly forgive somebody who isn't sorry, it only enables them to do it again, so it isn't forgiveness.
I agree. I've always taken a firm stance against punishment rituals. Some cultures literally and legally torture their citizens as punishment. And even that doesn't work as a deterrent.
The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots & tyrants. " -- Thomas Jefferson in 1787
Since the pandemic started, Stoicism seems to becoming quite popular. There's a ton of videos on Youtube, now. I sure got into it after covid put me in bed for 8 months, including a week in the hospital for a collapsed lung. Got a free ride in a helicopter, though! I did see the bill. The VA shelled out $79,000!
"It is not the critic who counts. ... The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly ... who, at worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly; so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who know neither victory or defeat." -Theodore Roosevelt
OOH! Good one! Saving that.
Yep, pretty much. The consolation prize is I lost 140 pounds in 2020! I'm not that jolly fat guy in the picture anymore!
So your idea of a perfect God is a God that is completely indifferent?
My guess is that they likely believe in the nihilistic monist-monadic-nondual view of God, which is not really "God" at all (at least in any meaningful sense other than being a stand in of "that transcendent ultimate reality"). Their type of ontology and eschatology is generally cyclical and is ultimately lax about both meaning and consequence within manifest existence ('Creation' to us Abrahamics, but for instances what the Dharmics would call 'Samsara').
"Just as when you are half awake and can see a dream, and know you are dreaming, and yet are apart from it, that is how God feels this universe. On one side he is awake, and on another side he is dreaming this universe. And that is how you should look upon this world. Then you will know why he created it, and will not ascribe these dream conditions to your soul. If you pass through a nightmare, you know that is no more than a bad dream. If you can live in the world in that consciousness, you will not suffer.
