An abrahamic sub-forum

[NaturaNaturans]

Good evening good folks. Id assume you have considered it, so what made you decide to not go ahead with it?

[Maddie]

1 hour ago, NaturaNaturans said:

Good evening good folks. Id assume you have considered it, so what made you decide to not go ahead with it?

 

I find the concept in theory interesting being the religious studies wana be nerd that I am. I would assume that the primary hesitancy would be that Abrahamic religions tend to be exclusive as opposed to the complementary nature of Eastern religions, so fear probably is that it might likely lead to heated arguments if I had to guess.

[Nungali]

yeah ... possibly .  I am not keen on the  'ours is the only real right opinion '   trip .

 

Then again , I am not clear on what an 'Abrahamic' definition is  ?

[NaturaNaturans]

9 minutes ago, Nungali said:

yeah ... possibly .  I am not keen on the  'ours is the only real right opinion '   trip .

 

Then again , I am not clear on what an 'Abrahamic' definition is  ?

Neither am i. I have the sense that christianity is mainly a greek invention, and that both jewdaism and Islam has heavy pagan origin. So does Christianity to be fair, but that seems to be more european pagansism and mithras.

 

Also, from what i have gathered from the quran, they are really not aware of Christian and jewish scripture, and yeah… abrahamic is not a good description, but as a sub-forum i figured it could work.

[Sanity Check]

The necronomicon and other tomes are supposed to be scary books.

 

But there is no book that exists on this planet, containing written sentences that is as terrifying as the christian bible.

 

Even christians do not read it, as it is too frightening.

[Nungali]

Yeah ....  Necronomicon  ( regardless of its 'invalidity' )  is a system that can work     IF  you know how to read it ,   re structure it , and  get past the authors silly mistakes and confusion at his results .  People have said 'It has no banishings ! '   Errmm, they are at the back, dont start anything until you read the whole book    .  A bit like following an electrician's manual  where the last page tells you not to forget to turn the power off first .

 

And it sorta ends in chaos and despair   " Dog faced demons are at my window at night !  "     Dude !  You where invoking Sirius ... the 'dog star ' !          What did you expect ? 

 

Whats so terrible about the bible ?     A guy puts up some travelers for the night , the locals turn up and apparently, for some reason (as the Christian translators tell us )  want to have sex with the  visitors   (  'Send them out so we  may  'know' them  ' ) anyway, maybe they just did want to meet them , but still, what happens next ?  The guy says nope , the crowd gets restless, angry , threatening to get outa control  so guy decides to throw his wife out there  ( or was it his daughters ?  or both , anyway ) the crowd beats her up and rapes her for most of the night .  Hubby comes out in the morning  sees her slumped  on the doorstep and says ;

 

" Get up woman "   - but she cant get up ... she is dead . So he goes in and gets a carving knife , hacks her in to 12 bits, wraps them up in parcels and sends each parcel to a tribe of Israel asking if they have ever seen such a wondrous  thing . They reply , no , we have never seen such a thing .  And then, he gets lauded as the only descent man in that town .

 

Ummmmm .... 

 

I went to catholic school ... NEVER  saw a bible , we got taught out the 'catholic catechism ' .. a highly censored version of the Bible with various spins and additions to it .

 

But not everyone  is terrified to read it  : 

 

( Malcome McDowle in Clockwork Orange ; after extreme therapy for super violent sadistic anti-social behavior , the prison psychologist is impressed to find him reading the bible and contemplating with a look of ecstatic beatitude on his face , eyes gazing up to heaven .... but then we see what he is imagining  ; 

 

being the centurion that is  flogging , crowning with thorns and crucifying Jesus

 

 

 

 

[Zhongyongdaoist]

I have been thinking about this idea for several days and I can see some good things that could come out of it.  I don't have much time to detail them now, but I will attempt to clarify the notion of an "Abrahamic" Religion.  Basically an Abrahamic religion would be one that claims to have rightfully inherited the Covenant which "God" supposedly made with the Biblical character Abraham.  The big three in this regard are of course Judaism, then Christianity and finally Islam.  In order to provide some authoritative background for this definition I decided to do a search for Islam and Abraham and found that the first paragraph of the Wikipedia article had most of the pertinent details:
 

Quote

Abraham^[a] was a prophet and messenger^[5][6] of God according to Islam, and an ancestor to the Ishmaelite Arabs and Israelites.^[5][7] Abraham plays a prominent role as an example of faith in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.^[5] In Muslim belief, Abraham fulfilled all the commandments and trials wherein God nurtured him throughout his lifetime. As a result of his unwavering faith in God, Abraham was promised by God to be a leader to all the nations of the world.^[8] The Quran extols Abraham as a model, an exemplar, obedient and not an idolater.^[9] In this sense, Abraham has been described as representing "primordial man in universal surrender to the Divine Reality before its fragmentation into religions separated from each other by differences in form".^[10]: 18

 

 

I hope that the above will stimulate some fruitful discussion which may further clarify the notion of an Abrahamic Religion.  I'll post my own ideas about how I believe such a forum could be useful shortly.

 

ZYD

[steve]

On 11/21/2023 at 3:41 AM, Sanity Check said:

But there is no book that exists on this planet, containing written sentences that is as terrifying as the christian bible.

 

I haven't read the new testament in its entirety but for sheer scale of wanton violence and abuse I would put the Torah up against just about anything. I vividly recall the first time I was told the story of Abraham being ordered by his god to murder his child with a knife and burn corpse as an offering to demonstrate his faith. That was when I checked out emotionally and intellectually and knew this particular mythology would never be credible for me.

 

Regarding an Abrahamic religion sub-forum, I will tag @Trunk, @ilumairen, @dwai, and @zerostao to see if they want to be a part of the discussion. Not sure if I would have much interest in such a sub personally but if enough people feel it would be valuable, I have no objection. 

[dwai]

8 minutes ago, steve said:

Regarding an Abrahamic religion sub-forum, I will tag @Trunk, @ilumairen, @dwai, and @zerostao to see if they want to be a part of the discussion. Not sure if I would have much interest in such a sub personally but if enough people feel it would be valuable, I have no objection.

Given that there are Daoist, Hindu, Buddhist, and occultist sub-fora, I think it is only fair to give the other spiritual traditions a place to discuss theirs. I’m not personally interested in Abrahamic religions per se, but would like to find out more about Kabbalah for instance. 

[Zhongyongdaoist]

I'm glad that this notion has found some support among staff, while I can understand that many people here would have no active interest in these proposed areas of study, I think that it is important for them to have a basic understanding of the origin and development of the Abrahamic religions so that they will be in a good position to not be fooled into taking them as being true and thus to be given serious consideration.  As examples I will note that last summer we had a former member, whom I remember as being quite interested in Daoism, who had been converted to some form of fundamentalist Christianity and wanted to share the "Good News" with us for the sake of our salvation.  Had this person been well informed about the history and development of Christianity this would not have happened, and while back we had member who came to Dao Bums advocating Sufism, which is little more than a pseudo mystical smiley face with which Islam seeks converts.  Fortunately there were members here, including myself, who were in a position to deal with his incursion and he left.  I view a sub forum dealing with this subject as like a clinic to "inoculate" Dao Bums against the possibility of becoming fooled by the fallacies that are promulgated by Christianity and Islam.  I also hope that this can be done in a way that can avoid antisemitism while examining the historical origin of the Old Testament.  One reason why I have not posted much on Biblical history is because it could be used to support antisemitism, and that is something which I hope that we can completely avoid.  Recently I was very hesitant to post this criticism of Philo of Alexandria:

 

On 11/21/2023 at 6:00 PM, Zhongyongdaoist said:

Quote

 

1. Introduction

 

A direct influence on second century Christian theology is the Jewish philosopher and theologian Philo of Alexandria (a.k.a. Philo Judaeus) (ca. 20 BCE–ca. 50 CE), the product of Alexandrian Middle Platonism (with elements of Stoicism and Pythagoreanism). Inspired by the Timaeus of Plato, Philo read the Jewish Bible as teaching that God created the cosmos by his Word (logos), the first-born son of God. Alternately, or via further emanation from this Word, God creates by means of his creative power and his royal power, conceived of both as his powers, and yet as agents distinct from him, giving him, as it were, metaphysical distance from the material world (Philo Works; Dillon 1996, 139–83; Morgan 1853, 63–148; Norton 1859, 332–74; Wolfson 1973, 60–97).

 

 

 

for fear. that taken out of context of the whole historical development of these ideas, it would be interpreted in an antisemitic fashion, something which I very much wish to avoid.

 

ZYD

[Taoist Texts]

1 hour ago, steve said:

Abraham being ordered by his god to murder his child with a knife and burn corpse as an offering to demonstrate his faith.

i  personally object to such subforum because of this kind of topics. if you still greenlight it, can it at least be hidden like other sensitive subforums?

[Cobie]

 

4 hours ago, dwai said:

… to give the other spiritual traditions a place to discuss theirs. 

Thank you. That’s a lovely notion, I appreciate it.  
 

Unfortunately Zhongyongdaoist, a Confucian, intends to spam such a forum with propaganda:

 

3 hours ago, Zhongyongdaoist said:

… I view a sub forum dealing with this subject as like a clinic to "inoculate" Dao Bums against the possibility of becoming fooled by the fallacies that are promulgated by Christianity and Islam.  …

 

And I think dear old Nungers, the occultist, also will spam.

 

So I would like it to be a hidden forum (which I will not join). 

 

Edited November 23, 2023 by Cobie

[NaturaNaturans]

2 hours ago, dwai said:

I’m not personally interested in Abrahamic religions per se, but would like to find out more about Kabbalah for instance. 

I think this is a good point of view. On surface level they seem dogmatic, boring, even insane, but i do think gnosticism, sufism, mystical jewish traditions are interresting. It is not that important to me personally, just thought about it since all other major traditions are represented.

[Zhongyongdaoist]

45 minutes ago, NaturaNaturans said:

3 hours ago, dwai said:

I’m not personally interested in Abrahamic religions per se, but would like to find out more about Kabbalah for instance. 

I think this is a good point of view. On surface level they seem dogmatic, boring, even insane, but i do think gnosticism, sufism, mystical jewish traditions are interresting. It is not that important to me personally, just thought about it since all other major traditions are represented.

 

As can be guessed from my own post above, I am in fundamental agreement with NaruraNaturans suggestion, and similarly inferred from this excerpt in another post of mine:

 

On 11/20/2023 at 1:39 PM, Zhongyongdaoist said:

Henads gave me an explanation through Eckhart's doctrine of bullitio for an experience that I had when working to invoke and understand the various sephiroth of the Qabalistic Tree of Life in my late teens over fifty years ago.  When I reached the top of the Tree and proceeded to invoke Kether the first sephiroth, rather than finding the expected experience of pure unchanging One, I found myself envisioning what could only be described as a radiant white cauldron bubbling with life.  This was my own experience of Eckhart's bullitio, decades before I had any idea of Eckhart's ideas.

 

I have not only theoretical, but practical experience with "mystical Jewish tradtions", AKA, Qabalah, albeit within the framework of Western magical practice as developed within the Order of the Golden Dawn, version of Qabalah which I was later to Humorously refer to as "Wasp Qabalah" because of its social milieu consisting of White-Anglo Saxon Protestants.  To a certain extent we have a forum for dealing with these matters in "Esoteric and Occult Discussion", but it is more focused on practice then the historical religious background which forms the social context in which such beliefs and practices exist.  A forum dealing with the Abrahamic traditions would provide such a source for information and comment on such matters.  Most people on Dao Bums are not much interested in such things, others are outright refugees from the worst aspects of the Judaeo-Christian environment which surrounds them, for these reasons it may not be one of the most popular sub-forums on Dao Bums, but with the right contributions it could be a useful and informative addition.

 

ZYD

 

[S:C]

Christian Mysticism, if there is any resource  and thoughts on the gospel of Thomas would be of interest for me. 
But I can continue to read what is posted elsewhere about this, so I am indifferent whether there is a subforum or not.

(Whatever was Leonard Cohens belief I’d be curious too…) 

[Taomeow]

1 hour ago, S:C said:

(Whatever was Leonard Cohens belief I’d be curious too…) 

 

Raised in Orthodox Judaism, ordained as a Zen monk, with interest in Christianity, Gnosticism, and Hindu philosophy.   I think "anything goes as long as it's not taoism" would describe his beliefs best ...most probably due to lack of exposure, he may have been "taoist material" but it's a narrow path and not many stumble upon it. 

[Cobie]

18 minutes ago, Taomeow said:

… a Zen monk, … as long as it's not taoism" would describe his beliefs best …

Hold on! 
Zen has it’s root in Chan, which (some say) came from the interaction between Mahāyāna Buddhism and Taoism! 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chan_Buddhism#:~:text=Some scholars have argued that,total fixation of the mind.

 

Edited November 23, 2023 by Cobie

[Nungali]

8 hours ago, dwai said:

Given that there are Daoist, Hindu, Buddhist, and occultist sub-fora, I think it is only fair to give the other spiritual traditions a place to discuss theirs. I’m not personally interested in Abrahamic religions per se, but would like to find out more about Kabbalah for instance. 

 

Traditional or hermetic ? 

 

 

[Nungali]

6 hours ago, Cobie said:

 

Thank you. That’s a lovely notion, I appreciate it.  
 

Unfortunately Zhongyongdaoist, a Confucian, intends to spam such a forum with propaganda:

 

 

And I think dear old Nungers, the occultist, also will spam.

 

So I would like it to be a hidden forum (which I will not join). 

 

 

 

Spam eh ?    Propaganda   ? 

 

 

In case anyone has never noticed ..... some people  'spam' ,  I mean question ... dissect, point out discrepancies  about  Daoism   itself on this daoist forum !

 

Also in defence of Donald, his angle is   historically factual .... if one cares to follow up what he writes, study the references and drop one's 'self loaded prejudices' . And I dont think anyone has sufficient value here  to call him out like that , unless you have actually done the research he points towards . 

 

But hey, whatever ... as long as we all maintain smiley faces  and accept   everyone and  everything   .... la la la

 

well, except me and Donald of course   

[Nungali]

4 hours ago, Zhongyongdaoist said:

 

As can be guessed from my own post above, I am in fundamental agreement with NaruraNaturans suggestion, and similarly inferred from this excerpt in another post of mine:

 

 

I have not only theoretical, but practical experience with "mystical Jewish tradtions", AKA, Qabalah, albeit within the framework of Western magical practice as developed within the Order of the Golden Dawn, version of Qabalah which I was later to Humorously refer to as "Wasp Qabalah" because of its social milieu consisting of White-Anglo Saxon Protestants.  To a certain extent we have a forum for dealing with these matters in "Esoteric and Occult Discussion", but it is more focused on practice then the historical religious background which forms the social context in which such beliefs and practices exist.  A forum dealing with the Abrahamic traditions would provide such a source for information and comment on such matters.  Most people on Dao Bums are not much interested in such things, others are outright refugees from the worst aspects of the Judaeo-Christian environment which surrounds them, for these reasons it may not be one of the most popular sub-forums on Dao Bums, but with the right contributions it could be a useful and informative addition.

 

ZYD

 

 

So, you include GD type kabbalah   as within Abrahamic tradition ?    At least one person here does not ... well, they seemed to agree at first, then got confused then accused it of some type of 'cultural theft ' , not original etc etc .  Which of course, I communicated at the beginning, which they seemed to understand, but then didnt later . 

 

I dont see why things like kabbalah , 'magic stuff' from any tradition ... or esoteric stuff from any tradition cannot go in esoteric forum  - all that would have to be done would to be to remove the 'western' part of the description ... then again ,  is 'Abrahamic' western ? 

 

( Just in case any newcomers do not realise  , Donald and I often DO NOT and have NOT in the past seen 'eye to eye ' on many subjects  .   However, that has nothing to do with his valid and relevant observations  and 'direction pointing '  he often makes .

 

For example , I will paraphrase  someone he is not that fond of , but I think it might be relevant to what he proposes his contribution in this area might be  ;   'The only real sin is to deliberately ignore  information presented to you , that you know is or feel might be true  but you ignore it  because it does not pander to your own prejudices . ' 

[Taomeow]

2 hours ago, Cobie said:

Hold on! 
Zen has it’s root in Chan, which (some say) came from the interaction between Mahāyāna Buddhism and Taoism! 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chan_Buddhism#:~:text=Some scholars have argued that,total fixation of the mind.

 

 

Like I said, he was (IMO) "taoist material."  

 

"And I lift my glass to the Awful Truth
Which you can't reveal to the Ears of Youth
Except to say it isn't worth a dime

And the whole damn place goes crazy twice
And it's once for the devil and once for Christ
But the Boss don't like these dizzy heights
We're busted in the blinding lights
Of Closing Time..."

 

I think I could write a whole "commentary," in the style of, e.g., interpretations of Zhuangzi, to this passage (as well as quite a few others) to flesh out my point.  But between taoism and zen, as another poet put it on another occasion, "falls the Shadow..."     

[Trunk]

On 11/20/2023 at 10:16 AM, NaturaNaturans said:

Good evening good folks. Id assume you have considered it [an Abrahamic subforum], so what made you decide to not go ahead with it?

 

[edit: save yourself some frustration and skip to the bottom of this message, to after I’d looked up the word  ]

 

my own perspective on the formative arc of this forum ...

Originally conversation was at Chia's Healing Tao forum, then transitioned to here.  The emphasis was always generically "cultivation methods and results", but initially with strong umbrella of modern Taoist origins, then broadened to include various other eastern religions, and modern eastern influenced schools ... all with an emphasis on cultivation methods, sharing experience, resources and results.

 

All of this within the context of western culture where varieties of Christianity are predominant and the eastern influenced cultivation scene is slowly establishing a practical foot-hold.  I never saw a need to include a special forum area for traditional western religions, as my view was always that there's already lots of that in current western culture.  However, I have no qualms about someone talking from the perspective of *any* religion and - as I review the topic now - there ought to be at least some area that includes "any religious orientation not already specifically listed".  Honestly, I don't know what "Abrahamic" religion is, specifically.  I'll have to look it up.  (And so I'd not previously considered it as a subforum.)

 

I still have some orientation of this forum to steer toward

1. cultivation method/s, results, resources ... and also principles & theory that assist in understanding practices and results.

2. an emphasis towards methods & schools that are of eastern origin, yet not exclusive

3. inclusive of some general area/s for religion/s not specifically listed

 

I'll review #3 to see if adjustments seem in order.

 

- Trunk

admin

 

p.s.

I am open to fine tuning on this.

cc:

@steve, @dwai, @ilumairen, @zerostao

 

 

~~~~ EDIT ~~~~

 

Agggghhhhhh!  Yup, embarrassingly woefully ignorant of a certain term:

Quote

The term Abrahamic religions refers to the categorization of certain religions; most notably Judaism, Christianity and Islam, centered around the worship of one God (God in Abrahamic religions). Abraham, a Hebrew patriarch and Islamic prophet is extensively mentioned in the religious scriptures of the Hebrew and Christian Bibles, and the Quran.

 

Yep: perfect.

We oughta have an Abrahamic subforum.

I was not previously aware that there was that broad category.

(Also, the whole formation arc that I wrote about previously in this post.)

 

That setup is good and still can suit the emphasis of TDBs.

 

A concern that I do have, is that some Abrahamic traditions can be aggressively sectarian in fundamental orientation.  That can lead to all sorts of trouble, at least in this eclectic environment.  Seems to me likely that making that section as broad and inclusive as “Abrahamic” + the TDBs context to begin with … I suspect and hope will neutralize excessive sectarianism.

 

I’m happy to add that space, and we’ll see how it goes.

[dwai]

1 hour ago, Nungali said:

 

Traditional or hermetic ? 

 

 

Don’t know much about them. Hermetic I know a bit more via Franz Bardon’s book and Mark Rasmus’ perspective of using it with Tai chi. Do share more context

[Nungali]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kabbalah#Jewish_and_non-Jewish_Kabbalah

[Nungali]

... and you might notice ;

 

"  Through these non-Jewish associations with magic, alchemy and divination, Kabbalah acquired some popular occult connotations forbidden within Judaism, where Jewish theurgic Practical Kabbalah was a minor, permitted tradition restricted for a few elite. "

 

So you should not have any traditional Jews approving of it with  such a distinction , let alone post on an internet forum about it .

That would be like me posting confidential 'initiation information'  from my  indigenous teacher  ... yikes !   And just the other day a friend (   a woman , who has a women's tradition indigenous teacher  - here those traditions are separate ; ' Women's business' / Men's business )  told me that their ( the group's ) teacher scolded them  ; " I see ANY of this on facebook  or social media  ......

I'll come after ya ! " 

 

I could do without that .

 

 

So really it be mostly hermetic ... unless you made a sub forum split between traditional Jewish  ( probably no valid posts ) and Hermetic , probably lots of posts .

 

Anyway , under this clarity I think you can see the esoteric and occult forum already has a space for it :

 

"  Esoteric and Occult Traditions: Western Mysticism and Magic, such as Hermeticism, Qabalah, Rosicrucianism, Ceremonial Magic, Occultism and more ."

 

 

 

Spoiler

A note on  'cultural property '  .   Of course if someone started a discussion about those things ( 'private information' ) from another perspective , eg 'New Age '   some might get offended about that the way some Jews get offended about hermetic kabbalah . Take for example the 'Aboriginal Tarot Deck '  ... seriously , there is one . It was made by a couple of Japanese tourists on holidays here .  I would enter the discussion on that  , but I would  make the distinction .  

 

Besides  ... my indigenous teacher had the 'Aboriginal Tarot Deck '  on  a  slab shelf in his gunya