God created you, why should god let you die?

There are variations on this - but generally I think the idea is that it's only at the end of the life of Brahma that Shiva opens his eye. These myths come from different sources, mainly Vaishnavism and Tantra, two traditions that view things somewhat differently.

But there's also other symbolism involved in the opening of the eye of Shiva. On another level it represents the attainment of liberation, when the phenomenal universe, including the sense of separate individuality is burned to ashes and the Brahman alone remains

 

Asmo - all this stuff is symbolic. Only a lunatic would think it is literal truth.

 

I am just giving my interpretation, I understand it may differ per person and certainly do not insist that other people take it literal. Also, I can see the beauty that another person has a different interpretation, also if that means they believe more in a personifaction of good/creation (wether it is Allah, Brahma, Ahriman etc. etc. etc). It is all good as long as we tolerate and accept eachothers views.

If we are not interested in eachother's views it is also ok, although I would advise such people not to ask or trigger people who happen to believe in things one seemingly has a deep disgust for

edit: spelling

 

I agree up to a point. I'm prepared to listen to a variety of views, and I certainly don't want everyone to think just as I do. There are some views of which I am intolerant though - mainly extreme stuff like fascism or Islamist extremism. I don't want to listen to someone's notion of things whilst they point a gun at my head.

Generally though I think there are as many different perspectives on the universe as there are people. One thing that always attracted me to 'Hindu' philosophy is the fact that it caters for a wide variety of different views. Within it are many different paths and systems.

 

christianity became very large by compromising itself to appeal to the human ego. the rest of that is pretty much a bald faced lie. but if we were to take its claim at face value, then every christian who read the koran became a moslim and every islamist who read baha'u'llah, became a baha'i. sorry, no, i cannot and do not trust anything that would have the slightest desire to be feared. and no, nothing human has ever known the will of any god. humans have written books of fantasy about it/them, motivated by very good reasons, and there is even a little bit of wisdom in each of them, but none of them are any more the will of any god then any other of them.

jesus of nazareth was a very good man, who was exicuted for leading the insurgency against the roman occupation. from the grave he destroyed the roman empire entirely. but he wasn't god on earth. though god, or a god, may have chosen him to be channeled by, just as it may have every founder of every name brand of belief every thousand years. nothing less. nothing more.

whatever a god is, it is more likely to be unlike anything anyone has ever imaginied, than at all like anything anyone ever has.

 

there is exactly one problem with this thread being in a forum about hinduism. it has absolutely NOTHING to DO with hinduism.
if you want to bullshit about the cult of christerism, then keep it there, not in hinduism, athiesim, or any damd thing else ism.

 

Hindu stuff has been mentioned. But I don't think there are many members these days who have much interest in Hinduism to judge from the lack of posts here over a long time.

 

i find it sad, no sad isn't even the word, i find it thoroughly (every expletive ever invented and that ever will be) messed up, the diminishment, of religious diversity.

 

Yes it's a great shame.

On a forum like this you might expect greater diversity - but unfortunately many posts in philosophy and religion just turn into arguments between Christians and Atheists. Both sides seem to have a significant emotional investment in their positions, and I think that tends to stymie a lot of discussion.

It also shows the general narrowness and dare I say it, ignorance of many people. But I suppose the culture is largely to blame.

 

indeed. and a plague on both their houses.
whatever god or gods there are, must be kinder, or at least more patient, then i am, to forebear their pettiness.

i guess i have some emotional investment in my position too. it just happens to be neither of theirs.

 

See, Jesus stated that 'God is love.' Hence the true purpose of Christianity, if you ask me, is to create lovers, not Christians.

In love there is no duality, whereas in all sects or organized religions, there is bound to be duality which brings conflict and hatred. The bloody wars between Catholics and protestants , along with the burning of Christian women with evolved psychic powers as witches at the stake is a far cry from the original teachings of Christ which exuded love and nonviolence.

As Martin Luther King stated, " You have a moral responsibility to be intelligent."

And intelligence starts with understanding the fact that Christianity as an organized religion is actually adversarial to the true spirit of Christ's teachings and is bound to become spiritually counter-productive.

 

Christianity has lost the plot - although there are some good people who call themselves Christian.

In love is no duality? Usually there's an object of love and one who loves, so there is a duality there.

 

Yes, but such duality also brings along with it the pair of opposites as well. Love can turn into hatred after a span of time. We have seen this a lot in many couples. And such love is not true love as well. Attachment is the proper word for it, and attachment comes for want of security.

Love begins with the cessation of duality, when there is no subject and object . Such a perception is indeed possible, where preconceived thoughts and images are absent.

 

Maybe you could explain how love exists without an object. If there's no duality, then it would be self love perhaps - otherwise hard to see how it could exist, or if it did what meaning it would have. It would be the One loving itself. Logically it couldn't be anything else.

That may be one reason why all the Hindu devotional schools are in effect dualistic in their philosophy.

 

I sorta think we die when our ego forms a life. Seems all the fun is on the other side and that's were real life exists.

 

Ego is definitely the enemy as regards any kind of actual conscious participation in a Divine reality, or so say the sages of India, even if they may disagree on other matters.

I'm not sure if the ego forms a life though. It may be the other way round. Ego, or the ego sense forms during our early developmental stages as human beings. Before we came here the ego as we experience it couldn't have existed because it is a construct formed under the conditions of cosmic existence on this physical and mental level. In the concept of reincarnation as per the Hindu teachings in general, it isn't the ego that returns life after life but something deeper, a soul that is in its nature our essential being and the essential being of everything.

The Upanishads speak of the One Brahman as the only reality, and go on to say 'thou art That'. Ego, or the consciousness of a separative existence are seen as illusory and ever changing. Very partial manifestations of the reality that subtends and supports them.

To have some intellectual understanding of this philosophy is relatively easy. Actually to realize it is more difficult. Thus in India the various Yoga systems developed all with this one aim, although going by different routes.

 

If love does not exist without an object, then it was not there at all in the first place. It is just attachment that comes from a want of security, emotional or financial.