In God's Image

Religion and Secularism
101

A clear example of misuse of power in religion can be found in this exerpt from the official handbook of the Roman Catholic Inquisition.

The 1578 handbook for inquisitors spelled out the purpose of inquisitorial penalties: ... quoniam punitio non refertur primo & per se in correctionem & bonum eius qui punitur, sed in bonum publicum ut alij terreantur, & a malis committendis avocentur. Translation from the Latin: "... for punishment does not take place primarily and per se for the correction and good of the person punished, but for the public good in order that others may become terrified and weaned away from the evils they would commit."[11]And later still, the institution of god was a convenient tool for control.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inquisition
102

Not being nit-picky, just talking back and forth. :slight_smile:
This remained true even when we learned to write the earliest scriptures about the nature of the gods. And because everything on earth is subject to the natural forces of climates, these individual accounts all paralelled each other in most respects. They were based on common subjective visual, physical and emotional experiences. Later still, these unrelated scriptures were refined and compiled into a single book, the earliest bibles
Of all the Geneses stories, only the ones written in the Age of Deities would be considered earliest scriptures. The other Geneses stories could be considered history. Even though they seem to parallel each other. They are very different in meaning. About as far apart as you can get. But you have to have an understanding of the gods and what god is and was back in time to understand this fact.
You are right about unrelated scriptures being compiled into a single book. That is just what the Geneses in the bible is. It was written by a conquered people who were far away from their homes and most likely if they didn’t get it written they would have lost their heads.
When modern man acquired the ability for verbal communication (story telling), these feats were passed on verbally, but at that time real knowledge was extremely limited, and these unknown forces were attributed to god of thunder, god of lightning, god of rain. This is not proof of insight into the nature of these events but of observing the physcally experiential events without knowing their real cause… And this then led to the concept of god ordered miracles.

Anything is possible. But what we do have from this early time in history shows no sign of any gods. And some of the religions that are still around today that most likely had roots in this time period do not have gods yet. I would have to bet this is a misconception.
And then came the revelation that these multiple gods must be subject to a single controlling force and God was born from imagination. This is advanced thinking, but scientifically inaccurate because we just had no access to Physical Science, and might be considered early Theoretical Science, which is a product of thought, not proof of fact.
No, history does not show us any advanced thinking. What history shows is that the one god and the combined power of gods was all political and part of government movements that controlled religion.
For thousands of years viruses were considered demons. The story goes that during the building of the pyramids rations of garlic were a daily staple, in order to ward off the demons of disease. We still use this concept in our stories of vampires.
When a garlic crop failed, these rations were cut back and in protest the workers staged the first recorded labor strike in history. Garlic was sacred to them. This record exists from a royal scribe who duly noted the strike.
And the first labor strike in pre-history was done by the lower gods. They were building the cannels and the work was hard and their backs were hurting. They went on strike. The upper gods agreed that the work was too hard and had the midwife create man to help the lower gods. The head of the labor strike had entered the gate to the house of the upper god to complain. This was against the rules and showed no respect. So he was put to death. And his bones were burnt so his spirit could live forever. And that the first time we heard of the Holy Spirit.
This is the reason that has been passed down for the domestication of man. Just like they breed horses to be useable, early man may not have evolved naturally for jobs like farming and building cannels.
With the evolution of the sciences these attributes were put in proper perspective, but the ancient beliefs persisted, just as they still do today. Even I, as atheist, still use the expressions, “thank god" and “oh lord". These terms are pervasive in our collective memory and their compassionate intent is understood by all.
There is nothing that can lead us to believe that the upper and lower gods were not atheist too.

103
MikeYohe, There is nothing that can lead us to believe that the upper and lower gods were not atheist too.
From who's viewpoint? The gods or the people? The use of the term God in any contexts is by definition Theist. If gods existed in reality, they would know they were gods, i.e. Theism. If gods did not exist in reality, but man believed they existed, then that would be Theism also. To guess at man's ability to think of gods in a completely objective abstract way in the earliest days of subjective abstract thinking, is a stretch IMO. People believed in the existence of supernatural beings which created and controlled the universe and made earth the center of the solarsystem (our subjective observable universe). This is why the earliest cave paintings depict gods descending from heaven in carriages of all sorts as shown by documentaries such as "Chariots of the gods". Of course depictions of rockets were based on the observation of comets, but we did not yet know what a comet was, so it was assumed it a chariot of the gods. In the very earliest days in our evolution to modern man, Gods existed for real and that is advanced thinking (albeit from ignorance) as shown by these paintings. We invented the gods as our creators and teachers, and for lack of other scientific knowledge (remember, the gods themselves were our teachers) we depicted these beings as humans with funny heads and eyes. Good creative thinking, but not factual. It seems to me that we tend to assign "sophisticated" abstract thinking to ealy man, but they had not yet acquired real knowledge of the universe and the physical impossibility of physical beings living in space. Chronos,
Mythology, Chronos is a god, serpentine shape in form, with three heads—those of a man, a bull, and a lion.[citation needed] He and his consort, serpentine Ananke (Inevitability), circled the primal world egg in their coils and split it apart to form the ordered universe of earth, sea and sky.
Today, we can interpret this mythology as metaphorical analogies for the creative processes of the physical universe, but AT THAT TIME, these divine physical beings were understood to be exactly as described (to be expected from a rational but subjective standpoint of ignorance). Even in the days of Roman conquest, stars were seen as little windows in the world of the gods high above. All based on our limited understanding of cosmology. Comets were seen as messengers of the gods descending to earth. IMO, real sophisticated abstract thinking started with the emergence of Deism, which regards higher powers as "causal conditions" rather than "causal beings". One can make an argument that gods were invented to instill respect for the natural processes, but no religion was originally invented as a method of control, only as a tool for teaching morality (domestication) as demanded by the gods. The exercise of exclusive control demanded "by the church" is a natural evolutionary process of any institution, which emerges along with the expansion of the institution, so that came still later with our conquests of people with different mythology. See the excerpt from the Inquisitors handbook.
And later still, the institution of God was a convenient tool for control.
That's when we started using religion for purposes of controlling rather than teaching society. So instead of offering sacrifice to "appease" the gods, we turned to sacrifice for purpose of "instilling fear" of religiuos power.
Mike, But, the big kicker is, when you do this, then man himself ends up being domesticated.
. Well it depends on your definition of domestication doesn't it. Slavery (advocated in the bible) is also a form of domestication. Objectively we are not talking about that kind of domestication, are we?
104

But it is still the same element. Now if that water could make gold, then we got something. Otherwise I see no value in Potential.
Post #63. The Implicate is a higher state of order than Reality, but Potential is an even higher hierarchical order, from which the Implicate order is formed. Bohm then proposes a final state of order, Insight Intelligence".
The chimp was scared and protecting his pack. Now if the chimp made and offering and prayed, then you might think there was a god involved. So I do not see where you come up with the god of thunder.
The oldest human bones found is 2.8M years old. God as a deity has been around for 12/15K years. So what we have in deities have been with humans for about one half of one percent of the time.
When you talk about viruses being thousands of years old. You are still in the Age of Deities.
Can you give me some dates?
Solid dates are like the Great Flood, May 8th, 2708 B.C. off the top of my head. I may be a couple days off.
The Near Extinction of Mankind. 74,000 B.C. to 71,000 B.C.
The Burckle Crater, somewhere in between the two.
The Age of Domestication. Unknown, (est. 160,000 B.C. (guess)) to 12,000 B.C.
The Age of Deities. 12,000 B.C. to 2015.
In post #45 you talked about Red Ochre. There were two burial methods. Red Ochre and Sky Burial. It is possibly that the sky burial was use by the natural humans (gods) because the heavens were at the planets. And Domesticated man (you and me) use earth to earth burials (red ochre). The viruses you have been talking about most likely wiped out natural man, but because of breeding, domesticated man survived. Domesticated man being of slave statues and uneducated passed down stories of gods who created man and the other items that they were using to survive.
That is just one idea.
I like it better than trying to explain to someone who had never heard of a deity, what a deity is. Most people don’t know how a car or airplane works, but they don’t just assume a deity must make it work.

105
But it is still the same element. Now if that water could make gold, then we got something. Otherwise I see no value in Potential. Post #63. The Implicate is a higher state of order than Reality, but Potential is an even higher hierarchical order, from which the Implicate order is formed. Bohm then proposes a final state of order, Insight Intelligence". The chimp was scared and protecting his pack. Now if the chimp made and offering and prayed, then you might think there was a god involved. So I do not see where you come up with the god of thunder.
You think the chimp had ever heard of Bohm? He did not pray, he defended (flight or fight instinct) his family fron this UNSEEN enemy that was making loud noises and flashing lights (which caused fire and destruction) and was throwing water at his family to make them wet and miserable. That is what he saw and experienced, but did not understand. This was HIS god of thunder, an enemy to be feared. In Nordic mythology this god was popularized as Thor.
The oldest human bones found is 2.8M years old. God as a deity has been around for 12/15K years. So what we have in deities have been with humans for about one half of one percent of the time.
Yep, even a broken clock has the correct time twice a day/night. That does not make it an accurate clock. God has been around for 12/15K years, but only in our imagination and an occasional "miracle" (an observable but unknown natural event) confirmed his existence, to our minds.
When you talk about viruses being thousands of years old. You are still in the Age of Deities. Can you give me some dates? Solid dates are like the Great Flood, May 8th, 2708 B.C. off the top of my head. I may be a couple days off.
Yes, because you take the biblical account of the Flood where God commands Moses to build his ark. But even if that date is correct in time, God did not create that flood, it was a naturally recurring phenomenon, just like thunder, lightning and rain. There is even evidence that Moses himself was a fisherman as well as a farmer, and he just needed a "bigger boat" to save his animals. Perfectly understandable, but nothing divinely inspired. The "parting of the sea" was MOST LIKELY a result of an extremely low tide, revealing a land bridge across the narrow divide. Nothing divine about that. As a child I loved a Dutch comicbook publication of Kapitein Rob (my name).
Kapitein Rob en het Geheim van Professor Lupardi, Kapitein Rob is minding his cousins Stijn & Sandra when he is called away on a secret mission. His arch enemy Professor Lupardi has developed a weather machine and is threatening not only to destroy the Dutch houses of parliament, but the Elfstedentocht as well.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0887750/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl As he always used a sailboat for transportation to his adventures, I was determined to get me a sailboat when I was grown up. Well, 50 years later, I was driving home from work and recalled this old boyhood dream and wished I had invested in a sailboat. On the following crossroad, I looked left, then right and there it was, my dreamboat! An exact copy of Kapitein Rob's boat and it had a for sale sign on it. It belonged to a college student who had financial problems and sold it to me for 1/3 of the price it was worth. If I were religious, I would have thanked god for answering my prayers and doubly devote myself to Him. Of course, being an atheist, I knew it was sheer luck, one of those rare moments when "determinism" seems to favor you. As to demon viruses, I gave you an example, the age of the pyramids. They did not know what a virus was, so it was a demon. Did god actually create viruses? If so, what does that make God?
A virus is a small infectious agent that replicates only inside the living cells of other organisms. Viruses can infect all types of life forms, from animals and plants to microorganisms, including bacteria and archaea.[1]
and
Viruses are found in almost every ecosystem on Earth and are the most abundant type of biological entity.[5][6] The study of viruses is known as virology, a sub-speciality of microbiology
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virus What is so divine or demonic about viruses. To the religious, it was a convenient vehicle for demons. No one ever equated a Plow with a god. But there was a god of the harvest (which was controlled by unseen forces (gods). You are citing religious history which presumes the existence of god(s) to begin with. I am speaking strictly from an objective evolutionary standpoint and the evolutionary cause for the "presumption" (from ignorance) of god(s) being causal to natural phenomena.
In post #45 you talked about Red Ochre. There were two burial methods. Red Ochre and Sky Burial. It is possibly that the sky burial was use by the natural humans (gods) because the heavens were at the planets. And Domesticated man (you and me) use earth to earth burials (red ochre).
I don't use ochre for burial, do you? If that is the correct way to bury someone, why do we no longer do this except in the most primitive societies? I plan to be cremated, but not to release my soul to heaven, but to fertilize the soil (or the ocean) with my ashes. When I am dead, I don't want to take up any more space.
The viruses you have been talking about most likely wiped out natural man, but because of breeding, domesticated man survived.
oh, domesticated man survived the Black Plague? Scientifically domesticated man does not pray any longer to be spared from demons, we innoculate against viruses and our religiously domesticated friends offer a prayer for good measure.
Domesticated man being of slave statues and uneducated passed down stories of gods who created man and the other items that they were using to survive. That is just one idea.
Some religiously domesticated men (pharaohs) believed they were gods or favored by the gods and that justified slavery as a spiritual hierarchy, where some are gods and slaves were the servants of the gods, just as in the Church. The Pope is infallible, because he is god's voice. But more importantly, in God's domain there is only suffering for slaves on earth, but never fear, after you are dead your soul will be welcomed as equal in heaven. Nice sales pitch.
I like it better than trying to explain to someone who had never heard of a deity, what a deity is. Most people don’t know how a car or airplane works, but they don’t just assume a deity must make it work.
We don't think a deity makes cars and airplanes work, because we DO know how they work. There was a time we didn't think flying was possible, until we understood the principles of aerodynamics. If we had seen an airplane from a advanced civilization on the other side of the earth, they would have been gods to us, just like the cavemen saw their gods. Have you ever seen the movie "The Gods must be Crazy"? We are asked to accept a Deity on faith (ignorance of cosmological facts), not from any scientific or even philosophical facts. But more and more, God has become the "god of gaps". What we cannot explain scientifically is proof of a god? Science cannot even investigate God. There is no proof of any god ever having existed except in the minds of man. They have definitely disproved "immaculate conception". If Jesus was the son of God, SHE would have to have been a clone of Mary. Remember it takes genes from two physical parents. Genes from one (female) parent resuts in a clone. Males cannot reproduce at all by themselves, but they can make babies in the female. Perhaps God inhabited the body of a priest and he deposited gods' semen. God, the father of Jesus, twice removed. Coming back to Domestication. Ants have been around for hundreds of millions of years and are a perfectly domesticated species. They even practice agriculture and aphid herding themselves. They even save their own hive mates. Compassion? Nahh, they don't have an deductive brain, but still they did evolve a very sophisticated society. Have ants ever heard of god? Are they gods? Are they a god favored insect? If so, why do we eradicate them when we see them anywhere near our homes? It is 'cause they are pests to us. Nothing sacred about ants. All Gods are the names we gave to "unknown forces". But if you state an absolute that any of these gods existed in reality, we need only a single falsification to disprove the absolute statement and we have debunked most of God's miracles. But still, from our wishful thinking, we have a last remaining god of the gaps. The God of gods and the universe and everything that's in it. And above all Heaven. All gods did and do only exists in our minds. As George Carlin observed "We made the whole thing up".
106

The way I view things.
Thor was like Santa. The occasional miracle. Most gods had three or four, they pile them up with Jesus, what did he have 24. The most of any god. With viruses, what I think was going on. In domescation they seemed to have travel great distances to collect plants and animals. This is most likely where the story of the animals and the ark came from. There were several floods in the past. I would guess when they gathered the plants and animals they also brought back viruses.
With burials, dust to dust, man was made from red ochre.
On the black plague, no it got everyone. But we are just now finding out the worst plagues in Europe was Leprosy.
One common factor in deities is that it system is controlled by the rich. The church tried to sell us on the fact that Jesus was poor. But now we find out that was not true.
On “immaculate conception". Gods could be married, have sex and have kids. And still be considered a virgin. But I have never heard the church bring up that fact. I think if they start bringing up how people thought in the past it might start people today asking questions.
I don’t think ants are domesticated. Domestication changes objects from its natural wild state. And can even create a new species. As in the case with wheat. They say it took over 40,000 years for wheat to be domesticated into its own species. Because of that, DNA can’t even tell what grass wheat originated from.
Fair sailing Kapitein Rob. :slight_smile:

107
The way I view things. Thor was like Santa. The occasional miracle. Most gods had three or four, they pile them up with Jesus, what did he have 24. The most of any god. With viruses, what I think was going on. In domescation they seemed to have travel great distances to collect plants and animals. This is most likely where the story of the animals and the ark came from. There were several floods in the past. I would guess when they gathered the plants and animals they also brought back viruses. With burials, dust to dust, man was made from red ochre. On the black plague, no it got everyone. But we are just now finding out the worst plagues in Europe was Leprosy. One common factor in deities is that it system is controlled by the rich. The church tried to sell us on the fact that Jesus was poor. But now we find out that was not true. On “immaculate conception". Gods could be married, have sex and have kids. And still be considered a virgin. But I have never heard the church bring up that fact. I think if they start bringing up how people thought in the past it might start people today asking questions. I don’t think ants are domesticated. Domestication changes objects from its natural wild state. And can even create a new species. As in the case with wheat. They say it took over 40,000 years for wheat to be domesticated into its own species. Because of that, DNA can’t even tell what grass wheat originated from. Fair sailing Kapitein Rob. :-)
LOL, thank you, I did become a merchant marine and sailed half way around the world. I even was honored with the Pollywog and Shellback ceremony.
The ceremony observes a mariner’s transformation from slimy Pollywog, a seaman who hasn’t crossed the equator, to trusty Shellback, also called a Son or Daughter of Neptune. It was a way for sailors to be tested for their seaworthiness.
Equator-crossing ceremonies, typically featuring King Neptune, are also sometimes carried out for passengers' entertainment on civilian ocean liners and cruise ships. They are also performed in the merchant navy and aboard sail training ships.
The captain officially made me a Son of Neptune named Flying Fish. It is a legal name. I still have the certificate. Domestication, it just occurred to me that we are using slightly different definitions. I believe you are using the term in context of human control over his environment.
Domesticated: These populations are bred and raised under human control for many generations and are substantially altered as a group in appearance or behaviour. Examples include sweet potato, garlic, pigs, ferrets, turkeys, canaries, domestic pigeons, budgerigars, goldfish, koi carp, silkworms, dogs, cats, sheep, cattle, chickens, llamas, guinea pigs, laboratory mice, horses, goats and (silver) foxes.
but that is a narrow interpretation, IMO. It does not answer the question of who domesticated man. Answer: We did it ourselves and it took probably millions of years from way back, when man was just an implicate potential in our common hominoid ancestor.
hom-i-noid, Anthropology. a member of the biological superfamily Hominoidea, including all modern great apes and humans and a number of their extinct ancestors and relatives.
I have slightly broader view, that allows for the self-domestication by all communal or hive species, by natural evolution (symbiosis). The ant practices domestication (horticulture) growing and harvesting a particular fungus grown only in the hive which are maintained and tended and fed dilligently by young ants. Who domesticated the fungus? Without the ant, it would die. Thats why ants grow them, its an edible crop that can be sustained in the confines of the hive. Ants also practise aphid herding, maintaining and purposefully herding the aphids from one leaf to another. They will even protect and defend their herds from other predators. Remarkable really for such a simple organisms as the ant. These aphids get to live a long life in safety. The ants, in turn are rewarded by the aphids' honeydew, which is actually milked by the ant...Holstein anyone?.. All communal species domesticate their environment to some extent and undergo a natural evolutionary process of self-domestication that may take millions of years, but results in a cooperative, rather than competitive behavior, when presented with common natural pressures of their common unknown gods (the elements). IMO, it was inevitable that some kind of religious, philosophic, and/or scientific communal practice would emerge in ever more sophisticated forms. In the end, I believe we are talking about the same thing, just in different terms. I understand religion, sometimes I use religious language, but practically I have no use for it. I have not yet been domesticated to that degree. Carlin, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r-e2NDSTuE (crude language)
108

but that is a narrow interpretation, IMO.
It does not answer the question of who domesticated man. Answer: We did it ourselves and it took probably millions of years from way back, when man was just an implicate potential in our common hominoid ancestor.
I see it a lot different. Domestication of the earth for man seems to have happened in India. And the stories talk about the Garden of Eden. So at what level was this domestication? From what history tells us, India was highly advanced over its neighbors. India controlled China for over a thousand years without a single soldier, by technology alone. Examples are. The chicken was domesticated in India, then went to all areas trading with India, like Egypt for example. Now the chicken had been in Egypt for a hundreds of years from India. But it was not until the Asians came to rule Egypt that large industrial chicken farms were built. The use of incubators and the ability to produce and feed many came from Asia. The Olive is another good example. Olives were in the Mediterranean area. They were small and few, and only cropped every other year. That changed when the Asians came, they brought the hybrid olive. The hybrid could only be grafted. They brought that grafting technology with them. The Mediterranean was able to go from flax seed to olive oil which changed the life style of the Mediterranean area. A note should be made about the colleges in India. If you wanted to study the atom for example. In 600 B.C. there was only one college teaching that subject. And it was in India. That college claimed to have over 20,000 foreign students attending classes each year. By 500 B.C. there were two colleges teaching the subject in the Mediterranean. The knowledge seems to have moved from India to Europe. The money used for trading came from India. It was the Cowry Shells. Last used in Africa in the 1960’s. The house mouse that is lives off of man, you got it, came from India. We could just goes on and on listing items that came out of India.
Anyway the point I am trying to make is that domestication was done as a trade and science in India. Not the same as a farmer in Egypt or a herdsman in England.
IMO, it was inevitable that some kind of religious, philosophic, and/or scientific communal practice would emerge in ever more sophisticated forms. In the end, I believe we are talking about the same thing, just in different terms. I understand religion, sometimes I use religious language, but practically I have no use for it. I have not yet been domesticated to that degree.
This is the main point. Religion has been around for a long time. But religion does not need a god. And it does not need a hell. Religion is about after life. What seems to have caused all the confusion, is the meaning of the term “god". Before deities, god had to of been the name of a group of people. Or a term used for knowledge. Or maybe both. The translators have done a poor job in passing down history. We know this because deity gods evolved. Thus the term, created in God’s Image could only happen by domestication.
Ever think of taking your boat around the world? Wouldn’t that be a trip to remember?

109
MikeYohe, Anyway the point I am trying to make is that domestication was done as a trade and science in India. Not the same as a farmer in Egypt or a herdsman in England.
W4U, IMO, it was inevitable that some kind of religious, philosophic, and/or scientific communal practice would emerge in ever more sophisticated forms. In the end, I believe we are talking about the same thing, just in different terms. I understand religion, sometimes I use religious language, but practically I have no use for it. I have not yet been domesticated to that degree.
This is the main point. Religion has been around for a long time. But religion does not need a god. And it does not need a hell. Religion is about after life. What seems to have caused all the confusion, is the meaning of the term “god". Before deities, god had to of been the name of a group of people. Or a term used for knowledge. Or maybe both. The translators have done a poor job in passing down history. We know this because deity gods evolved. Thus the term, created in God’s Image could only happen by domestication.
I agree with that analysis. You just apply it to humans and religious domestication as the communal practice. I do find it disturbing that after all this time our religious domestication has not resulted in peaceful coexistence. I took it in a larger context. In that context one can also say that the ant was created in the image of the god of ants and vice versa. But, of course ants don't think at all, so their domestication is from a non-religious natural communal practice. Physicians are created in the image of the god of medicine and scientists are created in image of the god of science, and vice versa. You are what you practice and what you practice creates a god of that practice, just with different commands. I do find it curious why non-religious communal practices have mostly resulted in peaceful coexistence in their "garden of eden". while man cannot seem to find this tranquility, in spite of the promise of a happy afterlife. Ants have no such incentive, they just function in the image of their god. But, as I see it, in principle we agree on the analogy of believing that we were created in the image of what we are, our own dedicated personal god. Unfortunately, human gods (and their human creators) cannot seem to coexists peacefully. My question then, is it necessary for humans to be in conflict (death and destruction) in the name of their gods? p.s. If "god created man in his image", is that not called procreation? Or is it, "man created the god who created man in his image". Clever.
110
My question then, is it necessary for humans to be in conflict (death and destruction) in the name of their gods?
My point of view. What does history show us? Gods as we know don’t exist except in the minds of people. History shows us the gods were the puppets or tools of the rich and those in control. I use to think that Jesus was poor, but now the truth is coming out to the contrary. The wars were for the rich to get richer. One of the longest running empires was the Egyptian. They were so much bigger than their neighbors that they did not have what we consider wars. The structure of Egypt’s power was set up to keep the earth in balance. Greed was the item that got the earth out of balance. The Pharaoh’s job was to re-balance the earth. He did this by taking land and money from the rich temples and giving it to the people. The Pharaoh is said to have to do this on an average of every twenty years. Or once each generation.
111
My question then, is it necessary for humans to be in conflict (death and destruction) in the name of their gods?
My point of view. What does history show us? Gods as we know don’t exist except in the minds of people. History shows us the gods were the puppets or tools of the rich and those in control. I use to think that Jesus was poor, but now the truth is coming out to the contrary. The wars were for the rich to get richer. One of the longest running empires was the Egyptian. They were so much bigger than their neighbors that they did not have what we consider wars. The structure of Egypt’s power was set up to keep the earth in balance. Greed was the item that got the earth out of balance. The Pharaoh’s job was to re-balance the earth. He did this by taking land and money from the rich temples and giving it to the people. The Pharaoh is said to have to do this on an average of every twenty years. Or once each generation. I agree. But natural self-domestication started here, I believe.
Abstract, The acquisitions of mitochondria and plastids were important events in the evolution of the eukaryotic cell, supplying it with compartmentalized bioenergetic and biosynthetic factories. Ancient invasions by eubacteria through symbiosis more than a billion years ago initiated these processes. Advances in geochemistry, molecular phylogeny, and cell biology have offered insight into complex molecular events that drove the evolution of endosymbionts into contemporary organelles. In losing their autonomy, endosymbionts lost the bulk of their genomes, necessitating the evolution of elaborate mechanisms for organelle biogenesis and metabolite exchange. In the process, symbionts acquired many host-derived properties, lost much of their eubacterial identity, and were transformed into extraordinarily diverse organelles that reveal complex histories that we are only beginning to decipher.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/304/5668/253.abstract?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT;=&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&volume=304&firstpage=253&resourcetype=HWCIT
112
Infinite potential is a property of the universe and hierarchically exist as the Implicate order before it is expressed (Explicated) in reality.
Finally somebody zeros in on the essential elemental; Infinitude. There has been such a clutter of confusion about ideas of God misconstrued as God. God's image being the undefined potential resulting from unbounded no-thing. The point of religion being to draw us up close to that. To focus our attention. Regain the image. The Word is the first THING. Endless iterations later, here we are. Yet the infinitude of the foundation permeates entirely.
113
This is the main point. Religion has been around for a long time. But religion does not need a god. And it does not need a hell. Religion is about after life.
Unless, like me you find it to be about enlightenment. The intuition of the inherently eternal foundation of existence. You are right, it does not need a god, or hell. These things arise along with ourselves in the confusion of seeming otherness. Our situation, this experience of existence, has the potential to teach us by what it is not; undivided and entire. A conscious co-operation with this process is the essence of religion. It does not require "death". Death not being real once the confusion of identity is removed.
114
Infinite potential is a property of the universe and hierarchically exist as the Implicate order before it is expressed (Explicated) in reality.
Finally somebody zeros in on the essential elemental; Infinitude. There has been such a clutter of confusion about ideas of God misconstrued as God. God's image being the undefined potential resulting from unbounded no-thing. The point of religion being to draw us up close to that. To focus our attention. Regain the image. The Word is the first THING. Endless iterations later, here we are. Yet the infinitude of the foundation permeates entirely. On my timeline of religion. If I was to put the start of the “infinitude" of god in religion. I would have a range of 600 BC to 200 Ad, is that correct?
115
This is the main point. Religion has been around for a long time. But religion does not need a god. And it does not need a hell. Religion is about after life.
Unless, like me you find it to be about enlightenment. The intuition of the inherently eternal foundation of existence. You are right, it does not need a god, or hell. These things arise along with ourselves in the confusion of seeming otherness. Our situation, this experience of existence, has the potential to teach us by what it is not; undivided and entire. A conscious co-operation with this process is the essence of religion. It does not require "death". Death not being real once the confusion of identity is removed. Yeah, the reason I stated that, the older religions show no proven signs of having a god. But they did have a heaven. And it is still that way in some religions today that we don’t know how far back in history those religions go.
116

Just interesting.
The word God is a relatively new European invention, which was never used in any of the ancient Judaeo-Christian scripture manuscripts that were written in Hebrew, Aramaic, Greek or Latin.
http://linguistics.stackexchange.com/questions/2229/the-origin-of-the-word-god

117
... Unless, like me you find (religion) to be about enlightenment. The intuition of the inherently eternal foundation of existence. You are right, it does not need a god, or hell. These things arise along with ourselves in the confusion of seeming otherness. Our situation, this experience of existence, has the potential to teach us by what it is not; undivided and entire. A conscious co-operation with this process is the essence of religion. It does not require "death". Death not being real once the confusion of identity is removed.
So in real people English, I think you are saying that religion is basically, us humans way of processing all the stuff we don't yet know, and all the stuff we can't know (due to the limits of our perception, including the limitation that comes with perceiving ourselves as individuals). Uh, if that's it, ok, I'm enlightened. Now what? (I hope it is nothing that involves typical religiosity bullshit.)
118

I am always amazed at the philosophical approaches to enlightenment through meditation.
Theism tells you to fill your mind with God in order to “connect” and experience enlightenment.
Deism tells you to empty your mind completely in order to “connect” and experience enlightenment.
IMO, as a meditation discipline, Deism is preferable as it seeks to “clear the mind” of all subjective notions in order to allow for objective thought, whereas Theism seeks to replace all objectivite thought by “filling the mind” with subjective notions.
At least one must be the wrong approach.

119
I am always amazed at the philosophical approaches to enlightenment through meditation. Theism tells you to fill your mind with God in order to "connect" and experience enlightenment. Deism tells you to empty your mind completely in order to "connect" and experience enlightenment. IMO, as a meditation discipline, Deism is preferable as it seeks to "clear the mind" of all subjective notions in order to allow for objective thought, whereas Theism seeks to replace all objectivite thought by "filling the mind" with subjective notions. At least one must be the wrong approach.
Enlightenment today might be a search on the web.
120
I am always amazed at the philosophical approaches to enlightenment through meditation. Theism tells you to fill your mind with God in order to "connect" and experience enlightenment. Deism tells you to empty your mind completely in order to "connect" and experience enlightenment. IMO, as a meditation discipline, Deism is preferable as it seeks to "clear the mind" of all subjective notions in order to allow for objective thought, whereas Theism seeks to replace all objectivite thought by "filling the mind" with subjective notions. At least one must be the wrong approach.
Enlightenment today might be a search on the web. If you are able to separate the "wheat from the chaff", much cam be learned on the internet. Perhaps not enlightenment, but at least some knowledge of reality.