What is belief in God? I grew up religious (a Muslim) but grew out of it when I was around 13 years old. Now I have a Master's Degree in Philosophy but I still don't have any clue what it even means for people to say they believe in God.
During my childhood believing in God was actually literally akin to believing in Santa, a very nice story that just wasn't questioned. But what's it like for a reasonable adult?
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My dad was raised a southern baptist, became an atheist, but returned to Christianity (sort of) after a nervous breakdown. He's an extremely level-headed, reasonable and competent person and he sincerely believes in god. For him it entails the existence of a higher power with a plan for his life, and indeed all lives. He definitely believes god created the universe and so forth, though how much of his faith actually aligns with Christian doctrine I cannot say since he is very private about it.
Look into mysticism and non-dual ideas about God.
"God" isn't a being in the sky controlling the universe and demanding worship. "God" is rather Being Itself, of which you are a part.
While this is a good question, this is really not the appropriate board to post it on.
If God is Being Itself, he must utterly transcend finite being, so that finite being could not possibly be said to be 'part' of him. If we were parts of God, he would depend upon us, and hence be qualified being, not Being Itself.
>master's degree in philosophy
>isn't familiar with various philosophical conceptions of god
i call bullshit
...
Are you Abrahamic?
>Tfw no runi mara gf
Believing in Santa into adulthood. Not thinking too hard abou it... I stayed only marginally faithful till my late 20s. Embarrassingly long in hindsight. And a fretful agnostic period followed. I felt so much better once I took the time o challenge these stupid ideas. I can’t imagine keeping that mindset into senility.
! I love Brittany Nicole Cox
Good response user. Hadn't thought about that really before
>! I love Brittany Nicole Cox
the fact that you know about her and like her has ruined her for me you degenerate tripfag
>If...
But no. So your whole line of reasoning is abysmal.
this
>If God is Being Itself, he must utterly transcend finite being, so that finite being could not possibly be said to be 'part' of him
Only if finite being was actually real, but some of the main areas of Islamic mysticism (e.g. Sufism) holds that in a higher sense there is only God, because to attribute inherent or fundamental existence to everything is to in a sense create a duality or posit a partner/opposition to God; which is forbidden in the Quran. These ideas are supported in Sufi texts by the examination of various Quran and Hadith verses that suggest this, for example the Quran says 'we are nearer to him than his jugular vein', and in one of the Qudsi Hadith (which are effectively the direct words of God in the traditional Islamic view) God says of those who draw near to him "I am his hearing and his sight". That Mohammad taught some sort of esoterism concerning a higher level of understanding different from the exoteric view is supported by reputable hadith passages such as the one where one guys says "I was taught two kinds of knowledge by the prophet, with one of those if I revealed it you would strike off my head". One of the main aims of Sufism is to seek fanā (extinction of the self) and from there baqāʾ (subsistence in God), in effect actualizing what is already true in the highest sense but not realized. I don't know the exact sources by memory but if you are genuinely interested I have the books which cite them in my room and can look them up for you if you want.
> If we were parts of God, he would depend upon us, and hence be qualified being, not Being Itself.
Wrong, this would only hold water if the parts were as real/essential as God, but if they are effectively transient and not fundamentally real than there is no qualification of God by them. In Sufism the manifestation of the universe is more or less simply the overflowing of Gods existence. Rays of light emanating out from the Sun are not totally separate from the sun with their own fundamental independent existence, but the Sun itself does not depend on that light. If you are OP, than like the other poster I would advise you to begin studying or seek out personal instruction in Islamic mysticism/esoterism if you truly want to know what it is like to believe in God, you won't get there by applying philosophical methods of logic.
show us your tits
>Imagination falls short of His attributes; understanding vainly boasts her powers; the prophets are confounded at these sayings, the saints stupefied at these attributes. He is the desired and lord of reason and soul, the goal of disciple and devotee. Reason is as a guide to His existence; all other existences are under the foot of His existence. His acts are not bounded by 'inside' and 'outside'; His essence is superior to 'how' and 'why.' Intelligence has not reached the comprehension of His essence; the soul and heart of reason are dust upon this road; reason, without the collyrium of friendship with Him, has no knowledge of His divinity. Why dost thou instigate imagination to discuss Him? How shall a raw youth speak of the Eternal?
>By reason and thought and sense no living thing can come to know God. When the glory of His nature manifests itself to reason, it sweeps away both reason and soul. Let reason be invested with dignity in the rank where stands the faithful Gabriel; yet before all His majesty a Gabriel becomes less than a sparrow through awe
Sanā'ī - The Hadîqatu' L-Haqîqat
May I asked you where you got this knowledge/reasoning from, did you study this on your own or have you been enrolled in certain uni courses?
Explain how your life has improved since you've become an atheist
No more anxiety. Learned to be happy. Have actual feelings of ataraxia.
Its a short life, but you appreciate it more knowing that this is it. People with the old escape hatch after death don’t understand life the same way.
I feel free. Though I’m still a wage slave, my mind is my own
I got it after reading books specifically about Sufism and also translated works by various Sufi thinkers and poets in my own free time. I enjoy reading texts from the mysticism of other religions as well but I find Sufism to be very interesting. Sufism is above all else something transmitted by instruction from a master to disciple, all the writings are in a sense sort of secondary to that, I accept that without becoming personally involved in such a context I will never completely understand it, but nevertheless enough texts have been written by Sufis throughout history that through studying them one can still gain a decent knowledge of it to an extent that enables one to deeply appreciate it.
>muslim
go back to your country
please fucking kill yourself you disgusting fellah ant
>I accept that without becoming personally involved
So you are not a sufi yourself?
>I stayed only marginally faithful till my late 20s. Embarrassingly long in hindsight.
My hard materialism did not crystallize until I was 26, which was due to an almost subconscious unwillingness to face fear about one's own extinction. I wonder how long it takes other more intelligent people but I guess it's all relative; John Von Neumann died believing there was a God, probably because he was too busy doing brilliant work to even think about the idea, but I'm guessing he took the Pascal pill in the end. I'd rather die alone, without some disingenuous notions.
No, I'm not even a Muslim. The possibly remains open that one day in the future I could convert to Islam and seek out initiation into a Sufi order, but I don't feel driven to do that at the present time. There are other areas of mysticism and eastern philosophy which interest me just as much as Sufism does. Despite being neither a Muslim nor Sufi I still have a deep appreciation and respect for it though.
I'm not sure what you mean by 'fundamental existence.' Obviously nothing exists non-derivatively apart from God. But having derivative existence is not the same as having *no* existence. God alone exists unqualifiedly and underivatively, but that doesn't mean qualified and derivative things are nothing.
Aristotle gives us the stable category between being and non-being which allows us to affirm the contingent world, namely, potency, or orderedness-toward being. With finite beings consisting of acts qualified and limited by potency, we understand the intermediate sense in which the things of common experience exist- they are not God, but they are also not nothing, consisting in a certain contingent, finite relation toward God.
Nondualism is to deny the fact of creation, which is manifestly contrary to sense, reason and genuine communion with God (since communion implies a relation between the communer and God). It is a symptom either of weak categories unable to digest contingent existence, or an unnecessary parity posited between the being of God and that of creatures.
>this would only hold water if the parts were as real/essential as God
If God truly has parts, then he must be truly divided, and thus, dependent upon his components. If he is only 'divided' in some extrinsic sense, as when we capture some aspect of him in limited words, then he can't really said to have parts, or us as parts, and hence the idea that we are 'part' of God is absurd. Or, you could deny that finite exists at all.
I was sharing a premise with my interlocutor. One cannot spend all one's time accounting for the weakest intellects, or one would never get serious contemplation done.
At its most reduced it just means that there’s some sort of order in the universe and things are constructed in some way. This brings great comfort to humans and always will.
>appreciate it more
I’m glad you’re avoiding nihilism but the ignorance it takes to make this a prescriptive axiom is disgusting. The less fortunate and frankly the stupid don’t have the luxury you do faggot. Stop pretending this shit is a priori.
1. I accept nihilism as far as I can throw it.
2. I urgently want to afford these same luxuries to all others;
hence I am a socialist.
Why do the haters of this pomo world stick so tightly to it? Even the trads can't seem to get over it. I tell people to start with the Greeks in hopes they'll be inspired by mythic heroes. Instead all I get is a flock of spiritualists going on and on about Platonism
>The less fortunate and frankly the stupid don’t have the luxury you do faggot
Stop drinking onions.
>Now I have a Master's Degree in Philosophy but I still don't have any clue what it even means for people to say they believe in God.
how is this fucking possible.
I have no degree and know exactly what it means to believe in God.
Go back to Islam, life is easier that way
>I have no degree and know exactly what it means to believe in God.
Kek. Let's hear it, just for fun.
>Kek. Let's hear it, just for fun.
Believing in God is adopting as true the philosophical assumption that a first principle exists. That's it. Questions of the nature of God have been examined by all the big names, and I find these attributes of God determined by Aristotle and Aquinas most convincing. Belief in God also has a revealed component in Scripture, which imo is 100% necessary. It is a mystical understanding based in a Semitic-Platonic syncretism, but without it we would not have the understanding of God we do today. The ideas would no doubt have been found anyway, but God would be some impersonal faceless deity without parts, without an implemented morality, and probably forgotten or lost forever in some library fire. This would be a bugman world.
>Believing in God is adopting as true the philosophical assumption that a first principle exists.
That's a bit shallow and incomplete, because it ignores the more existential aspects and reasons why people make the claim to believe.
Ask yourself this: How do you know whether a person believes in God or not? How can you tell they're not pretending/lying about it? How does one know himself whether he believes or not?
You are a bit shallow and incomplete.
>it ignores the more existential aspects and reasons why people make the claim to believe
No. Keep reading. I said Scripture is indispensable. If one asserts to oneself that a first principle exists, that one is a created being, then all those 'existential aspects and reasons' you were so vague about will naturally follow.
>Ask yourself this: How do you know whether a person believes in God or not?
You don't. How is it necessary to anyone to know this.
>How can you tell they're not pretending/lying about it?
Same dumb question with a different wording.
>How does one know himself whether he believes or not?
I already explained this. By adopting an assumption as true. It's just an idea. You can change your mind on it from day to day. But if you are religious, and especially if you are Christian, loyalty to that idea is not only necessary but also a blessing to the believer. I am in this camp.
>>Ask yourself this: How do you know whether a person believes in God or not?
>You don't. How is it necessary to anyone to know this.
Because that is literally OPs problem.
No. This is OP's question:
>But what's it like for a reasonable adult?
I have answered it.
it seems pretty clear to me that a belief in God is a belief in something deeper than just a first principle. Like it encompasses more things than just the knowledge or perception of a being. It's really more like a movement towards faith, which can be hard to deal with in an extremely logical way, because it isn't about logic.
Like what Pascal wrote: The God of Abraham, Issac and Jacob, not of the philosophers
>belief in God is a belief in something deeper than just a first principle
Well yes of course. But I was speaking from a strictly non-denominational perspective. "God" is a term claimed by many.
>It's really more like a movement towards faith, which can be hard to deal with in an extremely logical way, because it isn't about logic.
God is the light in the darkness. Perfection itself. The form which illuminates all others. Incarnate, a man born without sin that brings the listener to know his father.
>Start with the Greeks
>But not the one I disagree with
Came here to post this
>What is belief in God?
People here are committing the western Protestant error of separating belief from practice.
Belief is the hope that this incomprehensible entity exists and preceding it and expressing it is religious ritual and action (fasting, praying, postrations, alms, and so on). I think, and it is my personal experience, that one just doesn't believe in God and Religion but practice it and with that comes belief.
I would say in my experience at least it is more like belief is the cause for practice.
You can say it is a simbiosis. Again in my experience, you cannot approach God like it is some kind of logical thing, but, through practice you can actually experience him.
Pleb tier: Monotheism, atheism, science cult, agnosticism, whatever the fuck chinks believe in
Patrician: Paganism
>You can say it is a simbiosis.
I did. Right here: and here >Belief in God also has a revealed component in Scripture, which imo is 100% necessary
>Scripture is indispensible
>Nondualism is to deny the fact of creation, which is manifestly contrary to sense, reason and genuine communion with God
Wrong, it is to say that what we perceive as creation is simply not what we think it is, your claim presupposes that we can correctly assume/verify the ontological status of what we perceive as creation through sense and reason, which is foolish.
>It is a symptom either of weak categories unable to digest contingent existence
Here again you make the mistake of assuming that humans are capable of coming up with or deducing categories which are truly capable of 'digesting' contingent existence, despite its exact nature being predicated on and cloaked by something which is beyond our ability to fully understand, that completely transcends human reason.
>If God truly has parts, then he must be truly divided, and thus, dependent upon his components. If he is only 'divided' in some extrinsic sense, as when we capture some aspect of him in limited words, then he can't really said to have parts, or us as parts, and hence the idea that we are 'part' of God is absurd. Or, you could deny that finite exists at all.
God is without parts and is undivided, the third option you are not realizing is that neither we nor creation are part of or separate from the one undivided God; and that what we perceive as creation is not even non-existent (or is only non-existent in terms of not being what we attribute it to be); but simply that we do not understand the true nature of what seems to be contingent existence such that one may be led to the errors of viewing it as separate from or as a part of God that He is dependent on instead of the truth that there is only God and nothing else, and that the universe is unreal (which does not mean non-existent) figuratively only foam on the surface of the ocean of God or light streaming out from the sun of God which He is not dependent on in the slightest.
based and correctpilled
Checkmate, Christfags. Japanese culture is superior!
I am a Christian and I respect Senegalese more tan Japanese. They provbe you don't need to be smart to enter HIS kinhdom.
It’s intellectually superior to play jrpgs and watch anime, ok.
>It’s intellectually superior to play jrpgs and watch anime, ok.
as opposed to what the Senegalese are doing? I really couldn't say
>Why I need God, when I can collect plastic figures with my waifu
you make a very compelling argument with all those pictures
>Venerates one or two Greeks
>Claims to have started with the Greeks, but never finishes.
>unironically being a murtadd faggot
*cringe*
I think you can put adult believers into many categories, but the main category is the "believer with benefits", a person that will ask you "what, you think there isn't a reason for all this?" And will be involved in some rituals but he won't think about them in any way beyond his everyday routine.
Why do people ITT talk about mysticism? Most adult believers, if they believe in mysticism, they think Uri Geller is legit and NOT about metaphysics and other "too deep for you" shit.
One does not finish the greeks.
Belief in God is belief in the limitation of human prowess. God is the ideal we strive toward and the power which constrains us.
I've read many Greeks and Plato is still my favorite
I believe that girl is pretty cute
>but grew out of it when I was around 13
good for you, you little precocious bastard
youtube.com
Read Kierkegaard.
I have had two or three vivid dreams in my life that insisted upon me that I was learning to float. Each time I woke up from these, I felt a tickled sort of disappointment. Like, oh hoho, you had me going there for a bit.
Technology can make it possible someday.
All these little arab boys that run away from the middle east to wave the the flag of atheism seem less concerned with actual philosophical questions and instead are just acting out of rebellious angst ridden spite in relation to their strict upbringings , they never seem to have much to say about anything
Finite things can be a part of something infinite
No, finite things by *necessity* are part of something infinite. A finite thing cannot be its own cause.
That you’re interested in.
Which end of the egg is it proper to open?
I like your Sun & sunlight analogy. What are some Sufi books you'd recommend?
Tell me more about your beliefs/ideas on the Almighty...
>La mash-hud illallah
>La mawjood illallah
>La haqqa illallah
Nonetheless God is fully human.
How is this mysticism. This is literally Aquinas, AKA normie church dogma
Aquinas would refute the part about "being part of God."
God is something fixed that allows me to get through times of uncertainty via faith in divine providence.
Yeah I know. Pantheism was pretty heretical. I was referring to the God as being itself part I should have been more clear
>Muslim.
wow. So provocative