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"Many Paths To God"?

Eddi

Agnostic
Premium Member
Well? :shrug:

Please explain your logic besides what you may believe.
Wow, I was planning to make an OP in Journals with the same title as your OP!

I was even going to illustrate it with this little picture:

interfaith.jpg

I believe that the only way to get close to God is through accruing positive moral credit

But I believe that there are many ways to get positive moral credit

Therefore there are many ways to God

If that makes sense?
 

metis

aged ecumenical anthropologist
Wow, I was planning to make an OP in Journals with the same title as your OP!

I was even going to illustrate it with this little picture:

View attachment 46028

I believe that the only way to get close to God is through accruing positive moral credit

But I believe that there are many ways to get positive moral credit

Therefore there are many ways to God

If that makes sense?
To me it makes sense at least.
 

TransmutingSoul

Veteran Member
Premium Member
Well? :shrug:

Please explain your logic besides what you may believe.

Yes I see many paths and each of those paths lead to the Gate and we have a lot to consider if we are to pass through that Gate.

I see the Bible says it best in Mathew 7:14 "Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it."

Regards Tony
 

sun rise

The world is on fire
Premium Member
Many paths: same in essence while being very different in appearance (theology).

My logic is based on historical figures including St. Francis of Assisi, the Buddha, Rumi, Kabir, Hafiz, Jesus, Ramakrishna, Muhammad, Moses and the Baal Shem Tov. I add to that the records these people have left behind along with works such as "Practice the Presence of God", the writings of St. Catherine and others.

I also find concepts like the 'spiritual path' and Native American "red road" to be expressing the same idea.

I can look at the Catholic vocal and mental prayer and find the same in sufi literature and Hindu yoga albeit expressed very differently. Christian good works and Hindu karma yoga have the same basic idea.

I take away from all of that is that the essential messages are the same in spite of being expressed in very different ways.
 

Evangelicalhumanist

"Truth" isn't a thing...
Premium Member
Well? :shrug:

Please explain your logic besides what you may believe.
Near as I can tell, from what I've heard from the religions I've listened to , the only "path to God," (meaning the path that gets you to meet God) is death.

And while it is possible that billions of dead humans have travelled that path, tragically, we can't actually verify a single one.
 

metis

aged ecumenical anthropologist
I tend to agree with "many paths lead to God" for these reasons:

1.Humans have been humans for somewhere between 5.5 to 7 million years based on both the fossil evidence and also d.n.a. testing, and yet the Abrahamic religions have only been around for 3000 years or less. That latter figure represents on 1/2000 of the time us humans have been here, thus didn't the other 1999/2000 of the people who have inhabited our planet count to God?

2.These three religions originated only in one small area of the world, so what about human life on all the other continents, didn't they matter to God?

3.Therefore, therefore there is something illogical, imo, with the idea that God supposedly so limited Himself that He only favored one very small group of people at a late time in history.

4.How could we possible know if there's God or Gods?

5.I drift in the direction that there's Something that is just a part of who we are, namely an inclination for love and compassion that goes beyond being self-centered. As an example, why do robins produce young? After all, when the parents live and then die, what difference did it and does it make to them? Thus, since it is not self-centered nor self-sustaining, what's the driving force behind this push to even have offspring in the first place and then have to take care of them as it would be a lot easier for them to just move on?

6.Gandhi felt that God was and is Love and Truth, but also that Something that we have to tap into for direction, such as what the Society of Friends ("Quakers") call the "Inner Light".

7.Finally, this "Inner Light" quite possibly may be found in all of us going back maybe even before us humans emerged, thus this doesn't imply that it can only be found in religion. Maybe taking our cue from Nature itself is enough, such as what Spinoza believed. But either way, Love and Compassion gets played out on a daily basis, and it's not just with religion of even just humans.

Am I certain about all the above? Nope.

Take care.
 

pearl

Well-Known Member
5.I drift in the direction that there's Something that is just a part of who we are, namely an inclination for love and compassion that goes beyond being self-centered.

I would add that from the earliest, much evidence provided through archeology, there has been a sense of a 'wholly other', Mystery, defined differently by various cultures.
 

capumetu

Active Member
Well? :shrug:

Please explain your logic besides what you may believe.


No sir, God has always had one group of people. We became a nation when we accepted the law covenant shortly after God delivered us from Egypt. It was at that point we became His nation. He still has one group of people today, under a new covenant that was enacted shortly after Jesus returned to heaven. Eph 4:5 says there is one faith, and John 4:24 states that those who worship God must do so with spirit and truth. There are not multiple sets of truth. The Bible identifies the true faith beyond any doubt.
 

metis

aged ecumenical anthropologist
No sir, God has always had one group of people. We became a nation when we accepted the law covenant shortly after God delivered us from Egypt. It was at that point we became His nation. He still has one group of people today, under a new covenant that was enacted shortly after Jesus returned to heaven. Eph 4:5 says there is one faith, and John 4:24 states that those who worship God must do so with spirit and truth. There are not multiple sets of truth. The Bible identifies the true faith beyond any doubt.
That's if one doesn't realize that scriptures are really not objective-- they're subjective. If you doubt this, try and provide objective evidence that the Upanishads are wrong and the Bible is right?

What I am not saying is that your believe in the Bible is wrong, only that it is not the only source of morals and inspiration that I believe have a Divine source. I could be wrong on this, but it is the only position that makes sense to me.
 

pearl

Well-Known Member
Indigenous peoples are filling in the gaps in our faith as Pope Francis continues the journey that St. John Paul II started. Working through the relationship between new philosophies and church doctrine is messy. Thankfully, indigenous Christians have already put in centuries of work sorting out these questions, exemplified in Servant of God Nicholas Black Elk’s spiritual classic, The Sacred Pipe. I believe in Christ, he stated without qualification, but all should know “the greatness and truth” of Lakota tradition “to help in bringing peace upon the earth...within men and between the whole of creation.”
Indigenous peoples are filling in the gaps in our Catholic faith | America Magazine
 

Vinayaka

devotee
Premium Member
I agree there are many paths. I also agree that they're going to 'something'. Where I differ is on the term 'God', as I've rarely seen a definition of 'God' that suits all. So yes, there are many paths, but I'm not convinced they all lead to the same place. Although I've heard people claim that moksha and heaven are synonyms, I personally don't believe it, as the descriptions are so different.

Nice thought, but I looked closer.
 

pearl

Well-Known Member
Where I differ is on the term 'God',

The word "God" is a bit of shorthand, a stand-in which functions in Christian theology almost as "X" functions in algebra. When working an algebraic problem, one's concern is "X." But "X" is the stand-in for the thing one doesn't know
 
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