Re: God
J J R (jrovira@juno.com)
Sat, 17 Oct 1998 14:25:34 -0400 (EDT)
<<I've always pictured god as Thoreau and the Romantics did--god is part
of me, part of nature, part of the universe. God isn't some SEPARATE
being standing in judgement of me, nor is it some force that drives me
to do "good things." I create god for myself; god is simply that part of
me that is what I strive for. In fact, my god has absolutely NOTHING to
do with religion. It exists only for me.>>
Actually, it has everything to do with religion--and one specific kind.
The transcendentalists and (to a degree, perhaps) the Romantics were
working within a pretty specific stream, even if they thought they
defined the boundaries of it themselves.
See, this is what religions are. They're just, at a very rudimentary
level, sustained meditations on the human spiritual experience. If you
read the Vedas and the Bible, you'll cover just about all the ground
imaginable. Everything else is variations on a theme, some more creative
than others.
<<So to answer the question about what it is we look for when we look at
art or read or write poetry, maybe in some way I am looking for god, but
only as I've defined it; that is, I'm looking for something that MOVES
me, something that incites that ultimate emotion inside, something that
may (pardon the cliche) make me a better person by providing some
insight into the nature of this world that I had never thought of. God
is more a synonym for my own inner growth. --Kari>>
But, within the context of my experience, a good orgasm does the same
thing :) So what do we use to judge between experiences?
Jim
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