A New Smear Article: Interpreter Targets Givens and Hauglid

[Kishkumen]

I would have hoped that the manual was not so regarded by anyone. But, for Piggy, the conce was so highly regarded, it might have been "spiritual" to him, in the way holding what Jeff Holland proclaimed was the actual copy of the Book of Mormon that his great grandfather had in the Carthage Jail was for Jeff. Now, the sounds generated by the synthesizer might understandably be 'spiritual' for some listeners even if the manual isn't.

I can agree that people find music spiritual. Beyond that I have almost no idea what you are talking about, except that you misspelled conch in your allusion to Lord of the Flies.

[Philo Sofee]

Kishkumen
I am sitting here wondering why there is a perception of a burden at all. I don't need someone else to tell me that the Book of Mormon is ancient or not ancient. I have the Book of Mormon. It either speaks to me spiritually or it does not. What someone says about its antiquity is immaterial and has, for the most part, always been immaterial. I had no concept of antiquity, really, when I obtained a witness of the Book of Mormon, and coming to understand something about antiquity just did not relate to the Book of Mormon for me. If the Book of Mormon does not work for you, great. Ignore it. If it does work for you, embrace it by all means.

If I may, I think there is a seed herein with what you say which was developed in the Jewish Zohar. It's antiquity is truly and quite literally irrelevant to its having a sensational manner of breaking us out of a box of thinking, and almost, as it were, forcing us to view what scripture says from an entirely foreign yet productive perspective, one that is, quite frankly, seriously uncomfortable at first. It's almost ludicrous how they do it completely disregarding the context, historically, spiritually, and psychologically, almost against all reason. There is simply no reality to it. And yet... and yet, it grows on you and it really does speak in a manner you haven't experienced ever before. All the sudden they say something truly just idiotic and outrageous, and that triggers a memory of a scripture which you look up, and now you will never see it as you did before. It has grown and changed and developed in a way it never, ever, ever would have had you not been jarred out of your comfortable experience with the scripture. And now, you really are a different (perhaps new) kind of thinker! Now you recognize hey, that scripture I used to link with one of those in Isaiah, I wonder what the Isaiah scripture looks like now. You read it in light of the jarring lightning bolt comment in the Zohar and all the sudden you see a connection that just YELLS at you HEY!

Now... now you ask just why did the rabbi make such a warped interpretation of the original scripture? It absolutely has no reality in textual criticism or biblical archaeology or Mormon spirituality or what-have-you. It surely changed now how I grasp this Isaiah scripture. You do some gematria and all the sudden another word that there is no bloody way in all get out you would ever imagine having anything at all to do with the scripture you just read, but the gematria (which was the outrageously silly thing the Zohar began all this with) matches so you pursue the lead a bit just for fun. And weirdly enough, some word Jesus spoke in the New Testament comes to mind in a different way, and it just continues to unfold, expand, and get you all worked up. So you keep track by writing down the new "scripture chase" connections with the Zohar commentary, and pretty soon you are reading entire dozens of scriptures in ways that you never ever even could have done so as a Mormon or as a Christian or as a Muslim, or even as a Jewish person, and the scriptures, oddly enough, begins to come alive for you.

And the totally loony thing is, you cannot tell anyone else what this is like. You experience this sensation or you don't. You take the time to explore and be rewarded with a real gem and jewel of ideas or meaning that others simply cannot have in relation to what you are having right at this moment. And yet it means nothing to others. Ironically, that is exactly as it is supposed to be. To me, that is the beginning of a kind of spirituality from the text.

And, ridiculous as it sounds, I actually do know this happens. I have done so multiple times. And I have no reason to try and explain it since it cannot be the same for another even if they go through that exact same process beginning at the same place in the Zohar and take off with any intellectual suggestions their mind tells them. And that has nothing to do with it being fake or unreal. Each and every single person is individual and simply do not have to have the same kind of experience or thought in order for it to uplift, enhance, and enrich our life. And that, I would propose is spirituality. It is letting the everyday drab and mundane things, including boring and worthless meanings in any scripture all the sudden take a drastic left turn and spring a wickedly weird surprise on you in your thoughts. You mull that over while all the sudden a Magpie dang near flies into you when you round a corner in the city and that experience too enhances your experience and wonder of it all. Why worry about explaining it all? That isn't where the meaning and joy is for an individual. Getting others to agree is entirely, fundamentally irrelevant and is entirely the wrong headed way to go about it. Which, I seem to sense is the sense of your own post.

And I do believe this ties into your wonderful post here! Thanks man.

[Kishkumen]

And the totally loony thing is, you cannot tell anyone else what this is like. You experience this sensation or you don't. You take the time to explore and be rewarded with a real gem and jewel of ideas or meaning that others simply cannot have in relation to what you are having right at this moment. And yet it means nothing to others. Ironically, that is exactly as it is supposed to be. To me, that is the beginning of a kind of spirituality from the text.

And, ridiculous as it sounds, I actually do know this happens. I have done so multiple times. And I have no reason to try and explain it since it cannot be the same for another even if they go through that exact same process beginning at the same place in the Zohar and take off with any intellectual suggestions their mind tells them. And that has nothing to do with it being fake or unreal. Each and every single person is individual and simply do not have to have the same kind of experience or thought in order for it to uplift, enhance, and enrich our life. And that, I would propose is spirituality. It is letting the everyday drab and mundane things, including boring and worthless meanings in any scripture all the sudden take a drastic left turn and spring a wickedly weird surprise on you in your thoughts. You mull that over while all the sudden a Magpie dang near flies into you when you round a corner in the city and that experience too enhances your experience and wonder of it all. Why worry about explaining it all? That isn't where the meaning and joy is for an individual. Getting others to agree is entirely, fundamentally irrelevant and is entirely the wrong headed way to go about it. Which, I seem to sense is the sense of your own post.

And I do believe this ties into your wonderful post here! Thanks man.

Thank you, Philo! I know you of all people get it, and you get it much better and more profoundly than I do. Thank you for describing in some detail your experience reading the Zohar! Makes me want to dive right in!

[dastardly stem]

So, you never felt something you would identify as spiritual? I would say that my experience of that sensation is quite different from merely interesting.

Sure...I'm still curious what we mean by spiritual. Yes, there were many times when I felt some sort of self motivating feeling and then called that spiritual. But I also recognize there's no verification of something spiritual. If I look back and identify any given "spiritual" experience I have had it is interesting, even if not merely so. But it's not truth messages from another world. Or its not comfort from something outside myself. When I analyze it it seems to be only me.

Huh. Well, I think there are some meanings that can carry a spiritual feeling with them. Of course, there is more than one sense of meaningful, and perhaps the simple experience of the spiritual can be meaningful. It is interesting that you think spirituality is too self-serving or self-aggrandizing. I would agree that it is important not to mistake spiritual feelings for altruistic outcomes. But I think the obsessive concern about selflessness is counterproductive. I think there is value in the experience of spirituality, even for those who are not directly experiencing it. You might call these collateral benefits.

Ok. But I'm interested in exploring the value. If the value is personal then what is the value other than self-serving? If the value is more than that, then what is it and how could we explain it as something outside ourselves? In my mind "spiritual" only has meaning if we can possibly identify something as spirit. And we haven't. So the word loses significance from the outset. And every "spiritual" experience seems to best be explained as something happening in an individual, most often, for the individual. I don't see anything obsessive about stating these things or pointing this out. I simply see it as descriptive. If you have a better description of the spiritual, what is it?

I don’t assume that dropping spirituality and religion is progress. So, I disagree with you. I see nothing wrong with finding spiritual meaning in texts, and I think it can be a very salutary practice.

Ok. I'm not so sure. As it is the "spiritual" is, it seems, by necessity self-serving. And it all occurs in the self. When people talk about experiencing the spiritual they are simply talking about experiencing something that we can't verify as ever happening, and it turns out every thing we can determine suggests the "spiritual experience" is simply a product of our own minds feeding us what we want, most often. Dropping the assumption that something unverifable or unfalsifiable is happening I think leads to better mindsets, healthier perspectives. Of course this is not easy. Many religious people drop the assumption when it works for their benefit and then pick it back up as quickly as they drop it to work again for their benefit. It's not easy to distinguish, I think.

I think they do lots of good. They seem to bring peace to individual lives and inspire people to do good for others. These are not bad outcomes.

Yes. There are some good outcomes. But it is quite possible each of those outcomes can be achieved if we simply favored rational thinking over assumptions that don't really work with reality as a means of discovering truth and purpose. Meaning all of the outcomes can be had for those who think there is a spiritual realm and those who do not. Just because people really want a spiritual realm and these experiences to be more than they are, doesn't mean they are. They happen to be self-serving.

I would say most everyone is good, or has plenty of good in them. They want to be good. Whether religion or spiritual or whatever is part of it, they still want good things to transpire. That's good. But, as many have noted, what causes good people to do evil? Religion, or spirituality. Many of the bad things that people do or have done, if we grow a bit general, tend to appeal to the same type of mindset brought on by thinking there is legitimacy to the "spiritual" or its equivalents.

I'd say beauty, meaning, purpose, art, etc all continues without religion. And its silly to continue it simply because people really want it, if in the end, it'll continue to the source of us getting bitten.

[dastardly stem]

Kishkumen
I am sitting here wondering why there is a perception of a burden at all. I don't need someone else to tell me that the Book of Mormon is ancient or not ancient. I have the Book of Mormon. It either speaks to me spiritually or it does not. What someone says about its antiquity is immaterial and has, for the most part, always been immaterial. I had no concept of antiquity, really, when I obtained a witness of the Book of Mormon, and coming to understand something about antiquity just did not relate to the Book of Mormon for me. If the Book of Mormon does not work for you, great. Ignore it. If it does work for you, embrace it by all means.

If I may, I think there is a seed herein with what you say which was developed in the Jewish Zohar. It's antiquity is truly and quite literally irrelevant to its having a sensational manner of breaking us out of a box of thinking, and almost, as it were, forcing us to view what scripture says from an entirely foreign yet productive perspective, one that is, quite frankly, seriously uncomfortable at first. It's almost ludicrous how they do it completely disregarding the context, historically, spiritually, and psychologically, almost against all reason. There is simply no reality to it. And yet... and yet, it grows on you and it really does speak in a manner you haven't experienced ever before. All the sudden they say something truly just idiotic and outrageous, and that triggers a memory of a scripture which you look up, and now you will never see it as you did before. It has grown and changed and developed in a way it never, ever, ever would have had you not been jarred out of your comfortable experience with the scripture. And now, you really are a different (perhaps new) kind of thinker! Now you recognize hey, that scripture I used to link with one of those in Isaiah, I wonder what the Isaiah scripture looks like now. You read it in light of the jarring lightning bolt comment in the Zohar and all the sudden you see a connection that just YELLS at you HEY!

Now... now you ask just why did the rabbi make such a warped interpretation of the original scripture? It absolutely has no reality in textual criticism or biblical archaeology or Mormon spirituality or what-have-you. It surely changed now how I grasp this Isaiah scripture. You do some gematria and all the sudden another word that there is no bloody way in all get out you would ever imagine having anything at all to do with the scripture you just read, but the gematria (which was the outrageously silly thing the Zohar began all this with) matches so you pursue the lead a bit just for fun. And weirdly enough, some word Jesus spoke in the New Testament comes to mind in a different way, and it just continues to unfold, expand, and get you all worked up. So you keep track by writing down the new "scripture chase" connections with the Zohar commentary, and pretty soon you are reading entire dozens of scriptures in ways that you never ever even could have done so as a Mormon or as a Christian or as a Muslim, or even as a Jewish person, and the scriptures, oddly enough, begins to come alive for you.

And the totally loony thing is, you cannot tell anyone else what this is like. You experience this sensation or you don't. You take the time to explore and be rewarded with a real gem and jewel of ideas or meaning that others simply cannot have in relation to what you are having right at this moment. And yet it means nothing to others. Ironically, that is exactly as it is supposed to be. To me, that is the beginning of a kind of spirituality from the text.

And, ridiculous as it sounds, I actually do know this happens. I have done so multiple times. And I have no reason to try and explain it since it cannot be the same for another even if they go through that exact same process beginning at the same place in the Zohar and take off with any intellectual suggestions their mind tells them. And that has nothing to do with it being fake or unreal. Each and every single person is individual and simply do not have to have the same kind of experience or thought in order for it to uplift, enhance, and enrich our life. And that, I would propose is spirituality. It is letting the everyday drab and mundane things, including boring and worthless meanings in any scripture all the sudden take a drastic left turn and spring a wickedly weird surprise on you in your thoughts. You mull that over while all the sudden a Magpie dang near flies into you when you round a corner in the city and that experience too enhances your experience and wonder of it all. Why worry about explaining it all? That isn't where the meaning and joy is for an individual. Getting others to agree is entirely, fundamentally irrelevant and is entirely the wrong headed way to go about it. Which, I seem to sense is the sense of your own post.

And I do believe this ties into your wonderful post here! Thanks man.

It seems what Philo has described here is precisely what I'm talking about as well. I hate to poo poo personal meanings we all find and get excited about. I just don't think it's a great source of reality thinking. And I don't think the "spiritual" if thought of as something from outside us imposed upon us has much meaning. We often want these excitable, or thoughtful moments to mean much more than they do. We want our personal to be better than others. Or more important...or more insightful...or whatever. Nah...I'm much more into collaboration and the purposes we get out of it instead. The spiritual starts to sound more and more shallow to me the more I think about it.

[Kishkumen]

Sure...I'm still curious what we mean by spiritual. Yes, there were many times when I felt some sort of self motivating feeling and then called that spiritual. But I also recognize there's no verification of something spiritual. If I look back and identify any given "spiritual" experience I have had it is interesting, even if not merely so. But it's not truth messages from another world. Or its not comfort from something outside myself. When I analyze it it seems to be only me.

What kind of verification are you talking about? For me, I feel better when I am spiritually edified, and I feel worse when I am not. The difference may be kind of subtle, and it *is* difficult to quantify or put one's finger on, but I can tell the difference. Whether it is outside of your self or not makes no difference to me. The questions you are asking seem confused to me. Do you want the benefits of spirituality or to pinpoint the existence of God?

Ok. But I'm interested in exploring the value. If the value is personal then what is the value other than self-serving?

I am not exactly sure what your concern is. So, let's say you being physically healthy is self-serving, but then the fact that you spend less time in the hospital makes you a better contributor to your family, your community, and your profession. Was it *just* self-serving? Similarly, if your spiritual health makes you a better participant in the human community, what is the problem with it nourishing your soul first and foremost?

Yes. There are some good outcomes. But it is quite possible each of those outcomes can be achieved if we simply favored rational thinking over assumptions that don't really work with reality as a means of discovering truth and purpose. Meaning all of the outcomes can be had for those who think there is a spiritual realm and those who do not. Just because people really want a spiritual realm and these experiences to be more than they are, doesn't mean they are. They happen to be self-serving.

I would say most everyone is good, or has plenty of good in them. They want to be good. Whether religion or spiritual or whatever is part of it, they still want good things to transpire. That's good. But, as many have noted, what causes good people to do evil? Religion, or spirituality. Many of the bad things that people do or have done, if we grow a bit general, tend to appeal to the same type of mindset brought on by thinking there is legitimacy to the "spiritual" or its equivalents.

I'd say beauty, meaning, purpose, art, etc all continues without religion. And its silly to continue it simply because people really want it, if in the end, it'll continue to the source of us getting bitten.

It will continue. Period. Whether you like it or not. Whether you want it or not. Whether you think you need it or not. Seems to me that we had a real moment in the 2000s when the religion was given a bad name by Radical Islam and Christian Fundamentalism. The LDS Church did its part by getting involved in Prop 8, etc. The New Atheists were happy to pile on with the silly suggestion that religion was THE PROBLEM, and that it needed to be tossed aside or at least greatly diminished. I get that there was this moment, and I am one of those who got caught up in it. It was exhilarating.

But the new religio-phobia of that time has not stood up to scrutiny as I have learned more. My view is that the ex-Mo movement of the late 2000s was very much a product of that new religio-phobia, and the largely irrelevant questions it poses come from that mindset. That said, I find it fascinating. It is as though we were all fish waiting for a hook and now we are all flopping on the shore. Honestly, I am sympathetic. We are certainly not to blame that the world changed, and that the LDS Church committed itself to fighting the culture wars and so many other stupid decisions.

[dastardly stem]

What kind of verification are you talking about? For me, I feel better when I am spiritually edified, and I feel worse when I am not. The difference may be kind of subtle, and it *is* difficult to quantify or put one's finger on, but I can tell the difference. Whether it is outside of your self or not makes no difference to me. The questions you are asking seem confused to me. Do you want the benefits of spirituality or to pinpoint the existence of God?


I am not exactly sure what your concern is. So, let's say you being physically healthy is self-serving, but then the fact that you spend less time in the hospital makes you a better contributor to your family, your community, and your profession. Was it *just* self-serving? Similarly, if your spiritual health makes you a better participant in the human community, what is the problem with it nourishing your soul first and foremost?


It will continue. Period. Whether you like it or not. Whether you want it or not. Whether you think you need it or not. Seems to me that we had a real moment in the 2000s when the religion was given a bad name by Radical Islam and Christian Fundamentalism. The LDS Church did its part by getting involved in Prop 8, etc. The New Atheists were happy to pile on with the silly suggestion that religion was THE PROBLEM, and that it needed to be tossed aside or at least greatly diminished. I get that there was this moment, and I am one of those who got caught up in it. It was exhilarating.

But the new religio-phobia of that time has not stood up to scrutiny as I have learned more. My view is that the ex-Mo movement of the late 2000s was very much a product of that new religio-phobia, and the largely irrelevant questions it poses come from that mindset. That said, I find it fascinating. It is as though we were all fish waiting for a hook and now we are all flopping on the shore. Honestly, I am sympathetic. We are certainly not to blame that the world changed, and that the LDS Church committed itself to fighting the culture wars and so many other stupid decisions.

If we don't know if a spiritual experience is outside of ourselves or not, then that'd be one of the points I've raised here. We couldn't validate any claimed experience to be anything other than a person imagining or hoping or dreaming or many other things occurring in our brains. But, as an obvious sounding example for us, if Joseph S thought his dreaming of God and Jesus really was God has a real special work for him to do and then he in time takes advantage and practices polygamy among the many other exploitations he practiced, then that is the type of risk I'm alluding to. It doesn't always result in good if one imagines God has a special message that we can't find other than inside us in "spirituality".

Calling it spirituality is another part of the problem. We have no verification of a spirit realm. Its simply assumed...because we want it to be there. And treating it other than "this makes me feel good every so often" seems to be a problem. For the most part, such a mindset might not do any damage...but as we let it persist eventually it'll burn us. The problem here is this isn't limited to religion, at least not to religion as conventionally seen. I think we're all much better off in sticking to what is rational rather than pretending slight moves into the superstitious isn't going to matter.

But as you suggest it's a steep and unending uphill battle. It'll never end because people really really want something more. They want a better place than others in the end. They want to be made to feel special. And we have to wonder if any amount of reasoning will ever bring the majority around.

[Rivendale]

Sure...I'm still curious what we mean by spiritual. Yes, there were many times when I felt some sort of self motivating feeling and then called that spiritual. But I also recognize there's no verification of something spiritual. If I look back and identify any given "spiritual" experience I have had it is interesting, even if not merely so. But it's not truth messages from another world. Or its not comfort from something outside myself. When I analyze it it seems to be only me.

But the new religio-phobia of that time has not stood up to scrutiny as I have learned more. My view is that the ex-Mo movement of the late 2000s was very much a product of that new religio-phobia, and the largely irrelevant questions it poses come from that mindset.

I think the google apostasy had much more to do with information rather than 9/11. Historical information and the exposure of ulterior motives for the church.

[Kishkumen]

I think the google apostasy had much more to do with information rather than 9/11. Historical information and the exposure of ulterior motives for the church.

You and I are talking about related but different things. I did not say that this was all about 9/11.

[Rivendale]

I think the google apostasy had much more to do with information rather than 9/11. Historical information and the exposure of ulterior motives for the church.

You and I are talking about related but different things. I did not say that this was all about 9/11.

Pivotal moments like McVeigh and 9/11 played a part in the so called new atheists rise. However , Mormonism's decline seems to be rooted in historical claims being uncovered. And as usual it wasn't the crime it was the coverup.