Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.2 9/18/84; site ucla-cs.ARPA Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!bonnie!akgua!whuxlm!harpo!decvax!ittvax!dcdwest!sdcsvax!sdcrdcf!trwrb!trwrba!cepu!ucla-cs!ellen From: ellen@ucla-cs.UUCP Newsgroups: net.religion Subject: Re: The Purpose of God in creating man ...... Message-ID: <5967@ucla-cs.ARPA> Date: Tue, 11-Jun-85 16:27:29 EDT Article-I.D.: ucla-cs.5967 Posted: Tue Jun 11 16:27:29 1985 Date-Received: Fri, 14-Jun-85 06:05:55 EDT References: <330@mhuxr.UUCP> Reply-To: ellen@ucla-cs.UUCP (Ellen Perlman) Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department Lines: 111 Summary: This quote from Baha'i suggests to me that this particular god (and most that i have heard of) claim to have created humanity so that humanity can know/worship/appreciate god. strikes me as rather egotistical. "I created all this junk (stars, planets, plants, animals), but none of them act like they appreciate all the hard work and all-mighty power i put into it, so now i'll make something that will say "Thank you."" Then this god (Judeo-Christian-Moslem-Baha'i) keeps sending down messangers saying "The big fella up-stairs thinks that you don't appreciate him enough." this god may decide to punish the unappreciative humans by sending disasters (floods, plagues, wars, famines, droughts, etc.) or by sending teachers appointed to show the wayward humans just in what manner this god wants to be appreciated. Of course, rotten humanity never seems to catch on. oh, what naughty children! this nice god (parent) gave us life, and we just aren't nice enough to it (look at all i've done for you, and this is the thanks i get!), so it punishes us (cosmic spankings) or tries to teach us (be a nice human, and say "Thank you"). Baha'i seems to have put it a bit more directly than some of the other of its cousins, but this applies to them all. sure, there are useful lessons to learn from the various holy books which humanity (mostly men) has written, but i think that this is only one possible answer for why we're here. it's a rather anthropocentric view of the universe - and patterned after human family life. it's all backwards - why should you honor your parents? because god said so! and god will do in a big way what mom or dad does in a small way, if you aren't good enough. what a guilt trip! oh, i'm so unworthy! i'm such a bad human, but if i listen to god/parents then maybe i'll be better. oh, i'm feel so bad, i made god/parents unhappy. what can i do to make it/them feel better? then some humans write down the rules according to whoever, who claims to have gotten them straight from the big fella's mouth (divine inspiration). it's just another form of self-deprication, and also a nifty excuse to wipe out other clusters of humanity, because they aren't playing by the set of rules that the wipers-out use, and of course we all know where they got their rules..... i'm not into self-flaggelation. sure, i do things on occasion that i regret. and yes, some of my actions may have repercussions throughout a larger community than just myself. i am responsible for my own actions (shaped as they are by my own unique personality and by culture and the fact that i am human). but don't forget that the manner in which we humans chose to cast that spark of divinity is shaped by human perceptions. all being-ness in the universe is interconnected (we see light and get cosmic fall-out, as it were, from stars millions of lightyears away, so there must be some kind of link). that seems to me to be the primary precept to work from. divinity isn't something "out there" and separate from us (or from the animals or the plants or the rocks, for that matter), we just perceive it a particular way. a voice doesn't come resounding out of a void - that's anthropocentric, again. whatever this divinity is (yes, i know, i'm not defining it), resides even in the tiniest sub-atomic particle. no, i don't worship science; it's another human-created perceptual tool, and i don't deny its usefulness. probably humans cast god or whatever in a human-like form because that's what we relate to the best. even that hoary old Judeo- Christian-Moslem-Baha'i god, no matter how any of its followers argue, is shaped by our human perceptions and expectations. the truly divine is not going to "bless" humans more than its other creations. this happens only with an anthropocentric system. god making humans to worship god, since the other cosmic flotsam and jetsom doesn't is human ego-centricity. a rock sings its song and dances its dance far longer than a human. it is as alive as a human, with its whirling little atoms, etc., but our human perceptions don't quite touch it (except with dynamite and bulldozers:-). i am no longer a Buddhist, because there are some aspects to it which i can't relate to (because of my naughty bits:-), but i still think that the idea of the Buddha mind gets closer to the truth than the more recent J-C-M-B religion/s - gods exist in a plane above humans, but lower than the ultimate, because they are perceiving themselves separately from the whole, or have such inflated egos that they believe that they created the whole. Buddha was another of those "divinely inspired" humans, but he didn't say that he was anymore "god's" child than any other being (not just human). he was human, not divine, though there are Buddhist who revert to the same old perception of a godly and thus not-quite-human Buddha. where i part ways with Buddhism is when it teaches that my body does naughty things. heck, i am human. i partake of the divine, but there's no reason that i see to say that ANY of my normal human functions (physical, mental, emotional, or spiritual) is less good than any of the others. (that's why i lean toward Tibetan Tantrism, these days, of all the Buddhist flavors.) don't get me wrong, i am not a Buddhist (i've got my feet on another path which i find more satisfactory - and even within Buddhism is the admission of the existence of other viable paths). and don't get me wrong, i don't automatically say that everything that other religions have to teach is wrong. even my current path tends to cast things in a rather anthropocentric light. as i said, heck i am human, so that forms my basic perceptual filter. what riles me is other religions claiming that the anthropocentric vision is the right and only one, especially when they try to FORCE their perceptions on others...i'm not naming names, there would be far too many...it's seems to be the human way, an excuse for mistrust, abuse, and murder. just remember, when you wrap yourself up in YOUR GOD, that it is only yours because you made it so, and you are human - what kind of divinity do you thing exists in the perceptions of a dolphin, or a plant? how are these beings any LESS than a human being (i don't think they are)? try to dent your anthropocentric filters by imagining yourself to be an ENTIRELY DIFFERENT being, then honestly see if you could come up with a punishing-father, enveloping-mother or androgynous "angel" for a deity. what is god to a rock, a tree, a star?