Saturday, 14 May 2016
Role Model
The definition of a role model is a person whose behaviour or character is mimicked and imitated by someone else, usually due to admiration or respect. But what kind of people get this amount of respect? Well, the answer is obvious: people who are better than us in one or more aspects. For example, if someone wishes to become a soccer player, or simply likes soccer a lot, then it is only natural for him to mimic the play style of a great soccer athlete. And there is nothing wrong with that. The problems start if he begins to mimic more than the person;s athletic abilities, like his behaviour because being a great athlete does not guarantee that he is also a great person. Sadly, the real problem lies even further beyond, in the fact that ,most people who are being mostly projected by the television are not fit to be role models at all because they represent an unhealthy lifestyle and make poor choices.
More specifically, it is of great importance that the person has a role model who is worth copying from, in the sense that the traits, the behaviour, or the characteristics he is trying to imitate will result in him bettering himself and providing him with an overall positive outcome. But the role models that are currently being promoted, mostly by the US television (and generally the Western Ideals throughout the world), are far from that, since the majority of them are singers or actors who promotes a lifestyle that is based on excess sex, drugs, alcohol and generally they are giving the impression that the purpose of life is to fulfill lustful desires. This is bad for the body for the immoderate use of drugs and alcohol leads to permanent health damage. It is also bad for the soul, since the satisfaction of every desire, does not lead to happiness, but primary to the abolition of moral values, which leads to poor choices. Moreover, Hollywood movies not only promote this life style of worshipping money, that promises joy but instead leads to unhappiness (please read my relative article about it, where i explain what is the real path that leads to happiness https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/04/firstof-all-in-order-to-make-my-case-we.html ), but they also promote that it is fine to hurt people and then justifying your actions by simply telling to your self ''they deserved it''. That is extremely wrong because by taking retribution, we take the law into our hands and secondly, doing something bad to someone, because he did something equally bad to an other person, does not justify our actions. The only thing we do, by taking such actions is to cause more violence and bring ourselves down to the level of the ones we think we are punishing. In another one of my articles ( more specifically the one at the web address of https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/05/forgiveness-and-violence.html ) I make my case that we should forgive our enemies instead of hurting them back and the mentality of causing harm to bad people. Not only does not lead anywhere, but it provides the false sense of justification, that they are using in order to exert violence in the first place. So by punishing someone else for a bad deed he committed, of course we don't help him to reform, but also we don't stop him from committing another one, plus it brings us right to his level, so in a bigger sense, we are practically punishing ourselves for something we did not do. Sadly, the list with the negative results of the Western role models and trends goes on and on, so i will stop here only to mention, that a big percentage of the rising of criminal activities, the decline of moral values and teen pregnancy are caused due to movies (that makes criminals and vigilantes look so cool) and harmful teen role models (e.g. the singer who knows better how to shake her ass than actually singing and so she also objectify woman in the eyes of man, by pushing the mentality, primary to teenagers, that females are nothing more than meat meant for sex). And the worst part is that the people who are getting easier influenced by that, are the new generation.
As a result, one must be very careful when he chooses a role model because usually they do not only imitate the aspect of their character they admire him for, but also extend this admiration to his whole personality and lifestyle, or simply the thing they admire the person for, is not really worth admiring (e.g. money, that somehow turned Steve Jobs into a role model after his death). For example, if you admire a singer for his singing, it does not cause any problems, but if that subconsciously also makes you to want to imitate his drugs heavy lifestyle or excessive sex, then that is a problem, because it will probably lead to drug addiction or sexual transmitted diseases. Also, we must be aware of who we are having as a role model, because if it is for example a fictional character, like one of the''superheroes'', that kills without consequence and is himself the judge, the jury and the executioner, it does not result in bettering your character, but it is probably affecting you negatively. Of course, not every role model has the same gravity, as different aspects of our lives matter differently, meaning some things are more important than others, for example it is more significant to have a role model in science, because that will motivate your advance in science, than in a sport you will never make a career out of. But then it follows from logic that there must be one aspect, one category of role models, that bears the most significance. This category, must therefore include the kind of people that one by trying to mimic,will receive and be provided with the biggest benefits. And according to my previous article, one draws the biggest benefits when he elevates his character,
( https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/04/the-purpose-of-life-is-to-try-to-better_26.html ), because the most important thing in our lives is what we truly are and this is our souls. So, by having a role model who by his exemplary behaviour will lead him towards living a just and good life and also self improving himself and elevating his character and soul, allowing to enjoy the maximum benefits. As a result, the best role models we can have in our lives are people like Socrates, Plato, Gandhi, Buddha and Christ (even if someone does not believe in His divine nature, the fact remains that His words and preachings, changed the face of humanity and are forever engraved into history and so he must pay attention and respect to what He said), because having a singer as a role model will motivate you to sing better, but having Socrates as a standard to live by will motivate you to live a good and fair life, where you will ensure the improvement of your character and a happier life! Plus, someone usually becomes a role model for another one due to receiving a lot of respect from him and these people deserve the greatest amount of respect, because they died and suffered for their ideals and they actually managed to do some good in this world! So, if someone wishes to make a difference, to improve himself and the world around him, then he must take as a role model the ''wise persons'' I mentioned above, or others like them, because by studying their behaviour he will only learn how to be just, fair and good, how to love and forgive, but mostly how to tell apart what is right from wrong and how to help the people around him! There is nothing more important in life than to learn how to love all the people around you, even the ones who instead of loving you back are trying to hurt you and by looking at the way these people lived, someone may finally learn this very hard lesson. Just remember that when Jesus was on the cross dying, he said on Luke 22-23 ''Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing''. Is there something more admirable than this? Praying for the salvation of the ones who are torturing you and are taking your life? That is what truly people should try to imitate, this immeasurable love and not how to sing.
Moreover, when someone admires a person so much as to make him his role model, usually, subconsciously he replicates all the traits of his character, good or bad, for example, young boys imitate the behaviour of their fathers, and they acquire both good, but also bad characteristics. That is the reason parents should be very careful how they behave in front of their children, especially in their childhood, due to the fact that no one is perfect and of course, they would not like their sons to copy their bad habits and to repeat them in the future. If we extend that reasoning, one should avoid taking people as a role model that are still alive or very close to him, for this way, he will replicate, not only the aspect of their character that he admires them for, but also their bad traits. As a result, the safest choice is to have as a role model people that are not walking amongst us, so only the things they were known for will be copied and not their poor habits. If, for example Socrates had a bad habit, no one would be in danger of subconsciously mimicking it while studying his philosophy. Even further, when we love another person we tend to idealize him and so we ignore all the negative aspects of his character and we blind ourselves to their mistakes. For example, no little child's parents are perfect, but from the view point of the child they are and so by being unable to tell right from wrong, they might imitate a behaviour that is bad, even against the parents will, but in the mind of the child it is right. Sadly, this extends well beyond the childhood age, even to adults, but especially on teenagers, who might pick up a negative trait, thinking it is right, from people they love, for example their parents, relatives or teachers, because when people love someone, they close their eyes to any bad aspects the person might have, for they wish to believe that the person is perfect. Of course, understanding that no one is perfect and that no one close to us should preferably be a role model (or at least, if he is, we should be very careful not to copy his bad traits), does not mean that they deserve less of our love or respect or admiration. Plus, loving another person does not mean loving a hypothetical image of him that does not truly exist, except in the lover's mind, but loving the actual person, with his good and his bad and also his unlimited potential for improvement. Finally, a wise person once said that all people have positive and negative things to offer and give to us, but we should just try to take only the positive from them. Even the worse person might help you, sometime in your life, when you are in need, so be nice to everyone.
Summarizing, people become role models due to excess admiration or love, but we should be very careful which such person we choose to imitate and for what aspect of his character, because no one is perfect and all people have positive and negative traits that one may copy. Also, the better role model one can hope for, is the person who dedicates their live for ideals like love (Christ), justice (Socrates) and salvation (Buddha), for they will lead us towards the path of knowledge, self improvement and happiness.
Andreas Sarchosis
More specifically, it is of great importance that the person has a role model who is worth copying from, in the sense that the traits, the behaviour, or the characteristics he is trying to imitate will result in him bettering himself and providing him with an overall positive outcome. But the role models that are currently being promoted, mostly by the US television (and generally the Western Ideals throughout the world), are far from that, since the majority of them are singers or actors who promotes a lifestyle that is based on excess sex, drugs, alcohol and generally they are giving the impression that the purpose of life is to fulfill lustful desires. This is bad for the body for the immoderate use of drugs and alcohol leads to permanent health damage. It is also bad for the soul, since the satisfaction of every desire, does not lead to happiness, but primary to the abolition of moral values, which leads to poor choices. Moreover, Hollywood movies not only promote this life style of worshipping money, that promises joy but instead leads to unhappiness (please read my relative article about it, where i explain what is the real path that leads to happiness https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/04/firstof-all-in-order-to-make-my-case-we.html ), but they also promote that it is fine to hurt people and then justifying your actions by simply telling to your self ''they deserved it''. That is extremely wrong because by taking retribution, we take the law into our hands and secondly, doing something bad to someone, because he did something equally bad to an other person, does not justify our actions. The only thing we do, by taking such actions is to cause more violence and bring ourselves down to the level of the ones we think we are punishing. In another one of my articles ( more specifically the one at the web address of https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/05/forgiveness-and-violence.html ) I make my case that we should forgive our enemies instead of hurting them back and the mentality of causing harm to bad people. Not only does not lead anywhere, but it provides the false sense of justification, that they are using in order to exert violence in the first place. So by punishing someone else for a bad deed he committed, of course we don't help him to reform, but also we don't stop him from committing another one, plus it brings us right to his level, so in a bigger sense, we are practically punishing ourselves for something we did not do. Sadly, the list with the negative results of the Western role models and trends goes on and on, so i will stop here only to mention, that a big percentage of the rising of criminal activities, the decline of moral values and teen pregnancy are caused due to movies (that makes criminals and vigilantes look so cool) and harmful teen role models (e.g. the singer who knows better how to shake her ass than actually singing and so she also objectify woman in the eyes of man, by pushing the mentality, primary to teenagers, that females are nothing more than meat meant for sex). And the worst part is that the people who are getting easier influenced by that, are the new generation.
As a result, one must be very careful when he chooses a role model because usually they do not only imitate the aspect of their character they admire him for, but also extend this admiration to his whole personality and lifestyle, or simply the thing they admire the person for, is not really worth admiring (e.g. money, that somehow turned Steve Jobs into a role model after his death). For example, if you admire a singer for his singing, it does not cause any problems, but if that subconsciously also makes you to want to imitate his drugs heavy lifestyle or excessive sex, then that is a problem, because it will probably lead to drug addiction or sexual transmitted diseases. Also, we must be aware of who we are having as a role model, because if it is for example a fictional character, like one of the''superheroes'', that kills without consequence and is himself the judge, the jury and the executioner, it does not result in bettering your character, but it is probably affecting you negatively. Of course, not every role model has the same gravity, as different aspects of our lives matter differently, meaning some things are more important than others, for example it is more significant to have a role model in science, because that will motivate your advance in science, than in a sport you will never make a career out of. But then it follows from logic that there must be one aspect, one category of role models, that bears the most significance. This category, must therefore include the kind of people that one by trying to mimic,will receive and be provided with the biggest benefits. And according to my previous article, one draws the biggest benefits when he elevates his character,
( https://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/04/the-purpose-of-life-is-to-try-to-better_26.html ), because the most important thing in our lives is what we truly are and this is our souls. So, by having a role model who by his exemplary behaviour will lead him towards living a just and good life and also self improving himself and elevating his character and soul, allowing to enjoy the maximum benefits. As a result, the best role models we can have in our lives are people like Socrates, Plato, Gandhi, Buddha and Christ (even if someone does not believe in His divine nature, the fact remains that His words and preachings, changed the face of humanity and are forever engraved into history and so he must pay attention and respect to what He said), because having a singer as a role model will motivate you to sing better, but having Socrates as a standard to live by will motivate you to live a good and fair life, where you will ensure the improvement of your character and a happier life! Plus, someone usually becomes a role model for another one due to receiving a lot of respect from him and these people deserve the greatest amount of respect, because they died and suffered for their ideals and they actually managed to do some good in this world! So, if someone wishes to make a difference, to improve himself and the world around him, then he must take as a role model the ''wise persons'' I mentioned above, or others like them, because by studying their behaviour he will only learn how to be just, fair and good, how to love and forgive, but mostly how to tell apart what is right from wrong and how to help the people around him! There is nothing more important in life than to learn how to love all the people around you, even the ones who instead of loving you back are trying to hurt you and by looking at the way these people lived, someone may finally learn this very hard lesson. Just remember that when Jesus was on the cross dying, he said on Luke 22-23 ''Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing''. Is there something more admirable than this? Praying for the salvation of the ones who are torturing you and are taking your life? That is what truly people should try to imitate, this immeasurable love and not how to sing.
Moreover, when someone admires a person so much as to make him his role model, usually, subconsciously he replicates all the traits of his character, good or bad, for example, young boys imitate the behaviour of their fathers, and they acquire both good, but also bad characteristics. That is the reason parents should be very careful how they behave in front of their children, especially in their childhood, due to the fact that no one is perfect and of course, they would not like their sons to copy their bad habits and to repeat them in the future. If we extend that reasoning, one should avoid taking people as a role model that are still alive or very close to him, for this way, he will replicate, not only the aspect of their character that he admires them for, but also their bad traits. As a result, the safest choice is to have as a role model people that are not walking amongst us, so only the things they were known for will be copied and not their poor habits. If, for example Socrates had a bad habit, no one would be in danger of subconsciously mimicking it while studying his philosophy. Even further, when we love another person we tend to idealize him and so we ignore all the negative aspects of his character and we blind ourselves to their mistakes. For example, no little child's parents are perfect, but from the view point of the child they are and so by being unable to tell right from wrong, they might imitate a behaviour that is bad, even against the parents will, but in the mind of the child it is right. Sadly, this extends well beyond the childhood age, even to adults, but especially on teenagers, who might pick up a negative trait, thinking it is right, from people they love, for example their parents, relatives or teachers, because when people love someone, they close their eyes to any bad aspects the person might have, for they wish to believe that the person is perfect. Of course, understanding that no one is perfect and that no one close to us should preferably be a role model (or at least, if he is, we should be very careful not to copy his bad traits), does not mean that they deserve less of our love or respect or admiration. Plus, loving another person does not mean loving a hypothetical image of him that does not truly exist, except in the lover's mind, but loving the actual person, with his good and his bad and also his unlimited potential for improvement. Finally, a wise person once said that all people have positive and negative things to offer and give to us, but we should just try to take only the positive from them. Even the worse person might help you, sometime in your life, when you are in need, so be nice to everyone.
Summarizing, people become role models due to excess admiration or love, but we should be very careful which such person we choose to imitate and for what aspect of his character, because no one is perfect and all people have positive and negative traits that one may copy. Also, the better role model one can hope for, is the person who dedicates their live for ideals like love (Christ), justice (Socrates) and salvation (Buddha), for they will lead us towards the path of knowledge, self improvement and happiness.
Andreas Sarchosis
Friday, 13 May 2016
Thursday, 12 May 2016
Christ and the Church
The nature of humanity is imperfection. That is a sad truth, but truth none the less, that is based on the fact that as a race, we make mistakes, we give in into lesser feeling like anger or hate and we are unable to control ourselves from them, we exert violence on one another and unfortunately the list goes on and on. That is the essence of our imperfection. It is not due to our bodies, that will eventually fade away, or due to our appearance, but due to our characters, who even though contains positive aspects, also contains negative, that leads us to poor choices (e.g. revenge in the place of forgiveness). Like us though, nothing on this material world can be categorized as perfect. But what about God? If we assume that God exist (i recommend you to read my relative article about it, at http://theoryofhope.blogspot.ca/2016/05/the-nature-of-reality-and-godreality-is.html) then He must, by definition be perfect, or he will be no God at all. This means, that if God is not an all loving, all good, merciful, just and fair entity, which has no jealousy or hate or anger etc inside him, then He must by definition not be God, He must be an entity, that instead of praying to Him, we should rebel against Him.
So, following logic, since God is all about love, then He must not have forsaken humanity. As a result, His ''word'' must be globally known and there is a specific name for the ones and also the organizations, that claim to be bringing God's will, towards humanity. They are named religions. But since humans are imperfect and God is perfect and therefore His ''word'' must also be perfect, in the sense that it is all about love, good etc, can humans truly understand it or follow it? The answer is no. Humans and religions, throughout history are twisting at a certain degree the word of God, in order to get their way. Meaning, for example, if God's ''word'' is all about love and peace, how would humans made wars in the name of God? If Christ, preached about being humble, then how would the Pope be leaving in a palace, and how would the church have a ridiculous amount of wealth? The same goes for all religions. People, misinterpret the ''holy texts'' of every religion, because they are perfect and humans are imperfect. In my above mentioned article, i make my case, that all religions have twisted on some degree the ''word'' of God, and since God is unique, meaning that they can be no two or more different ''Gods'' or religions right at the same time, the untwisted part of every religion or spiritual dogma, must be the same. And if someone is to study all religions and dogmas, he would discover, that by ignoring the obvious human part of their teaching, they all speak of an all loving, perfect, peaceful and fair God, and not only.
In this article though, i wish to write only about Christianity, about the preachings of Christ and how the church throughout the centuries has corrupted them in some degree. At this point, if some of you, my readers, are rigorous church believers, consider to yourselves, that church is a man made organization, and humans make mistakes, so it just might be possible, that some of the things you have been taught about God and Christ, since you were a child, might be wrong, due to priests, simply having not understand the meaning of them. So, if you wish to discover, with the use of logic and not blind faith, if some part of God's word have been corrupted, since there must be nothing greater that learning the true intentions of God, stick with me, through my following articles. Plus, believing a lie as a truth, especially about God, is worth spending time to uncover. Of course, i will force no one to agree with me, but in case i am indeed right about the things i am going to say to the following articles, you should spend the time to read them, just in case, someone was lying to you (intentionally or not) since you were children and if you do not agree with me, feel free to debate me. I am open in every discussion, since by putting my beliefs under examination, i can always be as certain as possible that i am on the right side and by avoiding intellectual conflict, all i do, is to blind myself, to the right or wrong information i am about to receive and deprive my self from learning something new, that could potentially be true. Now, for my non Christians readers, even if you do not believe in the divine nature of Christ, you can not deny his significance as a historical figure or the wisdom of his teachings, that a whole religion was based upon.
Christ's preachings, according to my previous statements, must have been perfect, in the sense that He talked only about love, forgiveness, mercy e.t.c and one by studying the 4 gospels, can confirm that, even though there are a lot of Christ's parabolas, meaning stories with symbolic connotation, that is hard to understand. In order for me to not get out of context, i will deal with the allegoric meaning of them, in other articles and i will focus here, on His non symbolic statements. On the other hand, church in order to do the crusades, the holy inquisition e.t.c must have corrupted and twisted these teachings, either by misinterpreting them, or by inserting non so holy or wise texts in the holy bible and embodying them into the religion or even, by simply ignoring them. So, by a quick comparison, Christ said on Luke 9:50 that ''whoever is not against you is with you'', and that we should follow Him only if we so choose, plus no where in the bible He forced anyone to follow Him. Instead, the church baptize us when we are children. OK someone might think, that does not sound so bad or terrible and it has its practical applications. Then how about, what the church did to non Christians? When Columbus discovered America, with the blessing of the church, Christians destroyed, slaughtered and enslaved the natives in the name of God, in order to Christianize them, meaning to bring them into the path of the merciful God, by enslaving them. How many wars have been done throughout the middle ages, with the support of the church, or better said, how many wars have been done, due to the church? Is all the blood that was spilled, in the the name of God, God's doing? Of course not! God should not be blamed for the actions of man. But how exactly would the church manage to eradicate all those tribes and cities in America, Africa, Asia and do their ''holy wars'' for example the crusades, if they had not corrupted the words of Jesus, who said on Mathew 43-48 “43''You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.' 44"But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45''so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46"For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? "If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?48"Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.''? Christ also said on Mark 12:31 ''love your neighbour as you love your self, no other commandment is greater than these'', yet the church burned people alive, tortured people and don't even get me started on the atrocious crimes they did on the first centuries of its creation, to the followers of the old religions e.g. the ones who followed the ancient Greek religion. I will only mention Hypatia of Alexandria the philosopher who was publicly murdered at 415 ac for not following the religion of love and light, by having her skin peeled of her body with stones. Yeah, by now everyone should have noticed at least a minor difference between what Christ said and what Christians did, who obviously believed that they were doing God's work, by following the not so holy teachings of the church. Even further, Jesus said on Matthew 19:21 '' if you want to be perfect, go sell all your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come follow Me. ''. The Pope obviously did not get the memo in his palace and so must have the rest of the church, that has acquired tremendous amounts of money, throughout the years. I recommend you to read the book ''The Vatican Billions'' by Avro Manhattan. Moreover, the orthodox dogma says ''Πίστευε και μη ερέυνα'' which literally translates to believe and do not search, but has the meaning of believe and do not question, while Christ said at John 5:39 "You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about Me.'' If i continue like this, i can write a whole book, which far exceeds the capacity of this article... Gandhi one time said, ''I like your Christ, but i do not like your Christians''.
But when did this whole turn, from love to hate, happened in the religion? The answer is that it happened throughout history, by various priests and Popes who wished to change the religion to fit their agenda (e.g. Filioque), but the primary twist happened during the first centuries after Christ, during the establishment of the church and their dogma. More specifically in the firsts ecumenical councils, which is practically a meeting of all high priests and bishops, where they decide which dogma is the right one and abolish all other dogmas and their believers as cults. You may find summarizing information about them at the following web page http://oodegr.co/english/dogma/synodoi/oik_syn1.htm or simply by googling it. In this meetings, where they decided what is the official position of the church going to be on religious matters, or simply put, what the people are going to believe in, they accepted which Christian documents are going to be considered sacred and which not. So, they embodied in the newly formed religion of Christianity, not only the loving preachings of Jesus, but literally also an other religion, the ancient Hebrew, which is not only about love and also some less than wise texts, by Saul, or more commonly known apostle Paul. One, by reading through the old testament will know a God, that is cruel, and has nothing to do with love or justice. For example, during the great exodus, when the Pharaoh forbidden the Israelis to leave Egypt, God sends a plague in order to kill all the first born sons of the Egyptians. Furthermore, the God of forgiveness Christ talked about, decides to wipe off the map, 2 cities (Sodom and Gomorrah), turns the wife of Lot into stone, for looking at the city during its destruction and all over the old testament, God appears as a bloody entity, who murders, kills and slaughters people and if i were write about each of the monstrosities described in that book, this article would last for ever. For a list of the victims of God in the old testament see http://www.view-pdf.com/ViewPDFFile.aspx?file=http://www.htmlpublish.com/newTestDocStorage/DocStorage/5bd9a62f24794d24bef29f9fae9db8da/OTG.pdf or for a more complete list check
http://dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.ca/2010/04/drunk-with-blood-gods-killings-in-bible.html
Andreas Sarchosis
So, following logic, since God is all about love, then He must not have forsaken humanity. As a result, His ''word'' must be globally known and there is a specific name for the ones and also the organizations, that claim to be bringing God's will, towards humanity. They are named religions. But since humans are imperfect and God is perfect and therefore His ''word'' must also be perfect, in the sense that it is all about love, good etc, can humans truly understand it or follow it? The answer is no. Humans and religions, throughout history are twisting at a certain degree the word of God, in order to get their way. Meaning, for example, if God's ''word'' is all about love and peace, how would humans made wars in the name of God? If Christ, preached about being humble, then how would the Pope be leaving in a palace, and how would the church have a ridiculous amount of wealth? The same goes for all religions. People, misinterpret the ''holy texts'' of every religion, because they are perfect and humans are imperfect. In my above mentioned article, i make my case, that all religions have twisted on some degree the ''word'' of God, and since God is unique, meaning that they can be no two or more different ''Gods'' or religions right at the same time, the untwisted part of every religion or spiritual dogma, must be the same. And if someone is to study all religions and dogmas, he would discover, that by ignoring the obvious human part of their teaching, they all speak of an all loving, perfect, peaceful and fair God, and not only.
In this article though, i wish to write only about Christianity, about the preachings of Christ and how the church throughout the centuries has corrupted them in some degree. At this point, if some of you, my readers, are rigorous church believers, consider to yourselves, that church is a man made organization, and humans make mistakes, so it just might be possible, that some of the things you have been taught about God and Christ, since you were a child, might be wrong, due to priests, simply having not understand the meaning of them. So, if you wish to discover, with the use of logic and not blind faith, if some part of God's word have been corrupted, since there must be nothing greater that learning the true intentions of God, stick with me, through my following articles. Plus, believing a lie as a truth, especially about God, is worth spending time to uncover. Of course, i will force no one to agree with me, but in case i am indeed right about the things i am going to say to the following articles, you should spend the time to read them, just in case, someone was lying to you (intentionally or not) since you were children and if you do not agree with me, feel free to debate me. I am open in every discussion, since by putting my beliefs under examination, i can always be as certain as possible that i am on the right side and by avoiding intellectual conflict, all i do, is to blind myself, to the right or wrong information i am about to receive and deprive my self from learning something new, that could potentially be true. Now, for my non Christians readers, even if you do not believe in the divine nature of Christ, you can not deny his significance as a historical figure or the wisdom of his teachings, that a whole religion was based upon.
Christ's preachings, according to my previous statements, must have been perfect, in the sense that He talked only about love, forgiveness, mercy e.t.c and one by studying the 4 gospels, can confirm that, even though there are a lot of Christ's parabolas, meaning stories with symbolic connotation, that is hard to understand. In order for me to not get out of context, i will deal with the allegoric meaning of them, in other articles and i will focus here, on His non symbolic statements. On the other hand, church in order to do the crusades, the holy inquisition e.t.c must have corrupted and twisted these teachings, either by misinterpreting them, or by inserting non so holy or wise texts in the holy bible and embodying them into the religion or even, by simply ignoring them. So, by a quick comparison, Christ said on Luke 9:50 that ''whoever is not against you is with you'', and that we should follow Him only if we so choose, plus no where in the bible He forced anyone to follow Him. Instead, the church baptize us when we are children. OK someone might think, that does not sound so bad or terrible and it has its practical applications. Then how about, what the church did to non Christians? When Columbus discovered America, with the blessing of the church, Christians destroyed, slaughtered and enslaved the natives in the name of God, in order to Christianize them, meaning to bring them into the path of the merciful God, by enslaving them. How many wars have been done throughout the middle ages, with the support of the church, or better said, how many wars have been done, due to the church? Is all the blood that was spilled, in the the name of God, God's doing? Of course not! God should not be blamed for the actions of man. But how exactly would the church manage to eradicate all those tribes and cities in America, Africa, Asia and do their ''holy wars'' for example the crusades, if they had not corrupted the words of Jesus, who said on Mathew 43-48 “43''You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.' 44"But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45''so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven; for He causes His sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. 46"For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? "If you greet only your brothers, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same?48"Therefore you are to be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect.''? Christ also said on Mark 12:31 ''love your neighbour as you love your self, no other commandment is greater than these'', yet the church burned people alive, tortured people and don't even get me started on the atrocious crimes they did on the first centuries of its creation, to the followers of the old religions e.g. the ones who followed the ancient Greek religion. I will only mention Hypatia of Alexandria the philosopher who was publicly murdered at 415 ac for not following the religion of love and light, by having her skin peeled of her body with stones. Yeah, by now everyone should have noticed at least a minor difference between what Christ said and what Christians did, who obviously believed that they were doing God's work, by following the not so holy teachings of the church. Even further, Jesus said on Matthew 19:21 '' if you want to be perfect, go sell all your possessions and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come follow Me. ''. The Pope obviously did not get the memo in his palace and so must have the rest of the church, that has acquired tremendous amounts of money, throughout the years. I recommend you to read the book ''The Vatican Billions'' by Avro Manhattan. Moreover, the orthodox dogma says ''Πίστευε και μη ερέυνα'' which literally translates to believe and do not search, but has the meaning of believe and do not question, while Christ said at John 5:39 "You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about Me.'' If i continue like this, i can write a whole book, which far exceeds the capacity of this article... Gandhi one time said, ''I like your Christ, but i do not like your Christians''.
But when did this whole turn, from love to hate, happened in the religion? The answer is that it happened throughout history, by various priests and Popes who wished to change the religion to fit their agenda (e.g. Filioque), but the primary twist happened during the first centuries after Christ, during the establishment of the church and their dogma. More specifically in the firsts ecumenical councils, which is practically a meeting of all high priests and bishops, where they decide which dogma is the right one and abolish all other dogmas and their believers as cults. You may find summarizing information about them at the following web page http://oodegr.co/english/dogma/synodoi/oik_syn1.htm or simply by googling it. In this meetings, where they decided what is the official position of the church going to be on religious matters, or simply put, what the people are going to believe in, they accepted which Christian documents are going to be considered sacred and which not. So, they embodied in the newly formed religion of Christianity, not only the loving preachings of Jesus, but literally also an other religion, the ancient Hebrew, which is not only about love and also some less than wise texts, by Saul, or more commonly known apostle Paul. One, by reading through the old testament will know a God, that is cruel, and has nothing to do with love or justice. For example, during the great exodus, when the Pharaoh forbidden the Israelis to leave Egypt, God sends a plague in order to kill all the first born sons of the Egyptians. Furthermore, the God of forgiveness Christ talked about, decides to wipe off the map, 2 cities (Sodom and Gomorrah), turns the wife of Lot into stone, for looking at the city during its destruction and all over the old testament, God appears as a bloody entity, who murders, kills and slaughters people and if i were write about each of the monstrosities described in that book, this article would last for ever. For a list of the victims of God in the old testament see http://www.view-pdf.com/ViewPDFFile.aspx?file=http://www.htmlpublish.com/newTestDocStorage/DocStorage/5bd9a62f24794d24bef29f9fae9db8da/OTG.pdf or for a more complete list check
http://dwindlinginunbelief.blogspot.ca/2010/04/drunk-with-blood-gods-killings-in-bible.html
while note, that if you read all of the old testament, you will discover that God's evil actions exceeds far more than killing. Moreover, science tells us, that things like creation, Noah's Cataclysm and others, did not really happened, because of the proven beyond any reasonable question, evolution. But enough with the old testament. Let us see what Jesus had to say about it. Christ, said on Mathew 43-48 “43''You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.' 44"But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, 45''so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven''. Apparently Christ is having a disagreement with his Father presented in the old testament who says 'You shall love your neighbour and hate your enemy.'. But, if one finds it to be no big deal, he should wonder which God did the Jews believed in and called him Father? Obviously the one described in the old testament. So, lets see what Christ said about it on John 8:41-48 41 You
are doing the works of your own father.” “We
are not illegitimate children,” they protested. “The only Father
we have is God himself.”42 Jesus
said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for
I have come here from God. I have not come on my own; God
sent me.43 Why is my language not clear to you? Because
you are unable to hear what I say. 44 You belong to
your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s
desires. He was a murderer from the beginning, not holding to
the truth, for there is no truth in him. When he lies, he speaks his
native language, for he is a liar and the father of lies. 45 Yet
because I tell the truth, you do not believe me! 46 Can
any of you prove me guilty of sin? If I am telling the truth, why
don’t you believe me? 47 Whoever belongs to God
hears what God says. The reason you do not hear is that you do
not belong to God.”. Hmmm that sounds curious. It appears that the primary relation Christ had with the Jewish religion, is that he was born in Israel.
How certain are you that what you have learned so far from the Church about religions is true? Because if you wish be a true Christian, you must follow Christ and His God, which apparently is not the same God as the one the Church speaks about. Christ's God, is the God of forgiveness, mercy, light, hope and love! So if you truly wish to obey the will of God, then listen to Mark 12:31 ''love your neighbour as you love your self, no other commandment is greater than these''. The majority of Christians i meet, have never read the bible, even though they claim to be devoted to God, because they go to the church one, maybe two or even seven times per week, but there, they only read specific passages, explicit chosen by the church, so that they may conform the religion to fit the churches official positions and doctrine. Instead, one should read the 4 gospels by himself and try to see the meaning of Christ's allegories and also, if he wished to confirm my previous statements, also read the old testament and compare it to Jesus' teachings.
The essence of being a true Christian is not to just go to the church, or debate with people who believe in evolution, or giving a few dollars every now and then to Greenpeace, believing you did your share to humanity, but it is to love and help other people, to be modest and good and of course to apply Jesus; teachings. If one wish to make a difference, then he must follow an other path than the one the church suggest, one that it is filled with love, self-improvement and kindness, for the real problems do not lie with creationism or homosexual people, but lie ''within'' people and they have the form of negative emotions, like anger or hate, that drive people to do bad things. One also must see further and understand, that even though there is a notable difference between church and Christ, the majority of people that chose to become priests, did it for the right reasons, meaning to serve God and most of them do that every day, by helping people and teaching about love, or even in their own way and even though they represent an organization that is responsible for a lot of bad deeds, they deserve respect, for they are trying to make this world a better place, which is more than the average person can say for himself. Finally, i know that a lot of people have given up to Christianity due to the church, primary because they start reading the old testament, while a lot more, just blindly accept Christ, because they were born in a Christian family and have never bothered opening the New Testament to read. For the first group, since the teachings of the church, differ by a lot from the ones of Christ, you should give it an other try, primary because there are no better teachings than the ones of love and hope, while for the ones that are only baptized, but have never searched about the true meaning of being Christian, please read the 4 gospels.
Summarizing, since Christ's teachings were perfect, in the sense that He only preached about love, kindness and salvation, humans being imperfect, in the sense that there is not only kindness inside us, but also hostility, twisted his words, in order to justify doing terrible things in God's name, or to manage to ignore their peaceful character, in order to exert violence on one another e.g. in order for the church to do the crusades, they preached that Arabs were the race of the devil. The primary distortion of the words of love, spoken by Jesus, happened during the first centuries after Christ, at the establishment of the Church, when at the ecumenical councils, the ''wise'' priests decided which dogma and which teachings they are going to be right or not. For example, until the first ecumenical council, the majority of the people who believed in Christ, also believed in reincarnation, a concept unknown to modern Christians. So, they inserted to the core of the religion, due to political and other reasons, a completely different doctrine, the Jewish religion, which represents a resentful violent God, different from the God of Christ, by embodying the old testament and the texts of Saul into the holy bible and also a few passages, where Christ says ''as it is written''. So, one instead of following the dogma of the Church, that although contains true preachings, that are caused due to the words of Christ, he should find out the true Christian dogma, by performing research of his own and as Jesus said "You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about Me.'' but above all 'love your neighbour as you love your self, no other commandment is greater than these''.
How certain are you that what you have learned so far from the Church about religions is true? Because if you wish be a true Christian, you must follow Christ and His God, which apparently is not the same God as the one the Church speaks about. Christ's God, is the God of forgiveness, mercy, light, hope and love! So if you truly wish to obey the will of God, then listen to Mark 12:31 ''love your neighbour as you love your self, no other commandment is greater than these''. The majority of Christians i meet, have never read the bible, even though they claim to be devoted to God, because they go to the church one, maybe two or even seven times per week, but there, they only read specific passages, explicit chosen by the church, so that they may conform the religion to fit the churches official positions and doctrine. Instead, one should read the 4 gospels by himself and try to see the meaning of Christ's allegories and also, if he wished to confirm my previous statements, also read the old testament and compare it to Jesus' teachings.
The essence of being a true Christian is not to just go to the church, or debate with people who believe in evolution, or giving a few dollars every now and then to Greenpeace, believing you did your share to humanity, but it is to love and help other people, to be modest and good and of course to apply Jesus; teachings. If one wish to make a difference, then he must follow an other path than the one the church suggest, one that it is filled with love, self-improvement and kindness, for the real problems do not lie with creationism or homosexual people, but lie ''within'' people and they have the form of negative emotions, like anger or hate, that drive people to do bad things. One also must see further and understand, that even though there is a notable difference between church and Christ, the majority of people that chose to become priests, did it for the right reasons, meaning to serve God and most of them do that every day, by helping people and teaching about love, or even in their own way and even though they represent an organization that is responsible for a lot of bad deeds, they deserve respect, for they are trying to make this world a better place, which is more than the average person can say for himself. Finally, i know that a lot of people have given up to Christianity due to the church, primary because they start reading the old testament, while a lot more, just blindly accept Christ, because they were born in a Christian family and have never bothered opening the New Testament to read. For the first group, since the teachings of the church, differ by a lot from the ones of Christ, you should give it an other try, primary because there are no better teachings than the ones of love and hope, while for the ones that are only baptized, but have never searched about the true meaning of being Christian, please read the 4 gospels.
Summarizing, since Christ's teachings were perfect, in the sense that He only preached about love, kindness and salvation, humans being imperfect, in the sense that there is not only kindness inside us, but also hostility, twisted his words, in order to justify doing terrible things in God's name, or to manage to ignore their peaceful character, in order to exert violence on one another e.g. in order for the church to do the crusades, they preached that Arabs were the race of the devil. The primary distortion of the words of love, spoken by Jesus, happened during the first centuries after Christ, at the establishment of the Church, when at the ecumenical councils, the ''wise'' priests decided which dogma and which teachings they are going to be right or not. For example, until the first ecumenical council, the majority of the people who believed in Christ, also believed in reincarnation, a concept unknown to modern Christians. So, they inserted to the core of the religion, due to political and other reasons, a completely different doctrine, the Jewish religion, which represents a resentful violent God, different from the God of Christ, by embodying the old testament and the texts of Saul into the holy bible and also a few passages, where Christ says ''as it is written''. So, one instead of following the dogma of the Church, that although contains true preachings, that are caused due to the words of Christ, he should find out the true Christian dogma, by performing research of his own and as Jesus said "You study the Scriptures diligently because you think that in them you have eternal life. These are the very Scriptures that testify about Me.'' but above all 'love your neighbour as you love your self, no other commandment is greater than these''.
Andreas Sarchosis
Apothegm
Because no one should be afraid of death itself, if he is not a total idiot and coward, but he should be afraid of injustice, because going to Hades (afterlife) with his soul full of sins, is the worse of all fates...
... death, i believe, is nothing more that 2 things, the separation of the body and the soul, between them.
Socrates at Plato's book Gorgias
... death, i believe, is nothing more that 2 things, the separation of the body and the soul, between them.
Socrates at Plato's book Gorgias
Monday, 9 May 2016
The nature of God and reality
Reality
is unique; and so there is only one ''truth'' that explains it. We
cant have 2 different explanations for the same reality, that are
both equally right. Truth, meaning what correctly describes our world
and reality, must be unique and the same for all people, even though
people have many disparate views of it. So, following this logic,
only one God or better said religion can be true. We cant have more
than one religion being true at the same time, since they have so
many differences, neither can we have more than one truth. So if we
suppose that e.g. Christianity is real, then all other religions must
be, simply put, wrong and if we assume that e.g. Hinduism is right
then all others must also be wrong. It follows from logic, that since
all known big religions, preach that their way is the only right way,
if one of them is the real one, then all others must be wrong.
Thankfully, the vast majority of people were so lucky as to be born
and be taught the one and only truth as a child, so there is no
reason for them to question their beliefs and bother themselves with
these kind of questions. But for the ones, who think that what they
were taught, might be wrong, since apparently the majority of people
disagree with them and wish to think further, they must question
themselves, what if everyone is right and wrong at the same time?
No, this is not quantum mechanics. As i stated before, we cant have more than one reality or truth, to be right. But what i mean, is that every dogma, doctrine and religion have both embodied truths and wrongs. This world is grey, true white or black does not appear in reality, meaning there are no real absolutes. One religion is not the absolute truth, neither everything that it has in its doctrine is right. Also, none of them is completely wrong. All big religions have some things inside their dogma, that are right, but they also have beliefs that are wrong!
In order to make my case, one must first consider that if there is truly a God and he is as every religion describes him, all powerful and all good, he must be therefore also perfect. And what is God if not the definition of perfection? If there is a being that is not perfect, meaning all powerful, all good, merciful, just and loving, then by definition is not God, and it does not deserve our faith or prayer. God by definition must be perfect and if he is not, then he must not be called God! This, although it appears to be a very simple thought, it is a logic that the majority of people fail to follow and that leads them to misconceptions about God, where they imagine (or even worse believe) a vengeful God that passes his eternity by punishing the humans who do not follow His orders and therefore, these people, are being alienated from Him. So, assuming there is God, because he is perfect, every knowledge or belief about him, must also be ''perfect'', since it describes perfection, in the sense that if it gets even close to the truth, then it must be about love, forgiveness, mercy, justice, light and generally about good and benign. Also, if God is the definition of love and good, then he must desire no other than good and love for humanity, therefore, every religion or belief about him, must also be conjugated with these things. If it is not, then it must be wrong, for if a being, values something else than good, love and justice, then from definition it is not God, even further it must be an evil entity. Therefore, every knowledge or belief or dogma about God that is true and right, must be approaching perfection, in the sense that it is being composed of teachings and preachings about perfection, which means love, forgiveness, benign etc. But sadly, no religion, doctrine or organization can claim such a thing, because of the human nature. Humans, from our nature, we are no perfect, since we have negative feelings like hate, anger, jealousy etc inside us, that leads us to wrong decisions, like violence, both physical or psychological. Therefore, if humans are far from perfect, how can they grasp perfection then? Well, the answer is simple. We can't! That is why every big religion, has both rights and wrongs inside it, both truths and lies embodied in it, where the truths stem from a ''godly'' source and they are ''perfect'', while the lies stem from humanity, which misinterpret these ''perfect'' teachings and twist them, in a more ''human'', ''imperfect'' way. For example, lets think about Christianity, probably the biggest religion. Christ, talked and taught, about love, about forgiving your enemy, about turning the other chick when someone hits you! He also said, that whoever is not against me, is with me and he said to love the people around you as you love yourself. Meanwhile, the church spilled more blood in the name of Christ, than Hitler ever did. Jesus talked about forgiving your enemy and even to pray for their good and the church executed the crusades, destroyed the Indians, constituted the Holy inquisition and so on. The list with the monstrosities performed in the name of God is way too long for me to include in one article. Does that mean though, that all these sins (to use the term the church uses) that were committed by the church, are God's doings? Of course not! The teachings of Christ has been twisted by the church, throughout the centuries. If not so, then how would the church have made all those wars? How would the priests become rich? How would the Pope have a palace, when Jesus said about modesty? These things are man's doings and not God's! And that does not extent only to Christianity, but to all other religions too. Did Allah ask Muslims to became suicide bombers? Or did Zeus made the Ancient Greeks to fight against each other? No, no, no. All these misinterpretations are due to humans, who are trying to twist the divine, in order to get their way! Moreover, in the case of Christianity, the church in the first centuries after it was formed, changed the teachings of Jesus, by embodying in its core the Hebrew religion, meaning all of the old testament and also including, some less than wise texts written by Saul or more commonly known, apostle Paul. These texts, where included in the core of the religion and were considered as holy and as God inspired, as the teachings of Jesus, even though they have nothing to do with love, forgiveness or even good. The God that is presented in the old testament, has nothing to do with the all loving God presented by Christ! They were two completely different religions combined together by humans, in order to serve political purposes or other means. Of course, i cant expand on these things further, since it is not the main purpose of this article, but you can find a lot more details and proofs about that, in my other text about it. Therefore, an important distinction between religion (a man made organization, with a human conformed dogma) and God (the all perfect being of love and good) must be made, where the church, or every ''church'' of every religion, has distorted or misinterpreted at some point, more or less, the truth about God, or failed to convey the whole true ''perfection'', that only very few minds, if any, can grasp.
But, as we said above, there must by only one truth, since reality is unique and so, supposing that the all loving God, did not forsaken His humans, all teachings and credos that are true, must be the same, no matter what religion we examine. That means, that the ''God inspired'' part of every religion, e.g. for Christianity, the teachings of Jesus, must be the same, or at least not contradict each other and all the differences in beliefs, that exist between them, must be caused by a human factor, where this could be the geopolitical and cultural differences of the eras, but also the tendency of humans, to distort the divine, due to our not so divine nature. Simply put, if one is to examine all big religions, by studying their holy texts (or at least the part of their texts that is actually holy and yes, here i am referring to the not so loving God, of the old testament) and not the preachings of their ''churches'', he will find, that deep down bottom, all these religions and all the actually wise people, that represented those religions, are saying the same stuff, since there is only one truth! If someone, is to read the teachings of Christ in the new testament, the preachings of Buddha, listen to what Gandhi said and learn the philosophy of Socrates, he would discover, like me, that they are all saying the same truth! Of course, sometimes they emphasize on different issues and they are using far different words, or ways to describe something, since they lived in a different era, obviously, but the meaning is the same. Not only they never contradict each other, but they complement each others teachings. Of course, at more than one point they speak with allegorical stories and symbolical descriptions, as Christ often did, but even that, remains the same and carries the same meaning, even though it is hard to understand. The purpose of these symbolical narratives, is often explained around the different religions and beliefs and they are made like that, in order to protect the ''uninitiated'' or the ''outsider'', from gaining their hidden knowledge, for this truth could not be handled by him. If you find that, hard to accept, i encourage you to go and discuss this article, with a church fanatic, creationist, conservative, Christian. Obviously, when i say about all religions, i think it is self explanatory, that satanism and other ''religions'' like that, do not really count and can be exempted.
Of course, this article is way too small for me to discuss all the similarities between the various religions and spiritual groups and compare them, and then derive what is really truth and what is not and of course to convince you about the nature of God. This is to happen systematically, through my other articles and my upcoming book. But i will end this article, with 2 teasers. All ''holy inspired'' texts and all truly wise man (e.g. Buddha or Plato) are all giving the same description about the nature of God and usually with the same words, some of them have been already mentioned before: perfect, all good, all caring and all loving, fair and just and last but not least, hope, salvation, life and light. Second, even though there is an article of mine, specifically examining this subject, i will suffice here to mention that the parabola of the lost son, given by Christ, has the same meaning as Odyssey, written by Homer (which is obviously much more detailed) and is about the path and the purpose of man on this world.
Summarizing, there can be only one right description or truth that can explain reality and it also must be universal. Furthermore, God must be perfect, in the sense that he is all loving and all good, or else he must by definition not be God. As a result religions and spiritual systems have both embodied wrong and right teachings, due to the inability of humans to conceive and apply the perfection of the ''divine inspired'' teachings and our imperfect nature, that tends toward violence and so it must ignore the preachings of love and mercy or justify its actions by distorting the holy texts. But, since there can be only one truth, all the right parts of the religions, that approach truth, must be the same. And so, if one is to compare the holy texts of all the religions and spiritual organizations, ignoring the ''human factor'' that have been embodied inside them, he will find that they are the same and they all describe a God that is love, light and pure kindness!
Andreas Sarchosis
No, this is not quantum mechanics. As i stated before, we cant have more than one reality or truth, to be right. But what i mean, is that every dogma, doctrine and religion have both embodied truths and wrongs. This world is grey, true white or black does not appear in reality, meaning there are no real absolutes. One religion is not the absolute truth, neither everything that it has in its doctrine is right. Also, none of them is completely wrong. All big religions have some things inside their dogma, that are right, but they also have beliefs that are wrong!
In order to make my case, one must first consider that if there is truly a God and he is as every religion describes him, all powerful and all good, he must be therefore also perfect. And what is God if not the definition of perfection? If there is a being that is not perfect, meaning all powerful, all good, merciful, just and loving, then by definition is not God, and it does not deserve our faith or prayer. God by definition must be perfect and if he is not, then he must not be called God! This, although it appears to be a very simple thought, it is a logic that the majority of people fail to follow and that leads them to misconceptions about God, where they imagine (or even worse believe) a vengeful God that passes his eternity by punishing the humans who do not follow His orders and therefore, these people, are being alienated from Him. So, assuming there is God, because he is perfect, every knowledge or belief about him, must also be ''perfect'', since it describes perfection, in the sense that if it gets even close to the truth, then it must be about love, forgiveness, mercy, justice, light and generally about good and benign. Also, if God is the definition of love and good, then he must desire no other than good and love for humanity, therefore, every religion or belief about him, must also be conjugated with these things. If it is not, then it must be wrong, for if a being, values something else than good, love and justice, then from definition it is not God, even further it must be an evil entity. Therefore, every knowledge or belief or dogma about God that is true and right, must be approaching perfection, in the sense that it is being composed of teachings and preachings about perfection, which means love, forgiveness, benign etc. But sadly, no religion, doctrine or organization can claim such a thing, because of the human nature. Humans, from our nature, we are no perfect, since we have negative feelings like hate, anger, jealousy etc inside us, that leads us to wrong decisions, like violence, both physical or psychological. Therefore, if humans are far from perfect, how can they grasp perfection then? Well, the answer is simple. We can't! That is why every big religion, has both rights and wrongs inside it, both truths and lies embodied in it, where the truths stem from a ''godly'' source and they are ''perfect'', while the lies stem from humanity, which misinterpret these ''perfect'' teachings and twist them, in a more ''human'', ''imperfect'' way. For example, lets think about Christianity, probably the biggest religion. Christ, talked and taught, about love, about forgiving your enemy, about turning the other chick when someone hits you! He also said, that whoever is not against me, is with me and he said to love the people around you as you love yourself. Meanwhile, the church spilled more blood in the name of Christ, than Hitler ever did. Jesus talked about forgiving your enemy and even to pray for their good and the church executed the crusades, destroyed the Indians, constituted the Holy inquisition and so on. The list with the monstrosities performed in the name of God is way too long for me to include in one article. Does that mean though, that all these sins (to use the term the church uses) that were committed by the church, are God's doings? Of course not! The teachings of Christ has been twisted by the church, throughout the centuries. If not so, then how would the church have made all those wars? How would the priests become rich? How would the Pope have a palace, when Jesus said about modesty? These things are man's doings and not God's! And that does not extent only to Christianity, but to all other religions too. Did Allah ask Muslims to became suicide bombers? Or did Zeus made the Ancient Greeks to fight against each other? No, no, no. All these misinterpretations are due to humans, who are trying to twist the divine, in order to get their way! Moreover, in the case of Christianity, the church in the first centuries after it was formed, changed the teachings of Jesus, by embodying in its core the Hebrew religion, meaning all of the old testament and also including, some less than wise texts written by Saul or more commonly known, apostle Paul. These texts, where included in the core of the religion and were considered as holy and as God inspired, as the teachings of Jesus, even though they have nothing to do with love, forgiveness or even good. The God that is presented in the old testament, has nothing to do with the all loving God presented by Christ! They were two completely different religions combined together by humans, in order to serve political purposes or other means. Of course, i cant expand on these things further, since it is not the main purpose of this article, but you can find a lot more details and proofs about that, in my other text about it. Therefore, an important distinction between religion (a man made organization, with a human conformed dogma) and God (the all perfect being of love and good) must be made, where the church, or every ''church'' of every religion, has distorted or misinterpreted at some point, more or less, the truth about God, or failed to convey the whole true ''perfection'', that only very few minds, if any, can grasp.
But, as we said above, there must by only one truth, since reality is unique and so, supposing that the all loving God, did not forsaken His humans, all teachings and credos that are true, must be the same, no matter what religion we examine. That means, that the ''God inspired'' part of every religion, e.g. for Christianity, the teachings of Jesus, must be the same, or at least not contradict each other and all the differences in beliefs, that exist between them, must be caused by a human factor, where this could be the geopolitical and cultural differences of the eras, but also the tendency of humans, to distort the divine, due to our not so divine nature. Simply put, if one is to examine all big religions, by studying their holy texts (or at least the part of their texts that is actually holy and yes, here i am referring to the not so loving God, of the old testament) and not the preachings of their ''churches'', he will find, that deep down bottom, all these religions and all the actually wise people, that represented those religions, are saying the same stuff, since there is only one truth! If someone, is to read the teachings of Christ in the new testament, the preachings of Buddha, listen to what Gandhi said and learn the philosophy of Socrates, he would discover, like me, that they are all saying the same truth! Of course, sometimes they emphasize on different issues and they are using far different words, or ways to describe something, since they lived in a different era, obviously, but the meaning is the same. Not only they never contradict each other, but they complement each others teachings. Of course, at more than one point they speak with allegorical stories and symbolical descriptions, as Christ often did, but even that, remains the same and carries the same meaning, even though it is hard to understand. The purpose of these symbolical narratives, is often explained around the different religions and beliefs and they are made like that, in order to protect the ''uninitiated'' or the ''outsider'', from gaining their hidden knowledge, for this truth could not be handled by him. If you find that, hard to accept, i encourage you to go and discuss this article, with a church fanatic, creationist, conservative, Christian. Obviously, when i say about all religions, i think it is self explanatory, that satanism and other ''religions'' like that, do not really count and can be exempted.
Of course, this article is way too small for me to discuss all the similarities between the various religions and spiritual groups and compare them, and then derive what is really truth and what is not and of course to convince you about the nature of God. This is to happen systematically, through my other articles and my upcoming book. But i will end this article, with 2 teasers. All ''holy inspired'' texts and all truly wise man (e.g. Buddha or Plato) are all giving the same description about the nature of God and usually with the same words, some of them have been already mentioned before: perfect, all good, all caring and all loving, fair and just and last but not least, hope, salvation, life and light. Second, even though there is an article of mine, specifically examining this subject, i will suffice here to mention that the parabola of the lost son, given by Christ, has the same meaning as Odyssey, written by Homer (which is obviously much more detailed) and is about the path and the purpose of man on this world.
Summarizing, there can be only one right description or truth that can explain reality and it also must be universal. Furthermore, God must be perfect, in the sense that he is all loving and all good, or else he must by definition not be God. As a result religions and spiritual systems have both embodied wrong and right teachings, due to the inability of humans to conceive and apply the perfection of the ''divine inspired'' teachings and our imperfect nature, that tends toward violence and so it must ignore the preachings of love and mercy or justify its actions by distorting the holy texts. But, since there can be only one truth, all the right parts of the religions, that approach truth, must be the same. And so, if one is to compare the holy texts of all the religions and spiritual organizations, ignoring the ''human factor'' that have been embodied inside them, he will find that they are the same and they all describe a God that is love, light and pure kindness!
Andreas Sarchosis
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