Daniel

Yes, if God exists and is omnipotent then God is ultimately responsible. But it still could be for the good. From the Abrahamic perspective, people have the ability via freewill to overcome the inner evil impulse. It's a great challenge which renders a great reward.

The heart of good lies in actions bereft of personal benefit. The classic example is charity. Regarding justification for actions which derive benefit; perhaps it is in the pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness which doesn't cause harm.

I don't know. I hope that it's good. But I acknowledge that at times it can be wrathful, cruel, and dreadful.

Nice dodge I'm hoping to have a conversation with you about the nature of existence: do good and evil exist? Honst question: Are you interested in having that conversation, or are you looking for an exit?

Most people agree that children are innocent.

yes, but not omni-benevolent

If , according to you, murdering an innocent person is neither good nor evil; then, am I correct to conclude that your answer is the same for saving the life of an innocent person? It's neither good nor evil?

Or more simply it points out the injustice of killings during warfare. What do you think, is military action resulting in murdering innocents good or evil?

Doesn't this quote assume that Murder is wrong? Apologies for the brevity, I'm posting from my phone.

Very well said; but, do we currently live in the "pure realm"? I agree that a pure realm exists; but, I'm not sure how relevant it is in the here and now.

So..... Focusing on murder is an easy example. Whether or not murder is wrong is dependant on specific societies? Certainly killing in self defense isn't wrong; but that's different. Can you provide an example where murder is right? Are there any societies that deem murder to be right?

An intersting thought: If the punishment occurs in this life, then perhaps it reduces the karmic impact in the next life?

It's a really good question. I don't honestly know. It seems to me that the 4 examples of wrong action I provided in the OP are wrong by consensus. Most people agree, I think, that murder, for example, is wrong. Perhaps it originated when humans began collecting into communities and the community realized that there could not be peace if people murdered each other. The same can be said for Rape, Kidnapping, and Theft. I do beleive in a single divine being; but, I don't think that is the absolute source for morality, because Atheists have come to the same conclusion using empathy that Murder, Rape, Theft, Kidnapping is wrong.

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two bodies, one sleeping bag, zero-clothes

Once the speck tries to make something of themselves the metaphor fails.

Yes, I agree. A more healthful result would be surrender, not fear. Although fear/awe has its place as well. Fear directed in a constructive manner is very close to excitement. As an example, a lot of people enjoy haunted houses and horror movies. Fear/awe that results in excitement can be a powerful, positve motivation. You make a good point. What you're describing sounds to me like domination, not surrender. I'm not sure that a speck-of-dust would attempt to dominate others into accepting their god-concept. I would hope they would surrender and leave it to their chosen deity to effect change. Although, sadly, world history shows that some people default to zealotry and doing the terrible things you mentioned above. Even if these people are not the majority, imo, only a few zealots can do a lot of damage.

Precisely Yes, but the seperateness is a requirement in certain circumstances. For a devotional practice, it would depend on the diety and what are the bounds of relationship permitted. Perhaps this deity prefers the relationship of Monarch to Citizen or Transcendant God to speck-of-dust. On a practical perspective, the speck-of-dust visualization can be useful too. It's kind of like the axiom "nobody's perfect" when a goal or task fails. I'm being brief, hopefully you understand what I mean?

It's all encompassing from afar, imagining this the devotee is like a speck of dust in comparrisson. That's the idea, at least. A mental visualization intended to bring a specific emotional response.

That was from here: The original idea I put forward was that a masculine god who is distant and aloof and all encompassing can be used to cultivate humility. I thought, incorrectly, that you were proposing that devition to Nuit can also be used to cultivate humility. Thank you for explaining that. It makes good sense.

No doubt there are many devotional practices to gods which cultivate humility if departing from the Abrahamic POV.

1) I noticed that most of these are from the New Testament; I was speaking about the original version Pre-Jesus 2) There's only a few on the list which claim that God is light. In Psalms it is likely poetic imagery. The verse in Micah might be taken literally, but it's really only one verse.

Masculine is distant, aloof, and all encompassing.

Well, not really. The original Abrahamic religon would view God as creater of light not light itself. Isaiah 45:7. In addition to this; the verse also distinguishes between darkness and evil the two are not the same. Darkness is a blessing when traveling in the desert. Further support for this is in Psalms 91 where one finds refuge under the shelter of God. So, for me, the whole god is light and light is good metaphor falls short. From my understanding the idea of God as male is useful for cultivating humility during prayer; but if it's taken too literally it can cause all kinds of problems.

Dreams with meaning are tricky. Sometimes the message is straight forward, sometimes it's the complete opposite of what is perceived. IF the dream is straight forward, it sounds as if you have the knowledge you seek already, it was given as a gift, and that others with less intellect ( the bad comedian and the stupid girl ) have the knowledge, the answer to your dilemma already. And the dream is your subconscious reacting to the frustration of not following the simple solution, what the others already know. In this case, the answer to your dilemma is the simple solution that you already have at hand. BUT it could be the opposite, the knowledge contained in the folio and the books could turn out to be empty pages, thus making it a bad joke played on you by the comedian and a worthless info possessed by the stupid girl.