Transcendent or Immanent God?
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That is ok, Themaninblack, since you have apologized that is all ok with me and thank you for your apologies. Not all people take the trouble to do that. So, thank you. I know you are not going to join the Isis, but I do think it is a bad trait when people adopt that overbearing tone in debates. That is not conducive to a friendly, even if vehement debate. If people fear they are going to be judged by what they say, there is no more debate, but examination. That Ihave noticed lately amongst some young people in the forum and that is very wrong and destructive, particularly for themselves. For me, really, I do not care, I have years enough to ignore that kind of thing. So I just wanted you to see for yourself that we are not going anywhere, anybody is nto going anywhere if we keep watch on each other as if we were some moral police and at the first exchange we launch the worst suppositions to people and before we ask or question whatever may shock us we think the worse. That we are indeed strictly forbidden by the Qur'an and warned very seriously. Freedom, friendliness and exchange are not compatible with moral or intellectual policing. See what I have put red of your words. Myself I can't follow how you can extract from that parable a shirk and sincerely I am not even interested. But on the other hand I find it terrible. It reminds me of Cardinal Richelieu when he said give me three lines written by the most innocent person on earth and I will find in them enough motives to hang him. That is it with words. We may learn from them, but we may choose to not only not learn but let loose our worst tendencies. We indeed are warned many, many times in the Qur'an about that. I I won't insist on what that kind of thing does to freedom. If people fear speaking, then there is very little left for them.
Now, to the question, you say
"A dream is a state in which thoughts and images are flashing and pass through the mind while one sleeps. Allah is not a person; Allah is Allah and does not sleep, Allah is free from any human attributes or traits. I believe to say that we are in Allah's dream is shirk.
Exactly Allah is nto a person, in fact Gos is beyond anything we can imagine, you or me or anybody and even beyond what the Qur'an might say, because what God is cannot be put in words, which are limited. We have no means of conceiving Allah, we may get some vision, to our own measure, through His names, attain at some level of his manifestations, through worshipping of His divine names.
THEREFORE in general when we speak about God we are doing it never litterally because simply He is beyond our grasp, we do it by approximations concerning some of his manifestations, never in any attempt whatsoever to comprise Him.
THEREFORE, if I say a dream of God, like even the Qur'an itself uses parables, I am using an analogy WITH RESPECT TO WHAT WE ARE DISCUSSING, not in any attempt to give a vision of God as such but in an attempt to show how we can be of God and not be outside of God and still not be God nor grasp God. The same as our dreams are ours, but we are not our dreams, and they are not us and do not have any power over us, or any existence outside of us, the same with us and God.
?Do you really think that what people may say in this forum or anywhere else will really tell you what God is or is not? Words. Only the heart may feel the way to God, our link to His mercy. Words cannot give us knwoledge nor real understanding of God if they are not the expression of a real fealt nearness to Him from the depth of our hearts and if we do not arrive at this certainty of being asolutely His.
Going back to dreams, they are of many kinds, even the daydreaming where in fact we are the masters of our own dreams by opposition to sleepdreaming, where our dreams are not under our will. That of course would not be pssible with God, I think, He would always be the master of his own dreams. His "dreams", like creation, keeping to the parable, would always be akin to daydreaming and not deepsleep dreaming, that is why I say that the parable that I put forward with this dream thing refers exclusively to the matter under discussion and that I took for granted that it was so understood, that we are talking about wheter God is transcendent or immanent, and to that I say that God is all there is, that outside of God nothing has real existence, like so many philosophers and writers have said, life is a dream, and our existence is the way back to the One awake. It is not that God is anything for Us. God is nto for us, we are for God.
Salaam
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I see, could you if you would, show me how what I said overbearing? Thanks, in meantime, I suppose I better tell you how I see us in relation to Allah. I see ourselves as lowly creatures in sense that we need His Grace, Mercy and Forgiveness but we are high enough to be spiritually separate from animals and act as guardians of the Earth, which is our home
That is ok, Themaninblack, since you have apologized that is all ok with me and thank you for your apologies. Not all people take the trouble to do that. So, thank you. I know you are not going to join the Isis, but I do think it is a bad trait when people adopt that overbearing tone in debates. That is not conducive to a friendly, even if vehement debate. If people fear they are going to be judged by what they say, there is no more debate, but examination. That Ihave noticed lately amongst some young people in the forum and that is very wrong and destructive, particularly for themselves. For me, really, I do not care, I have years enough to ignore that kind of thing. So I just wanted you to see for yourself that we are not going anywhere, anybody is nto going anywhere if we keep watch on each other as if we were some moral police and at the first exchange we launch the worst suppositions to people and before we ask or question whatever may shock us we think the worse. That we are indeed strictly forbidden by the Qur'an and warned very seriously. Freedom, friendliness and exchange are not compatible with moral or intellectual policing. See what I have put red of your words. Myself I can't follow how you can extract from that parable a shirk and sincerely I am not even interested. But on the other hand I find it terrible. It reminds me of Cardinal Richelieu when he said give me three lines written by the most innocent person on earth and I will find in them enough motives to hang him. That is it with words. We may learn from them, but we may choose to not only not learn but let loose our worst tendencies. We indeed are warned many, many times in the Qur'an about that. I I won't insist on what that kind of thing does to freedom. If people fear speaking, then there is very little left for them.
Now, to the question, you say
"A dream is a state in which thoughts and images are flashing and pass through the mind while one sleeps. Allah is not a person; Allah is Allah and does not sleep, Allah is free from any human attributes or traits. I believe to say that we are in Allah's dream is shirk
Exactly Allah is nto a person, in fact Gos is beyond anything we can imagine, you or me or anybody and even beyond what the Qur'an might say, because what God is cannot be put in words, which are limited. We have no means of conceiving Allah, we may get some vision, to our own measure, through His names, attain at some level of his manifestations, through worshipping of His divine names.THEREFORE in general when we speak about God we are doing it never litterally because simply He is beyond our grasp, we do it by approximations concerning some of his manifestations, never in any attempt whatsoever to comprise Him.
THEREFORE, if I say a dream of God, like even the Qur'an itself uses parables, I am using an analogy WITH RESPECT TO WHAT WE ARE DISCUSSING, not in any attempt to give a vision of God as such but in an attempt to show how we can be of God and not be outside of God and still not be God nor grasp God. The same as our dreams are ours, but we are not our dreams, and they are not us and do not have any power over us, or any existence outside of us, the same with us and God.
?Do you really think that what people may say in this forum or anywhere else will really tell you what God is or is not? Words. Only the heart may feel the way to God, our link to His mercy. Words cannot give us knwoledge nor real understanding of God if they are not the expression of a real fealt nearness to Him from the depth of our hearts and if we do not arrive at this certainty of being asolutely His.
Going back to dreams, they are of many kinds, even the daydreaming where in fact we are the masters of our own dreams by opposition to sleepdreaming, where our dreams are not under our will. That of course would not be pssible with God, I think, He would always be the master of his own dreams. His "dreams", like creation, keeping to the parable, would always be akin to daydreaming and not deepsleep dreaming, that is why I say that the parable that I put forward with this dream thing refers exclusively to the matter under discussion and that I took for granted that it was so understood, that we are talking about wheter God is transcendent or immanent, and to that I say that God is all there is, that outside of God nothing has real existence, like so many philosophers and writers have said, life is a dream, and our existence is the way back to the One awake. It is not that God is anything for Us. God is nto for us, we are for God.
Salaam
See the underlined parts? The underlined defeat the statement in red. We are and never were God, I am not God, I am too imperfect for the statement to be true. Besides, the worship of self is one thing forbidden in the Qur'an . The Qur'an instructs us to worship Allah alone and nobody else; Not even ourselves, I believe that in order to be with Allah, one must the crush the ego and submit to His Will. Still, I urge you to read the verses I have cited and now, for daydreaming, it sounds reasonable until you know the definition of it A dream-like state in which fanciful thoughts are mused and entertained. Again, it is a human attribute, Allah is free from any needs and all wants, He is a very self sufficient God; see 397 for evidence. With all due respect, I urge you to reconsider what you have said about being in Allah's "dream" for I do not see any ayahs supporting your statements about Allah, so I ask; Where is the proof for it? How did you come to such conclusion? Please explain to me further if I have totally missed the point but nonetheless, I am curious.
Pardon me if I was a bit headstrong in my questions to you Plus, I might have messed up the highlights and underlining.
Salaam.
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Salaam, I like your analogy and I am eager for you to explain the idea in further detail. I am intrigued by it
I especially like the part underlined.The part that you underlined is a nice analogy, isn't?
Bold Kindly explain further or more about this, brother MoF. Thanks.
Salm.
Harmony upon you,
I am not really sure what kind of explanation you are expecting, but it is the way I perceive faith and by using an allegorical approach which makes it easier to fathom the way things are. We are born as a soul into this world inserted into a physical body and I take it that the soul is blank as we enter into existence using a template which is designed by God and like a copy of the original specimen Adam, and also with an impurity called Satan which acts much like a virus for the soul. We can choose to become one with God or become whole as I prefer to call it, or we can choose to become like Satan and letting Satan, the virus, contaminate our entire mind. And the good is from God, so the person who does good is pushing the virus Satan away from their soul and approach the state of wholeness. This is why I tend to erase the concept belief vs. disbelief because it does not work this way and the Arabic word "iman" is misrepresented by using the "belief" word. The person who lets Satan, the virus, contaminate his or her mind is "disbelief" in that case and it is pretty hard to define that using a scale belief vs. disbelief because claiming to be believer will not avail much in the matter.
Rather the goal of the promise (al-deen) is for the one who enters into symbiosis with God, which is by becoming 'whole', or one with The Master, and this is also what I consider the Arabic word "iman" to symbolize. The only real opposite scenario of becoming one with God is to become an anomaly, as I allegorically call it in contrast to the kind of "singularity" we live within. The anomaly is an impurity and the virus Satan is affecting the severity of that "disease". It does not matter much if you call yourself a believer or not in case your heart is not "iman", or whole, because it is the sincerity from deep within the soul and the cleanliness of the soul that really counts. Belief vs disbelief is a dogmatic and imprecise measuring technique because going by that parameter then you would not end up with many "believers" in the world at all.
Anyway, what I said in the previous post here was that they are put into quarantine as the promised day comes, but that was merely allegorically speaking to demonstrate what happens to the impurities from the old world. It was quite a well-matched definition for what becomes of them. Besides I have noticed the recitation to (alleged) Muhammad says something similar, i.e. if these people were sent back they would just repeat the same errors and thus it may be wiser that they are kept in quarantine rather than destroy the living for people. The pure people will have no more problems from these insincere people.
Be whole
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If all is evidence of God, and we see "his" face wherever we look, this says more about the nature of creation and our relation to God, than it does about where God is "placed". The point is to see Allah's face and to know. The point is not to conclude the location of Allah, because that's just intellectual philosophy, at best.
Salaam,
Just an expansion of what you said.
I think you meant with "Allahs face" the quranic expression "wazjhu Allah".
Indeed everywhere where we look there is wazjhu Allah.
But it is very important for us to understand that "wazjhu Allah" is not Allah.
With other words what we see is NOT Allah but wazjhu Allah.
It is the same as rasulu Allah, rasulu Allah is a much Allah as wazjhu Allah is.
Who Allah is, is beyond us. Allah is The One who is beyond our utmost imagination.I found your response appropriate, balanced and wise.
On the other hand, I found myself poorly expressed.Peace
I think both of you have excellent posts yes
Salaam,
Bender -
Immanent.
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I dont get it why should God either Trancendent or Immanent. Do you have any other definition rather than on my dictionary?
Each time I thought my consicousness was God's part, there is something bothering me, how our consciousness is very material dependant. For example, nicotine. If consicousness was separated from the body, why when our brain had certain molecule it created certain sensation? It very material dependant right?
Once I had to go to the surgery table, and I was given particular drugs. If soul separated from the body, I should experience something right? But, what I remembered was, when I closed my eyes, it was just a few seconds. I thought the surgery was cancelled, who thought it was 4 hours. Of course, suddenly I gradually remembering something, but what I remembered was just an inconvenient experience like you are just about to die. But when I first gradually regain consciousness I dont remember any of it.
Once I was poisoned by a drugs(Ahem, overdosed ;D), my parents saw my eyes open, after a few hours, yes I remembered it, but when it happened, I dont understand anything, I can see, but I know nothing, I can hear, but I understand nothing. I dont even remember am I really conscious in there. And like I said, I gradually remembered it, part by part after a few hours, until I fully regain my consciousness.It kept me thinking, why our soul was depend on our physical appearance. Why is it attached to me? And why certain molecule can alter it?
I cant understand it except, matter can create consciousness. I always thinking, no matter who is the real God, we are dealing with a God, that understand about Him self, and make a thing that resemble with His. Why not? We already saw "senseless" things on our life. The space, the complete"non-sense technology", or a contradicting "technology" like the plants. Electrolysis is the best advanced technique I knew on how to separated water to the purest form, hydrogen and oxygen, but plants do it to carbon, without heat, and plants make the world cooler.
If I thought about God, I thought about "superstition" ;D about "magic".
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God is everything, the foundation.
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I dont get it why should God either Trancendent or Immanent. Do you have any other definition rather than on my dictionary?
Each time I thought my consicousness was God's part, there is something bothering me, how our consciousness is very material dependant. For example, nicotine. If consicousness was separated from the body, why when our brain had certain molecule it created certain sensation? It very material dependant right?
Once I had to go to the surgery table, and I was given particular drugs. If soul separated from the body, I should experience something right? But, what I remembered was, when I closed my eyes, it was just a few seconds. I thought the surgery was cancelled, who thought it was 4 hours. Of course, suddenly I gradually remembering something, but what I remembered was just an inconvenient experience like you are just about to die. But when I first gradually regain consciousness I dont remember any of it.
Once I was poisoned by a drugs(Ahem, overdosed ;D), my parents saw my eyes open, after a few hours, yes I remembered it, but when it happened, I dont understand anything, I can see, but I know nothing, I can hear, but I understand nothing. I dont even remember am I really conscious in there. And like I said, I gradually remembered it, part by part after a few hours, until I fully regain my consciousness.It kept me thinking, why our soul was depend on our physical appearance. Why is it attached to me? And why certain molecule can alter it?
I cant understand it except, matter can create consciousness. I always thinking, no matter who is the real God, we are dealing with a God, that understand about Him self, and make a thing that resemble with His. Why not? We already saw "senseless" things on our life. The space, the complete"non-sense technology", or a contradicting "technology" like the plants. Electrolysis is the best advanced technique I knew on how to separated water to the purest form, hydrogen and oxygen, but plants do it to carbon, without heat, and plants make the world cooler.
If I thought about God, I thought about "superstition" ;D about "magic".
I've actually discussed all these things in details, and it is important to know what it is that we are worshiping.
Allah is non-information. Everything else is information which Allah has the power to generate, creating and destroying or "changing" as Allah wills.
Allah is not information, so can not be experienced directly because there is nothing to be "informed of", no information. That is why death and unconsciousness like you experienced is skipped, and called "returning to Allah".