This topic contains 10 replies, has 9 voices, and was last updated by .jpg){kind=avatar}
Helene 1 year, 6 months ago.
-
Posts
-
How does one come to a conclusion about what is really true regarding spiritual things? I’m sure we all have our different methods, whether conscious or subconscious but I’m interested in hearing what different people have to say about it.
AnonymousFor me, when I’m listening to someone or reading something and it just really resonates with me – I take that as strong indicator that what I’m hearing or reading is truth. Especially if it continues to resonate with me over time.
AnonymousI think that most of what we come to accept as true in our lives is really about accepting or conforming to the norm, or what is generally accepted as true. We get told. This is true about all knowledge. Some of it we get to test and discover it’s real validity, but most we just accept. So what do I know about spiritual truth? Jack.
That’s an interesting question, but let’s go back a bit. How does one come to a conclusion about what is true about the physical world in which we live?
Consider the education system and the way that children are taught. We start with the simplest of things – we tell stories – and we gradually build on their understanding. As Wayner says, we generally accept what we are taught. Unless that is you are one of the awkward brigade who are always asking questions and are thick skinned enough to ignore the rejection of many of our thoughts!
I sense that most of us go through a phase of wondering why we are here, and what is the purpose of life. Those who have been brought up in a church environment are likely to have one set of answers. But as older teenagers who go out into the big wide world they are faced with a very different scenario (very different from the time I was a teenager more than 60 years ago). With the advent of the internet and especially broadband people generally are becoming aware of so many different perspectives – something like 40,000 different Christian denominations?
In the material world we are encouraged to use reason and logic. When people use reason and logic to try to understand that ‘something’ beyond the five senses, reason and logic provide no definitive answers – just endless theological concepts! It’s really no surprise that many people become ‘atheists’ but what does that really mean? There are I would suggest a very few atheists – people who are absolutely convinced that there is no god (I know that many would argue with that definition of an atheist).
So to answer Savage’s question:
I am one of those people who cannot remember ever doubting the existence of ‘God’ but I would have been over 70 before I realisesd that up until then my beliefs had been based on ‘head knowledge’ rather than ‘heart awareness’. I had originally been an Anglican but later spent some 20 years as a member of a Sabbath keeping church that was convinced that it was God’s one and only true church because nobody else kept the Sabbath and biblical Holy Days properly. That all changed in 1995 when the church announced that much of its theology had been misguided. It was about three years later that I had this sense of FREEDOM AND LIBERATION FROM THE SLAVERY OF LEGALISM, but it was another 5 years before I really began to find many others through the internet who were going through wilderness experiences as they were being drawn away from churches that they may have attended for many years. These were the people who at that time were often being described as the ‘out of church Christians’. It’s been very interesting to have shared part of the journey with quite a number of these people over the last ten years.When I look back I often wondered why I had been allowed to be drawn up so many blind alleys and why I had continued to be convinced that this was all part of a meaningful journey. With hindsight I can see that I have been learning so much about why people believe what they believe, often as a result of divisive, denominational theology, and why many (especially former evangelicals) are turning towards atheism.
I’m 77 and I realised last year that it was time to share something of my journey – I have my own blog – I have a faith that I don’t have to defend, because I know that I don’t need to have an answer to all the questions. We are all on unique journeys – we are all seeing just a small part of the overall picture – we have a lot to learn – and civilisation as we know it hasn’t been around for more than about 10,000 years – and we haven’t learned very much yet about how to live in peace and harmony.
In a lot of ways I think what is true for us in the spiritual realm is a matter of how the story works for us. And by that I mean not just what is told, but how it meshes with our life at that point. We have experiences (i.e. an event in narrative) and understandings that cohere, so when they match, we “believe”. Or at least, that’s the description that makes sense to me.
Wade.
I guess I wonder why it is important to come to a “conclusion about what is really true regarding spiritual things.” The way I practice spirituality and what I believe has changed over time just as I have changed and grown over time. What was true for me 30 years ago is no longer true now. What I hold true now did not seem to matter much 35 years ago.
Truth: That which is in accordance with fact or reality.
I do not think spirituality has anything to do with truth… Truth means Fact…
Like:
2+2=4
Water is made of 2 parts hydrogen and 1 part oxygen.
At its closest point, the Moon is 363,104 km away from the Earth
These are statements of truth.Things that are not truth… could one day be truth if facts are found to support these THEORIES…
Things that are not currently truth:
There is a god…
God is Jehovah… God is Allah… God is Buddha…
There is only one god…
God is a trinity…
The Bible is the word of god…
None of these things are truth…
In the early church I think the concept of spirituality was very different… I do not think people were so driven by facts… but were more drawn to christianity because of some of the mystery… after all faith is … Believing in that which is not seen… that which you cannot prove… thats kinda the point… If it were truth… if it had fact and reality backing every thought or principal… then faith becomes a moot point… How can “Keep the Faith!” if it were all fact… Believing in facts requires no faith… and therefore nothing is required of us to have faith in something… then faith is dead and gone…
Now I have heard someone say that there is personal truth… and I guess there is… I think that if the belief in your religion or your faith gives you happiness and joy… then it is TRUTH that your faith does benefit you… but it is not a fact that your faith is TRUTH and that it can help everyone or even anyone else…
I think we started to fixate on this topic when we entered the age of reason…
Just my 2 cents!
Peace
DavidI think we started to fixate on this topic when we entered the age of reason…
Yes! Totally! People get obsessed about whether the earliest stories of the Bible are literally true or not. Unfortunately, that is really beside the point. We used to say “they don’t say how; they tell you the who (and sometimes the why)”. I mean, no-one believes Rudyard Kipling’s “Just So Stories” are the literal truth, do they?
Wade.
Interesting question @SavageSoto… it made me think about how I’ve been trained in theology basically from a very young age, so I feel my arriving at truth, which I actually think is an illusion now, is more by clearing stuff away than adding stuff on.
“what is really true regarding spiritual things?”
I sometimes like to ponder about what early man was thinking about the world. In this case what did they mean by ‘spirit’? In some of the older languages the word spirit meant wind, air or breath. It seems to indicate something powerful yet invisable. Long ago and far away people thought spirits were everywhere. They attributed the unexplained and the mysterious to spirits. We today have inherited many ancient ideas and concepts. Some of these have turned out to be true according to the scientific method; and some not so true.
I think it is good to question things and look for better answers, but it takes time, even lifetimes. The trouble with religion is that it says something like…’choose you this day whom you will serve’. Threats and fear mongering are not conducive in the pursuit of reality.
I can see now that I may not find the ‘truth’ before I die. Perhaps the natural world is the whole truth. For example, why is there death? Is it because a naked woman was talking to a snake and ate a piece of forbidden fruit? Is it because of sin? Or is death simply a natural event?
The cycle of birth and death is ubiquitous: plants, animals, environments, planets, solar systems, stars, galaxies, and even the universe its self with the Big Bang with expansion and rebound (or whatever).
Are holy books the source of truth or is it found in scientific discovery?
I’m waiting for someone with a philosophical background to discuss Kant !
You must be logged in to reply to this topic.