For the hell of it, apparently
Is God evil then?
I would say No.
I tend to lean in the direction of Proclus and Plotinus with the view of God.
God is totality, completion, and perfection. Evil doesnât have openness and deference to God. Evil wants to become God in a possessive sense. To have all the powers for a local sense of Selfâto be a lord over others or over elements of their own life.
It can show up, frequently, from Greed and Ambition and it can also show up from Sloth and Laziness. âRemember the 7 deadly sins? lol. Anything that takes something good and adulterates to limited and selfish ends creates an evil.
Although I see what you are sayingâŚ
God is evil then
Evil is part of Godâs doing since he is âtotalityâ
Right?
So what you call evil is selfishness then? Cus me too
Nvm, I guess I totally forgot the last part of your comment
It depends on how you parse things.
Some of the ideas are best exemplified by Yin and Yang in Taoism. Lots of people tend to view it as a simple dualism. But, there are more complex elements to it. Pure Yang, for example, is supported by perfectly harmonized Pure Yin.
The unity of the two if like a cosmic slab of stone that can be engraved. The properties of the stone show up everywhere, but they can be warped in different ways depending on how the carving was done. Thereâs also some weird thing with layered time that goes on with energy.
So the primordial purity of God is never compromised.
But if harmony is broken, there are blemishes in local time and space. The goodness of God being warped by the essentially Evil will of people.
Essentially yes. A desire to perpetuate a sense of self that doesnât align with what is best. Whether it is because people are too busy with certain activities or whateverâit is ultimately just too many attachments to things that they shouldnât be attached to.
Good Pun
Where do you draw the line between what is best and what isnât
The âbestâ in this case would be something that leads to more qualities of pure harmony. It shows up physically and metaphysically as the beautiful proportions of yin and yang, which hearken back to the original purify of God at the foundation of creation.
In mundane things, there isnât usually a âbestâ thing. Itâs usually good or less bad lol
Thanks lol
Sorry for the heavy direction of the conversation. Whenever Tao projects get made, it tends to weigh heavy on my heart and mind. I donât even need to have a visual confirmation that it happened, some part of me just knows it and is pained by it because there is enthusiasm for a new ability or experience but no ownership of the process or deference to those who have gone before . --Under traditional standards, the sort of thing would have been considered worse than Dharma Theft (a grievous sin unto itself). I wish people would just leave it alone.
Anyways⌠on to lighter things
Oh my gawd. This is the hardest question people have been working on for millenia.
But if no ultimate good exists how would we recognize evil?
Iâve been thinking something like this. Itâs as if people automatically feel a need to become in ultimate control if they donât feel they can trust the ultimate power to take care of them. Or thereâs fatalism.
Watch out for Bias I guess.
Itâs good to be balancedâŚ
Well let me ask you this then:
Does evil exist for you?
What do you mean?
Yep, but good will always have greater ultimate power.
I dunno⌠I was just making a general statement this time lol
ââif no ultimate good exists how would we recognize evil?â, you responded that we should watch out for bias.
You can avoid bias by being balanced⌠in my own mind, I was seeing that as a way of hearkening back to the idea of harmony that I mentioned earlier. --Nothing that I wrote was without an empirical basis. So I guess I was making a bit of a jibe that watching out for bias would eventually get back to what I was saying earlier.
But, regardless, balance is always good, and bias is good to avoid
The âbestâ in this case would be something that leads to more qualities of pure harmony. It shows up physically and metaphysically as the beautiful proportions of yin and yang, which hearken back to the original purify of God at the foundation of creation.
I see
Do you have any experiences related to/working with Deities?
Would you say they represent or embody this harmony you are talking about?
Iâve had limited experience with deities.
For most of my years, since I had no tangible experiences with them I assumed that they either didnât exist or, as the Epicureans had concluded, they didnât care.
So most of my own understanding was just from energy dynamics lol.
But, now that Iâve worked with some NFTs related to deities, I would say definitely. Deities reside in a portion of reality which can (usually) be regarded as heavenly. As a result, they embody harmony to a greater degree than what we usually see on earthâwith factors like longevity and power that support this idea.
The ultimate harmony would be beyond determinate forms, though. So, in my mind, the abstract understanding of God that we find in the concept of Brahman or for Abrahamic traditions or the concept of the Great Dao itself would probably most completely exemplify the harmony.