The end of the Christian Era.
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@gerry456 said
"In what way is the Love taught by Christianity "totally weak"?"
"No endurance. False charity. "
Yes, agreed for the most, but the Christian scriptures (Christ) warns against this "false charity" many times. Using some idiot who does not follow what was actually taught is like making negative comments on Thelema because of something you saw an OTO member do.
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@Jim Eshelman said
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@gerry456 said
"There is no scientific system of trans-ego attainment in christianity other than praying and being "moral" i.e. going to church on a Sunday and bearing with the monotonous sermon."...and the specific techniques and training of the likes of Molinos, St. John of the Cross, and St. Theresa."
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which were formulated from reliance upon the premise of faith, piety,original sin and salvation?not method of science ; aim of religion
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@DavidH said
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@gerry456 said
"In what way is the Love taught by Christianity "totally weak"?""No endurance. False charity. "
Yes, agreed for the most, but the Christian scriptures (Christ) warns against this "false charity" many times. Using some idiot who does not follow what was actually taught is like making negative comments on Thelema because of something you saw an OTO member do.
"yes that's it! Christ in general IMO just preached he didn't really teach a systematic method like the yogis hence the "followers" of christ are left with no basis for attaining genuine self-awareness.
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@gerry456 said
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@Jim Eshelman said
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@gerry456 said
"There is no scientific system of trans-ego attainment in christianity other than praying and being "moral" i.e. going to church on a Sunday and bearing with the monotonous sermon."...and the specific techniques and training of the likes of Molinos, St. John of the Cross, and St. Theresa."
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which were formulated from reliance upon the premise of faith, piety,original sin and salvation?not method of science ; aim of religion"
I'm not sure they were, but...
A premise of faith, piety, original sin, and salvation is as a good a premise for empirical testing as any other.
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@gerry456 said
"yes that's it! Christ in general IMO just preached he didn't really teach a systematic method like the yogis hence the "followers" of christ are left with no basis for attaining genuine self-awareness.
"I remain agnostic as to whether there was an actual historic figure on whom the Christ stories were based, though I suspect there was.
If there was, then there is more than a little reason to suspect that he did indeed teach a systematic approach - but not to the public, only to his inner circle. The scriptural figure is pretty much a match for the wandering yogi of a few hundred miles further east, and that would be the pattern of the type.
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Gerry wrote:
"yes that's it! Christ in general IMO just preached he didn't really teach a systematic method like the yogis hence the "followers" of christ are left with no basis for attaining genuine self-awareness."
Surely you have read the Gospel of Thomas, of Mary, and other Apocryphal texts before you reached this opinion? The Dead Sea Scrolls and the discoveries at Nag Hammadi are full of otherwise unavailable information, if that is your bent.
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There seems to be two discussions in one here. The first on the topic of Christianity and the second on the Core principles of Love in Thelema.
The Chirstian mythos is one of the mystic. It is through devovtion to God and faith and acceptance of the divine sacrifice that one may attain spiritual enlightenment, communicaiton/unity with the divine, salvation. It is detaching oneself from the mundane to see the divine in everything. Love is the practical teaching, because it is the unifying principle of existence. Love is not a feeling, though it invokes feelings; it is not specifically targeted at one person or thing, it is a mode of existence, a way of being. By giving onesself to faith and devotion in "God" and "Jesus", without wavering, this becomes apparent in that the false bindings of reality become less of a concern the more this faith becomes certainty; as the way "God" functions in the world (or at all) is through Love.
The problem for us humans is that we are barely capable of such faith. We need it spelled out for us. The unsaid is the unknown.
Now Thelema is more bold an blatant in the proclamation of this paradigm. The other half of the equation is a given, it is Said and thus can be known. I do not believe that this makes the path anymore accessible, it simply makes it more knowable to man in language. Granted consciousness in man has evolved and with it society and all other paradigms; however the base principles of existence remain intact. Divine Love is in fact proof of Divine Will.
What the "christian" did to christianity and the context in which christianity arose have a lot to do with the aforementioned underpinnings of the paternal age than does the actual message of Love which is the true religion. Thelema is different in that the context in which it arose is a much different environment, and we have yet to see what the thelemite may do to thelema. I think that we can get some idea of where we are headed given our prejudices, and the power grabs that we have seen between various factions of the movement. I really do not see the thelemite as being that much better off than the average christian. Often times the thelemite has annihilated a path to certainty by eliminating faith. The push for personal responsibility to define the individual relationship with the divine leaves most people in the dark due to fear, laziness, and a lack of understanding. I personally love that I am free to define my relationship to the divine, but damn it is a lot of responsibility. It would be so much easier to follow ten commandments, show devotion, and believe that my divine father would reach down to me and grant me eternal life.
I do not think that the definition of Love is any different between the two, I simply believe that Thelema gives Love a context. Will we be capable of grasping this context?
Live Love Liberty Light
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@augur said
"There seems to be two discussions in one here. The first on the topic of Christianity and the second on the Core principles of Love in Thelema."
Yes. And, within that, it isn't clear on exactly what is meant by Christianity here - there seem to be several overlapping conversations.
Do we mean (for example) Christianity in its pristine theoretical state? Or according to another particular angle of its meaning? Or as practiced by a majority of Christians in the present time? Or as practiced by a majority of Christians at an earlier time? Or as declared and defined by an administrative voice such as the Vatican? Or what?
All of these are very different. Even in modern times, the core definitions and living principles of Christianity as declared by, say, the Vatican and the governing authority of Southern Baptists would be strikingly different.
"The Christian mythos is one of the mystic."
Maybe. Or is it that the perspective of Christianity we might find most acceptable is a path of the mystic?
It is at least as true to say that living Christianity is a pattern Karma Yoga - people mostly living their ordinary lives while undertaking "good works." Such Christians are not detached from the mundane at all, but fulfill their faith through investment of themselves in the affairs of the world.
And there are definitely areas - especially within Catholicism - where practicing, living Christianity has more in common with ceremonial magick than anything else: exquisite ritual intermingled with passionate purpose-directed prayer, lighting of candles, invocation of intervention by sub-Deific heavenly personages, etc.
If there is a common principle it is that Jesus as Christ is Son of God and is the sole way to heaven; but what this means and how to effect it is as diverse as the varieties of esoteric practices.
PS - I do agree that it is easiest to characterize the majority of devoted and practicing Christians as mystics most of the time; but the very act of devotion moves it into a mystical direction, so my conclusion is surely influenced by the exact question.
"Love is the practical teaching, because it is the unifying principle of existence. Love is not a feeling, though it invokes feelings; it is not specifically targeted at one person or thing, it is a mode of existence, a way of being. By giving oneself to faith and devotion in "God" and "Jesus", without wavering, this becomes apparent in that the false bindings of reality become less of a concern the more this faith becomes certainty; as the way "God" functions in the world (or at all) is through Love."
This is beautifully expressed BTW.
"we have yet to see what the thelemite may do to thelema."
Exactly!
Unfortunately, there are some who are so afraid of what Thelemites may do to Thelema that they aggressively enforce Crowley's faux "Class A" comment to Liber L. in a way to suppress discussion and other shared personalization of understanding and implementation of the Law. I can't think of anything more likely to damage Thelema in the long-run.
"Often times the thelemite has annihilated a path to certainty by eliminating faith."
That's another word we haven't defined here BTW. I've accepted it in the context of this thread as having the conventional popular meaning, but it's not at all how I actually use the word. (Maybe I'll start another thread on that subject.)
"It would be so much easier to follow ten commandments, show devotion, and believe that my divine father would reach down to me and grant me eternal life."
Thus, Crowley (like Vivekananda and others before him) spoke of a real spiritual path as for the strong, not the weak.
We hold that popular religions are exactly what the majority of people need - it meets their immediate needs, level of understanding, and willingness to work. It doesn't much matter what the popular religion is - they all serve potentially as "outer courts" to something deeper which is common to all of them.
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I started a thread on Faith here:
heruraha.net/viewtopic.php?t=842 -
As you may have noticed I tried to differentiate some of these definitions between christianity and Christianity with capitalization. The lower case definition is the common religion tainted by political and historical debacles so apparent and what thelemites are rebelling against, understandably. What I see as central to Christianity is that one should live like Christ. No, I do not mean the Christian need to be a poor wandering yogi, however in principle living life through Love, Devotion, and Service to God and fellow man. As to the different methodologies of the christian faith these are all interpretations and variations created and maintained by people outside of the context of Christianity. The Romans, The Europeans, Rednecks, Ethiopians, Rastafarians, Mormoms, Catholics, Baptists, etc.... All of which are really trying to create an ideal society based in a common set of priniciples, and thereby they are trying to create Heaven in their own image thereof.
I beleive that the christian misses most of this, as much as thelemite may miss the central principles of Thelema. I also believe that the thelemite has already began to do the same thing to Thelema. for instance, "The rituals of old are black..." is so often quoted without the second part of the verse to put it in context. I believe that the thelemite may have a loose association with others in Thelema, as it is a specifically individual religion/path. As a consequence of following this path it may be found that this loose association is much firmer in that "there is no difference". Fortunately we do need not to be like Crowley, however we should hope to express ourselves as freely and openly as he did.
So yes there are historical and political definitions that taint what Christianity once was and still is at its core.
I will look for the thread on faith, that should be an interesting
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"By giving oneself to faith and devotion in "God" and "Jesus", without wavering, this becomes apparent in that the false bindings of reality become less of a concern the more this faith becomes certainty; as the way "God" functions in the world (or at all) is through Love."
"What I see as central to Christianity is that one should live like Christ."
If we aim at knowing/experiencing the most exalted gifts of Thelema, I think that we must also have adequate information about the before-it things, the exalted side of christian patrology etc.
Central to Christianity IMHO is not to live like christ, but to transmute individual life to a trinitarian mode of being, which means that one is not to accept his reality as an existential monad but as a part of a RELATION, which then is the "real" christian. God is Trinity means that there is no God as an ontological monad, "one God", but only IN RELATION TO- The father is not a God who, aside from that, happens to be father; he exists because a Son exists, and the father is considered THE god only asmuch as the holy spirit is.
The same with Love- the only definition of god in the new testament is "God IS love"; not God loves or god is loving eternally, that is not "There's God; and he loves". god exists because he loves.
Combined with the trinity, we see that this love is more or less in the Crowleyan sense. Further, in as
This all is extremely exalted IMHO, however humanity in the Osirian Age was not ready to percieve the crystalline clearness of Nuit and Hadit- in my oppinion, only in future generations will there be large groups with not EXTREMELY degrading concepts of Nuit and Hadit.QUESTION: We have seen that these christian concepts were never really embraced in a large scale before the end of the previous Aeon, only a distorted image was embraced as "Christianity". Should we suppose that the world will not see a LARGE SCALE thelemic (not necessarily by name) humanity??? I mean -successfully- thelemic, not only post-1904 thelemic.
[What many newbie Thelemites seem to be missing is that, as far as Thelema is concerned, core Christianity (patrology) HAPPENS to be "WRONG" from Now (i.e. 1904) on; this is almost antithetical to the widely spread "core Chstnity -IS- WRONG"- apart from the fact that the latter attitude actually degrades Thelema by making it an "opponent" of a corrupted form of worship generalised as the worship itself- it makes the whole of Thelema a political party of some kind.]
