Didn't God have Oneness "In the Beginning"?

[VioletImagery]

Duality in itself can't be 'bad' or 'good'—those are dualistic concepts and cannot describe the whole. Things just ARE. To see from a dualistic perspective is not wrong, it is a way of setting limits in order to perceive things. If you want to measure anything, you need to define a reference, a zero--where things split into positive and negative. Humans, it seems, get tired of see-sawing back and forth on the balance of opposites after a while, and want to remember what it's like to perceive the undifferentiated whole. I suppose it would be like always looking at the world through only one eye at a time and forgetting how to see any other way. Everything you see is flat and things shift a little way to the left or a little way to the right, depending on which eye you look through. Transcending the dualistic perspective would be like remembering how to open both eyes at once. What you are looking at hasn't changed at all (and neither have you), but instead of perceiving flat images that shift back and forth, you see them both at once and integrate them to 'create' this 'new' quality of "depth."

This is just how I understand it intellectually. I have not had the sort of experience of oneness that spiritual masters describe so I could be way off base with my analogy. I am currently reading Be As You Are by Sri Ramana Maharishi to understand more. http://enlightenedawareness.wetpaint...mana+Maharishi

[Tom]

I think everyone is jumping ahead of me. I really am just asking (1) Did God have the Oneness that everyone seems to be seeking now? and (2) Was there really a good reason why God chose to create this instead?

[ButterflyWoman]

Did God have the Oneness that everyone seems to be seeking now?

No. Because where there are not many (or at least more than one), there cannot be Oneness. There cannot be unity where there is no division.

Was there really a good reason why God chose to create this instead?

Probably, but maybe it was just to alleviate God's boredom. I cannot claim to know the mind of God as to why God would do this. Perhaps it's just God dreaming....

[Tom]

It just feels like (almost) everyone is trying to turn lemons into lemonade here rather than even considering the possibility that God might not be perfect and all-knowing. Maybe God, too, felt the need for personal growth and development. Maybe God didn't anticipate the development of opposing anti-God forces like the serpent in the Garden of Eden. Maybe God owes us an apology for creating us without asking if we wanted to be created, or at least for giving us only an illusion of free will.

For what it is worth, I'm not actually in the mental and emotional turmoil it may seem. I'm just trying to get a grip on what Christianity is about and going back to "In the Beginning" seemed like a good first step.

[Timotheus]

[Palehorse Redivivus]

Whether you call it "separation" or "duality" it is generally regarded as bad. Or the Taoist thing, the One became Two and the Two became Ten-Thousand. Now all us tiny little pieces are trying to regain the lost Oneness.

See, this is what I question -- IS it really? Are our only choices "separation," which is usually equated with conflict and suffering, OR merging with Source but giving up our individuality? Or are there other options?

I'm finding that as I go along, my appreciation for uniqueness, diversity, and desire for more experiences, learning and self-expression (though not necessarily here) is only growing. At the same time though, my ability to coexist peacefully and connect with a wide range of other beings is also growing alongside it. So am I regressing? Well... I hope not. But this particular piece has no real urge to merge. I think I've had about enough of earth, but in another sense I feel like I'm just getting started on this whole "being me and having fun with it" thing.

As for the original question, I've been kicking around ideas and I think I'm actually getting *less* sure about the true nature of the situation... though I think I lean toward a vague idea that a thought arose from Source, which was a thought of itself since it is All There Is -- and then since this thought was a reflection of the All, there was an effect like you get with two mirrors facing each other. Long story short, the One is still One, but it's becoming self-aware, through a process of exploring all probable realities through conscious beings like ourselves. It stands to reason IMO that this process has no beginning or end. I don't believe the "object" is to merge with the Source, because there is no object, and all is Source... identifying with the Whole is just one possible experience in the ocean of infinite probabilities.

[ButterflyWoman]

even considering the possibility that God might not be perfect and all-knowing.

I've considered that possibility. I just wasn't getting that that's what you're fishing for.

Maybe God, too, felt the need for personal growth and development.

I've even suggested that (in different words, but same idea) in a couple of threads now and then.

Maybe God didn't anticipate the development of opposing anti-God forces like the serpent in the Garden of Eden.

I don't actually believe that myth is literal, so I can't help you there.

Maybe God owes us an apology for creating us without asking if we wanted to be created, or at least for giving us only an illusion of free will.

Maybe. The Bible isn't actually at all clear on what God was doing. It just says God did it. And for the record, it does NOT say in the creation story (either of them; there are two in the book of Genesis, one right after the other) that God is all-loving or anything of the sort.

I'm just trying to get a grip on what Christianity is about and going back to "In the Beginning" seemed like a good first step.

Well, for heaven's sake. If you're interested in Christian dogma, you should have said so.

[Tom]

I'm not even thinking at the level of individual Christians and judging them by their beliefs. It is the same with any religion involving humans in that real life usually gets in the way - but I just can't even comprehend the beliefs themselves. In trying to formulate my question I kept getting stuck on this one: Why do the "universe" thing at all? I was planning to go to Genesis next and ask about the serpent in the garden. Adam didn't put the snake there and neither did Eve. The tree of life was there, but God didn't just say "eat this". Before eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, Adam and Eve were basically just little children - and they were exactly the kind of little children that God created them to be. Even humans know you don't just throw children outside and have it not occur to you that they might do something you told them not to.

[ButterflyWoman]

Well, the thing is, prior to Christianity, there was Judaism. Christianity is sort of hitched onto that (and not always that successfully, in my personal opinion). So the first thing you need to do if you want to go back to the beginning and wrap your head around the foundation, is to start with the ancient Hebrews and Yahweh, their God. The Jewish God (the God of Abraham) is not a very nice deity, as portrayed in the Old Testament. There's not much mention of "loving" in context with that God. There are plenty of passages where a prophet says that God told him to tell the Jews that God loves them as His special people, but that's not really the same thing as a universally loving God.

The teachings attributed to Jesus Christ are radically different from the Old Testament laws and rules and traditions. The picture Jesus gave of God is radically different, as well. Christianity is a very different religion from Judaism, and in my personal estimation, it's quite difficult to reconcile most of the Old Testament to the New.

I keep editing this post because the way Christianity, which was originally very much a mystical tradition, got forced into being a dogmatic, legalistic, official state religion is one of the topics I can go on and on and on about, and I don't want to go on and on about it.

[Jaco]

It is the same with any religion involving humans in that real life usually gets in the way - but I just can't even comprehend the beliefs themselves.

That's why it's a dogma It doesn't matter that it goes against common sense, doesn't explain all the unknowns, doesn't give plausible reasons, contradicts itself, goes against the views of other religions and the knowledge we get from science. The dogma is required to be viewed as the truth, without any questioning. It is like that because someone say so, period. But you'll find dogma in many (all?) religions.