Desert Snake
Veteran Member
An idea from another thread; namely, does a thesit have to believe that their deity is 'real', and not just a concept. //ie an actual entity.
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An idea from another thread; namely, does a thesit have to believe that their deity is 'real', and not just a concept. //ie an actual entity.
An idea from another thread; namely, does a thesit have to believe that their deity is 'real', and not just a concept. //ie an actual entity.
My two cents.
I think abrahamic has claimed the name theist. I believe God is an concept; its using already given language to describe the mysteries and interaction with the mysterious of life. By that definition alone, Id be a theist.
"... does a theist have to believe that their deity is 'real', and not just a concept. //ie an actual entity."
That's an interesting question... To be a Baha'i one must recognise Baha'u'llah as the Manifestation of God for this day... while we believe that the essence of God is unknowable there cannot be in my opinion a view God as merely a "concept" even though that in itself would be considered a "concept" ... and for me Baha'u'llah would be more than a "concept" I'm thinking.
So for me yes God is "real" even though I cannot know the essence of God.
I'd like to point out that concepts still exist, and are still real, albeit in a different sense. Anything which a person has awareness of can influence them; that which is "real" is that which one can know and experience in any way. That includes things we call ideas and concepts, which are also "entities." I honor the Spirit of Learning, which is a concept and a force, but not a physical thing; is also quite clearly something that exists and is a part of our everyday lives. This kind of thinking may be foreign to our classical monotheist-dominated overculture, but it was not to our polytheistic and animistic ancestors.
i voted noAn idea from another thread; namely, does a thesit have to believe that their deity is 'real', and not just a concept. //ie an actual entity.