old3bob

"trump prayed"? of course he does but to the powers of darkness that he embraces and draws his energy of maliciously destructive actions and hateful words from! Btw, right wing Christian nationalism is a very deep and deadly lie; it has nothing to do with an America that was never meant to be ruled by deceptive hate filled fear mongering against those that don' agree with it. (for instance by the likes of the KKK earlier in our history and now by dozens of dangerously similar spin offs) America is meant to follow the U.S. constitution which spells out the separation of church and state among many other important modus-operandi thus be a country of laws applied equally to everyone! (and to never be under a fascist dictator)

In general Christianity is heavily co-opted by worldly forces, using and abusing a great many for power, granted some of the dharmic aspects of say the 'Sermon on the Mount' gets through to us but at such a heavy price!! (and that also gets co-opted for worldly power)

seems that is mainly of the fanatical and violent dictatorial branch's quests for worldly power but not the Sufi...

lets not forget: "the Tao that can be named is not the great Tao" (paraphrased from Chapter one of the T.T.C.) or to me "God" beyond categories and evolution - although being Source for categories, evolution, and multitude of temporary and changing forms. (aka the Ten thousand)

we humans are not "God" beyond categories (and neither are stones, plants, animals, angels, archangels or subtle and ancient elder beings) although we have an atom/atman of god hidden deep within under our noses where we mostly can not see.

if the Abrahamic god is a particular individual being then there is no way to integrate that with more "eastern" religions.

in most ways it is not possible to somehow integrate the Old and New testament "God" regardless of various rationalizations or work arounds.

there is another one, a humble and major re-set and or start over after a hard lesson. (so such could also be said to be an "adaptation")

umm, nirvikalpa samadhi is also said (in certain schools of Hinduism) to be the last process before "total merger" being that masters still come and go (so to speak) from said samadhi until they no longer come and go, thus there is a final merger that there is no coming back from for a golden soul....but heck aren't we getting way ahead of the basic but all important yama, niyama and karma yoga that is applicable to most of us..? (and of course to most advanced folks until such merger)

you might have to expound on that?

1. Not much interested in multiverse stuff since this one is enough to deal with... 2. Time theory's are interesting, for instance in the Bible there is the cryptic sounding mention of time and half times... 3. P.D. Ouspenky got into dimensions and time stuff if you want to blow your mind on it. 4. Evil as a willful manipulation is not of what I would call the natural or elemental forces in opposition. (for instance naturally occurring alkaline and acidic compounds being opposite in PH to each other) 5. the rest is out there to ponder on, btw. "to whom much is given much is expected"...so we should be careful about what we ask for. (since we might get it and then be responsible to act on it and if we don't then end up worse off)

glad to hear so Thrice. I thought that "ground hog day" movie was pretty entertaining but it is said that in most cases suicide is a major setback in one's evolution thus one does not automatically reset to the previous stage of evolution like the guy in the movie did, but to a lower rung where one then has a lot of work to do to before getting back to the previous stage.

one thing though, there is Source but no non-source. As for evil it is in no way to be conflated with yin, for evil is willfully going against Tao to an "x" extent and all of its processes. Whereas yin in no way can willfully go against Tao which it is a 'natural' permutation of.

Will we ever know why Jesus allowed all the worldly permutations of super convoluted waring divisions and co-opting of his teachings? Apparently not after thousands of years....(although he did note that, "my kingdom is not of this world")

In Hinduism "God" has the aspects of creator, preserver, and destroyer aka Lords Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva, thus a lot different than orthodox Christianity. Then there is the absolute being/source beyond those categories that is called Brahman. (with an n) Anyway by saying God is this or that is putting a category onto same, btw. the Bible also uses the term "mystery" in relation to God, which is more or less similar to a 'beyond categories'. Our minds can not wrap our heads around a 'beyond categories' because it is the nature of mind to always try and nail things down with categories, having said that I'd say that Love and Grace are aspects of God if seen as derived from Source. There is also somewhere in the Bible that speaks of God as sometimes being terrible, thus not only Love and Grace. Jesus is called the Prince of Peace but he is also called the Lion of Judah along with being the most powerful and invincible spiritual warrior for Christianity's heaven. (thus not only a being a peaceful pacifist which doesn't go all that well with how Christianity is often taught ) Just some of my ramblings early in the morning....