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Is God Unknowable?

Suave

Simulated character
Do you think the simulation is controlled or does God maybe create a random seed and just lets whatever happen, happen.
Like the game off life.
Some simulations go on a path of infinite change.
Some die out after a time
Some reach a stable iteration.

gof.gif

My guess is we are part of an ancestral simulation, We could very well be the simulated ancestors of our posthuman descendants who are controlling our ancestral simulation. We might be the simulated ancestors of God/or the gods.
 

Nakosis

Non-Binary Physicalist
Premium Member
They who’ve dwelled in God and they who’ve come across God, often agree that doing so:
  • feels natural,
  • is both decentralising and depersonalising - but not in a discomforting manner,
  • is peaceful and harmonious,
  • increases one’s understanding of the relation between all that is,
  • brings sense to what once seemed senseless (makes sense of chaos),
  • changes one’s perspective, priorities and actions in life,
  • teaches one to truthfully forgive,
  • makes one trust life,
  • fills one with faith; in God and in one’s fellow beings

God is not “knowable” in the same way that one knows a “thing” because… well, God is not a thing. God has no shape or form, no age, no gender, no positioning. And yet, one certainly has the ability to “sense” God. Though not physically, with one’s senses, because …well, God is not physical.

I’d say that God is knowable but not definable and thus, can only be experienced and not truly be put into (limiting) words.


Humbly
Hermit

So if it feels like God per your guidelines that's good enough?

Unfortunately I began to question whether my feelings were good enough.
I'm not sure it is something one can recover from.

Maybe that will help others though.
IOW if one finds what you describe, stop there.
 

Nakosis

Non-Binary Physicalist
Premium Member
My guess is we are part of an ancestral simulation, We could very well be the simulated ancestors of our posthuman descendants who are controlling our ancestral simulation. We might be the simulated ancestors of God/or the gods.

Scary, I actually understood that.
 

Trailblazer

Veteran Member
knowgod-1.jpg

If not, what can be known about God?
What is known about God?

Or if knowledge about God is limited, has this limitation been defined.
Any God that you believe is real. WRT knowing your God, what are the possibilities?
What is not possible?
According to my beliefs, God is apart from, and immeasurably exalted above, all created things. God transcends and is independent of all His creatures and can never be known except through His Manifestation (who is also a Messenger of God). We can never know the Essence of God, or God’s intrinsic nature, all we can ever know are God’s Attributes which are reflected in the Messengers and God’s Will which is revealed by the Messengers.

“Immeasurably exalted is He above the strivings of human mind to grasp His Essence, or of human tongue to describe His mystery. No tie of direct intercourse can ever bind Him to the things He hath created, nor can the most abstruse and most remote allusions of His creatures do justice to His being. Through His world-pervading Will He hath brought into being all created things. He is and hath ever been veiled in the ancient eternity of His own exalted and indivisible Essence, and will everlastingly continue to remain concealed in His inaccessible majesty and glory. All that is in heaven and all that is in the earth have come to exist at His bidding, and by His Will all have stepped out of utter nothingness into the realm of being. How can, therefore, the creature which the Word of God hath fashioned comprehend the nature of Him Who is the Ancient of Days?”
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, p. 318

Since no tie of direct intercourse can ever bind God to humans, God sends Messengers in every age in order to communicate His Will to humans. These Messengers have a twofold nature, both divine and human, and as such they can understand God and humans, and act as mediators between God and humans. I believe we can know God through His Messengers but we can never know God directly.

“And since there can be no tie of direct intercourse to bind the one true God with His creation, and no resemblance whatever can exist between the transient and the Eternal, the contingent and the Absolute, He hath ordained that in every age and dispensation a pure and stainless Soul be made manifest in the kingdoms of earth and heaven. Unto this subtle, this mysterious and ethereal Being He hath assigned a twofold nature; the physical, pertaining to the world of matter, and the spiritual, which is born of the substance of God Himself. He hath, moreover, conferred upon Him a double station. The first station, which is related to His innermost reality, representeth Him as One Whose voice is the voice of God Himself.....The second station is the human station, exemplified by the following verses: “I am but a man like you.””
Gleanings From the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh, pp. 66-67

I believe that God is a personal God, a being with a personality (including the capacity to reason and to feel love), but this does not imply that God is like a human or has physical form. What is meant by personal God is a God Who is conscious of His creation, Who has a Mind, a Will, a Purpose for humans.
 

Hermit Philosopher

Selflessly here for you
So if it feels like God per your guidelines that's good enough?

Unfortunately I began to question whether my feelings were good enough.
I'm not sure it is something one can recover from.

Maybe that will help others though.
IOW if one finds what you describe, stop there.

Hmm… I’m not sure, Nakosis.
I guess it would depend on what’s meant by “stopping there”. Stop what specifically, if I may ask?


Humbly
Hermit
 

Nakosis

Non-Binary Physicalist
Premium Member
Hmm… I’m not sure, Nakosis.
I guess it would depend on what’s meant by “stopping there”. Stop what specifically, if I may ask?


Humbly
Hermit

Don't start questioning your feelings. In spiritual affairs, I think it is all you got.
 

Hermit Philosopher

Selflessly here for you
Don't start questioning your feelings. In spiritual affairs, I think it is all you got.

Hmm… maybe.
Though, does not something about that sound a little strange…? If I come up with what, I’ll share. It sits odd with me… I’m not usually one to discourage questioning.


Humbly
Hermit
 

Kenny

Face to face with my Father
Premium Member
knowgod-1.jpg

If not, what can be known about God?
What is known about God?

Or if knowledge about God is limited, has this limitation been defined.
Any God that you believe is real. WRT knowing your God, what are the possibilities?
What is not possible?
Only as much as my wife is knowable or unknowable :).

God is infinite and the depths of all He is, is unknowable... but not to say you can't "know" Him...

Obviously it depends on which faith your subscribe to.

I know Him as Father, Love, Merciful, Helpful, Comforter, Teacher, Pastor, and so much more.
 

Kooky

Freedom from Sanity
My guess is we are part of an ancestral simulation, We could very well be the simulated ancestors of our posthuman descendants who are controlling our ancestral simulation. We might be the simulated ancestors of God/or the gods.
What are we supposed to simulate?
 

Ashoka

श्री कृष्णा शरणं मम
This is a good question. In Hinduism, God can be known through Saguna Brahman (God with form) and at the same time, unknown through Nirguna Brahman (God without form). I think God can be known as we seek him; if we see God as Mother, God will come to us as a Mother; same with father, brother, sister, son, daughter, friend, and so forth. Ultimately, until we reach Moksha (union with God) I don't know that we can know God, at least not with the realization of a liberated soul. But that's just my view. Other Hindus on here can jump in if they wish to.
 

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
knowgod-1.jpg

If not, what can be known about God?
What is known about God?

Or if knowledge about God is limited, has this limitation been defined.
Any God that you believe is real. WRT knowing your God, what are the possibilities?
What is not possible?

Does God exist? Is God loving (allows wars, pain, disease, flooded world)? God put Satan in charge of earth after evicting Adam and Eve from Eden, so is God cooperating with evil? Is the God that people pray to Satan, since it is Satan who is in charge? Does that explain why prayers go unanswered?

Once we straighten out all of that, we can address your question about knowing God. It makes no sense to try to know God if God doesn't exist.

If God is all that they say (knows everything, even knows the future, is loving, etc.), then I can say:

God is to us, as we are to a dog.

Can a dog know us? Dogs can understand that we want them to do things (fetch stick). But dogs may not be able to do everything (use and flush toilet, drive to town, shop).

When things are very very very important to God, God gives us special instructions. For example, Revelation is from God through a psychic named Saint John, the Divine, and it is a commandment from God not to attack Iraq or face God's wrath.

The problem is, we're too stupid to understand the very clear instructions from God.

President George W. Bush openly defied God by attacking Iraq. He should have had patients to wait for confirmation that Iraq was involved in terrorism. In retrospect, the 1,000,000 Iraqi lives that were lost were needlessly lost (since Iraq was not involved in terrorism). Torture camps around the world (such as the one in Guantanamo, Cuba, and the one in Iraq, and the one on a ship in the Indian Ocean) were clearly against God's wishes. Clearly W. Bush withheld info from American voters and most (but not all) of the members of Congress. Now W. Bush is a bonafide war criminal, just as Hitler was.

Revelation, itself, in the bible, says that there will be people who will alter the meaning of it. That's why Revelation says that he who alters the meaning of Revelation will be written out of the book of life forever, and cast into the lake of fire of the bottomless pit of hell for all eternity.

Apparently, many preachers now will go to hell and roast in its fires for eternity for insisting that there is some, hitherto unknown, town (or state of mind) called Babylon that is not the same as the Babylon that has been a city in what is now modern day Iraq, for thousands of years. Clearly Revelation was about the Babylon that current exists in Iraq.

Clearly W. Bush defied God when he tried to get Wilson to tell lies about Niger's yellow cake Uranium, falsely asserting (bearing false witness) that Niger was selling Uranium to Iraq. Wilson refused to lie us into yet another war, so W. Bush and Cheney outed Valerie Plame (Wilson's CIA wife), which resulted in the murder of embedded CIA agents that Plame associated with. W. Bush got John Woo to redefine the word "torture" so he could tell a lie and pretend that he never tortured anyone. Under that redefinition, no torture ever existed, nor could exist. Thus, under that new definition of torture, Adolf Hitler and his Nazis never tortured anyone either. Redefining is another way of lying.

Can we know God by reading Revelation? Yes, of course. The important parts of the bible are very clearly written, but reacting to Satan's fear (fear of future terrorism) we ignore God's commandments to us. According to Tom Ridge (head of Homeland Security), he never issued orange alerts (and he is the only one who could), but those alerts came from higher up (W. Bush or Cheney).

Remember that Satan uses fear, greed, and lies to sway our decisions. So absorbed by fear, we cannot follow or know God. We've attacked peaceful nations, killed a million innocent people, tortured people, all so that we could feel a tiny bit more secure, knowing that we murdered a million people who lived somewhat in the region where the real terrorists lived (right next door).

When we focus on our needs (our need to feel safer, etc), we ignore God's command to do unto others.

We can't know God while following Satan (fear, greed, lies).
 

loverofhumanity

We are all the leaves of one tree
Premium Member
knowgod-1.jpg

If not, what can be known about God?
What is known about God?

Or if knowledge about God is limited, has this limitation been defined.
Any God that you believe is real. WRT knowing your God, what are the possibilities?
What is not possible?

In the Baha’i Writings Baha’u’llah states that God is the ‘unknowable Essence’ but that we can know Him by His Attributes like Mercy, justice, love, forgiveness etc.
 

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
My guess is we are part of an ancestral simulation, We could very well be the simulated ancestors of our posthuman descendants who are controlling our ancestral simulation. We might be the simulated ancestors of God/or the gods.

Eminent scientist, Neil De Grasse Tyson, believes that we are in a virtual world (like the movie Matrix). If so, the suffering that we perceive is not real. Animals are not really eating other animals alive, as they scream in agony.

But, real or not, there is mental anguish when we think that horrible things are real (whether they are real or not).

The correct scientific method is to believe that we have proven, and ignore everything else. Otherwise, we could speculate an infinite number of things, and we know that most of them are not true.
 

Suave

Simulated character
What are we supposed to simulate?

I'm guessing the Sim's non rectifiable characters and favorable characters whom they judge as worthy of being reanimated into a paradise virtual reality world.

tumblr_pst4h30GUj1rr6091o3_r1_540.gif
 
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Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
This is a good question. In Hinduism, God can be known through Saguna Brahman (God with form) and at the same time, unknown through Nirguna Brahman (God without form). I think God can be known as we seek him; if we see God as Mother, God will come to us as a Mother; same with father, brother, sister, son, daughter, friend, and so forth. Ultimately, until we reach Moksha (union with God) I don't know that we can know God, at least not with the realization of a liberated soul. But that's just my view. Other Hindus on here can jump in if they wish to.

Revelation (Christian bible) says that in the end times, we will know all things. Indeed, we are unravelling the mystery of DNA and understand how living creatures function.
 

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
Hmm… maybe.
Though, does not something about that sound a little strange…? If I come up with what, I’ll share. It sits odd with me… I’m not usually one to discourage questioning.


Humbly
Hermit
Never question what people tell you.....now, about that bridge in Brooklyn. . .
 

Clara Tea

Well-Known Member
Only as much as my wife is knowable or unknowable :).

God is infinite and the depths of all He is, is unknowable... but not to say you can't "know" Him...

Obviously it depends on which faith your subscribe to.

I know Him as Father, Love, Merciful, Helpful, Comforter, Teacher, Pastor, and so much more.

"God is infinite".....finally, someone I can relate to.
 

Suave

Simulated character
Eminent scientist, Neil De Grasse Tyson, believes that we are in a virtual world (like the movie Matrix). If so, the suffering that we perceive is not real. Animals are not really eating other animals alive, as they scream in agony.

But, real or not, there is mental anguish when we think that horrible things are real (whether they are real or not).

The correct scientific method is to believe that we have proven, and ignore everything else. Otherwise, we could speculate an infinite number of things, and we know that most of them are not true.

Neil De Grasse Tyson's stunning reaction to Dr. James Gate's revelation of there being computer code in string theory is nearly priceless.


I don't expect anybody to accept on pure faith the notion of there being a simulator ( a.k.a. - God )
Computer codes found in string theory might be an objective indicator of our simulated universe controlled by a simulator ( a.k.a. - God )

Please note the discovery of error correcting codes within the equations of symmetry is a rigorously proven theorem.

Reference: https://www.quora.com/Is-theoretica...mmunity-and-has-it-been-corroborated-by-other

Is theoretical physicist James Gates’ intriguing discovery of error-correcting codes within the equations of supersymmetry accepted within the theoretical physicist community, and has it been corroborated by other physicists?

Tristan Hubsch
, PhD Physics, University of Maryland, College Park (1987)
Answered 3 years ago · Author has 1.4K answers and 1M answer views


A.: The discovery is a rigorously proven theorem.

To be precise, the (error-detecting and error-correcting binary doubly-even linear block) codes were discovered/identified within the classification of worldline off-shell supermultiplets without central charge [On Graph-Theoretic Identifications of Adinkras, Supersymmetry Representations and Superfields, by C.F. Doran, M.G. Faux, S.J. Gates, Jr., T. Hübsch, K.M. Iga and G.D. Landweber: Int. J. Mod. Phys. A22 (2007) 869-930, arXiv:math-ph/0512016]. It was then proven that these (minimal) supermultiplets in turn encode the continuum of all possible worldline supermultiplets [On General Off-Shell Representations of Worldline (1D) Supersymmetry, by C.F. Doran, T. Hübsch, K.M. Iga and G.D. Landweber: Symmetry 6 no. 1, (2014) 67–88, arXiv:1310.3258]. See also my answer to “James Gates claims that he found code in string theory. Does that imply that we live in a simulation?”

If string theory proves to be a valid explanation for the fundamental constituents of the universe being one-dimensional “strings” rather than point-like particles, then the computer code found within string theory could be a real indication of us being simulated by God.
 

blü 2

Veteran Member
Premium Member
what can be known about God?
What is known about God?
Gods appear in thousands of versions around the world ─ I dare say millions, if we look back across thousands of years of human history.

It appears that they're best explained as cultural artifacts, the product of human evolution, since they occur in such numbers with such frequency ─ as far as I'm aware, we know of no culture without at least some supernatural beliefs.

God and goddesses and divine creatures and so on have been used by their followers to bring luck in hunting and gathering, battle, fertility, childbirth, weather, &c; to serve as protectors, against other tribes, and diseases, and famines, and also against other gods and supernatural creatures; to heal; to answer questions; to account for life, death, and after-death; to interpret dreams and portents; to tell the future; to justify priestcraft as a profession; to serve as an external justification of the peck order; to justify the enforcement of tribal rules; and very usually for the chief god to represent the identity of their group.

It's taken for granted that they have power to do all these things.

Gods can also be used to represent particular aspirations and ideals.

Gods do not appear, say or do. Instead humans make images and symbols to represent them, and tell stories about them, and particular people claim to speak and ordain because they have the gods' authority.

And there's more, but that's a rough outline.
 
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