What is the "Holy Ghost?"

[DavyCrocket2003]

Hi guys. I have been trying understand my life from a view that rejects belief in God. Seriously, I am trying to better understand how I could explain my life's experiences without using the beliefs of Mormonism. There are a few things that really cause me trouble, and I am just wondering what any of you have to say about it. Don't worry, I'm not trying to bait you into an argument or prove a point or anything. I'm just genuinely interested in learning.

So, let me explain. I have had numerous powerful "spiritual experiences" that I claim is feeling the Spirit. It is a very real experience, and can occur in many different types of situations. For instance, when I am praying, when I am reading the scriptures, when I hear an incredible story about love and sacrifice, when I bear testimony of things that I believe, etc. It can be just a gentle warm feeling or it can be so overpowering that it almost consumes you. It is mostly due to this power/influence/feeling, that I believe in God. It is powerful enough that I am as convinced of God's existence as I am of my very own. What could this be? I have thought that it is possible that it is my own mind. Would you agree? I mean, could it be that the power of my own mind creates this experience? I am fairly certain that it does not have to do with brainwashing. I "felt the spirit" very strongly as a child, while reading a children's version of the scriptures. The first time I read the story of Joseph Smith's first vision, I was almost overcome with emotion. I read it over and over, and couldn't believe what I was feeling. It was the most beautiful and powerful thing I had ever experienced as a young child. I was like, seven years old at the time. I had not previously been very interested in the story. It just seemed kind of boring to me actually. But when I read it this feeling just hit me like a burning fire. Sorry, it's really hard to explain. Anyway, I have been a little perplexed as to how to interpret this experience, as well as others like it, other than as inspiration from God. Now, I know it's different from your perspective, since you aren't me and can't know exactly what I experience, but what do you think? What is happening to me and other people who have similar experiences to this?

Thanks in advance for your responces.

 

[MSizer]

With all due respect, IMO the actual explanation to what you describe is emotion. Atheists have them too, but we generally don't attribute them to something magical. That wasn't meant to seem harsh, only to answer your question honestly.

Mike.

 

[Kilgore Trout]

Everyone has these experiences. It's a matter of learning how to interpret where they come from, and why you're feeling them.

Indoctrination not only identifies a particular source for these emotions, but also primes people to feel them even more exaggeratedly in relation to the concepts identified by the indoctrination (e.g., god, etc.) - because once you feel these emotions in relation to those concepts (god), they will intensify due to the taught expectation that these feelings should be very intense and significant.

However, if you're able to identify these types of feelings in relation to all sorts of other things, and recognize they are just as intense and significant as compared to the feelings generated by indoctrinated concepts, you begin to see that these feelings are self-generated based on what we, as individuals, apply significance to. This can be pretty much anything, and varies from person to person.

The key, is understanding that these feelings are brought about because you personally define something as significant - not because these things are inherently significant, and are somehow causing you to feel this way.

 

[DavyCrocket2003]

Thanks. No need to worry about offending. This is an atheist DIR after all . So if this feeling or experience is completely self contained/self generated, it makes me really interested in finding out more about the human brain. It really bears some looking in to. Do you think that this ability can create similar responses in other people? As in, can one person experiencing it induce the same thing in another person?

 

[MSizer]

Thanks. No need to worry about offending. This is an atheist DIR after all . So if this feeling or experience is completely self contained/self generated, it makes me really interested in finding out more about the human brain. It really bears some looking in to. Do you think that this ability can create similar responses in other people? As in, can one person experiencing it induce the same thing in another person?

Not that I'm aware of, unless you consider empathy maybe. Seeing a person feeling sad makes most other people sad, so if you include that perhaps. Then again there certainly seems to be an influence of a crowd. There seems to be some collective enthusiasm that results from people doing things in groups, such as worshipping together, or even playing sports together, so maybe in that way? I don't actually know of course, I'm only guessing.

 

[Buttercup]

I've had multiple experiences such as you describe in the OP. It's my thought that when you feel a profound spiritual serenity or emotional outpouring after reading, reflecting or meditating on something meant to be meaningful, it's simply a consequence of what you just poured into yourself. Your emotional reaction is because you (your soulful self) was searching and what you read resonated within you thereby causing an emotional reaction.

I don't know if there is a god. However, I'm quite certain we have a spirituality that lives on after we die. THIS essence of you is what reacts in the way you describe, imo.

 

[DavyCrocket2003]

Not that I'm aware of, unless you consider empathy maybe. Seeing a person feeling sad makes most other people sad, so if you include that perhaps. Then again there certainly seems to be an influence of a crowd. There seems to be some collective enthusiasm that results from people doing things in groups, such as worshipping together, or even playing sports together, so maybe in that way? I don't actually know of course, I'm only guessing.

The reason I ask, is because that feeling (that I ascribe as the Holy Ghost/inspiration) seems to work this way. It's like the collective enthusiasm you're talking about. When someone teaches by the Spirit, the person teaching and those listening are both affected by this feeling. It's common to hear things like, "Wow, the Spirit was here today". Or "He was so full of the Spirit." Missionaries use this to convert people to the Church. I mean, here is a verse of LDS scripture: "And the Spirit shall be given unto you by the prayer of faith; and if ye receive not the Spirit ye shall not teach." The "Spirit" is the key to everything in the Church. People will believe anything that is taught "with the Spirit." Pretty amazing huh. So I guess it's all a process of conditioning oneself right? Like, if you expect to feel the Spirit, you will. If you think something that someone is talking about is important, it will stir you. If you believe a book is true, it will inspire you. Correct?

 

[MSizer]

Actually, Dr. Andrew Newburg has done a lot of experimentation on what happens in peoples' brains while meditating or praying and the like. He wrote a book called "Why God Won't Go Away" where he describes his findings. Another person who is known to dabble in similar stuff is Dr. Michael Persinger. He is famous for his "god helmet" which induces magnetic pulses to the right temporal lobe and causes either an out of body experience or a sense that someone else is present in over %80 of his subjects. Most people who try the god helmet say "I felt like someone was with me in the room, even though I couldn't see anybody there".

 

[challupa]

I have experienced sensations also, like most here have said. The interesting part for me is that I blocked these for years. The sensations make me feel absolutely at peace and wonderful. Sometimes they are so intense I shudder. Another difference for me is that they are usually a cold feeling, not hot or warm. I have no idea what they are or what triggers them. I can just be sitting not doing or really thinking of anything and they will come. I explain them as something physiological, not sure what though.

 

[yourhopeboundheart]

So if this feeling or experience is completely self contained/self generated, it makes me really interested in finding out more about the human brain. It really bears some looking in to.

this is the best response to something you dont understand - research and experiment. gather some information, build yourself a hypothesis, and begin to experiment on your own experiences. write your experiences out and compare them. get recordings of services that elicit certain feelings (i guarantee the sound-guy at your church is recording everything). be creative in designing your experiment. but most importantly, hold every piece of evidence up to an incredibly critical standard of validity.

Do you think that this ability can create similar responses in other people? As in, can one person experiencing it induce the same thing in another person?

if you want to point some of your research in this direction then look into "mirror neurons".

 

[St Giordano Bruno]

A Halloween prank gone wrong with a guy in a bed sheet getting riddled with bullets

 

[Terrywoodenpic]

People have speculated about a holy spirit, or the holy spirit, even before Christianity.
Christians have written about it, their experiences of it, and its connection to God and man, from the earliest days of christendom.

Why we rationalise it as a single being seems quite strange, when it would be far easier to explain it as the infinite presence of God.

However Christians decided at an early stage that God Jesus and the Holy Spirit were seperate, then have ever since argued about their rationalisation as the "Trinity"

The Mainstream Trinity
The LDS three Persons
amd the Concept of the spirit being the breath of God.
Are all attempts to make sense of our beliefs.

I am happy to consider and leave these things as a wonder and a Mystery.

This make them no less real.

 

[tomato1236]

I'm interested to hear that many of the posters religious or not have had inexplicable feelings of peace, comfort, etc. I've had feelings that I did not feel were the spirit, but I couldn't explain at times. Feelings of guilt, or anxiety. After some introspection and reflection I've eventually been able to identify their source in my behavior--consistencies between the occurrences of those feelings which made it clear where they came from. I think the times I've felt "the spirit" have a similar quality. I can connect them with consistencies in the behaviors I was engaged in prior to the feeling's arrival. This isn't necessary for identification, but in this way I sort of confirm to myself that it's spiritual behaviors that initiate those feelings.

 

[Ben Dhyan]

Good question DavyCrocket2003, are you familiar with the concept 'Egregore', it is a an aspect of collective consciousness and is distinct from the concept 'Holy Spirit'.
Egregore - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Now it is my experience from Dhyan meditation that altered body-mind-soul states of extraordinary 'selfless' consciousness can't be maintained for long as self grandiose thoughts and comforting emotions soon arise to dominate the mind-body complex. Now since there are many meditators over time and space who attain this state of resonance, the collective conscious/emotion planetary state is established and continuously reinforced with a 'flavor' that can be felt by those who manage to resonate in harmony with it. This is what an Egregore is.

For that reason, in Dyan practice, one is warned to pay no attention to the alluring thoughts and emotions that arise in meditation, for these feelings are not highly spiritual but are constituted of the lower vibrational realms and are counter productive to the goal of Dhyana meditation and religion in general.

 

[evolved yet?]

According to "Advanced" theology we are made of three parts, spirit (life), soul (emotion, knowledge) and physical bodies, and god is no different his soul is, well... god and the body is Jesus, and the spirit of god is the holy spirit.

 

[St Giordano Bruno]

An impression of a holey ghost