MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

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_The Soap Maker
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _The Soap Maker »

mentalgymnast wrote:
Making a matter of fact statement such as this is silly. You don't know this for a fact. It's only your guess based upon your own set of reasonings/assumptions.

Regards,
MG


My statement is just as valid as claiming that god actually does talk to people since NOBODY knows either for a fact. Until there's a way to reconcile the circular reasoning of "God speaks to prophets>How do you know?>Prophets said so", there is no reason to actually believe that god speaks to anyone. The way some people try to reconcile this by claiming to live by faith. But as I pointed out a couple times, their faith is just in other human beings, not god.
_mentalgymnast
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _mentalgymnast »

I have a question wrote:However, earlier in the thread you said:
Ruminating after the fact. HIndsight is always better than foresight. There are experiences that I've had during my life in which as I look at them in hindsight it appears to me that there were other factors that may have entered into the equation other than pure chance and/or self induced/originating thought.


So if the determining factor for you differentiating between spiritual phenomena and simple constructs/fabrications of the mind is a qualitatively different ‘burning in the bosom’, how come you only ‘saw’ that ‘burning in the bosom’ in hindsight when you ruminated after the fact on the experience? Would such a qualitatively different burning in the bosom not be blatantly self evident there and then at the time you were experiencing it?


Good question. At the time(s) I've experienced something along the line of the "burning in the bosom", I've recognized it...but not been in full awareness of the ramifications/understandings of what was going on. Even at this time I still am left to wonder, "What the heck?" I suppose it's part of my natural skepticism/questioning that seems to be part and parcel of who I am. But it was something that happened and it was something that I later reflected on...and still do...in wonder. Retrospect, in this case, helps me to hold up these few experiences that I've had up against the fabric/texture of other experiences that I've had along life's highway, and see that they were indeed something way out of the norm.

Regards,
MG
_Stem
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _Stem »

Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:So. Thus far we have:

Zerinus - I feel super tingly when I think God is speaking to me.

MG - I feel super tingly when I think God is speaking to me.

There you go. That's the super exact science of how God speaks to believers, and, oddly enough, the super tingles seem to be subject to confirmation bias.

Huh.

- Doc


That's why there's nothing unique about Mormons on this. My old boss used to get inspired thoughts and feelings about new directions to take as a business group. Sometimes it seemed to work ok, other times it didn't. Revelation, spiritual experience amounts to the same experience people have when they watch Lion King or take part in innovative business practices and get enlivened or encouraged. There's nothing near exact science in this. We just pretend there is because, heck we have nothing better to do.
_grindael
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _grindael »

The way I see it is if there is a creator/God, He is going to communicate with us in any way He can.


He then said that it took him time to figure out what was from God and what wasn't. But if he (as he claims) can't describe what it is that supposedly comes from God, how can he differentiate between the two? He can't. He simply ascribes what he wants to as coming from "God". This is all silly crap.

And of course the preferred method of their God communicating to them is this esoteric whispering BS that they can confidently say can't be described or defined. Therefore, they can sit on their perches looking down at everyone and claim you don't know because you haven't "experienced" the Holy Dude.

It's a big circle jerk. And Zero calls this miracles! Of course it is all they've got. There won't be any raising of people from their coffins that have been dead for days, it's just isn't ever going to happen because their God is made up. He's had multiple names and titles, was said to be "Adam" and a "Trinity" with the Holy Dude being the "mind of "The Father" who was a "Spirit", and they have even argued about that. So has their God ever spoken to any of them? No. Do they have some mystical force like Priesthood? No. And of course to use this Priesthood one must conform to all of the arbitrary rules they make up, or it doesn't work. It never works. And if it doesn't, or God doesn't directly speak to them, IT IS ALL GOD'S FAULT.

What they want to pawn off on the world is ridiculous. But people fall for it, as they do with every other made up god that has ever been thought up through the ages. But Mormonism was supposed to be different, and JUST LIKE it was described in the New Testament. "Apostles" and "Prophets" raising the dead, healing the sick, casting out devils, giving the blind their sight, paralyzed people walking, etc. But that has NEVER HAPPENED. As I've said before, let one of their holy "prophets" go out in public, go to a graveyard and raise up a dead person who has been there a few days. But you will NEVER see that happen. Why? Because it is all a con.

Do they have an answer for this? No. They will then cry "Sign seeker!" Yet they will claim signs FOLLOW those who believe! What signs? Esoteric feelings. What a come down from the Apostles and Prophets of the New Testament, and the way they describe how REAL prophets should act:

The Two Witnesses

11 I was given a reed like a measuring rod and was told, “Go and measure the temple of God and the altar, with its worshipers. 2 But exclude the outer court; do not measure it, because it has been given to the Gentiles. They will trample on the holy city for 42 months. 3 And I will appoint my two witnesses, and they will prophesy for 1,260 days, clothed in sackcloth.” 4 They are “the two olive trees” and the two lampstands, and “they stand before the Lord of the earth." 5 If anyone tries to harm them, fire comes from their mouths and devours their enemies. This is how anyone who wants to harm them must die. 6 They have power to shut up the heavens so that it will not rain during the time they are prophesying; and they have power to turn the waters into blood and to strike the earth with every kind of plague as often as they want.

7 Now when they have finished their testimony, the beast that comes up from the Abyss will attack them, and overpower and kill them. 8 Their bodies will lie in the public square of the great city—which is figuratively called Sodom and Egypt—where also their Lord was crucified. 9 For three and a half days some from every people, tribe, language and nation will gaze on their bodies and refuse them burial. 10 The inhabitants of the earth will gloat over them and will celebrate by sending each other gifts, because these two prophets had tormented those who live on the earth.

11 But after the three and a half days the breath of life from God entered them, and they stood on their feet, and terror struck those who saw them. 12 Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, “Come up here.” And they went up to heaven in a cloud, while their enemies looked on. (The Book of Revelation)


Has any Mormon "prophet" ever acted like this? NEVER. And they never will. Why? Because they are a man made money making Corporation that only benefits those at the top who have no power to do anything of the kind. How do we know? Because in almost 200 years, they never have done anything remotely like that and neither has anyone else.
Riding on a speeding train; trapped inside a revolving door;
Lost in the riddle of a quatrain; Stuck in an elevator between floors.
One focal point in a random world can change your direction:
One step where events converge may alter your perception.
_grindael
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _grindael »

Are you familiar with Star Trek? Think of counselor Troi. She's a Betazoid and has this ESP-like ability to "read" things. What if we are part of a kind of Betazoid race/species and this is all just a school/bootcamp?


And of course the only way to compare Mormon so called "spiritual experiences" is to bring up a made up TV show. :lol:
Riding on a speeding train; trapped inside a revolving door;
Lost in the riddle of a quatrain; Stuck in an elevator between floors.
One focal point in a random world can change your direction:
One step where events converge may alter your perception.
_mentalgymnast
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _mentalgymnast »

I have a question wrote:
Separately, why do you think you had a spiritual burning in the bosom (a “burning feeling in the very core of the body going from head to toe”) when Dallin H Oaks hasn’t?
What does a “burning in the bosom” mean? Does it need to be a feeling of caloric heat, like the burning produced by combustion? If that is the meaning, I have never had a burning in the bosom. Surely, the word “burning” in this scripture signifies a feeling of comfort and serenity. That is the witness many receive. That is the way revelation works.

https://www.LDS.org/ensign/1997/03/teac ... t?lang=eng


Another good question. The answer is, I don't know. It may have been something that I needed because of a naturally 'hard heart' in regards to spiritual things? As I mentioned, I am a natural born skeptic, it seems, when it comes to 'The Spirit'. I've explained, in times past on this board, my upbringing and my natural skepticism which evolved over time. It may be that God had to hit me with a hammer, so to speak. Others have had the burning in the bosom, and others haven't. I think that God may speak/influence each of us according to our own needs. If He doesn't need a hammer, then He may use other means. I have experienced what might be considered to be the 'hammer method' one or two times in my whole life. Other times have generally been through the whisperings of the Spirit which I would say were experienced without any 'overload' of the natural conduits/ways/means of the physical system of brain/nervous system. Those times are a bit more difficult to differentiate from other 'normal' types of experiences without looking back in hindsight and looking at things in context.

One way or the other, IHAQ, these sorts of purported spiritual phenomena are very difficult to articulate and describe. Maybe you've had similar experiences in your life? If so, have you been able to fully explain them to yourself independent of outside influence(s)?

Others?

Regards,
MG
_mentalgymnast
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _mentalgymnast »

Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:So. Thus far we have:

Zerinus - I feel super tingly when I think God is speaking to me.

MG - I feel super tingly when I think God is speaking to me.

There you go. That's the super exact science of how God speaks to believers, and, oddly enough, the super tingles seem to be subject to confirmation bias.

Huh.

- Doc


Have you ever had the "super tingly" experience in your life?

Regards,
MG
_grindael
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _grindael »

Mental on another thread,

I can not explain my spiritual evidence with/to you and you cannot explain yours to me. It's like trying to explain the taste of salt.


And yet now he says it is like a "burning in the bosom". See what I mean? They can't get their stories straight about any of this because it is all BS.
Riding on a speeding train; trapped inside a revolving door;
Lost in the riddle of a quatrain; Stuck in an elevator between floors.
One focal point in a random world can change your direction:
One step where events converge may alter your perception.
_grindael
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Posts: 6791
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Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _grindael »

these sorts of purported spiritual phenomena are very difficult to articulate and describe


Now, instead of being impossible to describe they are merely "difficult". This is really a hoot.
Riding on a speeding train; trapped inside a revolving door;
Lost in the riddle of a quatrain; Stuck in an elevator between floors.
One focal point in a random world can change your direction:
One step where events converge may alter your perception.
_mentalgymnast
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Joined: Sat Jun 01, 2013 9:39 pm

Re: MG & JLHPROF: From Whence Come Spiritual Experiences?

Post by _mentalgymnast »

Stem wrote:
Doctor CamNC4Me wrote:So. Thus far we have:

Zerinus - I feel super tingly when I think God is speaking to me.

MG - I feel super tingly when I think God is speaking to me.

There you go. That's the super exact science of how God speaks to believers, and, oddly enough, the super tingles seem to be subject to confirmation bias.

Huh.

- Doc


That's why there's nothing unique about Mormons on this. My old boss used to get inspired thoughts and feelings about new directions to take as a business group. Sometimes it seemed to work ok, other times it didn't. Revelation, spiritual experience amounts to the same experience people have when they watch Lion King or take part in innovative business practices and get enlivened or encouraged. There's nothing near exact science in this. We just pretend there is because, heck we have nothing better to do.


On the whole and in many if not most situations/experiences I'd tend to agree with you. And yes, it is puzzling why folks can either make wrong decisions and/or be led the wrong way through what they think have been spiritual influence/impressions. It does get a bit confusing and can even be somewhat disorienting at times. That's why, like I've said, I tend towards a natural skepticism in regards to much of what we refer to as the influence(s) of the Spirit. But for me, that doesn't negate the absence or non-existence of the Spirit/Holy Ghost.

And I think we can only speak for ourselves and not others.

Regards,
MG
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