sweasel.com

For the record, I was NOT a reader of alt.gothic. I read this originally on alt.humor.best-of-usenet. Back in the day, if you could read a.h.b-o-u and not feel humbled by the number of people in the world smarter and funnier than you, you were an idiot.

Or, you know, the funniest, smartest human being on the planet.

Shucks, Mr. Sweasel, Best of Craigs List humbles me. I suspect a.h.b-o-u would be simply crushing to my fragile ego.

What sort of minion could survive a smoking, twisted ego?

I had no clue that there were so many variations and subtle distinctions between various types of twats. Kinda makes me feel rustic and uncultured, like when folks talk about wine.

Weasels blog – its not just a site, its an education.

Religion. Meh. My attitude is: Fool yourself any way you like, but don’t waste my time with it. But I, too, have recently found myself – unwillingly – inclined to defend the rights of complete imbeciles to believe in whatever Hairy Thunderer or Cosmic Muffin turns their crank.

Uh…do I need to give attribution for the Hairy Thunderer and Cosmic Muffin phrases? They were plucked – clean – from the creative asshole of another.

Religion. Hm. It seems to start out okay, but somewhere along the way the ‘I’m right, and therefore holy, so I will slay you in the swell of my righteousness’ bit sort of messes it up. Once someone discovers a spiritual path and it gets established into religion, then you have the structure in place to exploit others with it, and… fight to the bloody death over the particulars.

What’s wrong with religion seems to be that it’s interpreted by human nature.

But crystal sucking twats don’t strike me as less legitimate than the Holy Catholic Church, somehow. You could make some shit up, right now, and call it a religion. That Science Fiction dude did that, didn’t he? And there’s thousands of followers. Don’t remember details…but, if it gets you there, even if it’s ridiculous to the neighbors, were there an all knowing merciful God, I’m sure he’d try and make it easy to be saved; not hard.

Like, there wouldn’t be one hidden path in the darkest wood with 18 passwords and 85,999 rules in order to get to heaven, cus that God would be a God of carnage with a sick sense of humor. That God wants to giggle while he makes you the headliner in hell.

A merciful God would be posting roadsigns all over. Any tributary would get you to the holy river. If you decide picking fleas off your doberman for 3 hours every night is the path to righteousness, the merciful God is going to be like, ’10 points for trying, and 20 points for not fucking up my garden with Raid’. So off to heaven you go.

That’s my belief. God’s not too picky about how you get there. “Don’t be an asshole and you’re welcome here.” Heaven should be like an open wedding party.

L. Ron Hubbard…Dianetics? That seems too obvious.

A merciful God would be posting roadsigns all over. Any tributary would get you to the holy river.

A merciful God wouldn’t have invented pain…

“Oh, He was really being charitable to us when He gave us pain! Why couldn’t He have used a doorbell instead to notify us, or one of His celestial choirs? Or a system of blue-and-red neon tubes right in the middle of each person’s forehead? Any jukebox manufacturer worth his salt
could have done that.

From Catch 22

“God’s not too picky about how you get there.” — Wabbit —

“There”?

This goes to the core of my issues with essentially all religious belief systems. All religions address – in one way or another – the subject of suffering and death. Not surprising, since death tends to scare the mashed pea-shit out of most folks facing it, myself included.

Personally, I think when you croak, the lights go out and you are simply……not. If one accepts this premise (as I have), then all belief systems simply reduce down to little more than rules of behavior while alive. Therefore (in my mind, anyway) the measure of a belief system is how equitable, fair, kind, tolerant, and REALISTIC their rules are. Some rules are obviously good ideas. Others, less so.

But there is another issue. I like to have a say (however small)in what rules everyone is supposed to obey. I really don’t care to have them dictated to me without discussion or consensus. (My usual response is a succinct “blow me”.)The idea that the rules were “handed down from afar” is patently ridiculous, and simply a ploy to short-circuit debate and agreement. To quote T.E. Lawrence:

Nothing is “written”.

The idea that we are simply ‘not’ after we die is something I’ve always rejected out of hand. I don’t really think about it, though. I guess it’s a feeling. Couldn’t say what happens after you die, but there seems to be all manner of weird shit even in the ‘alive’ part of the human experience that points toward this conclusion: I don’t see the whole picture.

Personally, I don’t think we ‘end’. I’m not sure what goes on,, I”m not sure where we go, but this uber-awareness like sensitivity to music, poetry, and the well-being of others, the capability to soar to great heights, sink to abyssmal deaths and to ask these questions… I’ve never bought the idea that those faculties are byproducts of physical evolution. Natch. Nature’s often excessive, but rarely pointless in her excesses.

But yeah… the rules. This is what I’m saying, if you find a way to God/Allah/Buddha/Buddy Holly, whoever your spiritual ‘One’ might happen to be, I’d say that’s legitimate. There might not be another person on the whole planet who transcends to a higher state through the ritualistic mashing of turnips with Dutch Clogs, but if it fills your spirit with joy, brings you closer to God, who’s to say that isn’t a legitimate path to spiritual transcendence?

I’m not tryin to validate wackos. A lot of established religions started with one prophet or spiritual seeker, though. Wanting, desiring, believing- really seeking God- that seems to be more important than the way in which you do it.

I’m not advocating belief or disbelief, just registering a personal observation.

re: There

My dad told me this, he’s the only dude I know who has read the bible for the sake of scholarly interest. In the Hebrew version(?) I think (?) The only actual definition given for heaven is ‘with God’.

I’ve had the same experience (defending religiosos from faux outrage), and as an atheist, I’ve had to come to terms with all religions. I think that religions have been valuable to the human race in the development of unsurprisingly similar moral codes (don’t screw your wife’s twin sister no matter how hot she is, don’t take candy from the 7-11 even if the clerk is in the bathroom, don’t murder). And for that, religions are to be thanked. But in the same breath, we have to damn the same religions for making that moral code “other-directed.” And the problem with “secularism” is that replaces a workable moral code (but one with a bad foundation) with an ethics-free shell game collectivists seem to be playing against the rest of us.

Since Man is, after all, a rationalizing animal, and will find a way to do what He wants provided it’s worth the risk, I’m still not sure it isn’t a good idea to scare most of ’em with eternal damnation just to keep ’em from screwing their wife’s hot sister, etc., etc.

I am a Christian. My observation is most bloody fights to the death are not actually over religious doctrine or belief, but land and the right to control that land.

jwp,

All true, and well-presented. Maybe that’s why I’ve found myself doing the defending lately and wondering why.

Opiates do calm and subdue….

Dawn – the key word in your assertion might be “control”.

Oh, swell. I turn my back on you guys for a second, and you go all deep and philosophical on me.

That was the heart of my conflict, jw. I don’t like religion, but I can see that we are in many ways a poorer society when we have less of it. It baffles me, but apparently there are loads of people who need a giant, angry grownup in the sky to tell them how to act or they drift into wickedness. And the secularists are doing us no favors, replacing religion with a self-centered nihilism.

I was very religious as a kid, much to the horror of my conventional middle-class family. It just seemed to me “the god question” was the most urgent and important one. I still think so, only I eventually answered the question differently. The more I read and the more questions I asked, the less sense Christianity made to me until the day I realized I didn’t believe a word of it.

The old religions have the benefit of being old. We throw a sparkly mantle of pixie dust over the distant past and imagine all sorts of magical things happened then. The longer ago, the more sparkly. Hence modern pretend religions such as Wicca and neo-Druidism claim to be heirs to ancient knowledge.

The more recently a religion was born, the sillier it seems. The focus is too sharp. The edges haven’t worn off; it doesn’t have the glamor of past; there isn’t a complex history or a rich literary tradition behind it. Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Scientology — totally nucking futz when you look at them closely. And the New Age stuff is just a silly hodge-podge of Chinese medicine and Dungeons ‘n’ Dragons. Now with 50% more chi and Tolkien!

Still, you’d have to be a lot more sciencey than I am to pull off pure, chrome-plated atheism. Like the wabbit, “die? And simply cease to be?” feels wrong to me in every way. So I guess I’m accreting my own silly hodge-podge pretend religion. Weaselosophy. Stoatulism.

Ugh. I’m talking god at six in the morning. Somebody make coffee, hm?

Like Weasel, the more I learned about Christianity as a kid, the less I liked it. Although, the idea that one is simply extinguished after death just doesn’t ‘feel’ right.

So,looking around after my disaffection with Christianity, I stumbled across Judaism and took a closer look (that has lasted 25 years and counting). While Judaism has its odd little sects, and most practicing Jews are there for the emotional comfort; it also has the intellectual rigor to stand up to the criticisms above: ‘faith’ or ‘belief’ isn’t a requirement, so it allows for the possibility that we just simply aren’t after death, which also allows that an “other directed” moral code is just that. The requirement is just that one acts as though an “other directed” entity is capable of frowning upon your behavior if you harm other people or animals.

The traditional concept of hell is extinguishment, whitishrabbit’s dad’s translation as ‘with the Hashem’ is closest to the traditional concept of heaven~but since the Hashem is unknowable, there is no earthly idea of what that would be. It also makes provision for people, like me, who aren’t born to the path of enlightenment; recognizing that there are other peoples in the world who can live just and moral lives without the rules and strictures peculiar to Judaism.

A good reference if you’re planning to build your own religion is Prager and Telushkin’s Nine Questions People Ask About Judaism. And of course, there is always Gagdad Bob!

I’m not sure religion has to be about death and our chances of survival afterwards – though, clearly, most of it is.

There’s also a sense of ‘weird shit going on’, from that feeling we have that there’s ‘something happening’ in the universe that’s just outside our field of vision, the ‘numinous’ – the sense of awe, or the presence of ‘something other’ at work.

Because of that, I don’t quite share Weasel’s disdain for New Age types: not because I don’t agree they’re usually as mad as hatters, but because I think they are at least trying to explore things that traditional religions (certainly Christianity and Islam) insist we must not enquire about.

Almost all the traditional religions rule with whips and scorpions. Whatever may be wrong with New Age mysticism (at least until the eco-loonies gain power) it hasn’t quite developed into thought-fascism yet.

Maybe it will in a decade or three.

Umm.. Can I get back to eating worms, now?

Sorry. EW1(SG) got a brief detention in Spam Corral. More than one link probably did it. (Akismet is really excellent — we’d be swamped in spam without it — but it’s ultra paranoid about links).

Yes, I’m a fan of Judaism, too. I think I’m capable of just enough righteousness to make Righteous Gentile status (though pleasepleaseplease not in the “harboring Jews during a Holocaust” sense of the term). I think I can stick to the Seven Noahide Laws. The “not blaspheming” part will be hardest. Not eating animals while they’re still alive? A dawdle. (Sorry, oysters on the half-shell).

Just hedging my bets, you understand. I see no evidence whatever of the existence of the God of Abraham. Anything odd and transcendant that has happened in my life has been small, mischievous and inexplicable. A god, not a God.

I agree with Uncle B that religion is away of explaining our awe. Take away religion, and the awe is still there…begging to be explained somehow.

I remain a Noahide precisely because of oysters on the half shell.

I agree with Uncle B that religion is away of explaining our awe. Take away religion, and the awe is still there…begging to be explained somehow.

I think that is just as good a reason as any for religion: it allows us to pool our explanations.

/Didn’t think about the two link limit that WordPress uses by default.

Interesting conversation – and one of the more civilized ones I’ve observed on the net. As Winston Churchhill once observed (I think): “Nothing is more exhilarating than to blow it out your ass without getting stomped”. Or something like that.

Two points:

I understand the view that “…the idea that one is simply extinguished after death just doesn’t ‘feel’ right.”

One of the cold hard “truths” I feel I’ve faced is that – to put it bluntly – “Feelings are not data/evidence”. This is a fairly serious observation, and when examined carefully and dispassionately is supported by the evidence.

The second point is “…that feeling we have that there’s ’something happening’ in the universe that’s just outside our field of vision” is true.

{I’m not picking on you Uncle B: you just typed it nice and succinctly.}

There IS something going on out there – something so wonderful and beautiful and stunningly complex that it boggles the imagination of ANYONE delving into it. Its called Objective Reality, and folks who study it are called scientists. They’ve already pretty much determined two fundamental working “truths” (if you’ll allow me the abuse of the word) so far:

One – O.R.’s beauty and complexity are never-ending, and
Two – O.R. doesn’t give an aardvark’s rectum – either way – about you or any other living critter.

If you think about these, you can realize that they result in a hell of a lot of freedom for us.

Some folks do need that “Hairy Thunderer” daddy-in-the-sky for comfort. Fine. No problemo. But one mustn’t EVER ignore objective reality: its deadly, and I can assure you it is not ignoring you.

I know, McGoo. I know. My considered opinion is that we die and turn to dust and there’s nothing magical in the universe but those bits of weird science we haven’t discovered yet. Only, I can’t seem to hold that thought for long. It doesn’t persuade monkey-me.

And I don’t doubt the utility of a less rational approach. Certain features crop up again and again in otherwise unrelated religions — prayer/meditation, daily and seasonal rituals, oaths. Religious gang signs. It seems obvious the inner animal finds comfort in the performance of certain kinds of rites.

Happy me = better-performing me = better things happening to me = even happier me. If a spoonful of mumbo-jumbo keeps me out of the abyss, fine. I’m not above giving in to my own more primitive brainal areas if I get something useful out of it. (I drink, after all — that’s about as blunt-force a mood-altering technique as it gets).

I’ve contemplated inventing the first religion that states explicitly up front is not true.

Well, hell. You’re no fun.

I was looking forward to a rousing bout of hair-splitting and semantic pitfalls, followed by the obligatory ad hominem attack, and (hopefully) even the random scatological reference.

Wait – no I wasn’t. Forget I said that.

Meanwhile, does anyone know the Kanji symbol(s) for “feather boa”? I found a japanese medical site last night and am of a mind to mess with some Med Advice folks, big-time.

Hm. Check out Tokyo Damage Report in the blogroll. He was giving a tutorial on Kanji and he’s written extensively on Japanese pr0n, so the two seem peripherally related to your question. Also…what was that blog that would translate tattoos for you? I forget the name. They were always willing to translate things when asked.

I saw that tattoo blog last night. I will find it for you and feed it to akismet.

The tattoo blog is: http://japanese.about.com/bltattoo.htm

Thx for the kanji reference, btw. (rubs hands in anticipation).

I agree with Steamboat’s assertation that “Feelings are not data/evidence”. I have come to a completely different conclusion of the evidence, however. This does not in any way make me better or “holy”. But I do know that only one of us can be right. Either what I believe is true or it isn’t. My belief encourages me to question. Any religion that doesn’t is a cult.
You all would lump me into a group of mindless idiots who believe simply because we have no other explanation of our awe or that I am intellectually lazy, but I am perfectly ok with your “feelings” about my beliefs.

No matter where you come down on this one, Dawn, you get lumped in with some pretty unsavory stuff. I once saw a film clip of Madalyn Murray O’Hair that made me want to start slapping and never, ever stop. I almost accepted Jesus as my personal savior on the spot, just to piss her off.

We agree, at least, that you (and I) are either going to be proven right or wrong. One of the most widespread, pernicious ideas floating in the soup these days is a weird religious relativism that says there is no right or wrong religion. Ummm…what the hell? If there’s a divinity, he, she or it has certain characteristics — a nature, some expectations — and it’s important to work out the specifics. That’s what religion is.

The squishy thought that, somehow, a whole group of mutually exclusive ideas can all be true at once is much more scary and alien to deal with than any genuine religious idea. Unitarianism is a form of atheism, as far as I can see. Or mental retardation, one.

“You all would lump me into a group of mindless idiots who believe simply because we have no other explanation…”

Not at all, Dawn! (Speaking for myself, of course.)

My beliefs – ultimately – comfort me and make me feel good. They do so because they impart to me a feeling of at-least-partial-comprehension-and-control regarding this wonderful phenomenom we call Life. I may not “like” the idea of dying and crumbling to dust, but at least I (think I) know what’s ultimately in store for me. Knowing is comfortable.

I dare say your beliefs could be summed up precisely the same way with – perhaps – a word or two changed.

The rest is rules and custom. Christians (or whoever) have some rules (some good ones!) that they live by. I really only have one “religious” rule: Ignore reality at your peril.

The issue I have with theistic rules is that if I break one, the theistic folks judge and condem me (exaggeration to make a point). On the other hand, if you break “my” rule…..well, objective reality itself will take care of you, and your little dog, too! I need do nothing. I need judge nothing. I might not even wish it were so, but I cannot bargain with it for you. Reality personified is an equal-opportunity asshole.

oh boy, oh Boy, oh BOY!

I get to drag out one of my favorite toys! Pascal’s Wager:

Pascal provides an analytical process for a person to evaluate options in regarding belief in God. As Pascal sets it out, the options are two:

Live as if God exists,

or

Do not live as if God exists.

There is no third possibility.

Therefore, we are faced with the following possibilities:

You live as though God exists.
If God exists, you go to heaven: your gain is infinite.
If God does not exist, your loss is nothing.

You do not live as though God exists.
If God exists, you go to hell: your loss is infinite.

If God does not exist, you gain nothing & lose nothing.

For the first 25 ah,20, ah 10,ok 2 readers, I’ll toss in a slightly-worn quote from Voltaire:

If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent him.

Just a thought on this deeply philosophical thread that isn’t completely common to sweasel (I enjoy the inane humor though – very Simpsonesque)… While the presentation of the Christian world-view may be perceived as domineering, bias, or exclusive I think that it is only fair to ask, how would an Atheistic world view be defended (or for that matter a crystal sucking one)? I see atheism as the most depressing of world views with absolutely no reason for any moral belief OR any reason for any type of tolerance. Put more simply, I don’t think most atheists walk the walk – they just talk the talk. If a true atheist were to look at life it would simply be life of self-preservation and promotion. Laws should be meaningless except for the punishments. Interaction would be dominated by manipulation and desire would be the reason all things are done. Although that is bleak, I truly believe being an atheist creates a purposeless life that results in the “live for today” attitude.

Weasel, well said in your rant against relativistic truth. Laziness, Stupidity, or Mental retardation (with a bit of wishful thinking thrown in for fun). It is so hard to talk to someone who thinks you are both right even though you disagree.

I apologize McGoo I made a hasty generalization (i.e. “you all would) in order to defend against an ad hominem attack (“lazy idiot”). I unapologetically am a theistic folk and I only have two rules. Mark 12:28-34.

Wow, this discussion has gotten almost as heavy as English food. I blame the beanz

Ahhhh…Lokki. You can’t live as though all the proposed Gods exist. Should you get circumsized? Eat pork? Pray facing Mecca? Accept Jesus as the only path? Fast on certain days? Feast on others? Which ones?

Moderate followers of the major religions behave as though all that is required of them is attending the important services and holidays and being an all-around swell person. This flavor of religious observance is pretty good for society — better than the fundamentalist kind — so I’m not knocking it. But it’s hard for me to understand.

Because if you read the scriptures themselves, they are MUCH more restrictive and particular about what God wants from you. God is very specific about it. You blow it, and you’re out. (I’m talking about the Abrahamic religions here. I don’t know much about any other living religions).

The only kind of religious faith that makes sense is the fundamentalist kind. Anything less than that proves you don’t really, in your heart of hearts, believe what your own holy book is telling you.

Or is it the supreme beanzing?

I wish this site had an edit function.

Then I could retact that bad joke I just made.

Hm. Yes. I have a feeling — thanks to the magic of Google — this thread might hop up and nip me in the ass from time to time.

How come’s you always start something when you’re not trying to start something?

“The only kind of religious faith that makes sense is the fundamentalist kind. Anything less than that proves you don’t really, in your heart of hearts, believe what your own holy book is telling you.”

Well said! And don’t worry Weasel, we fundamentalists aren’t that scary – we just want to love you 🙂 And this thread? Bring up religion and prepare for a bombardment – people want life to have meaning…

The Japanese take their religion both cynically and seriously. (Mrs. Lokki is Japanese, and I lived there for several years). The Japanese have a saying – “Christian Wedding, Shinto Life, Buddhist Death”.

Christians have the prettiest weddings.
Shinto is the easiest religon to live by. No regular services every Sunday. Religous festivals are fun and you’re allowed to get realllll drunk. Gods are essentially in everything, and whenever you run into them, you’re supposed to say Hello and offer some respect.

Buddhists offer the best deal on reincarnation, so everybody starts getting seriously Buddhist at about 60 or so…. just in case.

Is that the kind of relativism you’re talking about Weasel?

So Weasel, you’re saying when you place your bet on God, you can only bet on “Win”… there’s no “Place” or “Show”

(A horse racing bet analogy in a religious thread? – Hope God is too busy watching Sparrows fall to notice)

Ewww! Dogpile on the fundie! Dogpile on the fundie!

And to think I used to look up to boobies as surefire traffic drivers.

Ha! To think I’ve got a thread moving so fast it’s getting confusing and out of sequence.

Well, no, that wasn’t exactly what I had in mind, Lokki. I’ll never be able to wrap my head around the Eastern worldview.

I was thinking about the people who say, “all religions are basically the same” and consider their ‘tolerance’ in this respect to be the ultimate spiritual sophistication. Well, all religions can only be the same if none of them is actually true.

Which, of course, is what I’m betting.

Boobies probably do a pretty good job too… The comments would probably be a bit more simplistic though. I like that thought that all religions can be right if they are all wrong. At least it is consistent.

Boobies! Did someone say BOOBIES?
Oh boy, oh Boy oh BOY!
Dang, now I forget what we were talking about earlier…..

Shoot. My WordPress blog used to be the #1 Google hit for “droopy boobies.” Now I’ve gone ten pages in without finding it.

How fleeting is fame.

How in the world did you discover that you were #1 for droopy boobies? And I refuse to google it to find out why there are now ten pages above you. I do not understand boys at all.

Trust me, it wasn’t a boy-magnet sort of post.

While I completely agree with McGoo’s “feelings are not data/evidence” (the Left’s fundamental mistake, after all) that doesn’t quite cover what I meant.

By ‘something going on’ I did not intend to suggest solely the sense of awe and wonder at the universe, for example. I also (perhaps even primarily) meant the curious events and happenings that sometimes pepper life. Charles Fort’s ‘damned’ evidence, if you like.

It may be that Arthur C. Clarke was right when he wrote ‘any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic’ and that all the quirky, edgy, ‘let’s call it quantum ‘stuff will eventually be explicable in terms as iron-clad as Newton’s. Maybe, if that happens, there will finally prove to be no distinction between magic and science.

But, until then, I find something deeply hubristic about mankind’s attempts to stuff everything we don’t understand under the bed and pretend it’s either not there, or can be explained away by something that’s sometimes even less convincing than believing the fairies did it while we weren’t looking.

Good worms today, incidentally.

Oh dear. I wander off to my daughter’s graduation from elementary school and y’all take the conversation fun places without me!

But, as Lokki points out, I’m betting with Pascal on this one.

Badger sez:

While I completely agree with McGoo’s “feelings are not data/evidence”

I feel I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that I also agree with McGoo.

But it’s not the scientific part of me that’s interested in religion, because that part gets plenty of objective reality at work.

Good Lord Weasel! I leave you alone for a couple days and you get The Minions all in an uproar. Well, here’s my two pennies tossed into the mix of pennies here.

I was an atheist in my younger days and in the course of time and much thought I moved from atheism to agnosticism to theism. Now I have before me something of the quandary that seems to twist the Weasel’s whiskers: Well, all religions can only be the same if none of them is actually true. I believe in the existence of God, but follow no established religion. So, I have to pick the correct one (seemingly) or still lose the great cosmic bet. How about this view?

God occupies the center of all existence. We as finite human beings dwell in a narrow outer ring of understanding and material awareness. God has provided many spokes that connect our little ring back to the center. All the spokes look different. The people who travel along these spokes believe, think, and act differently. All proclaim that theirs is the ONE TRUE SPOKE and all others are false. From our perspective on the rim we cannot see for ourselves the destinations of the spokes we can encounter on our physical journey around the rim. Suppose I pick one spoke and follow it on my own life’s journey on the material and spiritual paths to my eventual demise. Suppose I find that I successfully transition from my temporary rim existence to an eternal one at the center. Suppose I find that I see others who followed different (supposedly false) spokes there too. “What gives?” I ask (supposing God is in a receptive mood to impertinent questions. “All the Spokes said they were the ONE TRUE SPOKE! How did all those other False Spoke travelers get here?”

“Spokes?” He replies. “Look back on your path and tell me what you see.”

I look back. There are no spokes. There is no rim. There is a tiny speck in an unimaginably vast and dark void with a slender white thread connecting it to the center. The thread is not composed of a single strand; it is woven with many strands, looking not so different from this side.

Einstein once said that “God does not play dice with the Universe.” Well, He does actually. What He doesn’t do though, is play a rigged game of “Gotcha!”

Pick a strand / spoke and go on a journey, folks. Remember, though that you walk along a thread and the way, whichever way, is narrow and it’s easy to go astray.

Or not. Feel free to ignore my nonsense talk of spokes, strands and threads and contemplate non-existence in the void.

Whelp – back to work! Type at y’all later.

I know, I know. I didn’t try. I’ve written a couple of inflammatory screeds in the past and decided against posting them. This one I didn’t think would go much of anywhere 🙂

That was pretty awesome, Enas Yorl

Weasel- You shouldn’t be allowed to get weekends off now that your blog has become an accidental center for spiritual exploration.

But have a nice one, anyway. 😉

Enas,

I’ll buy it. Your view is a more artistic than the one I wear myself, but – hey!, you’re an artist – so it’ll do.

But….but…you didn’t agree with me like everyone else!

Mom! This is sooo unfair!

Weasel – A 51(52 counting this)-count thread. Nice. I do note that nowhere above is the word pooter used, but I just fixed that.

Have a wonderful weekend, all!

Enas~ luvverly!

And, while I’m quite happy with my own brand of non-Jewish Judaism as it allows me to join congregations, it’s easy to see other spokes as I wend my way to oblivion.

whitishrabbit: Motion seconded.

Mr. Weasel, we’ll have you in the dock soon for non-support of a blog soon if you’re not more prolific.

I, for one, very much enjoyed your post, Weasel. And I say that as someone who was involved in neo-pagan witchcraft.

In my understanding, there is something fundamentally different between people believing in a belief-system presented as unchangeable reality and those who consciously invent or create their own reality. Whereas the first may be fantastical, they do not intend to be (no matter how bizarre it may seem), the second group cannot deny that they are essentially creating or inventing their own reality. While the first may be engaging in mass hallucinations, the other are playing make-believe.

What is interesting, though, at least to me, is the doctrinalization of the New Age movement (including the neo-pagan, witchcraft, Wicca, and new occult movements) – certain issues are now being debated in that world as certain issues (soteriology and the hows thereof, for example) are debated in established religious movements. Consider the debates on the reality of the Rule of Three, for example, or whether to go widdershins or deosil when casting and/or banishing a circle. Some have come to the point of imagining these to reflect on issues of reality rather than ideas invented a few decades ago. Of course, they are also deluded in thinking their religious ways are the Old Ways. Some are almost as inflexible as the fundamentalists of established religions when one challenges the antiquity of their lineage. And so it amuses me how some in the New Age movement are becoming to resemble those religious folks they detest or oppose or mock so much.